Advertising inextricably links art and data. One can’t stand without the other, presenting a house-of-cards if one is out of synch.

While digital advertising is on the rise, viewability issues threatened to discredit the medium. Marketers have spent upwards of $10 billion annually -- about a third of total paid content -- on ads that never saw the light of a pupil, unviewable because the content didn’t load properly and other structural problems.

As the Media Rating Council (MRC) readied to launch a new, more rigorous set of viewability measurement standards, it needed to scale the mountain of industry acceptance and adoption. Talking measurement is mundane so it had to be done in a way that would compel advertisers to take notice and more importantly, take action.

Using quirky 30-second video PSAs shared through social, 3MS and the MRC changed the conversation around viewability. The films used simple allegories about failed message delivery – a graffiti artist using white-on-white, a banner ad over a winter beach – then directed viewers to a new website to learn more about adopting the standards. PSAs and earned articles – bylines, interviews and features – were amplified through social channels to spark conversation, using #viewability and #measurementnow.

With no paid media, the campaign secured 1.1 billion impressions, reaching 3.7 million ad professionals through social and 882 articles, and interviews and bylines in publications such as Ad Week, Advertising Age, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Media Post, Forbes, and Digiday.

At the campaign core was a series of 30-second video PSAs featuring allegories about failed message delivery shared through social channels of 3MS advertising consortium members including The American Association of Advertising Agencies (4A’s), Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). We created #viewability and #measurementnow to infiltrate industry conversation and lead ad professionals to a new website http://measurementnow.net as the go-to resource to for the new standards. Tremor Video, a large ad platform, donated inventory to run video on its network of premium sites (including the Wall Street Journal and New York Times) for three weeks.

The campaign propelled viewability to the front of the industry’s consciousness.

With no paid media budget, the campaign secured 1.1 billion impressions, reaching 3.7 million advertising people and leading to 18 ad-tech companies – from Google and Microsoft to comScore, Integral Ad Science and Yahoo – accredited to date.

PSA views totaled 3,796. The campaign website drew 137,599 page views, while social posts totaled 320.

Digital fueled earned media, resulting in 882 articles and bylines and 30+ executive interviews in publications like Ad Week, Advertising Age, Agency Post, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Media Post, Forbes, and Digiday.