GroupM Ad Verification Video Streaming Standards Viewability and CTV Measurement

Standards in Streaming Viewability and CTV Measurement

Recently GroupM, WPP’s media investment group, partnered with media companies across the advertising industry to create new standards in streaming viewability and CTV measurement to improve ad verification and reduce invalid traffic. 

The initiative follows a joint study with TV ad measurement company iSpot that quantifies inflated CTV ad delivery counts and reveals that, on average, 8-10% of streaming impressions play when the TV is shut off, primarily through ancillary devices. Companies including Disney, Fox/Tubi, LG Ads Solutions, NBCUniversal, Paramount, VIZIO and Warner Bros. 

Discovery have committed to working at an industry level with agencies, advertisers, and standards-setting bodies to create a streamlined measurement framework and set of best practices to ensure ads are only counted when delivered to screens that are on, with people in front of them.  The Phase One study found that: 

• On average, 8-10% of overall streaming impressions were delivered when the TV was shut off. 

• 17% of impressions delivered only through CTV streaming devices such as dongles, gaming consoles, and sticks were delivered when the TV was shut off. 

• Gaming consoles generally had lower rates of continuous play than dongles and sticks. Native Smart TV Apps—which account for about 50% of all CTV viewing ad virtually no incidence of overcounts across streaming ad delivery. 

Depending on the configuration among the three components—TV make and model, streaming device and publisher app—the CTV impression overcount by publisher ranged from 2.5% to 15% across all CTV streaming activity. Timed with our video leadership, the IAB Tech Lab has released the Open Measurement SDK for CTV, which will enable the industry to facilitate third-party viewability and verification measurement. 

It will also deliver a ‘set off’ signal and algorithmic assessment around the likelihood that a person is in the room viewing. The full extent of the findings, including performance metrics for platforms, publishers and specific devices, will be shared privately with respective companies for the purposes of exploring methods for solving technical issues and agreeing to standards suitable for each unique platform. 

We commend GroupM and others who look to quantify industry opportunities such as this one and look forward to continued education, best practice sharing, and technical standards to address these areas.  GroupM and iSpot are partnering to run ongoing measurement in Phase Two of the study with an expanded data set for 2023.