• by Philip Rosenstein , September 9, 2016

According to Wise Data Media, the Democratic and Republican conventions in July strongly impacted fill rates and overall CPMs in certain regional digital ad markets. Data from media buys made on the Wise Data platform showed fill rates increased more than 20% in Ohio and Pennsylvania, where the GOP and Democratic conventions were held respectively.

In Ohio, Wise saw fill rates of 42% prior to the conventions. The rate increased to 56% during the GOP convention and up to 70% during the Democratic one. Similarly, Pennsylvania fill rates through Wise’s platform were at 55% before the conventions, 65% during the GOP event and spiked to 87% during the Democratic one.

CPM rates were also significantly impacted. Wise was experiencing average CPM rates of $1.36 in Ohio pre-conventions. That dropped to $1.25 during the GOP convention and to $1.11 during the Democratic one. In Pennsylvania, the CPMs fell from $1.32 to $1.24 during the GOP convention and to $1.11 during the Democratic event.

“In the next upcoming months until November 8, our forecast is that there will be significant growth in the numbers due to high interest and primary focus from the audience as well as from the publishers,” said Tomer Sade, CEO of Wise Data Media.

“The high rate of impressions and low CPMs in comparison to the average for both throughout the year shows the benefits of ad campaigning during the elections -- even more specifically, benefits during campaign events,” he stated.

Other insights from Wise’s platform data:

• Florida, Illinois and Pennsylvania (three states that President Obama won in 2012) had the highest growth rate of impressions during the Democratic convention.

• Available ad space increased 50% in Pennsylvania during the Democratic convention.

• CNN App downloads peaked in July 2016, with the most downloads of all news apps

• CNN.com was the most popular news domain in July. During the Democratic convention, ad spaces increased by 40 million.