Who is the IAB internationally?

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is an advertising business organisation that develops industry standards, conducts research and provides legal support for the online advertising industry. The organisation represents a large number of the most prominent media outlets globally, but mostly in the United States and in Europe.

Founded in 1996, the IAB is based in New York City. Randall Rothenberg is the president and CEO of the organisation. Patrick Dolan, David Doty and Mike Zaneis are the executive vice-presidents.

IAB Europe is a coalition of 27 national IABs across Europe and more than 5,500 companies. It publishes the annual Mediascope Europe, a media consumption research to more than 50,000 consumer interviews.

It has developed a number of interface formats for digital advertising metadata, including the Video Ad Serving Template and Video Player-Ad Interface Definition formats. On February 26 2012, the IAB released the IAB Standard Ad Unit Portfolio, which included detailed information on all display advertising formats.

In June 2011, the IAB, in partnership with the Association of National Advertisers and the 4A’s American Association of Advertising Agencies, released the Guiding Principles of Digital Measurement. These five principles are the foundation of Making Measurement Make Sense (3MS).

As an example, IAB members include representatives from AOL, The Associated Press, the BBC, CBS, eBay, ESPN, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, the New York Times, Reuters, Time, Twitter, Verizon, Viacom, the Washington Post, Yahoo and others.

What is the methodology used to obtain data?

Effective Measure relies primarily on collection of local website market data through an on-page tag. This universal JavaScript tag provides the best coverage of all browser combinations, as it also includes a backup option for web browsers that do not support JavaScript on some mobile platforms. A website tags with Effective Measure by including this JavaScript code on the footer of all pages in the site, and then as its visitors browse around the site, each page view triggers a tracking call to EM, where cookies for the user are retrieved and set (when needed), and detailed information about that particular page view is recorded into our collection servers. This method provides direct measurement of visitors visitation to a website and is aggregated into "verified” statistics for UBs, UVs, sessions, page views and duration in the EM dashboard. In addition, we recruit a randomly sampled demographic pool from the users visiting this site by means of an on-site survey. The invitation for this survey slides up from the bottom right of a page by default, and is controlled at an appropriate rate per website. Once a user accepts the invitation to this survey and completes the demographic profile, we can then footprint that user on any site in the Effective Measure network and present accurate, highly detailed demographic data in the EM dashboard.

Why is demographic data important?

Demographic data provides those invested in the digital media industry with deep market intelligence that increases the effectiveness of marketing initiatives. We are acutely aware that online behaviour should directly reflect real-life habits. In comparison to existing digital audience measurement providers that typically offer data that is based on either tagged sites or panellists, we avoid inaccuracy by minimising estimation. With our capability to generate in-depth profiling of the online population on specific tagged websites, countries or regions, we offer our clients objective, unbiased intelligence that is of real value.

How does Effective Measure rank websites?

Effective Measure ranks websites on the number of unique browsers (UB) aggregated. However, we do not subscribe to the ‘one size fits all’ approach. The Effective Measure dashboard gives users the freedom to compare our standard measurement (UB) with unique visitors (UV). We measure the absolute visitors to your site in the specified date range, according to the unique browser that came to your site. This is the most accurate methodology. In general, the Effective Measure numbers are slightly different from other analytic tools such as Google Analytics, due to addressing cookie deletion. Because of this, the absolute monthly unique visitors may be up to 30% lower.

What is UV?

UV is a less accurate representation of website visitors typically based only on a third-party cookie that is used by other common providers for users to compare against. It is a form of measurement that is a less strict measure of site visits and includes people without reliable cookie support in their browser, who may generate multiple visitor IDs and be overcounted. UV is more in line with other systems, as many do not scrutinise the level of trust in cookies the same way Effective Measure does.

Why should we trust UB?

Our UB data, using Digital Helix tag methodology, is the most precise representation of unique machines/browsers accessing publisher websites available. Digital Helix, an industry first, has both first-party cookie and third-party cookie working harmoniously to produce unrivalled accuracy in tagged numbers.

Why do we rank sites based on South African audience instead of worldwide audience?

We rank sites based on a local audience instead of a worldwide audience to ensure that our data is the most relevant to advertisers and agencies keen on targeting the local market. However, we offer worldwide audience data over all the categories that we cover in Australia, South-East Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

Why can Effective Measure data be trusted?

Effective Measure is ABC UK accredited to global industry standards. Read more: http://goo.gl/jwpfq and http://goo.gl/CVtvK.

What are viewable impressions and why are they important?

What does it mean for the pricing of digital display advertising? Why do discrepancies occur between different providers? How should you reconcile delivery with your clients or suppliers?

Read more about viewable impressions in this FAQ document compiled by the IAB UK.

What are internet cookies and what are their advantages?

What information is stored in them? Are their safety or security risks? What are third-party cookies?

Read more about cookies in this FAQ document compiled by the IAB Europe.