Everyone has an opinion on CPMs these days, and most of them are pretty strong. This week, Chief Media Officer Catherine Walstad and Chief Analytics Officer Matt Hultgren weigh in on whether low CPMs always mean low quality.
Advertisers lose roughly 43 cents of every dollar spent in dull media environments.
Across 115,000 biometric ad views and 190 campaigns, "The Eye Watering Cost of Dull Media" found that optimizing for low CPMs alone pushes buyers toward low-attention inventory. That meant a 37% decrease in brand conversion and a 14% decrease in long-term ROI.
What CPM can and can’t tell you
Should marketers stop buying media on CPM?
No. But they should stop buying media on only CPM. CPM tells you the price of reach, and reach powers advertising. Ditch it, and you lose the ability to know if you're buying efficiently. The problem is when CPM becomes the only proxy for quality.
So why does the "low CPM = bad media" belief exist?
Because a lot of marketers got burned. They chased cheap digital inventory and ended up with autoplay videos, tiny placements, and ads that vanished before anyone saw them. The trouble is that this logic doesn't apply equally across every channel.
Where does the low-CPM criticism actually hold up?
In digital, it's often valid. Inventory is essentially infinite online, which means you can manufacture impressions almost anywhere. Low CPMs in that environment can absolutely land you in zero-attention placements. But TV inventory is finite, curated, and regulated. Viewers chose to sit down and watch. A low CPM there isn't a warning sign.
What does high-quality media actually look like?
Here are three things to look for when evaluating media quality:
1. Attention. Is the ad appearing where people will actually watch it?
2. Incremental reach. Are you reaching new audiences, or hitting the same people over and over?
3. Business outcomes. Is it moving the needle on sales, site visits or brand awareness?
If the answer to all three is yes, that's quality media.
Then what role should CPM actually play?
Think of it as the entry gate. It filters efficiency before you're even in the game. Once you're through, layer in reach, frequency, response rates, and outcomes. Sometimes that process will lead your CPM upward, toward pockets with higher response rates. That's fine. The goal is the CPM that produces the strongest result.
“What's Holding TV Back: Culture, Not Effectiveness”
This piece by Elliot Wright responds to Peter Field's research showing TV consistently outperforms digital on attention metrics and argues the real barrier to TV investment is more about perception than performance.
“Cost is more important than quality but quality is the best way to reduce cost.”
— Dr. Genichi Taguchi
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