DOOH Glossary

Ad recall – The estimated number or percentage associated with remembering an advertisement within a certain time period of being exposed.

Ad server – A web server dedicated to the automated delivery of advertisements. Specifically enables the serving, tracking and management of advertising related messages and metrics.

Ad spot length – Duration of time representing the unit/format containing advertising content.

Algorithm – A series of mathematical instructions that are combined to direct a specific outcome.

Aspect ratio – The size dimensions of a screen’s image expressed as the ratio of the horizontal width to the vertical height of the display container.

Audience composition – A series of demographic, socioeconomic, and often behavioral factors of a network’s viewers that are often combined and include the percentage(s) of the total audience residing in each segment. Also refers to attributes of the audience of a given campaign or set of campaigns. Very often based on demographic (e.g. 56% male/44% female) or geographic attributes.

Audience impression – A unit of measure that includes the total number of people with an opportunity to view (aka traffic), notice, and dwell, calibrated to a media’s unit’s spot length. Also defined as the total number of times people passing a digital out of home display are likely to notice a message. This is also frequently referred to as “Visibility Adjusted Contact”, or “VAC”.

Audience reach measurement – A count of the total number of people or machines that receive ad messages. In DOOH, it refers to a count of people. Audience reach measurement also refers to the guideline developed by industry bodies that standardizes the measurement of machine-based measures (unique cookies, unique devices, unique browsers) and people-based measures (unique users or visitors). It is a compliance requirement that the audience reach measurement does not misrepresent machine-based measurements as people-based measurements. The measure’s status as either a people-based or a machine-based measure is required to be clearly disclosed.

Audience reach percentage – Percentage of an addressable target audience reached by a given campaign.

Audio – Refers to capability that delivers consumers the ability to hear the sound of an advertisement.

Awareness – Typically, a measure of consumer or audience familiarity with a brand or product.

Behavioural profiles – Profile based on past-observed behaviour, typically within 30-90 days of recency. Behavioural profiles may or may not refer to a profile about unique users.

Behavioural segments – Segmenting audiences that are defined by previous behaviours, frequently their recent online behaviour, or offline purchases and visitation. For example, an auto advertiser may seek to reach anyone who’s visited an auto review site in the last 30 days.

Bid rates – A bid rate is a programmatic auction metric that shows how many bids are occurring in an auction. This is usually determined by one’s bid price and the frequency cap. An advertiser will typically only pay for impressions that are won.

Bid request – A bid request is a function that is triggered when a user visits a digital space with available ad units on it. It then requests an ad so that it can be displayed in the ad units for users.

Bid response – The response that gets sent by the DSP inside RTB system to address the bid request that was sent by SSP, Ad Network or Ad Exchange. The bid request normally comprises information about the amount of bid, an ID of the creative (banner or video), and ID of the participant that made a bid on the auction.

Brand health/brand equity – The measure of a way a brand is viewed/perceived by an audience and the associations with a brand.

Brand lift – A specific measurement within an advertising campaign that established the effectiveness in driving a positive shift and/or increase in customer awareness and perception of a brand.

Companion ad – The ad message which typically runs adjacent to an ad unit and/or programmed content.

Companion ad unit orientation – Refers to the size orientation of a companion ad – typically landscape or portrait.

Cone of vision – The immediate field of view for an individual. Also referred to as the area of sight. It extends from the subject as a 120° cone.

Confidence – A metric that indicted the statistical significance of the lift observed. Results that are statistically significant at the 95% confidence level or higher are considered a suitable norm for making business decisions. Results that are statistically significant at the 80% confidence level or higher are often considered directional.

Consideration – The extent to which a consumer considers a brand or product for purchase.

Consumer experience – The way the primary ad unit is experienced by a person watching the screen.

Content distribution server – A server or computer used to store content for distribution to digital signage.

Content management system (CMS) – An application used to create, schedule, manage and modify digital content. Digital signage software used to manage and schedule is an example of a content management system.

Conversion window – The number of days post exposure that a vendor attributes visits to a campaign. This typically varies by business and category.

Cost per ratings point (CPP) – The cost of one rating point in any geographically defined market.

Cost per thousand (CPM) – The cost (price) to deliver 1,000 ad impressions on displays in a given market.

