Which term refers to the monetary unit used to price advertising impressions?

• A. Cost Per Thousand Viewers (CPM)
• B. Cost Per Million Viewers
• C. Cost Per Thousand Impressions
• D. Clicks Per Thousand

Answer: (A)

Pricing an ad by impressions uses the unit CPM, which stands for Cost Per Mille. The idea is you pay a fixed amount for every thousand times the ad is displayed, not for every unique person who sees it. This standardizes cost and makes it easy to compare campaigns across sites and formats. While people sometimes say “per thousand viewers” in everyday speech, the precise concept is per thousand impressions—the ad being served or displayed. For example, if the CPM is $8 and the campaign delivers 250,000 impressions, the cost is (250,000 / 1,000) × $8 = $2,000. The other options mix in different metrics—per thousand viewers, per million viewers, or per click—so they describe other pricing ideas and aren’t the standard measure for impressions.