Display and Video / November 15, 2013 / By Erin Martin

Demystified: Measuring Video Ad Quality

As video advertising reaches every corner of the internet, the industry is finding itself in the tough spot of proving the quality of the $5.72 billion worth of impressions that eMarketer estimates will be sold in 2014. Adweek recently reported that “suspicious web domains cost online ad businesses $400 million per year” in wasted video ad impressions. Maintaining quality control across the diverse and expansive set of media suppliers will be daunting but vital as the online video ad market continues to grow its share of advertising dollars.

Mixpo surveyed over 150 Media Buyers from agencies of all sizes who managed video advertising campaigns in 2013. We asked questions about how they value and measure impression quality. Specifically, we talked to them about how they use measurements of fraudulent impressions and viewability to optimize ROI from the billions of video ad dollars coursing through the ecosystem.

Key Findings and Insights
Media Buyers are well aware of the impression fraud and viewability issues facing video advertising. In fact, Media Buyers estimate that 22% of the ad impressions in video ad buys are fraudulent and 32% are not viewable. Wasted impressions are standard operating procedure.

To remove low quality inventory from their video ad buys, Media Buyers are using analytics tools to measure viewability and sniff out fraudulent placements within their buys. With data in their hands they are proactively working with media suppliers to move ad dollars away from suspect sites, thereby optimizing inventory quality. Of the Media Buyers surveyed by Mixpo, 78% said the ability to optimize media buys mid-campaign is a key benefit of fraud detection mechanisms and 90% consider optimizing media buys mid-campaign a key benefit to measuring viewability.

Download the full report – Demystified: Measuring Video Ad Quality

Conclusion
The rate at which the digital video advertising industry can grow will be directly related to the quality of the product. Do advertisers and their agencies know if the video impressions they are paying for are being watched by actual human beings?

“Because of the high CPMs in video and the fact that demand far outstrips supply for video ad inventory, the best of the best of the fraudsters are taking on the Video Advertising Industry,” said Brian Cohee, SVP of Data Sciences at Mixpo. “Look for a vendor who can substantiate viewability (was your video ad watched?), detect fraud (was it “watched” by a person or a bot?), and assess the overall quality of the inventory.”

Media Buyers are sitting at the front lines. It should not be taken lightly that they estimate 22% of video ad impressions are fraudulent and 32% are not viewable. Measurement and analytics may be only one of many tools used to combat fraud and low quality inventory, but it will be a very important one. If you are a Media Buyer and are looking to ensure the quality of your video ad buys, the time to invest in fraud and viewability measurement is now.