Outdoor ASIA - July 2018

August 2018^13

MEDIA MATTERS

throughout the day. It also gives us the ability to
measure variances in audiences throughout the day,
throughout the week, and throughout the year.

Utilising the available data, we are now able to measure
OOH advertising exposure in granular time increments.
Last year, we were able to release data by the hour,
which was the first time our membership was exposed
to hourly population-level impressions. Additionally, we
are incorporating more than 10,000 different audience
segments to help make OOH plans more targeted.

What is Geo-data and how does it support traditional
OOH?

There are three major sources of location data being
used at scale in advertising research to understand
audience.

The first is carrier data, being gathered by telecom
operators by interpreting cellular signals using a process
called trilateration. Hundreds of observed locations for
each device can be gathered each day. Information is
very accurate, but location precision may be a hundred
meters. There are very, very, very specific government
regulations around the use cases, aggregate reporting
levels, privacy protection, and security and handling of
location data from carriers.

The second source is through applications or SDKs.
These use the core location services of a mobile
device’s operating system to pinpoint location using
relevant sensors (GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth, accelerometer,
magnetometer, barometer). Useful location context
is provided to the application and then often shared
back with a central server. Data from applications can
be very accurate and very precise, but the number of

observations per device per day can vary greatly and

occurs intermittently depending upon the app functions

and number of apps installed and permissions/consent

from the user.

The third is bid-stream. When an ad is requested and

delivered to a mobile device, either in an app or on a

publisher website in a browser, there is the option of

providing the location of the device in that bid request.

This type of data has widely varying levels of accuracy

and precision due to each publisher’s priorities. Another

challenge with bid-stream data is that it is incredibly

intermittent, and some devices have many observations

per day while others are observed only once or twice a

month.

After vetting Bid-Stream Data, we found it to be too

imprecise, inconsistent, and ultimately inadequate to

be utilised as part of our sophisticated measurement

solution. Instead, our Geopath Insights Suite includes

a variety of data sources that allow us to achieve the

precision and scale needed to measure OOH exposure

across the entire United States. These data sources

include multiple types of mobile data – specifically

carrier data and GPS data. The location data resources

that feed into Geopath Audience Measurement are

curated by our partners at AirSage. Their relationships

with mobile carriers and mobile location data companies

allow them to build a diversified data resource that

can be leveraged to understand aggregate population

movement in a precise yet responsible way.

How do you get industry-wide acceptance of the

solutions that you take to the market?

The drive for acceptance and adoption is an ongoing

initiative and certainly one of the most crucial. We

have a large number of OOH companies in the US, with

“There is a great opportunity

for our member companies to

understand how to tell better

stories about the consumers in

their markets based upon the

data and insights”