Why TopRoll might be the solution to mobile advertising’s elephant in the room

Into this mediocre mix of banners and pop-ups, the loss of engagement from consumer endless scrolling, and those infernal auto-play ads - enter the media and creative solutions specialist, Sublime. It has announced the launch of a pioneering new video ad format for mobile devices, TopRoll offering both premium video and fully viewable completion – a truly viewable ad unit.

Available in managed service and programmatic, TopRoll – which is currently patent-pending - was the end result of an in-house competition at Sublime, aimed at solving the problem of one of modern life’s real irritants: creative mobile ad formats are too often not-compatible with the contexts into which they are served.

TopRoll is an immersive video, which both adheres to the standards set by the Coalition for Better Ads and offers a more seamless integration within publishers’ websites. Crucially, it is intuitive – which really does distinguish it from traditional mobile ad formats.

It starts – as others do – as a video top banner. An icon invites users to discover the rest of the ad in full screen mode. Uniquely, as users scroll up the ad gets progressively bigger until appearing in maximum full screen. As users scroll down, it becomes progressively smaller.

TopRoll pauses when Sublime decides that it is no longer viewable. This means that it can tat 100% of completed impressions are viewable based on MRC and IAB standards. It can also be bought by a variety of methods (managed service, programmatic and programmatic guaranteed) and models (CPM, Cost Per Completed View and Viewable Cost Per View).

Unsurprisingly, this VAST and VPaid compatible solution claims a viewability rate of higher than 90% and a VTR (View -Through-Rate) over 65% for 15 seconds length, exceeding all industry benchmarks.

And it can host any video ratio. Which means brands can reuse assets that may have been originally created for television. It also works with vertical video, which is pregnant with possibility if one believes the rumours ahead of the launch of the new iPhone. Regardless, TopRoll works seamlessly with landscape video of all ratios.

All of this is set to matter even more as the death of the third-party cookie looms ever larger and Device ID becomes even more significant, allowing advertisers to track users on their mobile devices and link them to data from their connected televisions, desktops and other digital devices.

“With TopRoll, our new patent pending technology, we can guarantee brands and agencies that their audiences are truly seeing video ads” said Emir Teffaha, managing director, UK of Sublime.” “As the ad pauses when it is no longer viewable, we can guarantee that 100% of completed impressions are viewable, thus ensuring a really qualitative VTR. We believe our new solution is a game changer for the industry as a whole and this is how mobile video is going to make a real impact for branding campaigns.”

And, as sales of 5G devices continue to grow exponentially - with 424 million sales expected by 2023 – and mobile video becomes the ubiquitous medium, we can no longer ignore the elephant in the room. The potential for better creative solutions like TopRoll is as self-evident as the need is clear. It is not before time.

To try out the TopRoll on your mobile, please get the QR code here.