3rd party ad serving: the purpose of ad serving is to deliver ads to users, manage the advertising space of a website, and, in the case of third-party ad servers, provide an independent counting and tracking system for advertisers/marketers. Ad servers also act as a system by which advertisers can count clicks/impressions in order to generate reports, which help determine ROI for an advertisement on a particular web page. Using a centralized ad server enables progress reports on-demand, and updates creative content in one place rather than using multiple servers with different publishers.

Abandonment: when a user leaves a shopping cart with something in it prior to completing the transaction.

Above the fold (ATF): a term derived from newspaper print advertising, this means that an ad is placed on a website above the scroll line as the page is viewed before any scrolling occurs; in view before scrolling.

Ad banner: also known as banner ads, one of the most dominant forms of advertising on the internet. Banner ads are a form of display advertising that can range from a static graphic to full motion video.

Ad click: the user activity of pressing a navigation button or hitting the enter key on the keyboard on an advertisement unit on a web site (banner, button or text link). (see click-through).

Ad click: the user activity of pressing a navigation button or hitting the enter key on the keyboard on an advertisement unit on a web site (banner, button or text link). (see click-through).

Ad server: an ad server is a web server dedicated to the delivery of advertisement. This specialization enables the tracking and management of advertising related metrics.

Ad tag: software code that an advertiser provides to a publisher or ad network that calls the advertisers ad server for the purposes of displaying an advertisement.

Ad: for web advertising, an ad is almost always a banner, graphic image, or set of animated images (in an animated gif) of a designated pixel size and byte size limit. An ad or set of ads for a campaign is often referred to as the creative. banners and other special advertising that include an interactive or visual element beyond the usual are known as rich media.

Add to cart: the user activity of storing merchandise in a virtual shopping cart that the user intends to later purchase from an online e-commerce website. This enables users to continue browsing and check-out later or alternately delete these items from the cart.

Animated gif: an animation created by combining multiple gif images in one file. The result is multiple images, displayed sequentially, giving the appearance of movement.

Banner: a graphic advertising image displayed on a web page also known as display ads, banner advertisements are a form of graphical ads embedded into a webpage, typically including a combination of static/animated images, text and/or video designed to convey a marketing message and/or cause the user to take an action. Banner dimensions are typically defined by width and height, represented in pixels.

Behavioral targeting: using previous online user activity (e.g., pages visited, content viewed, searches, clicks and purchases) to generate a segment which is used to match advertising creative to users (sometimes also called behavioral profiling, interest-based advertising, or online behavioral advertising). Behavioral targeting uses anonymous, non-PII data.

Behavioral targeting: using previous online user activity (e.g., pages visited, content viewed, searches, clicks and purchases) to generate a segment which is used to match advertising creative to users (sometimes also called behavioral profiling, interest-based advertising, or online behavioral advertising). Behavioral targeting uses anonymous, non-PII data.

Bot: software that runs automatically without human intervention. Typically, a bot is endowed with the capability to react to different situations it may encounter. Two common types of bots are agents and spiders. Bots are used by companies like search engines to discover web sites for indexing. Short for robot.

Browser: a software program that can request, download, cache and display documents available on the web.

Browser sniffer: software that detects capabilities of the user’s browser (looking for such things as java capabilities, plug-ins, screen resolution, and bandwidth).

Buffering: when a streaming media player temporarily stores portions of a streaming media (e.g., audio or video) file on a client pc until there is enough information for the stream to begin playing.

Cache: memory used to temporarily store the most frequently requested content/files/pages in order to speed its delivery to the user. Caches can be local (i.e. On a browser) or on a network. In the case of local cache, most computers have both memory (RAM), and disk (hard drive) cache.

Cache busting: the process by which sites or servers serve content or HTML in such a manner as to minimize or prevent browsers or proxies from serving content from their cache. This forces the user or proxy to fetch a fresh copy for each request. Among other reasons, cache busting is used to provide a more accurate count of the number of requests from users.

Campaign: in traditional marketing, a campaign is a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme. In digital advertising, a campaign will refer to a set of ad buys from a specific ad network or publisher. Also, the advertising period in which an ad delivery strategy is executed.

Click: an interaction between a website visitor and the browser in which the website visitor uses a device, such as a mouse, to move the cursor (or pointer) to an active area of the screen and then deliberately interacts with that area by clicking a button on their device, triggering an event. In the case of touch-screen devices, the user clicks by touching the active area with their finger or a stylus.

According to the ad industry recommended guidelines from fast, a click is when a visitor interacts with an advertisement. this does not mean simply interacting with a rich media ad, but actually clicking on it so that the visitor is headed toward the advertiser’s destination. (it also does not mean that the visitor actually waits to fully arrive at the destination, but just that the visitor started going there.)

Click rate: ratio of ad clicks to ad impressions, the click rate is the percentage of ad views that resulted in click throughs, which indicates the ad’s effectiveness and results in the viewer getting to the website where other messages can be provided. A successful click rate depends on campaign objectives, how enticing or explicit the message is (a message that is complete within the banner may be less apt to be clicked), audience/message matching, how new the banner is, and how often it is displayed to the same user. In general, click rates for high-repeat, branding banners vary from 0.15% to 1%. Ads with provocative, mysterious, or other compelling content can induce click rates ranging from 1 to 5%. The click rate for a given ad tends to diminish with repeated exposure.

Click through: the measurement of a user clicking on a link that re-directs the user’s web-enabled device to another web destination, a click through is what the sponsoring site counts as a result of an ad click. In practice, click and click through tend to be used interchangeably. A click through, however, implies that the user actually went to the page. Some advertisers pay only for click throughs rather than for ad impressions.

Click through rate (CTR): the percentage of ad impressions that were clicked on as compared to the entire number of clicks [CTR% = (clicks ÷ imps) x 100], ratio of users who click on a specific link to the number of total users who view a page, email, or advertisement. CTR is commonly used to measure the success of an online advertising campaign for a particular website as well as the effectiveness of email campaigns.

Co-op advertising: the creation of advertisements by one party (usually retailers) that include the specific mention of a second party (usually manufacturers) where the second party will pay some or all of the advertising cost. For example, a motorcycle dealer that mentions specific makes of new motorcycles in their copy in order to receive some form of payment from the motorcycle OEM.

Connected TV: a television set that is connected to the internet and is able to access web-based content, also referred to as advanced tv. TVs can be connected through an add-on device like PlayStation, Roku, or an amazon fire tv stick. The tv can also have connectivity capabilities built in. The content viewed is all video on-demand, and streams similarly to how you would stream video content on your computer, smartphone, or tablet. Ott (over the top) is a term used to describe any of the devices used to connect a tv to the internet.

Conversion: a conversion occurs when the user performs the specific action that the advertiser has defined as the campaign goal. Conversions are often tracked by a web beacon, called a conversion pixel.

Conversion rate: the percentage of users who complete a desired action (e.g., purchase or registration) compared to all users who were exposed to an online ad.

