The level of online ad viewability in the UK rose 3% to 52% in the third quarter of 2015, according to ad verification company Meetrics; however, an estimated £1 billion a year is still spent on unseen ads.
Concerns mounted earlier this year when it was revealed that just 49% of online ads served met the IAB standard – that 50% of an ad must be in view for at least one second – however, the most recent figure is still significantly below that of Germany (61%) and France (69%).
“Viewability levels are, at last, heading in the right direction as the industry increasingly gets to grips with the issue but there’s still a long way to go,” said Anant Joshi, Meetrics’ director of international business.
“The main reason ads aren’t viewable is they take too long to load – about 20% of ads served don’t load before a viewer has moved elsewhere.
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“Consequently, the industry has much to do in terms of increasing web-page performance and ad serving systems, notably, to drastically reduce the amount of web browser redirects that go on behind the scenes before content is loaded.”
Based on the IAB’s latest digital adspend report, Meetrics estimates that approximately £260 million was wasted in Q3 on unseen ads – the equivalent of over £1 billion a year – and with 70-80% of all internet display ads in the UK forecast to be traded programmatically by 2018, improving viewability levels remains a key challenge for advertisers.
Bob Wootton, ISBA’s director of media and advertising, said that while any upward movement is a positive, advertisers should insist on paying only for viewed impressions.
“Any upward movement is welcome, though let’s remember this only means that the smaller rather than the larger half of online ads can’t be seen,” Wootton said.
“Online contrasts with all other media, where all ads can be seen (or heard) whether or not they are noticed.
“While viewability remains in question, advertisers should insist on trading and only paying for viewed impressions.”
