Ad spend in the UK has rocketed over the past couple of years and is expected to continue on the same track, being the fastest growing market in Western Europe, according to ZenithOptimedia. The media agency also shows that the UK ad market grew by $1bn to $20.9bn in 2013 and predicts it will increase further to $25.7bn by 2016.
While television remains to get a large proportion of advertisers’ spend, eMarketer shows that the growth of digital, via the rise in mobile and adoption of programmatic buying rose by 16.3 percent last year and are driving this rapid growth.
With such demand from advertisers and a host of new digital channels boasting even greater scale, increasing attention is turning towards how brands can be sure that they are reaching the right audience and gaining adequate ROI to justify their spend. With growth and demand however, comes the risk of rogue traders and an increase of bot traffic generating phony views on ads, so steps need to be taken to agree common advertising standards. This will ensure consistency across the digital market and guarantees advertisers’ get bang for their buck.
That’s why verification is such a major priority for us at blinkx Media UK and imperative in our agenda moving forward.
Making steps in the right direction
The IAB has recently released a set of UK viewable impressions standards to offer guidance and greater accountability for advertisers, mirroring guidelines released in the US at the beginning of April. This follows extensive collaboration between IAB UK and IAB US to agree common transatlantic standards, ensuring consistency across both markets.
Integral Ad Science has also teamed up to power viewability measurement within Nielsen Online Campaign Ratings™ in markets around the globe to deliver high-quality, third-party, multi-screen metrics that enable fair play in advertising.
For a market that is growing rapidly and becoming more accountable, it is crucial that third parties and brands alike ensure that verification becomes an intrinsic part of what we do and not seen as an add on. While there is certainly movement in the right direction, to ensure total transparency when it comes to reporting on ad impressions the entire industry needs to collaborate.
Programmatic buying and need for verification
According to recent findings from IAB, programmatic advertising will account for almost half of digital display ads in 2014. And programmatic is more dominant on mobile with 37 percent of ads traded in an automated fashion in 2013. It is fundamentally changing how advertising is bought but also the way that advertisers engage with consumers.
While advertisers can reach consumers at scale, cross device, they still need proof that their ads are being seen by the right target demographic in a brand-safe environment. For programmatic to drive the industry forward, consistent verification is imperative to ensure errors don’t occur in the automated process.
Work needs to be done for verification to be accepted
With so many outside influences, the digital landscape is extremely complex and a verification tool that is accepted by the entire industry is required. The European market, perhaps more than any other region is demanding consistent verification and so the wider ad community must come together to drive this. The whole ecosystem from media companies, publishers, brands and agencies need to be aligned and clear on measurement. Simply put, without verification the industry will not progress.
With so many outside influences, the digital landscape is extremely complex and a verification tool that is accepted by the entire industry is required.
We are however, in a position where a lot of work needs to be done in order to ensure one overall verification method is accepted by the entire industry. There is no quick fix but in the interim, media companies need to take actions to ensure the quality of audience viewing is high.
At blinkx Media UK, we’re working with Integral Ad Science and Nielsen to ensure the company continues to meet the needs of its advertisers in a quality, brand-safe environment.
The solution is acting now
The recent developments in online ad viewability is an indicator of the demand from brands to begin holding these digital opportunities accountable, and gain a clearer idea of what success really looks like online. To ensure that the advertising budgets continue to roll in, the market needs clarity and so a collaborative approach needs to be implemented to ensure that measurement is consistent.
The industry has to grow and the only way it can is through universal verification that is accepted by the entire ecosystem, ensuring rogue traders are eradicated from the market. The solution doesn’t need to be complex, just consistent and available now. Overall, the market will buy whatever works but we as a community need to have the confidence to test, learn and develop to find the right solution.
