“Impressions don’t guarantee visibility. Attention is what really matters.”

As the OOH industry continues to evolve, measurement remains one of its most debated challenges. While impressions have traditionally been used to evaluate campaigns, there is a growing need to understand whether those impressions actually translate into visibility.

According to Mangesh Shinde, Co-founder of OSMO, the gap begins at the planning stage itself. “Most of the industry focuses on people and places, who the audience is and where they go. But the most important aspect is the placement path,” he says. “A billboard in the same location can perform very differently depending on its angle, obstruction, and viewing distance.”

This is where a more detailed evaluation of sites becomes critical. Through its platform, Lock8, OSMO analyses OOH environments using video mapping and machine learning, studying factors such as visibility duration, perceptual size, and position within a viewer’s field of vision. “We analyse all these data points and create what we call a visual certainty score. There’s no gut behind it, the evidence is supported by video,” Mangesh explains.

The platform is built to support both planning and performance tracking. “It acts like both pre-planning and post-planning,” he says. “Before a campaign, we identify which routes and sites deliver the highest impact. Once the campaign goes live, we track impressions, dwell time, and traffic variations on a daily basis.”

However, at an industry level, measurement continues to be fragmented. “We are a ₹6,000–₹8,000 crore industry and highly fragmented. Bringing everyone onto a single mindset is the biggest challenge,” Mangesh notes. This has resulted in multiple approaches to measurement, with different agencies developing their own systems.

At the same time, how OOH is used varies across categories. Real estate, for instance, relies heavily on location-driven planning. “For real estate, location is everything—they target very specific micro-markets, so site selection becomes critical,” he says. In contrast, FMCG brands focus on cost-efficient reach, while fashion and lifestyle brands prioritise high-impact visibility.

In digital OOH environments, exposure is further influenced by dwell time. “We’ve seen dwell time vary from as low as 8 seconds to as high as 70–80 seconds. That directly affects how much of your audience is actually reached,” Mangesh explains.

As brands look for more clarity and accountability, the conversation is gradually expanding beyond impressions. “Impressions don’t guarantee visibility,” he says. “Attention is what really matters.”

Read the detailed story in the May edition of Outdoor Asia magazine.