Digital advertising needs a reality check.

comScore has the solution.

DIGITAL IS A POWERFUL AND GROWING BRAND ADVERTISING MEDIUM, but a lack of validated measurement that’s comparable to other media, such as TV, has limited its full potential. comScore has unique visibility into the complexities around why that’s the case, and what can be done about it.

This booklet uncovers key findings about what’s really going on and unveils a new measurement solution from comScore that can help move digital forward.

Take a closer look.

IN DECEMBER 2011, COMSCORE CONDUCTED A CHARTER STUDY based on new measurement technology to better understand the quality of campaign delivery and to investigate discrepancies between expectations and reality when it comes to ad delivery. The results are insightful.

The comprehensive study included:

12 national brands

2,975 placements

380,898 site domains

1,772,117,123 impressions

100% delivered in iframes

0 publisher site pixels required

The following contains a sneak peek into the results. The full report will be published in March 2012.

Select companies participating in the Charter Study

Allstate

The findings are eye-opening.

THERE IS MORE THAN MEETS THE EYE. The future of digital advertising depends on the ability to validate the delivery of quality ad impressions to an intended audience in a way that can be compared across different media with a high degree of confidence and transparency. Visibility is important, but it’s not the only part of the equation.

This booklet focuses on 5 key aspects of ad delivery validation and the complexities they each present in a digital context. These must be addressed both individually and holistically in order for digital advertising to deliver optimal value to the industry and its many players.

visibility

target audience

geography

brand safety

fraud

When an ad is not visible, consumers miss the point.

What’s the value of an ad that can’t be seen?

OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND. Internet pages aren’t static. Neither are the ads on these pages. There are a host of reasons, unique to the digital channel, why ads are sometimes delivered but not seen. An ad can’t work if no one sees it. It’s that simple.

It’s not just an ‘above the fold versus below the fold’ issue. Sometimes people scroll down quickly to get to the content they want, and miss home page ads. In those cases, the action might be below the fold. Compelling ads can work in both places – but only if they’re visible.

VISIBILITY

1of 4CHARTERFINDINGS:

ads delivered ABOVE THE FOLD were never seen

32%of ALL ads were delivered but NOTEVER SEEN

Think you’re hitting 100% of your target audience? Think again. Are you counting cookies or reaching people?

LET’S BE REALISTIC. Cookies are not people. When you plan and measure campaigns using cookies, it’s nearly impossible to know if you reached your target audience. Because multiple people share the same computer within a household and multiple cookies can be served to the same person, the numbers don’t add up.

If your goal is to understand how well a campaign hit its target audience, make sure people are at the center of the equation.

TARGET AUDIENCE

60+%of home computers have more than one user

5+

unique cookies are served per person per campaign on average

35% of people delete their cookies each monthin the U.S.

CHARTER FINDINGS:

73%of placements used audience targeting beyond age, gender

and HHI

Demographic cookie accuracy ranged from

14% to 96%

People are more than just a demographic.

When you target ads to an audience, shouldn’t your validation measurement follow suit?

AUDIENCES HAVE HEARTS AND MINDS OF THEIR OWN. We know that different people with the same demographic makeup can have wildly different purchase habits, which is why audience buying and selling has become a standard for many in the industry. When evaluating and validating ad delivery, measurement must play by the same rules. It must validate delivery to these specific audiences rather than simply validating based on age, gender and household income.

Because of shared computer usage and data-source quality issues, even demographic cookie targeting doesn’t always hit the target.

Your target geography has borders, but the Internet is everywhere.

How do you ensure your ads are delivered where your product is available?

GEOGRAPHIC SPILLAGE IS A WASTED TRIP. Because the Internet isborderless, and anyone can access content from anywhere, it’s sometimes tough to guarantee that an ad will be delivered within the desired geographic area.

Knowing that campaigns run in the intended geography is a key component of ad delivery validation and campaign measurement. After all, what’s the point of delivering an ad and building a brand in a region where your product is not available?

GEOGRAPHY

CHARTER FINDING:

Up to 15% of impressions were wasted because they were SERVED OUTSIDE THE DESIRED GEOGRAPHY

Good brands show up in bad places. What’s shocking is how they get there.

How many stops do your ads make on the way to final delivery?

MAKE SURE YOUR ADS ARRIVE SAFELY. Because of the complex daisychain of ad delivery, even the most careful players don’t have total control overwhere an ad might land. When your ad runs in the wrong place, whether that’son a site with objectionable content or next to content that doesn’t resonate with your brand, that can be a land mine. Don’t wait until after the campaign to find out there was a problem. By then it’s too late. Besides, who really wants to deal with make-goods? Take action in real time during the campaign to make sure your ads are not appearing in unsafe environments. When all your ads run in all the right places, everybody wins.

BRAND SAFETY

CHARTER FINDING:

72%of campaigns had at least some ads running in UNBRAND SAFE content

AD SERVER

AD NETWORK

AD EXCHANGE

AD NETWORK

PUBLISHER

PUBLISHER’S FRIEND WHO BORROWED THE AD TAGS

START

can make a very bad impression.

A ONE-PIXEL WINDOW CAN HIDE THE WHOLE WORLD. While the majority of individuals in the digital advertising ecosystem operate with the best of intentions, like any industry, there are fraudulent characters that can spoil the show. By placing a tiny pixel on a user’s screen, hundreds of ads can load and be counted as delivered impressions when they were never seen by anyone, and therefore never had a chance to make a brand impact.

Fraud detection helps ensure you only count messages that connect with your audience and not pixels served up by bad actors.

1 pixel

FRAUD

Digital advertising needs a reality check.

comScore has the solution.

visibleright audience in geographybrand safenot fraudulent

Introducing vGRP

Measurement that validates value

THE LATEST INNOVATION FROM COMSCORE. vGRP is a new measurement solution from comScore that validates ad delivery via a single, third-party source, enabling a complete view of campaign delivery and an accurate assessment of advertising effectiveness. Unlike existing single-point solutions, vGRP provides an unduplicated accounting of impressions delivered across a variety of critical dimensions. These include ads delivered in-view, to the right audience, in the right geography, brand safe and not fraudulently.

It’s holistic. It’s simple. It’s comparable. And it’s here today.

vGRP is a holistic, simple and comparable solution for validating the value of digital.

HOLISTIC. Measuring campaign delivery via multiple, disparate sources skews delivery validation results and distorts campaign effectiveness measurement. vGRP eliminates these differences by validating ad delivery in a single source.

SIMPLE. Today’s complex digital advertising ecosystem has driven up the cost of ad delivery measurement and driven down the ROI of advertising. vGRP opens the door for much-needed standardization and simplicity by providing a single planning and measurement validation solution that utilizes a single ad tag throughout.

COMPARABLE. Because digital and TV are inherently different due to the way ads are viewed, using the same GRP metric to evaluate ad delivery for both is misleading. vGRP solves this issue by including only validated digital ad impressions, making it a unique solution that’s truly cross-media comparable.

EVERYBODY WINS.

HOLISTIC

single source

COMPARABLE

cross media

SIMPLE

single tag

The future is now in focus.

comScore is advancing how the world sees digital advertising.

See what vGRP can do for you. Contact us today.

online www.comscore.com/vGRP

email vGRP@comscore.com

twitter #vGRP @AdEffx

visibleright audience in geographybrand safenot fraudulent

© 2012 comScore, Inc.vGRP@comscore.com www.comscore.com/vGRP