Metz: “Our research is still nascent. A guarantee requires that both buy and sell sides agree to transact on that value, and to date we do not have the predictability and scale of data we would need to enable such a guarantee.
What we do have today is very compelling attention research that can inform planning insights and marketplace strategies, which is why we at Omnicom have been so motivated to work with our partners in generating a large body of reliable attention research studies.”
How do publishers (and the open internet) stand to benefit from attention measurement and guarantees?
Hall: I mentioned the creation of a better marketplace for supply and demand based on attention, but there’s another interesting and positive twist for publishers.
Again referring to viewability, two different FMCG brands could come and buy off a publisher, each asking to clear a viewability threshold. These two advertisers are effectively competing for the same inventory, and while that might drive price up a little, it also means the publishers can only sell that inventory once. Attention metrics, however, are showing that different creatives can get radically higher/lower attention on different contexts. Publishers should be able to use attention tech in order to help match the right creative to the right context, and in turn be able to better monetize more of their inventory.
Would attention guarantees be harmful to any publishers? I understand programmatic guarantees on the open exchange offer a solution for weeding out fake news sites and made-for-advertising (MFA) sites.
Hall: Yes. When linking attention to outcomes, it becomes clear that not all attention is created equal. Those actors who have low attention inventory generally (or game the system to try and force attention when it’s not justified) are going to deliver much worse downstream effects/outcomes for brands, and this in turn will make their inventory less valuable. Viewability created a market of false incentives, and attention has a chance to correct that.
Metz: A publisher providing a guarantee might put more pressure on what we’ve historically called the long tail, in addition to weeding out MFAs. I want to stress if attention is guaranteed, it has to be a proven, consistent metric that is well understood and scalable. We are not there yet on attention metrics.
How do you think attention-guaranteed buys will impact big tech platforms—Meta, Google, X, Snap, etc.?
Hall: These companies are all very advanced when it comes to delivering value for advertisers. They understand that to command huge spends, they need to show real ROI for their customers. The notion of attention-guaranteed buys here is really just a new way to do just that, and it’s our hope they adopt attention metrics (and buying) just like the open internet will.”
