The long-held adage that "all media isn’t created equal" is being re-examined with a renewed sense of urgency within the advertising industry, particularly as the complexities of programmatic advertising and Connected TV (CTV) inventory come under scrutiny. A forthcoming paper from the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement (CIMM) aims to challenge the prevailing programmatic theory that ad formats and creative can be standardized and commoditized, with the audience as the sole focus of targeting. The organization teased its findings during the CIMM East event in New York City on Tuesday, with AdExchanger reviewing a pre-release copy of the influential document.
This groundbreaking paper not only demonstrates that measurable differences in media quality exist but also argues that the industry’s overemphasis on short-term outcomes has perpetuated systemic challenges. These include the proliferation of made-for-advertising (MFA) sites that exploit the programmatic ecosystem, brands inadvertently overspending on low-quality CTV ads juxtaposed with premium placements, and ad tech vendors prioritizing audience value over the inherent quality of the media itself.
"Quality has been a buzzword for a while in this industry, and no one’s really defined it, except, for the most part, in self-serving ways," stated Erez Levin, founder of ad tech consultancy Emet Advisory and a co-author of the paper. CIMM’s objective, according to Levin, is to foster an "objective, industry-wide shared consensus and framework" to elevate discussions around media quality measurement, moving beyond the current state of ambiguity. The paper’s intent is not to introduce new measurement standards but to catalyze a comprehensive industry conversation, compelling agencies, tech platforms, and publishers to articulate a coherent approach to defining and measuring media quality.
The Imperative for Consensus in a Fragmented Ecosystem
The impetus for CIMM’s paper is deeply rooted in the rapidly expanding ecosystem of media quality, curation, and programmatic verification services. A surge of startups, including Jounce Media, DeepSee, Sincera, Adalytics, and Gamera, are tackling similar challenges from diverse angles. Furthermore, the emergence of publicly traded incumbents like DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science has revitalized the dormant category of media quality assurance. Coupled with recent trends in attention measurement and deal curation, these developments have introduced novel mechanisms for transacting based on quality signals, further underscoring the need for a unified understanding.
The genesis of this CIMM paper can be traced back to the organization’s collaboration with the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) on the Attention Measurement Playbook for Marketers, released in late 2023. During the development of these attention standards, the working group repeatedly encountered a fundamental lack of consensus regarding the measurement of ad impression quality. This realization highlighted a critical gap in the industry’s ability to effectively evaluate and value media placements.
Despite these ongoing challenges, progress is being made, and CIMM’s paper aims to bring greater awareness to the evolving suite of tools now available to advertisers. Erez Levin has been a vocal advocate for improved quality and attention measurement since at least 2017, when he served as a product specialist for Google Marketing Platform, engaging with both buy and sell sides of the advertising market. Gabriel Dorosz, the paper’s other co-author, brings a wealth of experience as the global advertising initiative lead at the International News Media Association and former head of audience strategy for The New York Times.
Dorosz articulated his motivation for contributing to the project from a publisher’s perspective. "In the premium news publisher space, there’s a belief that the market is not serving those kinds of publishers well," he explained. "My passion is that quality publishers ought to be getting more of their fair share of ad spend, and this paper is a way to advance that."
Dispelling Enduring Myths in Ad Valuation
Dorosz further emphasized that the paper is not solely focused on enabling publishers to demonstrate their media’s quality. It also serves as a crucial guide for buyers, helping them to cease overspending on ads that may not be delivering the expected effectiveness. To achieve this, the authors endeavor to debunk several entrenched myths that have emerged from buyers being "oversold on the value of certainty," as Dorosz put it.
A prime example is the industry’s heavy reliance on deterministic attribution as a confirmation or proxy for audience value. In the current programmatic landscape, a bid request containing a deterministic identifier is often inherently perceived as more valuable than one lacking such an identifier. Consequently, factors like time of day, contextual data, and device type frequently become secondary considerations, overshadowed by the perceived importance of deterministic IDs.
However, the CIMM paper makes a compelling argument that probabilistic modeling, rather than solely deterministic data, offers marketers a more accurate and comprehensive view of the true value of a diverse range of ad impressions. The paper provides actionable advice for incorporating probabilistic metrics, such as attention scoring and contextual relevance, to better ascertain an impression’s likelihood of contributing to a brand’s stated campaign objectives. It meticulously details how these metrics can fluctuate significantly based on temporal and contextual factors.
The paper also addresses the often-inflated price points associated with premium CTV inventory. Levin highlighted that major streaming platforms frequently maintain high CPMs even for ads served during off-peak hours, such as the middle of the night, when audience receptivity is generally lower. This observation suggests that advertisers should critically question and scrutinize campaign expenditures, particularly those that allocate substantial budgets to overnight ad placements, and be wary of situations where such spending patterns are not strategically justified.
A New Paradigm: The Quality Trifecta
To galvanize the industry’s renewed focus on media quality, the CIMM paper introduces an innovative model designed to reconnect with the fundamental principles of marketing. This novel approach is primarily anchored in "The Quality Trifecta," a concept championed by Levin since the previous year. The core tenet of this framework is the independent measurement of three distinct pillars: media quality, creative quality, and audience quality.
Media quality itself is further deconstructed into two key components: "attention," referring to the prominence and visibility of the ad placement, and "situational context," which assesses the likelihood that the surrounding media environment fosters a receptive mood in the viewer. The paper advocates for marketers to transcend binary quality assessment methods, such as merely checking for the presence of an ID in a bid request or confirming minimum viewability requirements. Instead, it champions the adoption of "non-binary, relative, and probabilistic" measurements, such as attention scoring, which evaluate media quality on a dynamic spectrum of effectiveness.
Levin explained that these non-binary approaches facilitate more meaningful comparisons across different media types and are more adept at capturing the nuanced variations across diverse audiences and other influencing factors, including the time of day. The paper also underscores the importance of marketers equally considering both short-term performance metrics and the long-term brand-building opportunities afforded by different media placements. However, Levin acknowledged that for smaller brands heavily reliant on immediate results, prioritizing short-term returns remains a strategic imperative.
CTV as the Proving Ground and the Buy-Side Mandate
While CIMM’s paper is intended as a comprehensive guide for the entire open web, the authors specifically identify streaming media and CTV supply as critical proving grounds. This designation stems from CTV’s status as a high-stakes market characterized by the highest CPMs, most competitive demand, and the largest creative canvases. Furthermore, Dorosz pointed out that CTV has not been encumbered by the decades-long dependency on third-party cookies, allowing for a less entrenched status quo. Crucially, many of the traditional pixel-based measurement approaches that are effective on other platforms are not well-suited for the unique characteristics of CTV.
For instance, the paper advocates for a complete re-evaluation of viewability measurement for CTV. Given that CTV ads typically autoplay with sound on and occupy the full screen, the traditional definition of viewability becomes less relevant, necessitating a new approach.
Ultimately, while CIMM aims for widespread industry adoption of its proposed framework, the authors concur that the buy side must take the lead in driving this transformation. Dorosz concluded, "These theories only matter if the buy side demonstrates success and drives repeatability." The implications of this shift are significant: by embracing a more nuanced understanding of media quality, advertisers can optimize their spend, avoid wasteful expenditures, and foster more effective and sustainable advertising outcomes across the increasingly fragmented digital landscape. This recalibration promises to elevate the value of premium media and ensure that advertising investments are aligned with genuine audience engagement and brand objectives, rather than being dictated by outdated programmatic assumptions.