Cookie: also known as an HTTP cookie, web cookie, or browser cookie, is a string of text sent from a web server to a user’s browser that the browser is expected to send back to the web server in subsequent interactions. A cookie has a few core attributes: the cookie value, the domain and path within which it is valid, and the cookie expiry. There are other attributes as well that limit the cookie to https-only transactions, or hide it from JavaScript.

The domain and path define the scope of the cookie – they tell the browser that cookies should only be sent back to the server for the given domain and path. Cookies that do not have a specific expiration date and time are automatically deleted when the web browser is next closed. Cookies with a set expiry time are considered persistent cookies, while cookies without set expiry times are considered session cookies.

In online advertising, cookies generally store a unique identifier, and may contain information like what ads were recently seen (for frequency capping), when the cookie was created (to discover short duration identities), and other simple attributes.

Cost per action (CPA): what an advertiser pays for each visitor that takes some specifically defined action in response to an ad beyond simply clicking on it. For example, a visitor might visit an advertiser’s site and request to subscribe to their newsletter.

Cost per completed view (CPCV): the price an advertiser pays every time a video ad runs through to completion. Rather than paying for all impressions, some of which may have been stopped before completion, an advertiser only pays for ads that finished (CPCV= cost ÷ completed views).

Cost per download (CPD): the price an advertiser pays every time a desired download (such as a coupon download) occurs via an ad unit; rather than paying for all impressions, and advertiser only pays when the desired outcome occurs [CPD= cost ÷ download]

Cost per engagement (CPE): the price an advertiser pays every time a consumer interacts with a rich media ad unit; rather than paying for all impressions, and advertiser only pays when the desired interaction occurs [CPE= cost ÷ engagement]

Cost per lead(CPL): a more specific form of cost per action in which a visitor provides enough information at the advertiser’s site (or in an interaction with a rich media ad) to be used as a sales lead. You can estimate cost per lead regardless of how you pay for the ad (in other words, buying on a pay per lead basis is not required to calculate the cost per lead).

Cost per point (CPP): pricing model based on the cost of a campaign divided by each full percentage rating point of a targeted demographic that the campaign successfully reaches.

Cost per sale (CPS): the advertiser’s cost to generate one sales transaction. Sites that sell products directly from their website or can otherwise determine sales generated as the result of an advertising sales lead can calculate the cost per sale of web advertising. If this is being used in conjunction with a media buy, a cookie can be offered on the content site and read on the advertiser’s site after the successful completion of an online sale.

Cost per thousand targeted (CPTM): is cost per thousand targeted ad impressions, implying that the audience you’re selling is targeted to particular demographics.

Cost per unique visitor: total cost of the placement or application, divided by the number of unique visitors.

Cost per view (CPV): pricing model where the advertiser only pays for a video start. Typically sold at 1,000 impressions.

Cost per viewable impression: pricing model where the advertiser only pays for video ad impressions that are considered viewable based upon MRC and IAB viewability guidelines. Typically sold at 1,000 impressions.

Cost-per-click (CPC): CPC or cost-per-click is the cost of advertising based on the number of clicks received.

Cost-per-customer (CPC): CPC or cost-per-customer is the cost an advertiser pays to acquire a customer.

CPA: cost of advertising based on a visitor taking some specifically defined action in response to an ad. Examples of actions include such things as completing a sales transaction, or filling out a form.

CPL: cost of advertising based on the number of database files (leads) received.

CPM: media term describing the cost of 1,000 impressions, an industry standard measure for selling ads on websites. For example, a web site that charges $1,500 per ad and reports 100,000 impressions has a CPM of $15 ($1,500 divided by 100). This measure is taken from print advertising. The M is taken from the roman numeral for thousand.

CPO: cost of advertising based on the number of orders received. Also called cost-per-transaction.

CPT: see CPO (cost-per-order).

CPU: CPU is an acronym for central processing unit, the key component of a computer system, which contains the circuitry necessary to interpret and execute program instructions.

Creative: an advertising unit created by an ad designer, in accordance with publisher specifications and guidelines, for the purpose of communicating a marketing message to that publisher’s audience. One creative may consist of multiple files in various formats, such as standard images, animation, video, execution files (.HTML, .js, etc.) And other files that work together for an interactive experience.

Creative dimensions: measured in pixels, the width and height of an ad unit (W x H). The width is always the first dimension listed, followed by the height dimension (i.e. an ad that is 300×250 is 300 pixels wide by 250 pixels high).

Creative retargeting: a method that enables advertisers to show an ad specifically to visitors that previously were exposed to or interacted with the advertisers’ creative.

Cross-device targeting: the ability to serve sequential ad messages to the same consumer from one device to the next (e.g. First on a person’s desktop then again on his/her smartphone).

Demographic targeting: a method that enables advertisers to show an ad specifically to visitors based on demographic information such as age, gender and income which may come from, site registration data or an inference-based mechanism.

Demographics: common characteristics about the size and characteristics of a population or audience used for population or audience segmentation, such as age, gender, household income, purchasing history, personal preferences, etc.

Designated market area (DMA): as defined by Nielsen on Nielsen.com, DMA (designated market area) regions are the geographic areas in the united states in which local television viewing is measured by the Nielsen Company. The DMA data are essential for any marketer, researcher, or organization seeking to utilize standardized geographic areas within their business. (note: these regions can be applied to digital marketing as well as traditional tv).

Direct response (DR): an ad that is designed to have the viewer take immediate action; for example, in digital advertising, this often means a click, sign up, download, or purchase

Display advertising: a form of online advertising where an advertiser’s message is shown on a destination web page, generally set off in a box at the top or bottom or to one side of the content of the page.

Domain name: the unique name that identifies an internet site. Every domain name consists of one top or high-level and one or more lower-level designators. Top-level domains (TLDs) are either generic or geographic. Generic top-level domains include .com (commercial), .net (network), .edu (educational), .org (organizational, public or non-commercial), .gov (governmental), .mil (military); .biz (business), .info (informational),.name (personal), .pro (professional), .aero (air transport and civil aviation), .coop (business cooperatives such as credit unions) and .museum. Geographic domains designate countries of origin, such as .us (United States), .fr (France), .uk (United Kingdom), etc.

E-commerce: the process of selling products or services via the web.

Email advertising: banner ads, links or advertiser sponsorships that appear in email newsletters, email marketing campaigns and other commercial email communications. Includes all types of electronic mail (e.g., basic text or HTML-enabled).

Email bounce: an email that cannot be delivered to the mailbox provider and is sent back to the e-mail service provider that sent it. A bounce is classified as either hard or soft. Hard bounces are the failed delivery of email due to a permanent reason, such as a non-existent address. Soft bounces are the failed delivery of email due to a temporary issue, such as a full inbox or an unavailable ISP server.

Email campaign: advertising campaign distributed via e-mail.

Email inbox: within a mailbox provider, the default, primary folder that stores delivered e-mail messages.

Email mailbox provider: the e-mail program, and by extension the server, that hosts the targeted e-mail address.

Email preview pane: a small window within a mailbox provider that allows the user to view some e-mail content without opening the e-mail.

Effective CPM (eCPM): effective CPM – the average CPM of a campaign [ECPM= total cost ÷ total imps x 1000].

