Forbes Media is promising advertisers that ad impressions delivered under its validated Brand Increase Guarantee (vBIG) program will be in-view. Forbes sees the offering, which is based on comScore validated Campaign Essentials, as a way of differentiating its platform from other publishers. "For too long online ad pricing has involved significant guesswork, because while we knew that not all ads were delivered in-view, we weren’t always sure which ones," said Bruce Rogers, Chief Insights Officer, Forbes Media.
Growing Accountability
While comScore and Forbes’ partnership are new, the underlying theme—greater accountability to online advertisers—is a long-standing one. Facebook also touched on this sore point with its roll out of Reach Generator.
Other vendors’ formats that come with a guarantee include Pretarge, which introduced an ad format several months ag o that promises the banner ads are within view on a user's screen in the ad exchange environment. Pretarget cites research indicates that approximately 89% of display ads load above the fold or appear after a user scrolls down, creating an opportunity for a user to see the banner. It is using the comScore-AdXpose display ad validation technology to enable the format, called Opportunity to View measurement.
A related trend is cost-per-action online ad model, which also delivers advertisers a promise. In this space, BrightRoll introduced an audience guarantee to advertisers for ads that they run on the BrightRoll network. Under the program, called TAG, for Total Audience Guarantee, digital video advertisers only have to pay for the impressions that reach their target audiences.
The program informs advertisers how many impressions will reach target audiences before the campaign begins. It then rolls out at scale. comScore's AdEffx Campaign Essentials serves as the verification provider.
Ad Verification Standards
IAB gave the demand for ad verification a boost last year when it announced it would begin working on standards for the space. It said it was assembling a working group on this issue. The goal will be to develop and present a set of standard protocols that any agency ad server could implement to address the proofs of viewability advertisers desire, in a manner that protects the contents of the page.
