Advertising Effectiveness:

Benchmarks and Best Practices

A review of the latest benchmarks and best practices

Joe Nguyen, Senior Vice President, Asia Pacific | 26 June 2014

e: jnguyen@comscore.com
t: @jnguyen

comScore, Inc.

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Agenda

What is Online Ad Effectiveness?

Whats Normal?
In-Target Benchmarks

In-View Benchmarks
The Process
RFPs and Proposals

In-Flight
Post-Campaign

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What Makes An Advertisement Effective?

In-view
Correct geography
Brand safety
Non-human traffic

In-target audience delivery

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In-View Explained

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Non-Human Traffic (NHT) can have significant impact on your

numbers

Non-Human Traffic

IAB Bots and Spiders

Unknown browsers
Automated impression
generation tools

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Whats Normal?
In-Target Benchmarks
The latest data from comScore validated Campaign Essentials

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vCE Benchmarks

Multitude of campaigns
200 billion impressions
Rolling 12-month period

Display and video campaigns

Diverse set of advertisers as well as publishers and ad networks
Range of brand-building and direct-response objectives

Industry benchmarks are an important guidepost BUT they

shouldnt be used as the only indicator of delivery performance.

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In-Target: 100% isnt Realistic

More than 60%
of computers are
shared, so cookies
can show ads to the
wrong person

Demographic
data becomes
outdated

Not all
registration
data is accurate

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Some targeting
infers demography
based on content
consumption

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Overall average in-target rate is 44%, with significant variance seen

across product categories
% In-Target: Overall* and by Select Advertiser / Product Category**
Source: comScore vCE Benchmarks, Q1 2014, U.S.

*The Overall Norm comprises data from more than 200 billion impressions over the course of a 12-month rolling period. This includes campaigns that go beyond the select Advertiser / Product categories listed
above to also include additional Advertiser / Product categories as well as studies run directly by publishers and ad networks.
**Target audience is categorized based on the primary target selection in vCE, which is self-designated during campaign set-up.
***The Health / Wellness category includes campaigns for brands, products and/or services in the following sectors: health associations, health insurance, hospitals, over-the-counter, pharmaceutical, public health
and wellness.

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As the target narrows, so does the chance of hitting it

% In-Target by Age*
Source: comScore vCE Benchmarks, Q1 2014, U.S.

*Target audience is categorized based on the primary target selection in vCE, which is self-designated during campaign set-up.

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This is true with age and gender as well as the target narrows, so
does the chance of hitting the target
% In-Target by Age/Gender*
Source: comScore vCE Benchmarks, Q1 2014, U.S.

*Target audience is categorized based on the primary target selection in vCE, which is self-designated during campaign set-up.

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A Targeting Efficiency Index can also help you set expectations

It compares in-target delivery to the prevalence of that target on a site,

based on data from comScore Media Metrix

Females 18- 49
35% in-target
28% composition PVs

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X 100 = 125

Targeting
Efficiency
Index

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Whats Normal?
In-View Benchmarks
The latest data from comScore validated Campaign Essentials

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In-View: 100% isnt Realistic

Users browser isnt

on full-screen setting

User leaves page before

1 second

Non-human traffic drives

up impression counts,
when a person never
actually saw the ad

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Overall average in-view rate is 46%, with variance seen across

product categories, though spanning a smaller range than in-target

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Worldwide Data Suggests that Direct Site Ad Placements have better

In-View Rates

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The Process: RFPs & Proposals

Best practices for outlining campaign goals, setting expectations and eliminating painful
post-campaign renegotiations

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Audience Considerations

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RFPs and Proposals should clearly articulate audience

delivery expectations
There are two common ways to buy and sell audiences:

Absolute number

Percent

of impressions in-target

of impressions in-target

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Steps you can take during the negotiation process

Be sure to determine:
Audience delivery requirements and target audience based on industry
data/thresholds
Expectation of delivery and thresholds
Measurement solution for optimization and invoicing
How impressions that cannot be measured will be invoiced

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There will be situations where audience delivery data

is not available

Common ways to approach such situations:

NOT ENOUGH
IMPRESSIONS WERE
SERVED:
Pay based on the
overall in-target
percentage of the site

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MOBILE
IMPRESSIONS:
Pay based on the overall
in-target percent for
impressions delivered and
measured via desktop

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Viewability Considerations

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There are two routes buyers and sellers take when it comes to
evaluating campaigns based on viewable impressions

Require a minimum
percentage of ads to
be viewable

Only buy/sell
impressions that are
viewable

$
You must prove to me that 50% of the
impressions are viewable.

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I want to deliver 1 million ads but I will

only pay for the ones that are viewable.

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Sometimes viewability cannot be assessed, such as when delivery

occurs on certain types of video and mobile or for technical reasons

Common ways to pay for missing impressions:

Apply overall
rate of
viewability for
non-measurable
impressions

Use vendor who

can project
viewability on
non-measurable
impressions

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Pay 100% for all

ads where
viewability
cannot be
measured

Pay 0% for all

ads where
viewability
cannot be
measured

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100% of web display ads are measurable with projection

Using the geometric and timing

methods, comScore is able to
directly measure 95% of
impressions

95%
Our geometric
measurement, which
accounts for the majority
of impressions, is
MRC-accredited. The
timing method is
included in the inprogress renewal audit.
*Our projection method has been reviewed by the MRC.
**Does not include pixels or mobile impressions.

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There are other ad delivery dimensions that should be addressed

during upfront negotiations

FREQUENCY: What is the frequency goal? How should excessive

frequency be managed and invoiced?

GEOGRAPHY: What is the expectation for geographic delivery, and how,

if at all, will an ad delivered outside of the geographic region be invoiced?

BRAND SAFETY: What are the ad blocking and alerting parameters?

How will blocked impressions be invoiced?

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Once the IO is signed, the campaign can be actively managed

Here are some steps you can take to ensure proper campaign
management
Evaluate delivery early in the campaign to confirm tagging was correctly
deployed
Watch for situations where a high number of impressions cannot be
measured for viewability
Watch for situations where audience data is not reportable

Optimize delivery at the placement-level to meet performance delivery

objectives

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Summary

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Summary

UNDERSTAND what are the components makes ADVERTISING

EFFECTIVE

DONT expect 100% IN-TARGET OR 100% IN-VIEW

AGREE ON WHATS reasonable FOR A GIVEN RATE

KNOW THE technology AND ITS LIMITS

GET involved IN THE PROCESS

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Download our Best Practices booklet, vCE Benchmarks and

RFP/Proposal checklists today at:
English: www.comscore.com/BestPractices
Mandarin: www.comscore.com/chi/BestPractices

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Q&A

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Advertising Effectiveness:
Benchmarks and Best Practices
A review of the latest benchmarks and best practices

Joe Nguyen, Senior Vice President, Asia Pacific | 26 June 2014

e: jnguyen@comscore.com
t: @jnguyen

comScore, Inc.

Proprietary.