Engagement: a general term used to classify interaction a consumer has with brand content, whether it be in an ad, on a brand’s site, or via a brand’s social media profile page.

Expandable ads: rich media ads that can be enlarged to dimensions beyond the initial dimensions of the placement they fill on the webpage. The user initiates expanding events, sometimes after the ad initially expands briefly on its own to catch the user’s attention.

Expandable banners: expandable banners are rich media ads that expand in size when a user rolls over or clicks on them. They reveal more advertising information and are designed to grab the attention of the user. The IAB provides guidelines for expandable banners in the rich media ads section of the display advertising creative format guidelines quick reference guide.

Expanded dimensions: the secondary dimensions of an expanding ad unit (after the ad is expanded). Initial dimensions are fit to the dimensions of the placement. Then, either by auto-play or by user interaction, the ad unit expands to its secondary dimension.

Eyeballs: slang term for audience; the number of people who view a certain website or advertisement.

Flash™: Adobe’s vector-based rich media file format which is used to display interactive animations on a web page, used to build, generate, and play animated files. Also used to define the creative files generated by the program. In order for flash files to execute in a browser, the flash player plug-in must be installed. However, flash development tools can also generate files in HTML5 format so that no plug-in is required for execution.

Flighting: a term borrowed from television advertising that means the timing around when a commercial will air, this can be used to talk about laying out the parameters of a digital ad campaign.

Fold: the line below which a user has to scroll to see content not immediately visible when a web page loads in a browser. Ads or content displayed above the fold are visible without any end-user interaction. Monitor size and resolution determine where on a web page the fold lies.

Frame rate: the rate at which video frames or animated images display as the video or animated file executes, measured as the number of frames per second (fps) during a given time. The higher the frame rate, the more high-quality the image will be.

Frequency: the number of times an ad is delivered to the same browser in a single session or time period. A site can use cookies in order to manage ad frequency.

Frequency capping: the limit of how many times a given ad will be shown to a unique cookie during a session or within a specified time period.

FTP: internet protocol which facilitates downloading or uploading digital files.

Geographic targeting: a method that enables advertisers to display (or prevent the display of) an ad specifically to visitors based on zip code, area code, city, DMA, state, and/or country derived from user-declared registration information or inference-based mechanism. Relevant to both pc and mobile data devices.

GIF: a standard web graphic format which uses compression to store and display images.

Gigabyte: one gigabyte equals 1000 megabytes.

Gross rating point (GRP): a term used to measure the size of an audience reached by a specific media vehicle or schedule. It is used to measure the exposure to one or more programs or commercials, without regard to multiple exposures of the same advertising to individuals. For example, an advertisement that is aired/served 5 times, reaching 50% of the target audience each time it is aired, would have a GRP of 250 (5 × 50%). GRPs are typically used by media buyers to compare the strength of media vehicles.

Hit: the record of a single online transaction event stored in a log file. One-page view may contain multiple hits, one for each image on a web page.

Home page: the page designated as the main point of entry of a web site (or main page) or the starting point when a browser first connects to the internet. Typically, it welcomes visitors and introduces the purpose of the site, or the organization sponsoring it, and then provides links to other pages within the site.

HTTP: the format most commonly used to transfer documents on the web.

Hyperlink: a clickable link, e.g., on a web page or within an e-mail, that sends the user to a new URL when activated.

Hypertext: any text that contains links connecting it with other text or files on the internet.

Hypertext markup language (HTML): set of codes called markup tags in a plain text file that determine what information is retrieved and how a browser renders it. There are two kinds of markup tags: anchor and format. Anchor tags determine what is retrieved, and format tags determine how it is rendered. Browsers receive HTML pages from the internet and use the information to display text, graphics, links and other elements as they were intended by a website’s creator.

iFrame: short for inline frame, this is the area on a website designated for an ad to appear.

Impression: measurement of responses from a web server to a page request from the user browser, which is filtered from robotic activity and error codes and is recorded at a point as close as possible to opportunity to see the page by the user, also called a view. A single display of online content to a user’s web-enabled device. Many websites sell advertising space by the number of impressions displayed to users. An online advertisement impression is a single appearance of an advertisement on a web page. Each time an advertisement loads onto a user’s screen, the ad server may count that loading as one impression. However, the ad server may be programmed to exclude from the count certain non-qualifying activity such as a reload, internal user actions, and other events that the advertiser and ad serving company agreed to not count.

In-stream video ad: played before, during, or after the streaming video content that the consumer has requested (pre-roll, mid-roll, and post-roll.) These ads cannot typically be stopped from being played (particularly with pre-roll.) This format is frequently used to monetize the video content that the publisher is delivering. In-stream video ads can be played inside short or long-form video and rely on video content for their delivery. There are four different types of video content where in-stream may play: UGC (user generated content/video), syndicated, sourced, and journalistic. In-stream video ads are displayed within the context of streaming video content.

Initial dimension: the original width and height (in pixels) of an expanding ad. Expanding ads are designed to expand to dimensions larger than the initial dimensions.

Initial file load: includes all assets and files necessary (.HTML, .js, .css, .woff, images, etc.) For completing first visual display of the ad. The initial file load size of an ad is limited in order to preserve the page load performance and thus the user’s web browsing experience. For non-rich media ads, the initial file load size limit is all that’s allowed for the ad.

Instream: when a video ad streams (plays) alongside (before/mid/after) video content.

Interaction rate: the proportion of users who interact with an ad or application. Some will be involuntary depending on where the ad or application is placed on screen, so it is highly dependent on placement.

Interactions: specific to digital audio, any of a wide variety of metrics that indicate how many users took an action in response to an ad message, and or the depth of that interaction.

Interactive advertising: all forms of online, wireless and interactive television advertising, including banners, sponsorships, e-mail, keyword searches, referrals, slotting fees, classified ads and interactive television commercials.

Interaction rate: the proportion of users who interact with an ad or application. Some will be involuntary depending on where the ad or application is placed on screen, so it is highly dependent on placement.

Interactions: specific to digital audio, any of a wide variety of metrics that indicate how many users took an action in response to an ad message, and or the depth of that interaction.

Interactive advertising: all forms of online, wireless and interactive television advertising, including banners, sponsorships, e-mail, keyword searches, referrals, slotting fees, classified ads and interactive television commercials.

Internet: the worldwide system of computer networks providing reliable and redundant connectivity between disparate computers and systems by using common transport and data protocols known as TCP/IP.

Internet marketing: internet marketing, also known as web marketing, online marketing, webvertising, or e-marketing, is referred to as the marketing (generally promotion) of products or services over the internet.

Internet of things (IOT): proposed development of the internet in which everyday objects have network connectivity, allowing them to send and receive data. This includes everything from cellphones, smart watches, coffee makers, washing machines, headphones, lamps, wearable devices, thermostats, autos, and almost anything else.

Internet protocol: the internet protocol is the basis for addressing and routing packets across a network of networks. See IP address.

Interstitial video: video ads that appear between two content pages. Also known as transition ads, intermercial ads, and splash pages.

