Google Quietly Debuts Viewable Impression CPM Bidding In AdWords

In August, Google announced that it had received MRC accreditation for its Active View product to measure impressions by viewability. The company then stated that it would be building in viewable impressions bidding into all of its display ad targeting products.

In a significant move (curiously made without fanfare) Google has now rolled out CPM bidding by viewable impression in AdWords. Kim Clinkunbroomer, partner, executive vice president paid search at Philly Marketing Labs, noticed the new bidding option this week. The option is available to all campaigns running on the Google Display Network, including remarketing campaigns.

Advertisers now have the option to pay only for impressions that are deemed viewable by users according to Google’s Active View reporting. Traditional impression bidding is charged by “served” impression, regardless of whether the ad was actually visible onscreen. Some 31percent of display ads are never seen by users, according to comScore.

As part of the roll-out, Google has updated AdWords reporting to include Active View metrics for viewable impressions, viewable click-through rate and Active View average CPM.

As the market leader in display advertising, Google’s move to offer viewable impression bidding will likely accelerate the industry-wide effort to adopt the viewability standard. In June, leaders of the Making Measurement Make Sense (3MS) initiative, which includes the IAB, MRC and ANA, told publishers to be prepared to adopt the viewability standard by year-end.

Google has made little noise about this new feature, and the “learn more” link in the campaign setting option is broken. The company has not yet responded to a request for comment. We will update here if we receive more details.