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State of the Screens

The Viewability Challenge: Should Advertisers Care?

By January 6, 2018No Comments

The big question. How should brands evaluate the quality of their video advertising?

Current MRC standard — 50% of video ad should be in view for at least 2 consecutive seconds.

This focus on viewability raises two key questions:
1) Is it fair to apply the MRC viewable video definitions to social?
2) Do we have the tools to accurately and fairly measure viewability?

Facebook and Nielsen partnered on a study to explore at what point video ads started to deliver value for the advertiser.

How much impact occurs in the first 2s of a video impression?
1)
38% of brand recall
2) 23% of brand awareness
3) 25% of purchase intent

Wow thats fast! Mobile views on Facebook have been found to improve brand recall in as little as 0.25s !

The bottom line. An ad can not have an impact if it is never viewed by the consumer. The question is how long does the consumer need to watch for the desired impact to occur?

Flashback. Demanding More Stringent Measurement, Some Brands Are Using Their Own Viewability Standards

HP standard — 100% of video ad must be in view for at least half of the video length (Ex: 15s of 30s ad)

New GroupM standard — 100% of video ad must be in view for it to count as a view, but with or without sound and regardless of auto-start.

HP estimates that 20–30% of digital inventory meets this standard.

More. How Brands Can Still Win Over Customers as Attention Spans Decrease on Social

The average piece of mobile content on Facebook is viewed for 1.7s compared to 2.5s on desktop.

Michael Beach

Michael Beach is the Chief Executive Officer of Cross Screen Media, a media analytics and software company that enables marketers to plan, activate, and measure CTV and linear TV at the local level. Michael is also the founder and editor of State of the Screens, a weekly newsletter focused on video advertising that is a must-read for thought leaders in the advertising industry. He has appeared in such publications as PBS Frontline, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Axios, CNBC and Bloomberg, and on NPR’s Planet Money podcast.