Integral Ad Science, IPG Media Labs, and Cadreon recently conducted a collaborative study that shed light on one of the biggest issues affecting advertising – viewability. The top-line findings of the study, which illustrated the relationship between viewability and ad effectiveness, were presented at this year’s Advertising Week.
The study exposed users to two different brands in a variety of ad formats to test and understand the relationship between viewability and ad effectiveness. By utilizing Integral’s leading technology, IPG and Cadreon were able to measure and report on an ad’s viewability both by pixel percentage and time spent.
Kara Manatt, VP of Consumer Research and Strategy at IPG, presented the findings highlighting that “no brand impact was seen at the bare minimum MRC threshold” and elaborated further stating that, “the MRC standard isn’t a magical threshold for ad effectiveness”, but “serves as a stepping stone to ad effectiveness.” Manatt also indicated that an ad that is only 50% in view, generally needs seven seconds to create significant impact.
To expand on the exclusive findings, Suzanne Vranica of the Wall Street Journal, led a discussion on viewability. Our very own Ian wallin, VP of sales weighed in, alongside Gail Horwood from Johnson & Johnson, Howard Mitten from GQ, Zach Putnam from ABC Television, and and Mitchell Weinstein from Magna Global.
The panelists discussed the importance of viewability as a metric and as a part of the larger digital advertising. When asked if viewability is improving, Ian responded that measuring and understanding viewability is improving, but overall “viewability is getting worse year over year.” Mitchell Weinsten mentioned viewability as a billing tool, stating that “for agencies, viewability is really only paying for the ads that are seen, while Howard Mitten expressed the need for standardization of viewability measurement.
Addressing viewability is crucial aspect of digital advertising, and although advertisers may not agree on what to do with it, they all agree that it cannot be ignored.
