Findings from DoubleVerify’s 1H 2010 Report Drawn from 150+ Billion Impressions from Industry’s Leading Ad Networks, Publishers, Ad Exchanges & DSPs
New York, NY – DoubleVerify, the pioneer and worldwide leader in online media verification, released findings from its 1H 2010 Trust Index. The report provides insight into compliance and brand safety in online advertising with the intentions of increasing trust and accountability in the market. Highlights from the Trust Index include: identification of the best-in-class networks in the market with regard to non-compliance, benchmarks for advertising delivery and types of non-compliance and an analysis of the overall industry performance. DoubleVerify analyzed hundreds of advertisers, thousands of verified campaigns and more than 150 billion advertising impressions between January and June 2010 to produce the bi-annual report, which can be downloaded at: http://www.doubleverify.com/trust-index-1h-2010/
To identify the top performers in the industry, DoubleVerify analyzed networks based on benchmarks of non-compliance, including: instances of ads served out of inclusion lists, in exclusion lists, alongside inappropriate content and ads served to international audiences. Companies determined top performers include (listed alphabetically): AOL’s Advertising.com, AudienceScience, Burst Media, FOX Audience Network, interclick, Microsoft Media Network, Tribal Fusion and ValueClick Media.
“In order for brand dollars to shift online, advertisers need to trust that their campaigns are running as intended and the Trust Index provides an overview of how the industry is doing against those expectations,” said Oren Netzer, CEO of DoubleVerify. “Our data shows that improvements are being made across the board to increase brand safety and trust. Verified campaigns especially showed vast improvement in non-compliance. Nevertheless, there’s still work to be done and we hope this data will provide benchmarks for advertising vendors to guide them toward these goals and move the industry forward.”
DoubleVerify took additional data into consideration when analyzing overall non-compliance of the online advertising industry, including: instances when multiple ads from the same advertiser were served, when ads were served alongside a competitor and when ads were served below the fold. According to the report, the most compliant advertising networks had an average of 2 percent incidents of non-compliance over the first six months of 2010. In comparison, the ten networks that struggled most saw an average of 37 percent incidents of non-compliance. Additionally, the most compliant platforms (DSPs, Ad Exchanges and Trading Desks) showed an average of 6 percent incidents of non-compliance – outperforming the lower tier of players by almost five times.
While each industry sector showed an effort to decrease non-compliance, all players were subject to fluctuations that illustrate the fact that even the best players face issues. The Trust Index details the overall average of non-compliance as well as the standard deviation of each group of industry players, showing how much variation there is from the “average”. The standard deviation for the top performing advertising networks, for example, was 17 percent across campaigns. The standard deviation for the lowest performing ad networks was 28 percent.
DoubleVerify also analyzed how non-compliance on specific campaigns changed over time. Advertisers who worked with DoubleVerify to monitor, remediate and block non-compliant impressions witnessed a 67 percent decrease in inappropriate content and a 72 percent decrease in internationally targeted traffic.
Additional highlights around overall advertising delivery norms include:
• 44 percent of ads on verified campaigns were served below the fold
• 10 percent of advertising pages included multiple ads by the same advertiser
• 4 percent of ads in verified campaigns were shown alongside a competitor’s ads
For more information and to view the report in its entirety, visit http://www.doubleverify.com/trust-index-1h-2010/
Methodology
DoubleVerify used a robust set of data analysis tools to analyze online advertising campaign activity across more than 150 billion advertiser campaign impressions from January 1, 2010 through June 30, 2010. Types of non-compliance analyzed include instances of ads served out of inclusion lists, in exclusion lists, alongside inappropriate content, multiple ads from the same advertiser, ads alongside a competitor, below the fold ads and ads served to international audiences. The data in the analysis was carefully normalized to the best of our ability. Advertising delivery providers were categorized into 3 main categories: Advertising Networks, Platforms (includes DSPs, ad exchanges and trading desks) and Publishers. Video Networks and Video Publishers were not included in this analysis.
About DoubleVerify
DoubleVerify (www.doubleverify.com) is the worldwide leader in online advertising verification and the top choice of marketers, agencies, ad networks and publishers looking to ensure brand safety, campaign transparency and regulatory compliance. DoubleVerify verifies more than 35 billion advertising impressions per month for hundreds of leading Fortune 500 marketers. DoubleVerify is headquartered in New York City, with engineering offices in Tel Aviv, Israel. Investors in DoubleVerify include Blumberg Capital, Institutional Venture Partners, First Round Capital and Genacast Ventures.
