Maybe you've seen that show on the Travel Channel, "Meet the Natives"? It's about five guys who live on a remote island in the South Pacific. They have no running water or electricity and technically live in a full-on communist society (in the way it was originally and benevolently intended). The show is ultimately a reality story of their observations when brought to America, but one of their observations is so very relevant to the ad network verification frenzy going on right now. These natives are shocked about how many rules and laws we have. You know, things you kinda need with 300 million people living under one government. On an island of 100 people, you can self-police.
When there was just a network or two and those networks had 50-100 sites in their site list, it was easy to police. Now with 50 or more third-party networks, some claiming 20,000 sites (really?), it's not out of control, but out of our control. And when something is out of human control, someone is going to cheat. And because of that one bad apple, an industry is born.
This evolution is a byproduct of success within an industry. But now it's here and now we need to focus on how we can work together as to not over-regulate, yet still provide the protection and information people are seeking.
How verification can go wrong
The verification industry is one I've personally long advocated and think could be exactly what the third-party ad network industry needs to continue its tremendous growth. It could also be disastrous if taken too far. Here's a likely scenario to demonstrate why.
Publishers clearly have a love/hate relationship with ad networks. Those that have billions of unsold ad impressions each month hate that their sales force hasn't sold them, and also that they have to sell them off at a severely discounted price from where they would have sold them first run. Then again, better to get some monetization than nothing at all. The lynch pins for publishers agreeing to participate in the ad network world are that the advertiser will never be guaranteed to run on their site, and certainly not for any specified amount of impressions. This is fair, beause if advertisers want a guarantee to run on the site they should pay first-run rates.
However, if ad verification software reveals not only the identity of all of the sites on which the advertiser ran, but the quantity of impressions that ran on each site and its correlated performance, that will be too much for publishers and they will do one of two things: They will blacklist that advertiser from running on unsold inventory (so be careful advertisers -- curiosity may kill the cat here), or they will withdraw from being a part of that network. If it happens too often, they'll withdraw their remnant inventory all together.
While this is clearly bad for ad networks, the ultimate losers here are the advertisers, or maybe just the ad agencies themselves. Without ad networks, agencies are left to buy every single publisher individually, even if through an exchange (also incredibly blind in many cases) and paying much, much higher CPMs. So, for the advertiser that was getting 250 million impressions for their budget before, they're now looking at 100 million. Less reach, less frequency, fewer KPIs/ site-based actions for the money, fewer sales, and so on. Agencies and advertisers, do you really want this? I'm guessing you don't, but you do want honesty and security.
We can do both.
Like the laws that amaze "The Natives," our industry needs to agree on the foundation on which we'll operate this new industry. An advertiser/ agency verification bill of rights to ensure publisher rate integrity, ad network business model integrity, and advertiser confidence would move this off dead center quickly, so here is a first-draft for your consideration.
Agencies/Advertisers Verification Bill of Rights
- You have every right to know that your ads only appeared within the provided site list during and after the campaign, and to see the URLs of any sites on which your ads appeared outside of that pre-approved site list.
- You have every right to not be victimized by click or action fraud, to know when it happens, and to receive a full refund on any monies spent which enabled or allowed such activity.
- You have every right to know if more than 50 percent of the impressions within a buy occur on just one site within the site list.
- You do not have the right to know the list of sites on which your ad appeared during the campaign. Rights No. 1 and No. 3 ensure your safety here, and could cause publishers to withdraw from the unsold inventory space, adversely affecting your ability to secure reach, frequency, and results at attractive price points.
- You do not have the right to know how many impressions ran on specific sites within the campaign. This will cause publishers to withdraw from the space and will cause the same problems listed in No. 4.
- You have the right to have at least 80 percent of your ads appear within screenshot view of the user. This is the "above the fold" argument, but we've recently learned that above the fold ads often perform much worse than mid-page in-content units. That said, there are also dirty publishers that place ad units so far down the page that no one will ever see them. It would be great to promise 100 percent of ads in view, and I agree that this industry is about accountability, but to go to 100 percent will not help the advertiser and instead just raises their CPMs to account for the discrepancy.
- You have a right to a full refund of money spent on any inventory that violates the above rules.
This is just a start and I'd love feedback, and a respectful debate back and forth, on how to round out this list and hand it to Randy Rothenberg and the appropriate committee at the IAB. Agencies and publishers alike have every reason to love and be nervous about ad networks. Let's root out anyone who's misbehaving, provide proof of honesty and integrity to the 90 percent who are doing it right, and allow our industry to flourish.
Jay Friedman is the COO of Goodway Group, which owns and operates the Beep! automotive ad network and the IvyPixel ad network.
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