The Financial Times (FT) is rolling out its new ‘cost per hour’ (CPH) digital advertising metric, as it attempts to sell ads against reader engagement rather than the number of clicks.

The title has partnered with media analytics firm Chartbeat to offer advertisers “quality content over quantity”, and pledged 100% viewability of five seconds or more.

Brands such as BP, iShares and IMB trialled the time-based system scheme late last year, with the FT claiming the programme generated $1m in total incremental revenue, as well as a “significant” uplift in brand recognition.

FT global ad sales director Dominic Good – who revealed the launch at today’s IAA Leadership Forum in London – said that low viewability scores and questions about advertising placement and fraud have increased the need for “better measurement and transparency”.

He added: “For the nearly three decades of commercial internet history, advertising has derived its value from one measure: how many people click on an ad. While CPM values every impression the same, CPH uses time to measure value.

“The FT has shown through extensive testing that brand familiarity and recollection among readers increases significantly the longer an ad is in view. Adverts seen for five seconds or more on FT.com show up to 50% higher brand recall and familiarity than ads that are visible for a shorter period of time.”