Blind Fighting: Beyond Viewability for Media Optimization
An ad agency, which just
received a detailed brief from one of its top clients. This brief includes
information such as the target audiences, product offerings, spend, etc. The
advertiser also includes the objective of the campaign: to measure success by
“driving brand lift” through “viewability.” While this metric is important for
media delivery, it does not provide any insight into the branding performance
of the advertising. Therefore, the industry needs to look beyond viewability
for brand measurement.
The International Advertising
Bureau (IAB) define a viewable impression to be an ad which appears at least 50% on screen for
more than one second. However, there is a misconception that if an ad was
viewed then it accomplished its purpose. Namely, if the ad was seen, then most
likely, it was successful in delivering a message to the target audience, and
in turn, they were able to absorb, compile and understand that message. The
good people in advertising know that this is usually not the case. For instance,
consider the below example, where site property A has higher viewability than
property B:
Both properties are demanding roughly the same CPM, then by utilizing a
few rudimentary calculations, we can imagine a scenario where optimizing
towards viewability is not in the best interest of the advertiser:
Clearly, while property A has a lower Viewable CPM (VCPM), it actually
has a much higher Brand Lift Point per VCPM. Brand lift per unit of impressions
(CPM, VCPM, CPI) can be generally classified as Cost Per Point Lift (CPPL) and
can be calculated as
A metric like that would be something to optimize towards our effective
media channels. This however does require a brand tracker or study which is
focused measuring brand performance of media.
While I understand that the industry wants to move towards a place where
you only pay for the impressions that you see. In turn however, sites that
offer higher viewability ad units will require higher rates due to increase demand.
This does not take into account the inherit audience bias that this type of
media planning could introduce if not checked. A brand study that accompanies
your campaign to make sure that you are getting the best viewable bang for your
brand dollar works towards everyone’s advantage.
Comments
Post a Comment