Interstitial: between-the-page ad units displayed as a user navigates from one web page to the next web page. The ad appears after the user leaves the initial page, but before the target page displays on the user’s screen. Typically, the ad is self-contained within its own browser window, but may also appear briefly as an overlay on the target page rather than in its own browser window. Also known as transition ads, intermercial ads and splash pages, also known as ‘between-the-page’

Intranet: a network based on TCP/IP protocols that belongs to an organization, usually a corporation, and is accessible only by the organization’s members, employees or others with authorization.

IP address: an IP address is the numerical address assigned to each computer on the internet so that its location and activities can be distinguished from those of other computers.

IP address generally refers to the ipv4 addresses, a 32-bit value represented as 4 blocks of 8-bit values separated by periods (dot-decimal notation). This will look like ##. ##. ##. ## with each number ranging from 0 through 255.

IP-based geo-targeting: IP-based geo-targeted advertising is delivered to a user’s geographic location as determined by his or her internet protocol (IP) address.

Java: a programming language designed for building applications on the internet. It allows for advanced features, increased animation detail and real-time updates. Small applications called java applets can be downloaded from a server and executed by java-compatible browsers like Microsoft internet explorer and Netscape navigator.

JavaScript libraries: a collection of pre-written code used to simplify development of web-based applications.

JPEG: standard web graphic file format that uses a compression technique to reduce graphic file sizes.

Jump page ad: microsite which is reached via click-through from button or banner ad. The jump page itself can list several topics, which are linked to either the advertiser’s site or the publisher’s site.

Junk email folder: a folder within an e-mail client or on an email service provider server that stores e-mail messages that are identified, either by the user or by an automated spam filter, as undesired or undesirable.

Key performance indicators (KPIs): business metric used to evaluate factors that are crucial to the success of an organization. KPIs differ based on the business and marketing focus. For example, KPIs could be net revenue or a customer loyalty metric. Also known as key success indicators (KSI).

Keyword: specific word(s) entered into a search engine by the user that result(s) in a list of web sites related to the key word. Keywords can be purchased by advertisers in order to embed ads linking to the advertiser’s site within search results (see search engine marketing.)

Keyword targeting: targeting content that contains specific keywords.

Kilobyte (KB): a multiple of the unit ‘byte’ for digital information, used to quantify computer memory or storage capacity equal to 1,000 bytes (or technically, 2^10 = 1,024 bytes). For the purposes of this document, this measure relates to creative file size. (see definition for byte).

LAN: a group of computers connected together (a network) at one physical location.

Latency: can be seen as:

• the time it takes for a data packet to move across a network connection
• the visible delay between request and display of content and ad. Latency sometimes leads to the user leaving the site prior to the opportunity to see.

In streaming media, latency can create stream degradation if it causes the packets, which must be received and played in order, to arrive out of order.

Lead generation: fees advertisers pay to internet advertising companies that refer qualified purchase inquiries (e.g., auto dealers which pay a fee in exchange for receiving a qualified purchase inquiry online) or provide consumer information (demographic, contact, and behavioral) where the consumer opts into being contacted by a marketer (email, postal, telephone, fax). These processes are priced on a performance basis (e.g., cost-per-action, -lead or -inquiry), and can include user applications (e.g., for a credit card), surveys, contests (e.g., sweepstakes) or registrations.

Linear video ads: experienced in-stream, which is presented before, between, or after the video content is consumed by the user. One of the key characteristics of linear video ads is the ad takes over the full view of the video.

Link: a clickable connection between two web sites. Formally referred to as a hyperlink.

Listserv: a mailing list comprised of e-mail addresses.

Log file: a file that records transactions that have occurred on the web server. Some of the types of data which are collected are: date/time stamp, URL served, IP address of requestor, status code of request, user agent string, previous URL of requestor, etc. Use of the extended log file format is preferable.

Longtail: coined by Chris Anderson in an article in Wired Magazine, and in a book and his book the long tail; used to describe a portion of a statistical graph depicting the far end of a demand curve; applied in the digital media industry in different ways, but most commonly refers to a class of websites that each individually garner very little traffic (yet, when aggregated via networks and exchanges, offers tremendous scale).

M-commerce: mobile commerce, the ability to conduct monetary transactions via a mobile device, such as a WAP-enabled cell phone.

Mailing list: an automatically distributed e-mail message on a particular topic going to certain individuals.

Media math: series of media-based calculations used to project out media impression-based investment measurements, including GRPs, CPAs, and TRPs.

Megabyte (MB): a multiple of the unit ‘byte’ for digital information, used to quantify computer memory or storage capacity equal to 1,000 kilobytes (or technically, 2^20 = 1,048,576 bytes). For the purposes of this document, this measure relates to creative file size. (see definition for byte)

Metadata: data that provides information about other data. This includes descriptions of the characteristics of information, such as quality, origin, context, content and structure.

Microsites: multi-page ads accessed via click-through from initial ad. The user stays on the publisher’s web site, but has access to more information from the advertiser than a display ad allows.

Microblogging: publishing very brief, spontaneous posts to a public website, usually via a mobile device or wirelessly connected laptop

Midroll: a linear video spot that appears in the middle of the video content. See preroll and post roll.

Minification: the practice of removing unnecessary characters from code to reduce its size, removing unnecessary spacing, and optimizing the CSS code; thus, improving load times.

Mobile/location-based targeting: refers to a way to target advertisements on mobile devices such as smartphones or feature phones, GPS receivers, tablets (such as iPad) and soon on many mobile laptops. On phones and tablets, such advertisements can appear in a mobile web browser or within an app. Geographic targeting information can come in the form of either a confirmed location or a derived location.

Modem: device which transfers digital signals to analog signals and vice versa suitable for sending across phone or cable lines.

Mouse-off: the act of a user moving the cursor away (off) from the hot spot of an ad. Mouse-off by a user may trigger an event, such as collapsing an expanding panel or stopping any animation in progress.

Mouse-over: the act of a user moving the cursor and resting it on the hot spot of an ad for at least one second. Mouse-over may trigger an event such as expanding the ad or initiating an animated sequence within the ad. This is of primary interest if the area is a hot spot, as this can initiate additional action after a specified timeout. Mouse-over may not initiate audio play. Sometimes referred to as rollover, hover.

Mp3: CODEC most commonly used for digital music online. Generic term for any digital music file, regardless of CODEC used to create or play it.

Mp4: a digital multimedia format used to store video and audio, but may also include features such as subtitles, chapter details, and other data related to the video or audio file. The filename extension for mpeg-4 files is .mp4.

Mpeg: a set of standards for audio and video compression and transmission established by the moving picture experts’ group.

NAI (Network Advertising Initiative): a cooperative group of network advertisers which has developed a set of privacy principles in conjunction with the federal trade commission. The NAI provides consumers with explanations of internet advertising practices and how they affect both consumers and the internet. See networkadvertising.org for more information.

Native advertising: a form of paid media where the ad experience follows the natural form and function of the user experience in which it is placed. These paid ads aspire to be so cohesive with the page content, assimilated into the design, and consistent with the platform behavior that the viewer simply feels that they belong.

