• by Wayne Friedman , November 14, 2014

Traditional TV programmers will take heart from research showing that new digital platforms are still witnessing strong completed views of commercials. All that might yield an even greater hold on valuable digital video inventory.

A FreeWheel report says third-quarter completion rates for long-form messaging in programming — half-hour comedies and hour drama programming and the like — is at 90% for 30-second commercials, with 15-second commercials doing a bit better at 92%.

For short-length and mid-length programming — not necessarily content from big TV media companies — the results are somewhat worse. There is a 78% completion rate for 30-second commercials and 76% for 15-second commercials for mid-length programming; and 74% for 30-second commercials and 71% for 15-second commercials for short-length programming.

TV programmers/publishers know the value of this video inventory. Freewheel says the share of programmer video advertising views moving through digital ad networks and exchanges dropped this quarter to 4.6% from 4.9% last quarter, and from 4.7% in Q3 2013.

Freewheel says: “We believe that publishers will continue to limit the amount of inventory monetized through these channels due to conflicts with direct sales goals, inabilities to support compliance, and inconsistent fill rates.

"Marketers are cautious about buying from these channels due to fears around quality of inventory, which include content quality, viewability, traffic fraud and brand safety on long-tail sites.”

"Young woman watching TV on laptop" photo from Shutterstock.