Cover (coverage) – The proportion of a target group who see one or more frames in an outdoor campaign (creating an IMPACT), in a defined period. Expressed as a percentage.

Coverage – The geographic area covered by network installations.

Currency – Refers to a currency for each advertising medium. By creating a common currency measure of all formats equally, and giving a specific value to each, media space is able to be planned, traded, evaluated and reported based on the currency.

Daypart – A partial segment of a medium’s overall operating hours, during which programming and/or advertising is customised to appeal to a particular demographic or target audience.

Deal ID – Also known as a deal identifier, is the unique number assigned to an automated ad buy.

Delivered play – The number of times a creative message (with a defined spot length) completes its full duration.

Demand Side Platform (DSP) – A technology platform that provides centralized and aggregated media buying from multiple sources including ad exchanges, ad networks and sell side platforms, often leveraging real time bidding capabilities of these sources. DSPs allow advertisers to buy impressions across a range of publisher sites, but targeted to specific users based on information including location and previous browsing behavior. Publishers make ad impressions available through marketplaces called ad exchanges and DSPs automatically decide which impressions make the most sense for an advertiser to buy. Price is often determined by a real-time auction through a process known as Real Time Bidding (See RTB).

Demo targeting – Targeting audiences that are defined by demographic attributes i.e. age, gender, household income, presence of children.

Digital – Refers to advertising or content presented on a digital screen, displaying moving or rotating messages.

Dwell time – The length of time an individual is in a Screen Exposure Zone which is a location from which the screen is visible and, if appropriate, audible. (Source: MRC Digital Place-Based Audience Measurement Standards Version 1)

Dynamic content – The process of creating and enabling responsive and editable creative messaging to deliver contextually relevant messages driven by the smart use of data across DOOH.

Effective frequency – Refers to the number of exposures necessary to make an impact and achieve memorable communication goals.

Environment – Shorthand for the specific type of location where advertising frames are placed. For example, RAIL indicates displays in rail stations and on trains, and RETAIL includes frames inside retail centres and pedestrian areas, among others.

Exposed–store conversion rate – The Rate at which an exposed audience has visited a store per impression served.

Exposure – Message presence in the defined Screen Exposure Zone when content is deemed to be viewable, though does not require that the content be viewed or listened to. Exposure is also often referred to as Opportunity-to-See. (Source: MRC Digital Place-Based Audience Measurement Standards Version 1)

Face – Refers to an individual advertising image. One face may typically make up part of a scrolling billboard, or series of images within a digital frame.

Favorability – A measurement of an advertising campaign’s positive or favorable effectiveness in driving consumer perception of the associated brand.

Fieldwork – The part of research work which is the on-the-ground data capture: eg: interviews with participants, and the time spent carrying a GPS device.

Foot traffic attribution – The measurement of an advertising campaign’s influence on physical visitation to a specified location. Enables advertisers to understand the drivers of in-store visitation.

Frame – Refers to the physical housing of an advertising display. A frame may show a single static image, a series of images with a scrolling mechanism, or a digital screen capable of displaying and exhibiting many individual adverts. Each separate advertising image is referred to as a FACE.

Frequency – The number of times or instances in which the audience is exposed to content, advertising, or a specific ad, in the defined time frame. Frequency represents the average exposure when used in conjunction with cumulative reach estimates, though it can also be reported on the basis of specific exposure levels when evaluated in the context of discrete reach estimates through frequency distribution analyses.

Frequency capping – A limit/cap on how many times a specific user is shown a particular advertisement within a given time period.

Full screen – An ad unit which is displayed across all pixels – the only visible asset running on a display screen.

Geographic targeting – Targeting audiences defined by their location in the real-world. Location attributes can vary from granular attributes such as mobile/GPS-enabled latitude/longitude data tobroader attributes such as DMA or state/province. In technical specifications, targets may simply be referred to as “geo”, “user”, “audience” without spelling out the full term.

Global positioning system (GPS) – A satellite navigation system that provides precise location information for electronic devices.

