How Come Facebook Feels the Need to Verify That Online Ads Are Viewable?

Follow the money. Facebook and others are attempting to assure - and potentially guarantee - viewers can see, especially on mobile, because online ad revenues are not growing at the pace analysts predicted thanks to doubts about the veracity of claims about how many consumers can actually see them. 

Oh, and what do we mean by 'viewable?' That the entire ad, not just small segments (are you listening, mobile device makers?) are visually evident between 2 and 3 seconds - and the longer the better. JL

Robert Cookson reports in the Financial Times:

Many advertisers including Unilever and Kellogg’s are concerned that a large proportion of online ads that they purchase are served to parts of a website or app that are not being seen by viewers.
Facebook has become the latest big internet company to give in to pressure from advertisers and permit independent verification that ads served by the platform are seen by users.

Following similar moves by its rivals Twitter and YouTube, Facebook said on Thursday that it would give advertisers detailed data about what share of their ads were visible on a user’s screen.

Many advertisers including Unilever and Kellogg’s are concerned that a large proportion of online ads that they purchase are served to parts of a website or app that are not being seen by viewers.

Facebook said it would work with Moat, an advertising analytics company, to provide independent verification to brands.

The social network also announced that it would introduce a new ad buying option that lets advertisers purchase “100 per cent in-view impressions”, which guarantees that the entire ad — from top to bottom — has passed through a person’s screen in Facebook’s news feed.

At present, brands are charged by Facebook when even a tiny fraction of the ad appears on a user’s screen.

Keith Weed, chief marketing officer at Unilever, the consumer goods group whose brands include Dove shampoo and Hellmann’s mayonnaise, said Facebook’s move to give advertisers greater transparency was “very encouraging”.

However, there remain unresolved questions about exactly what should be counted as “viewable” by media sites and their advertising customers.

In June, Twitter said that it would henceforth only charge advertisers when a video is 100 per cent in-view on the user’s device, and has been watched for at least three seconds. Like Facebook, Twitter is using Moat for third-party verification.

By contrast, the Media Rating Council and the Interactive Advertising Bureau, two trade bodies, say a video ad is “viewable” when at least half of its pixels are on screen for at least two consecutive seconds.

Facebook’s decision to work with Moat is a significant win for the New York-based start-up. The company is in a race against groups such as ComScore, DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science to become the main provider of digital media measurement solutions.

Jonah Goodhart, co-founder and chief executive of Moat, said the company hoped to become the de facto “currency” for transactions between advertisers and digital media groups, in the same way that a single company — Nielsen — plays this role in the US television advertising market.