Native video ad: a promoted video within one of the six IAB native core ads (i.e., in-feed unit, paid search unit, recommendation widget, promoted listing, in-ad with native elements, or custom/can’t be contained). The video includes a headline, description, and context for the ad.

Netiquette: a term that is used to describe the informal rules of conduct (do’s and don’ts) of online behavior.

Off-site measurement: when a site forwards its log files to an off-site web research service for analysis.

On-target percentage (OTP): percentage of the total campaign delivery that is within the advertiser’s campaign-defined goals.

Online behavioral advertising (OBA): a method for targeting digital advertising impressions to appear to an select audience of consumers based on their prior actions, those actions occurring either online or offline; also called behavioral targeting (BT)

Operating system: an operating system (OS) is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is a vital component of the system software in a computer system. Application programs require an operating system which are usually separate programs, but can be combined in simple systems. Example operating systems include Microsoft windows, apple iOS and macOS, and Linux.

Opt-in: refers to an individual giving a company permission to use data collected from or about the individual for a particular reason, such as to market the company’s products and services. See permission marketing.

Opt-in e-mail: lists of internet users who have voluntarily signed up to receive commercial e-mail about topics of interest.

Opt-out: when a company states that it plans to market its products and services to an individual unless the individual asks to be removed from the company’s mailing list.

Out of home (OOH): advertising placements that appear in public places; for example: billboards, airports, grocery stores, taxi cabs, bus stations, etc.

Over the top device (OTT): a device that can connect to a tv to facilitate the delivery of internet-based video content (i.e., streaming boxes, media streaming devices, gaming consoles).

Overlay: an overlay is a media element or ad unit that ‘floats’ above other content briefly when initiated. This could be text floating over video, or an expanding banner ad expanding over page content.

Overlay ad: a banner ad that appears in the bottom 20% of the video window. Click action initiates a linear video spot or takes the user to a website. Sold on a CPM and CPC basis.

Pace/pacing: the rate at which a digital ad campaign uses up its pre-set number of impressions (for a fixed/reserved campaign) or budget (for an auction-based/unreserved campaign); campaigns can pace evenly or unevenly.

Page: a document having a specific URL and comprised of a set of associated files. A page may contain text, images, and other online elements. It may be static or dynamically generated. It may be made up of multiple frames or screens, but should contain a designated primary object which, when loaded, is counted as the entire page.

Page: a document having a specific URL and comprised of a set of associated files. A page may contain text, images, and other online elements. It may be static or dynamically generated. It may be made up of multiple frames or screens, but should contain a designated primary object which, when loaded, is counted as the entire page.

Page view: when the page is actually seen by the user. Some platforms, like Facebook cache preview images for applications, which can mean that page views are not counted until a user clicks through to an application canvas page.

Paid media: any media that is paid for to drive traffic to owned media properties; you pay to boost your exposure through the channel.

Pay per click (PPC): an advertising pricing model in which advertisers pay agencies and/or media companies based on how many users clicked on an online ad or e-mail message through to their website. The amount paid per click through is arranged at the time of the insertion order and varies considerably. Higher pay per click rates recognize that there may be some no-click branding value as well as click through value provided. See CPC.

Pay-per-impression: an advertising pricing model in which advertisers pay based on how many users were served their ads. See CPM.

Pay-per-lead: an advertising pricing model in which advertisers pay for each sales lead generated. For example, an advertiser might pay for every visitor that clicked on an ad or site and successfully completed a form. See CPL

Pay-per-sale: an advertising pricing model in which advertisers pay agencies and/or media companies based on how many sales transactions were generated as a direct result of the ad. See CPS.

Performance metrics: the measurement of digital ad campaigns with action-based goals such as click-throughs, leads, downloads, sales, etc.

Performance pricing model: an advertising model in which advertisers pay based on a set of agreed upon performance criteria, such as a percentage of online revenues or delivery of new sales leads. See CPA, CPC, CPL, CPO, CPS, CPT.

Permission marketing: a term popularized by Seth Godin, whereby marketers obtain permission before advancing to the next step in the purchasing process. For example, asking permission to send email newsletters to prospective customers. It is mostly used by online marketers, notably email and search marketers, as well as certain direct marketers who send a catalog in response to a request.

Persistent cookie: cookies that remain a client hard drive until they expire (as determined by the website that set them) or are deleted by the end user.

Personally identifiable information (PII): user data that can be used to contact the user, either directly or through a lookup.User data that can be used to contact the user directly includes postal address and email address. User data that can be used, through a lookup, to contact the user includes SSN and other government issued ID numbers.Some user data that does not fit either of these criteria is commonly considered PII because it has a reasonable probability of resulting in the ability to contact the user. The archetype for this is the user’s full name. The intersection of large datasets with consistent cross-session identifiers are being increasingly shown to offer the opportunity to derive user contact details.

Pixel: a web beacon, also known as a web bug, 1 by 1 gif, invisible gif, and tracking pixel, is a tiny image referenced by a line of HTML or a block of JavaScript code embedded into a web site or third-party ad server to track activity.

The image used is generally a single pixel that is delivered to the web browser with HTML instructions that keep it from affecting the web site layout. The web beacon will typically include user information like cookies on the http headers, and web site information on the query string.

Web beacons are used to collect data for web site and ad delivery analytics, and also specific events such as a registration or conversion:

• Ad creative pixel – a web beacon embedded in an ad tag which calls a web server for the purpose of tracking that a user has viewed a particular ad.
• Conversion pixel – a web beacon that transmits to a third-party server that a user has successfully completed a process such as purchase or registration.
• Piggyback pixel – a web beacon that embeds additional web beacons not directly placed on the publisher page.
• Secure pixel – a web beacon that is delivered over https.

Pixel (as a unit of measure): the smallest unit of measure for graphical elements in digital imagery, used as the standard unit of measure for ad creative (i.e. 300×250 pixels). Pixels may also represent x/y coordinates relevant to a given space, such as the browser window, an application workspace or the user’s computer screen. (see also tracking pixel)

Plan: the tangible nuts and bolts about how a strategy will be implemented. It is the difference between strategic and tactical.

POE: acronym for paid, owned, and earned media.

Point of awareness (POA): allocating media placements that enhance audience awareness and interest in an advertisers’ brand, product, or service.

Point of purchase (POP): the moment when a consumer is about to buy something; often times advertisers will place an ad or a special offer to increase the pending purchase

Point of sale (POS): allocating media placements that enhance audience desire to purchase that product or service.

Point of view (POV) reports: focus on selecting the best media vehicles for a business or organization to use in promoting its products, services, or causes, and helps their clients evaluate advertising options. These reports analyze a media outlet, such as a blog or magazine, to see if the client’s target market will be served by advertising in that vehicle.

Pop-under ad: ad that appears in a separate window beneath an open window. Pop-under ads are concealed until the top window is closed, moved, resized or minimized.

Pop-up ad: any advertising experience where visiting a website in an initial browser window initiates a secondary browser window to deliver an ad impression directly above the initial browser window.

Pop-up transitional: initiates play in a separate ad window during the transition between content pages. Continues while content is simultaneously being rendered. Depending primarily on line-speed, play of a transitional ad may finish before or after content rendering is completed.

