Google first started offering advertisers the ability to buy ads on a viewable rather than served impression basis in 2013, and now, their Active View solution is available across display and video. For a while, brands have been pushing the industry to bring in outside verification. In response to this pressure, YouTube announced that they will open up to outside measurement vendors.
There are a large number of vendors that have been approved by YouTube to report ad viewability, including comScore, DoubleVerify, Integral AdScence and Moat. Beginning early next year, Moat will be the first to begin reporting. Advertisers will still be able to use Active View. The move towards allowing viewability has been been largely anticipated since the Financial Times did a report about it earlier this fall.
Keith Weed, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer of Unilever said this in this announcement:
“Having partners like Google address these challenges helps to push the entire industry forward. This move will generate better industry-wide standards across viewability and third party verification practices and continues the momentum in the right direction.”
Weed said, in Facebook’s September announcement, that they will begin offering third-party viewability verification on video ads.
Back in May, Millennial Media and 33Across, both ad networks, announced partnerships with Integral Ad Science to offer viewability verification and guarantees that advertisers will only pay for ad impressions that are seen.