CPM is an acronym for "Cost per Impression", or more succinctly "Cost per Thousand Ad Impressions". An online ad impression is a single appearance of an advertisement on a web page. This pricing model is often associated with branded advertisers who desire the broadest reach for their advertisements with less of an emphasis on a click or a desired action or sale.

CPM is still a very popular and viable pricing model for online advertising. For advertisers, CPM rates have fallen in the last year or two as other pricing models have gained favor with advertisers. This has made CPM advertising with premium placements on premium sites actually more affordable. Premium inventory on major, heavily-branded websites are still very much en vogue under a CPM pricing model. Depending on the advertiser or agency, there is little to no focus on any performance aspect of a CPM campaign; the emphasis is on broad reach to as many potential targeted eyeballs as possible. A good offline analogy is a bus station billboard or an advertisement in Times Square which reaches millions of people per day but isn’t necessarily tied directly to sales stemming from the advertisement.

Contact our Sales team today with questions or inquiries regarding CPM advertising!

1. CPM advertising is only for huge, top-tier advertisers that have more money than direct response advertisers and care less about attributing sales to a specific ad.

Fact: No individual advertiser is the same as another. Many direct response advertisers will run a CPM campaign when they re-brand their company or need to reach the "targeted masses" in a cost-effective manner.

2. CPM advertising requires no thought or planning, advertisements are able to just run anywhere since they’re not tied to performance (a click or sale).

Fact: Quite the opposite. A strong CPM-based campaign requires a lot of planning and a deep-dive into proper website targeting. Audience demographics must be studied and there is a lot of campaign management needed for a successful CPM campaign.