Portable document format (PDF): is a digital file format originally developed by Adobe used to represent documents independently of software, operating system, and hardware. The PDF files are designed to contain all information needed to consistently present text, fonts, graphics, and other elements to the user.

Portal: a web site that often serves as a starting point for a web user’s session. It typically provides services such as search, directory of web sites, news, weather, e-mail, homepage space, stock quotes, sports news, entertainment, telephone directory information, area maps, and chat or message boards.

Post roll: a linear video spot that appears after the video content completes. See preroll and midroll.

Preroll: a preroll video ad is an in-stream video ads that occurs before the video content the user has requested. See also post roll and midroll.

Privacy policy: a statement about what information is being collected; how the information being collected is being used; how an individual can access his/her own data collected; how the individual can optout; and what security measures are being taken by the parties collecting the data.

Programmatic: media or ad buying that uses technology to automate and optimize, in real time, the ad buying process. This ultimately serves targeted and relevant experiences to consumers across channels. On the back end, algorithms filter ad impressions derived from consumer behavioral data, which allows advertisers to define budget, goal, and attribution and optimize for reduced risk while increasing ROI.

Psychographic: values, attitudes, and lifestyles that answer questions such as what motivates your customers to buy your products and services. What are their key values? What are their hobbies and habits?

Publisher: an individual or organization that prepares, issues, and disseminates content for public distribution or sale via one or more media.

Purchase: the user activity of completing an e-commerce transaction.

Push advertising: pro-active, partial screen, dynamic advertisement which comes in various formats.

Push down banners: push down banners are banners that push website content down while expanding the banner to show more advertising space. They are usually triggered by either rolling over the banner, clicking the banner, or sometimes autoload once the website loads. Users then click a custom designed close button to minimize the banner.

Push down: an IAB rising star ad unit template designed for rich interaction in a space similar to, but larger than, an expanding leaderboard. This unit has initial dimensions of 970×90 pixels and expanded dimensions of 970×415 pixels. When the ad is expanded, it pushes the page content down rather than displaying over the top of page content as most expandable ads do.

Quartile reporting: refers to whether the video played to its 25% and 75% points.

Reach: (1) unique users that visited the site over the course of the reporting period, expressed as a percent of the universe for the demographic category; also called unduplicated audience or (2) the total number of unique users who will be served a given ad.

Real time bidding (RTB): 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.

Real-time: events that happen live at a particular moment. When one chats in a chat room, or sends an instant message, one is interacting in real time.

Referring URL: the address of the webpage that a user previously visited prior to following a link.

Repeat visitor: unique visitor who has accessed a web site more than once over a specific time period.

Replays: refers to the number of times a user requested to see the video ad again (where available).

Resolution: the quality of an image or video file often determined by the number of pixels displayed on the screen and usually noted as a pixel width and height dimension. However, resolution can be measured in a number of ways and considers pixel aspect ratio, pixel density, and other factors that determine the viewing quality of the file.

Responsive design: a web design method that enables content (including advertising) to resize, reformat, reorganize and/or reposition itself in real-time so that it looks good and functions appropriately no matter what screen it’s been viewed on

Retargeting: the use of a pixel tag or other code to enable a third-party to recognize particular users outside of the domain from which the activity was collected. See creative retargeting, site retargeting.

Return on ad spend (ROAS): a metric used by advertisers to measure how much revenue they earned that can be attributed to the expense of an ad campaign

Return visits: the average number of times a user returns to a site over a specific time period.

Rich media: advertisements with which users can interact (as opposed to solely animation) in a web page format that are more elaborate than the usual banner ad. These advertisements can be used either singularly or in combination with various technologies, including but not limited to sound, video, or flash, and with programming languages such as java, JavaScript, and DHTML. Rich media guidelines cover standard web applications including e-mail, static (e.g. HTML) and dynamic (e.g. Asp) web pages, and may appear in ad formats such as banners and buttons as well as transitionals and various over-the-page units such as floating ads, page take-overs, and tear-backs. Today, the term is often used for banner ads with popup menus that let the visitor select a particular page to link to on the advertiser’s site. Rich media ads are generally more challenging to create and to serve. Some early studies have shown that rich media ads tend to be more effective than ordinary animated banner ads.

Roadblock: a roadblock ad in digital marketing is a full screen ad that is displayed before any page content. This ad type is similar to a pre-roll in digital video advertising.The roadblock ad is very similar to the interstitial ad. However, the roadblock occurs before the first page of content, while the interstitial occurs between pages during user interaction with the site.

RODI (return on digital investment): the bottom line on how successful a digital ad or campaign was in terms of what the returns (generally sales revenue) were for the money expended (invested).

ROI (return on investment): net profit divided by investment.

RTB: the RTB acronym indicates a real-time system for either bidding on or buying ad inventory. The initial RTB ecosystems evolved from the efforts of DSPs to create a more efficient exchange of inventory. Due to these roots, RTB ecosystems put significant emphasis on user information (demographic and behavioral data, for example), while discounting the situation information (the publisher and context).

Run of network (RON): a run of network ad is one that is placed to run on all sites within a given network of sites at the ad networks own discretion, according to available inventory. Ad sales firms handle run of network insertion orders in such a way as to optimize results for the buyer consistent with higher priority ad commitments. The advertiser usually forgoes premium positioning in exchange for more advertising weight at a lower CPM.

Run of site (ROS): a run-of-site ad is one that is placed to rotate on all non-featured ad spaces across an entire site. CPM rates for run of site ads are usually less than rates for purchase of specific site sub-sections or sponsorships.

Search: fees advertisers pay internet companies to list and/or link their company site or domain name to a specific search word or phrase (includes paid search revenues). Search categories include:

• Paid listings: text links appear at the top or side of search results for specific keywords. The more a marketer pays, the higher the position it gets. Marketers only pay when a user clicks on the text link.
• Contextual search: text links appear in an article based on the context of the content, instead of a user-submitted keyword. Payment only occurs when the link is clicked.
• Paid inclusion: guarantees that a marketer’s URL is indexed by a search engine. The listing is determined by the engine’s search algorithms.

Search click: A click originating from a list of links returned by a query to a search engine.

Search engine: A website that provides a searchable index of online content, whereby users enter keywords describing what they are seeking and the website returns links related to this search query.

Search retargeting: A method that enables advertisers to show an ad specifically to visitors based one or more searches or search click events.

Search click: A click originating from a list of links returned by a query to a search engine.

Search engine: A website that provides a searchable index of online content, whereby users enter keywords describing what they are seeking and the website returns links related to this search query.

Search retargeting: A method that enables advertisers to show an ad specifically to visitors based one or more searches or search click events.

Session: (1) a sequence of internet activity made by one user at one site. If a user makes no request from a site during a 30-minute period of time, the next content or ad request would then constitute the beginning of a new visit or (2) a series of transactions performed by a user that can be tracked across successive web sites. For example, in a single session, a user may start on a publisher’s web site, click on an advertisement and then go to an advertiser’s web site and make a purchase. See visit.

