Viewability: The Cornerstone of Online Video

November 26th, 2014 | ACA Team,

By Grant le Riche, Managing Director, TubeMogul

Grant le Riche
Grant le Riche

July 1st – the day that the MRC (Media Rating Council) in the US announced the standard for online video viewability – is now five months in the rearview. So what do we have to show for it?

Well, we know that a “viewable” video impression is one where 50% of the video player’s pixels are in view on an active tab for two consecutive seconds. (They don’t necessarily have to be the first two seconds of the video, and the video doesn’t have to be audible.) Whether two seconds is long enough is an issue that advertisers and publishers will continue to fight over. But the more important question: has this standard actually helped improve viewability rates?

At first glance, the numbers aren’t pretty. Overall global viewability rates from inventory purchased on open exchanges hover around 34%. Viewability rates from inventory purchased directly from publishers are 54%.

These numbers beg several questions: now that a standard has been announced, why are so many ads going unseen? Are publishers selling terrible inventory? Are intermediaries unwittingly buying this terrible inventory and not doing enough to stop it?

When we dug deeper, we found that about 20% of non-viewable impressions were primarily due to ad space being below the fold. This is partially a function of ad inventory quality, but this also includes impressions where a user starts the video and then quickly scrolls it out of view. So while ad placement is a bit of an issue, it’s not the primary reason for non-viewable impressions.
Really, the main reason is due to viewers. We found that 70% of non-viewable impressions were due to an inactive tab. In other words, we all start our videos, realize an ad is in front of the content we want to watch, and we switch to another tab to wait it out.

The biggest factor that affects video viewability is human behavior. If all other variables—player size, position on the page, etc—remain constant, the user’s attention span is the most likely determinant of viewability.

This has a critical implication for the industry, which is that it is impossible to only buy viewable impressions, because viewable impressions are a function of the behavior of the viewer.

This bears repeating: it is impossible to only buy viewable impressions, because viewable impressions are a function of the behavior of the viewer. In other words, advertisers cannot buy on a guaranteed viewable basis. You can only ascertain viewability after the fact.

While this is obviously a dynamic that will always be present, creative quality and player size can likely mitigate it. The more immediately engaging an ad is and the bigger the video player it is shown in, the more likely people are to remain on the active tab to watch the ad.

In fact, we found that player size is the best predictor of viewability.

Why is the predictive power of player size so important? It’s because it’s an actionable predictor! Remember how viewability is only something we can measure after the fact? Well, player size is the opposite. Player size is available before an ad impression is purchased, so we can use it as a proxy to buy viewable impressions.

In fact, we have demanded that every inventory source we work with provide us the player size of every ad impression in the real-time bid information so we can make a decision based on player size before we buy the ad impression.

So where do we go from here? How do we come together as an industry to increase viewability across the board and give advertisers the results they expect from their investment in digital video?
The next major step the industry is going to take is to move to transacting on viewable impressions. But in order to do that, several things need to happen:

First, we need consistent measurement of viewability, regardless of which technology provider is tracking viewability on a campaign

Second, publishers need to adapt to the focus on viewability. They need fewer, higher quality placements and the ability to monetize those placements at their market value.

Third, brands need to demand the right data and metrics from their technology partners and they need to recognize that cost per viewable impressions are going to be more expensive than the bulk CPM rates they are paying now.

Ultimately, brands and agencies that continue to demand more insight and control from their tech providers and publishers will accelerate the improvement of viewability rates across our industry.


Grant le Riche
Grant le Riche is Managing Director of TubeMogul Canada. With over a decade of experience in the digital media industry, le Riche is responsible for TubeMogul’s continued growth and expanding the footprint of its programmatic brand marketing platform amongst Canada’s top advertisers.