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Viewability

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Viewability
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About viewability

Viewability measurement determines if an ad which was served (impression) was actually served in a way that it could be visualized (seen) by the end user (viewable impression). For instance, a medium rectangle at the bottom of the page may be served (impression) but not viewed (viewable impression) by a user who did not scroll to the bottom. 

Viewability measurement is based on two criteria:

  • Pixels: the percentage of the ad’s pixels (surface) which was viewable for the end user
  • Time: the duration the ad was viewable by the end user (in seconds)

The Media Rating Council (MRC) has issued guidelines detailing when an impression is supposed to be counted as a viewable impression - see MRC Guidelines for display ads and MRC Guidelines for mobile ads. Equativ follows these MRC guidelines.
Viewability features are also supported in AMP integrations.

 

Viewability measurement rules

Equativ applies the following viewability measurement rules:
  
  • Display web / in-app
    • an impression is viewable when 50% of the ad’s pixels (surface) is viewable during 1 continuous second
  • Video web / in-app
    • a video impression is viewable when 50% of the video ad’s pixels is viewable during 2 continuous seconds of video playback; counting of the time is stopped when the video is paused; the 2 seconds are not necessarily the first 2 seconds of the video
    • this rule applies to in-stream video (pre-roll etc.) and out-stream video formats where only a video is shown
    • in case of out-stream video formats where the video is embedded in a display format, the “Display web” rule applies (see above), e.g. Smart Video-Read with the “Show banner first” feature enabled, Smart Video-Screening, Smart Video-Fold, Smart Video-Floorad)
  • Large ads
    • ads larger than 242 500 pixels are considered as viewable when 30% of the pixels (not the usual 50%) are viewable during 1 continuous second; this rule only applies to desktop formats (not to mobile formats)

Official creative templates supporting viewability measurement

Viewability measurement is supported by many official creative templates, e.g. Default Banner, Parallax, Interstitial, Smart Video-Read, Smart Video-Interstitial, as well as SDK ones; to determine whether any creative template supports viewability measurement, check the corresponding ad format specification article (under the "ad format specs" category in the help center tree menu).

Viewability measurement in custom creative templates

For viewability measurement, Equativ uses a viewability module in official creative templates which are available for all Equativ customers. This viewability module is also available for custom creative templates Equativ customers can create in their individual network following the instructions in the Creative template editor article. When the viewability module is used in custom creative templates, the viewability measurement/reporting is the same as for official creative templates.

At this time, the viewability module only works for custom Display web creative templates. Equativ is planning to make it available for custom out-stream video creative templates as well. There are no plans to support it for custom app/in-stream video creative templates; in case of custom in-stream video creative templates, the viewability pixels are already included in the VAST ad response in case Equativ’s video plugin is not used.

Viewability module

The viewability module is enabled by calling the scripts below.

Viewability module for direct (non-programmatic) creative templates
<script src="//ced-ns.sascdn.com/diff/templates/ts/dist/viewability/ext/sas-viewability-1.1.js?containerid=[sas_tagid]&baseurl=[sas_smartBaseUrl]&pid=[sas_pageid]&iid=[sas_insertionid]&fmtid=[sas_formatId]&cid=[sas_creativeid]" async></script>

Viewability module for RTB+ (programmatic) creative templates
<script src="//ced-ns.sascdn.com/diff/templates/ts/dist/viewability/ext/sas-viewability-1.1.js?containerid=[sas_tagid]&baseurl=[sas_smartBaseUrl]&pid=[sas_pageid]&iid=[sas_insertionid]&fmtid=[sas_formatId]&cid=[sas_creativeid]&rtbbid=[sas_rtb_auctionId]&rtbet=[sas_rtb_environmentType]&rtblt=[sas_rtb_bidLogTimeTicks]&rtbnid=[sas_rtb_publisherId]&rtbh=[sas_rtb_impressionHash]" async></script>

The values (e. g. [sas_tagid]) of the parameters (e. g. containerid) are macros that will be replaced automatically by the actual values once the creative is delivered to the website.

Parameters
This table describes the parameters in the Viewability module script: 
Name________________Type_______Necessity__________Description
containeridSTRINGREQUIREDthe HTML container of the creative of which the viewability is being measured
baseurlSTRINGREQUIREDthe base URL, including the protocol https://
  • either Equativ’s default base URL of your network (e. g. https://www4.smartadserver.com); this is the base URL used in ad tags when you generate them in Equativ’s UI (see chapter “Ad Tags” in the Setting up inventory article) or
  • a custom base URL if you are using a CNAME that points to Equativ’s default base URL (e. g. https://ads.mydomain.com) 
pidNUMBERREQUIREDthe page identifier
iidNUMBERREQUIREDthe insertion identifier
fmtidNUMBERREQUIREDthe format identifier
cidNUMBERREQUIREDthe creative identifier
rtbbidNUMBERREQUIRED*Equativ internal RTB+ parameter
rtbetNUMBERREQUIRED*Equativ internal RTB+ parameter
rtbltNUMBERREQUIRED*Equativ internal RTB+ parameter
rtbnidNUMBERREQUIRED*Equativ internal RTB+ parameter
rtbhSTRINGREQUIRED*Equativ internal RTB+ parameter
* required only in case of RTB+ custom creative templates

Viewability module in custom creative templates

To integrate the viewability module in a custom creative template, first create a new custom creative template as explained in chapter “Creating creative templates” in the Creative template editor article. Then, provide the URL of the module in the template response so that it can be executed by the template script at runtime.
Note that the viewability module will be used in all insertions that run with the given custom creative template.

Viewability module in the Custom script field

You can also implement the viewability module for a specific insertion only: simply paste the script (direct or RTB+, depending on the creative template type) mentioned in chapter “Viewability module” above into the field ”Custom script” of the creative template (more about the "Custom script" field in Configuring creatives).
 

Testing the viewability measurement

To test if your integration of the viewability module works properly, you can use a web debugging tool such as Chrome DevTools: simply check if the viewcount pixel is triggered by the viewability module once the ad is viewable.
The viewcount pixel contains key=viewcount and looks as follows:
https://www4.smartadserver.com/track/action?key=viewcount…
 

Viewability as a delivery goal

You can assign a volume of viewable impressions to an insertion to sell campaigns on a viewable impression basis.
In the Delivery section of your insertion, select the event “Viewable impressions” and define a volume (target):

User-added image
 
Note
In the Insertion Follow-up, (menu: Campaigns > Insertion Follow-up), the indicator Progress rate is based on the viewability volume (if present).
 
Warnings
  • do not combine a viewable impressions goal with an impressions goal (the insertion would only stop if both volumes are reached)
  • if you are unsure about your viewability ratio, it is recommended to define a “maximum impressions per day” volume in addition to the viewable impressions; this security makes sure that your insertion does not deliver too many impressions
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