Session cookies: these are temporary and are erased when the browser exits at the end of a web surfing session. See cookie.

Share of voice (SOV): the percentage of ad space on a page that is filled by a single brand; for example, if only one brand has ads appearing on a webpage, then that brand has 100% SOV

Site index: the percentage of an overall desired audience that a website reaches; calculated by % of composition of a site divided by the % composition of the base audience, then multiplied by 100, so: (site comp ÷ audience comp) x 100 = site index; a site index of 100 is average, so for example, if a site indexes at 120, then they are 20% above the average

Site map: a model of a website’s content designed to help both users and search engines navigate the site. A site map can be a hierarchical list of pages (with links) organized by topic, an organization chart, or an xml document that provides instructions to search engine crawl bots.

Site retargeting: a method that enables advertisers to show an ad specifically to previous site visitors when they are on third-party web sites.

Skins: customized and interchangeable sets of graphics, which allow internet users to continually change the look of their desktops or browsers, without changing their settings or functionality. Skins are a type of marketing tool.

SME: acronym for subject matter experts.

SMS (short message service): standard for sending and receiving short (160 character) text messages via mobile handsets.

SMTP (simple mail transfer protocol): the protocol used to transfer email.

Sniffer: software that detects capabilities of the user’s browser (looking for such things as java capabilities, plug-ins, screen resolution, and bandwidth).

Social marketing: marketing tactic that taps into the growth of social networks, encouraging users to adopt and pass along widgets or other content modules created by a brand, or to add a brand to the user’s social circle of friends.

Social network: an online destination that gives users a chance to connect with one or more groups of friends, facilitating sharing of content, news, and information among them. Examples of social networks include Facebook and LinkedIn.

Spam: term describing unsolicited commercial email.

Spam filter: software built into email gateways as well as e-mail client applications designed to identify and remove unsolicited commercial messages from incoming email before the end user sees them.

Spider: a web crawler (also known as an automatic indexer, bot, web spider, web robot) is a software program which visits web pages in a methodical, automated manner. This process is called web crawling or spidering, and the resulting data is used for various purposes, including building indexes for search engines, validating that ads are being displayed in the appropriate context, and detecting malicious code on compromised web servers.

Stickiness: a measure used to gauge the effectiveness of a site in retaining individual users. Stickiness is usually measured by the duration of the visit.

Streaming: technology that permits continuous audio and video delivery to a device from a remote website. Also, can refer to an internet data transfer technique that allows the user to see and hear audio and video files. The host or source compresses, then streams small packets of information over the internet to the user, who can access the content as it is received.

SWF: acronym for Shockwave Flash™. .swf is the file naming extension used for animated files complied using Adobe Flash™ software. HTML cannot execute .swf files without the browser-installed flash player plug-in. For this reason, many content and ad providers are moving to the HTML5 format for more efficient execution of interactive media files.

Tags: software code that an advertiser provides to a publisher or ad network that calls the advertiser’s ad server for the purposes of displaying an advertisement.

Target audience: the intended audience for an ad, usually defined in terms of specific demographics (age, sex, income, etc.) Product purchase behavior, product usage or media usage.

Target rating point (TRP): a term used in traditional advertising to measure the size of an audience reached by a specific media vehicle or schedule; it is the product of the percentage of the target audience reached by an advertisement, times the frequency they see it in a given campaign (frequency × % reached). For example, a television ad that is aired 5 times reaching 50% of the target audience each time it is aired would have a TRP of 250 (5 × 50%)

Target region: refers to targeting a specific geographic area or groupings on a state, DMA, or hyper-local level.

Targeted advertisement: an advertisement that is shown only to users exhibiting specific attributes or in a specific context or at a particular time of day.

Targeted ratings point (TRP): the percentage of an advertiser’s target audience that sees its commercials, advertisements, or campaign. Typically, advertising is bought against a guaranteed demographic or audience segment. The TRP expresses that guaranteed audience.

Tracking assets: a metric specific to mobile advertising, any piece of content associated with an ad or the page on which an ad appears that is designated to serve as the trigger by which the ad is counted. The content that serves as a tracking asset often may be, but is not limited to, a 1×1 pixel image, a 302-redirect, a JavaScript code, or the ad itself.

Tracking pixel: a 1×1 pixel-sized transparent image that provides information about an ad’s placement. In many cases, a tracking pixel is used to notify an ad tracking system that either an ad has been served (or not served, in some cases) or that a specific webpage has been accessed. Also known as: beacon, web beacon, action tag, redirect, etc.

Traffic: the flow of data over a network, or visitors to a web site

Unique browser: an identified and unduplicated cookied browser that accesses internet content or advertising during a measurement period. This definition requires taking account for the potentially inflationary impact of cookie deletion among certain of the cookied browsers that access internet content.

Unique cookie: a count of unique identifiers…that represents unduplicated instances of internet activity (generally visits) to internet content or advertising during a measurement period.

Unique device: an unduplicated computing device that is used to access internet content or advertising during a measurement period. A count of unduplicated devices necessarily accounts for multiple browser usage on an individual computer or other computing device.

Unique visitors: unique individual or browser which has accessed a site or application and has been served unique content and/or ads such as e-mail, newsletters, interstitials or pop-under ads. Unique visitors can be identified by user registration, cookies, or third-party measurement like Comscore or Nielsen. Reported unique visitors should filter out bots. See iab.net for the audience reach measurement guidelines.

URL (uniform resource locator): the unique identifying address of any particular page on the web. It contains all the information required to locate a resource, including its protocol (usually http), server domain name (or IP address), file path (directory and name) and format (usually HTML or CGI).

URL tagging: the process of embedding unique identifiers into URLs contained in HTML content. These identifiers are recognized by web servers on subsequent browser requests. Identifying visitors through information in the URLs should also allow for an acceptable calculation of visits, if caching is avoided.

User: an individual with access to the web.

User initiated: the willful act of a user to engage with an ad. Users may interact by clicking on the ad and/or rolling over an ad (or a portion of an ad). When a user engages the ad using a rollover action, the user’s cursor must rest on the hotspot for at least one second before any action may be initiated in the ad.

User initiation: the willful act of a user to engage with an ad. Detailed guidance is provided in the IAB New Ad Portfolio document. Users may interact by a discrete device action like clicking on the ad, and/or tapping over an ad (or a portion of an ad). Rollover is not a valid user initiation action.

User registration: information contributed by an individual which usually includes characteristics such as the person’s age, gender, zip code and often much more. A site’s registration system is usually based on an id code or password to allow the site to determine the number of unique visitors and to track a visitor’s behavior within that site.

Video (aka digital video): in online advertising, the digital recording of a physical event or animated files that have been transcribed into a digital video format.

Video ad: a video ad is an advertisement that contains video. There are several different types of video ads: in-banner video ads, in-page video ads, in-stream video ads and non-linear video ads

Video ad completion rate (VCR): the percentage of all video ads that play through their entire duration to completion. Also known as view through rate (VTR) and video completion rate (VCR). Not to be confused with the videocassette recorder.