Gross rating point (GRP) – A term used to measure the size of an audience reached by a specific media vehicle or schedule. In DOOH, a GRP is defined as the total number of impressions delivered, expressed as a percentage of a market population. One rating point represents impressions equal to 1% of the market population. In calculating GRPs, total impressions are first reduced to the in-market impressions of individuals who live in the defined market and are part of that market’s population base. A frequently referenced term along with GRPs is Target Rating Points (TRPs), which is calculated by the sum of the ratings generated by a segment – often referred to as Target Audience GRPs or more simply TRPs.

Impact – Refers to one individual, seeing one advert, one time. This is a mathematical rule applied in audience calculations. The definition of a Route IMPACT uses LIKELIHOOD TO SEE (LTS), not OPPORTUNITY TO SEE (OTS). Each is adjusted for VISIBILITY.

Impression – In DOOH, a measurement of response from an ad server to a media unit request from a user browser, recorded at a point as close as possible to the opportunity to see the media unit by the user – also referred to as a view.

Impression multiplier – The multiplier is a DOOH specific metric which informs the buyer exactly how many impressions are delivered in a single ad play. Each impression equates to one viewer. One bid request accounts for one ad play, thereby the multiplier highlights how many impressions are included per bid request.

Lift – The Percent difference in visitation rates between exposed audience and unexposed audience. Also known as “incremental lift”. Also refers to the portion of store visits by exposed audience attributed to lift (incremental visits above baseline visits).

Maximum visibility distance – Derived from eye-tracking experiments, a defined distance from which posters can be seen. This varies, and often is dependent on the dimension of the frame.

Media unit – A unit defined by a DOOH network that describes the physical space on which a DOOH ad unit will play. Most often for digital place-based networks, a media unit is a single screen, however in locations where multiple screens are combined to portray content that is larger than one screen, the entirety of that group of screens may be referred to as a single media unit.

Message duration – The interval of time when a DOOH message is viewable.

Notice – The percentage of respondents who report to have noticed a screen.

Observation – A technique used in market research. The behaviour of people in interior spaces such as airports. A chosen group of people is observed as they move in the space, and a FACTOR for their likelihood to visit a specific location is produced.

Offset – The angle away from the path at which the poster is located. The offset is an important factor in calculating the visibility of the frame.

Open exchange – A way to buy/sell programmatic advertising. It is the least restrictive type of ad auction, with a media owner/publisher generally allowing any and all buyers to participate in accessing the ad inventory through this method. Usually, there is no direct relationship with the buyer. Media owners may choose to use blocklists and floor pricing to prevent certain advertisers from gaining access. On the advertiser side, they are often unaware of what media owner network they are buying on. DSPs usually present a list of exchanges/SSPs to the buyer that they automatically opt into. Buyers may not know or care that they are buying a specific network’s inventory. As a result of this, publishers can participate in the open auction on a blind basis.

Opportunity to see (OTS) – A basic measure of media exposure. OTS estimates are measures of media content exposure (e.g. readership or TV viewing exposures) – not advertising. In OOH advertising. likelihood to see is used, and often incorporates eye tracking data for a more realistic assessment of media exposure.

Partial screen – A portioned or partitioned display screen wherein a primary ad unit is accompanied by content and/or a companion ad unit, content or some other visual enhancement (such as ticker, clock, or logo). Companion ads may be text, static display ads or rich media.

Passive – Describes research fieldwork that requires minimal to no input from a participant. Passive data is simple to process and subject to fewer input errors than inactive or survey-based methods.

Play – Refers to a DOOH message which has a defined length, start and end time.

Playback format – The final format that a DOOH Network requires for an ad unit to be played across the network. Networks are always required to disclose the playback format.

Primary ad unit – Refers to the dominant area of advertising displayed on the screen. The primary ad unit is typically described as either full screen or partial screen.

Primary ad unit orientation – The scale of a DOOH ad unit, typically referred to as either “landscape” or “portrait”.

Private marketplace (PMP) – A way to buy/sell programmatic advertising. This auction type is very similar to an open exchange auction, except a publisher restricts participation to select buyers/advertisers. A publisher may choose to not participate in an open auction and only run an invitation-only auction. It is important to note that an invitation-only auction is still an auction and buyers will be expected to bid on inventory. A publisher may choose to expose different information such as transparency or data, through the use of deal IDs or line items to add value to this select group of buyers while using this method.