Video ad serving template (vast): a framework for serving ads to a video player. The specification also describes expected player behavior for executing ads that are supplied using vast. The interaction between the ad and the player is unidirectional, meaning that once the player receives the vast tag no other interactions are possible except for the activation of select tracking beacons at appropriate times during ad playback. Provides a standardized method for communicating the status of a video ad back to the ad servers in the case where the ad is served from a dynamically selected ad server. It is specifically designed for on-demand video player where the ad response is parsed prior to play. Vast is applicable to linear video ads (such as pre-rolls), non-linear video ads (such as overlays) and companion ads as defined in the IAB digital video ad format guidelines.

Video completion: when a video ad runs all the way through to the end

Video on demand (VOD): video content that is controlled, enabled, and consumed whenever a viewer wants after its official release date or original air date and time. VOD content can be found on set top boxes, OTT devices, mobile web, mobile apps, and video streaming services.

Video player: a video player is a computer program that translates data into video for viewing.

Video player ad interface (VPAID): the protocol between the ad and the video player required that enables ad interactivity and other advanced video advertising functionality. VPAID offers bilateral (two-way) communication between the ad and the video player, and meets the needs of emerging in-stream formats such as nonlinear video ads and interactive linear video ads.

View-through: when a consumer sees a brand’s ad, does not click on it, and then later visits that brand’s website

Viewability: a term used to describe whether or not a digital media ever appeared in the space within a webpage that was in view to the viewer – for example, when a viewer opens his browser and goes to a website, most often the webpage is longer than the browser window, so the viewer must scroll to continue reading down the page; if an ad never scrolls into that viewable space it is not considered viewable.

IAB and MRC standards for measuring and buying digital impressions that must meet the following minimum criteria:

• pixel requirement: greater than or equal to 50% of the pixels in the advertisement were on an in-focus browser tab on the viewable space of the browser page, and

• time requirement: the time the pixel requirement is met was greater than or equal to one continuous second, post ad render.

• video time requirement: to qualify for counting as a viewable video ad impression, it is required that 2 continuous seconds of the video advertisement is played, meeting the same pixel requirement of 50%.

Viewer: person viewing content or ads on the web. There is currently no way to measure viewers.

Viral marketing: (1) any advertising that propagates itself or (2) advertising and/or marketing techniques that spread like a virus by getting passed on from consumer to consumer and market to market.

Viral video: online video clips (typically short and humorous) passed via links from one person to another.

Virtual world: three-dimensional computerized environments that multiple users can explore and interact with via avatars, characters representing themselves. Online games like world of Warcraft take place in virtual worlds, but the term is often used to define services that are open-ended and geared for socializing, as opposed to the more goal-oriented environments of online games.

Visit: a single continuous set of activity attributable to a cookied browser or user (if registration-based or a panel participant) resulting in one or more pulled texts and/or graphics downloads from a site. Click here for IAB’s ad campaign measurement guidelines.

Visit duration: the length of time the visitor is exposed to a specific ad, web page or web site during a single session.

Visitor: individual or browser which accesses a web site within a specific time period.

WAN (wide area network): connectivity between a number of computers not located at the same physical location.

WAP (wireless application protocol): a specification for a set of communication protocols to standardize the way that wireless devices, such as cellular mobile telephones, PDAs and others access and browse internet-based content.

WASP (wireless applications service provider): an organization that provides content and applications for wireless devices.

Web beacon: a web beacon, also known as a web bug, 1 by 1 gif, invisible gif, and tracking pixel, is a tiny image referenced by a line of HTML or a block of JavaScript code embedded into a web site or third-party ad server to track activity. The image used is generally a single pixel that is delivered to the web browser with HTML instructions that keep it from affecting the web site layout. The web beacon will typically include user information like cookies on the http headers, and web site information on the query string. Web beacons are used to collect data for web site and ad delivery analytics, and also specific events such as a registration or conversion:

• Ad creative pixel: a web beacon embedded in an ad tag which calls a web server for the purpose of tracking that a user has viewed a particular ad.
• Conversion pixel: a web beacon that transmits to a third-party server that a user has successfully completed a process such as purchase or registration.
• Piggyback pixel: a web beacon that embeds additional web beacons not directly placed on the publisher page.
• Secure pixel: a web beacon that is delivered over https.

Web bug: see web beacon

Web crawler: a web crawler (also known as an automatic indexer, bot, web spider, web robot) is a software program which visits web pages in a methodical, automated manner. This process is called web crawling or spidering, and the resulting data is used for various purposes, including building indexes for search engines, validating that ads are being displayed in the appropriate context, and detecting malicious code on compromised web servers.

Many web crawlers will politely identify themselves via their user-agent string, which provides a reliable way of excluding a significant amount of non-human traffic from advertising metrics. The IAB (in conjunction with ABCE) maintains a list of known user-agent strings as the spiders and bots list. However, those web crawlers attempting to discover malicious code often must attempt to appear to be human traffic, which requires secondary, behavioral filtering to detect. Most web crawlers will respect a file called robots.txt, hosted in the root of a web site. This file informs the web crawler which directories should and shouldn’t be indexed, but does not enact any actual access restrictions. Technically, a web crawler is a specific type of bot, or software agent.See bot and intelligent agents.

WEBM: WEBM is a video file format. It is primarily intended to offer a royalty-free alternative to use in the HTML5 video tag. The development of the format is sponsored by Google, and the corresponding software is distributed under a BSD license.

Website: a website, also written as web site, web site, or simply site, is a set of related web pages containing content (media), including text, video, music, audio, images, etc. It is the virtual location (domain) for an organization’s or individual’s presence on the web. A website is hosted on at least one web server, accessible via the internet through an address known as a uniform resource locator. All publicly accessible websites collectively constitute the web.

Wifi: any of a family of wireless IAN data standards (ieee 802.11) used fairly ubiquitously for corporate and home connectivity. Also available as hotspots in public areas such as cafes and airport terminals, either for free or for a one-time use charge or subscription fee.

Widget: a small application designed to reside on a pc desktop (mac OS x or windows vista) or within a web-based portal or social network site (e.g., myspace or Facebook) offering useful or entertaining functionality to the end user.

web (WWW): a system of interconnected internet pages; commonly referred to as the collective existence of sites on the internet; the initials www usually precedes a website name in its URL address

XML (extensible markup language): a richer more dynamic successor to HTML utilizing SGML or HTML type tags to structure information. XML is used for transferring data and creating applications on the web. See SGML and HTML.

Yield: the percentage of clicks vs. impressions on an ad within a specific page. Also called ad click rate.

Yield and revenue management: please see yield management.

Yield management: yield and revenue management are the process of understanding, anticipating and influencing advertiser and consumer behavior in order to maximize profits through better selling, pricing, packaging and inventory management, while delivering value to advertisers and site users.

Z-index: enumerated layers of elements and content on a publisher’s webpage. Consideration of the z-element in page content design such as navigation, imagery, and ads are important for providing a seamless experience when page content overlaps (i.e. An expanding ad with a z-index that is lower [on the z-index scale] than navigational elements may give the appearance that page navigational elements are showing through the expanded portions of the ad).