Proof of play – The logging of playout data on specific media owner players/networks, each time a piece of content is played. A player logs an occurrence, stores it and is later provided to advertisers for analysis and audit verification.

Purchase intent – Purchase intent is a measure of the probability that a consumer will purchase a service or product.

Reach – The net (unduplicated) count or percent of the defined universe of the target audience exposed to content, advertising, or a specific ad, in a screen within a defined timeframe. This time frame can be a day, week, or month, or even less-frequent time periods although more frequent reports are generally desirable to users. (Source:MRC Digital Place-Based Audience Measurement Standards Version 1)

Reach and frequency – The estimated number of people that see an advertising campaign, and the average number of times they see it, in a defined period.

Reaction – Consumer response to advertising – brand or promotional.

Real-time bidding (RTB) – A way of transacting media that allows an individual ad impression to be put up for bid in real time. This is done through a programmatic on-the-spot auction, which is similar to how financial markets operate. RTB allows for addressable advertising; the ability to serve ads to consumers directly based on their demographic, psychographic, or behavioral attributes.

Recall – In market research, refers to the recollection of the advertising they have seen. This is known as recall.

Resonance – The degree to which advertising messaging influences the consumer’s perspective and/or drives purchase decisions or the desired brand impact.

Respondent – A participant in a research study. For route, respondents are selected based on their location, and fulfil a specific demographic requirement.

Retargeting – Targeting audiences that are defined by having recently shown interest in said advertiser, interest most often being defined as visiting the advertiser’s website.

Screen – A display device or medium designed to deliver digital place-based, digital out of home, and/or advertising content whether it be video, audio, or both.

Seat ID – A unique identifier used to offer inventory to specific buyers on a DSP platform.

Segmentation – Dividing a broad group of consumers or businesses into subgroups (known as segments) based on shared demographic/psychographic/behavioral attributes. Segmentation is often used to create target audiences (comprised of one or more segments) or to customize an offer or message for specific segments.

Served impression – An ad that was reported to have begun to render at the screen. Note that in the vast majority of DOOH experiences, all ads (when served) are fully viewable for the entirety of the play. In the digital media world, this term is commonly known as a “play”.

Served plays – The number of times a creative (with a defined spot length) has started playing (may not play fully).

Share of impacts – Average % share of viewed impacts across the dimensions reported on for the campaign (e.g. play, hour, panel, geography).

Share of time – Average % share of total time across the dimensions reported on for the campaign (e.g. play, hour, panel, geography).

Spot length – The duration of time the advertiser has to run their creative message in.

Street furniture – Advertising displays, that typically provide a public amenity, positioned at close proximity to pedestrians for eye-level viewing or at a curb-side within view of vehicular traffic.

Target – Any audience reflecting the most desired consumer prospects for a product or service, defined by age, sex, race, ethnicity or income; or their combinations for any geographic definition. Expanded targets include purchasing, behavioural and audience segmentations.

Target audience – A specific group that an advertiser seeks to reach with its campaign. Target audience is defined by a certain attribute or set of attributes (e.g. women aged 18-24, sports car lovers, shoppers in-market for a new car).

Traffic – Volumes of people moving, whether on foot or in vehicles.

Unique traffic – The unduplicated audience that has an opportunity to see any message during a reporting period.

Viewable impression – In online/digital media, a served ad impression can be only be classified as a “viewable impression” if the ad meets all of the following criteria: it was contained in the viewable space of the browser window, it is in an in-focus browser tab, and it meets pre-established minimum percent of ad pixels within the viewable space and the length of time the ad is in the viewable space of the browser. It is recognized that an “opportunity to see” the ad exists with a viewable ad impression, which may or may not be the case with a served ad impression. (Source: MRC Viewable Ad Impression Measurement Guidelines Ver. 2.0).

Visibility – The area of research that, using eye-tracking methods, produces data on the probability that an advert is visible to the viewer.

Visibility area – The area around a frame in which it can be seen. It incorporates the maximum visibility distance of the frame, and the angle that route has defined to mark its catchment area (120°).

Visual units – A collection of frames that are in sync; one ad typically plays on all the connected frames at the same time.