This document provides an introduction to automated trading and real-time bidding (RTB) in online advertising. It describes how RTB technologies like ad exchanges and demand-side platforms (DSPs) helped address challenges with the efficiency and scale of online ad campaigns. It explains how these systems use real-time auctions and data-driven bidding to match advertisers with available online ad space on publishers' websites. It also discusses related concepts like trading desks, supply-side platforms (SSPs), and the role of data in targeted online advertising through these RTB systems.
2. Online Ad Campaigns are
complicated.
The price of putting together an
online campaign can be 30%
more expensive in time and
effort than a print campaign
It is far easier for an advertiser to
find 1/2m people who are
interested in buying a car at this
moment on TV than online.
Real Time Bidding is a technology
that grew in response to these
two problems.
There had to be a way of bringing
advertisers and publishers
together in a more painless way.
3. 2007 was the pivotal year. It was the
year that created liquidity
Ad Exchanges had arrived. These
new technologies created huge
pools of available Inventory.
This created the scale that advertisers
were asking for. Kerching!!
Apr 2007 – Yahoo buys Right Media.
May 2007 – Google buys DC.
Aug 2007 – MSN buys AdECN
The DoubleClick logo
Shows this industry change
It now had two green
blobs coming together. This
represents the coming together
of advertiser and publisher.
5 years later it is actually
happening.
A Bit.
4. Most DSP’s started in 2007. This was because advertisers needed access to the
New liquidity in inventory. They provided single buying points for the exchanges.
DSP’s were faster and more automated.
5. THE PLAN COMES
TOGETHER.
With large pools of
inventory and buyers
able to get hold of it.
The time was right for a
technology paradigm
shift. RTB was the
missing piece.
Exchanges began to
build real time bidding
API’s.
This meant that a work
flow was developing to
allow data driven
display advertising
strategies.
Display competes with
search budgets again.
6. 2009 -2010 saw a surge in support for RTB from the supply side.
It began a wave of growth with DSP’s, Ad networks, Agency Trading Desks all eager to take
advantage. It has grown exponentially since.
7. RTB has taken off for one
simple reason:
Buyers see real benefits from
it.
CPM rates are lower than with
Traditional ad networks.
Data allows increase in CTR’s.
The reach is bigger than any
ad network could ever supply.
50bn ad impressions a month
in UK alone.
It has solved our original
problem of efficiency and
scale.
Really??
8. But what IS RTB?
2 layers.
• A real-time bidding API.
• A real-time bidder.
The API is the pipe.
A server-side
connection to an
inventory source.
It ANNOUNCES the
each impressions
The Bidder is the
‘Brain’. This EVALUATES
each impression on
behalf of the
advertiser.
Advertisers can bid
appropriately for the
impressions they really
want.
9. Jargon:
Real-time buying:
Acquiring inventory on demand.
Audience buying:
Acquiring inventory based on
audience data.
Auction-based buying:
Acquiring inventory by placing
winning bids in an auction.
Data-driven display:
Acquiring inventory based on data.
Impression-by-impression buying:
Acquiring inventory by evaluating
each impression as it
becomes available.
Bid optimization:
Employing techniques to ensure that
bids to acquire inventory are placed
in such a manner that goals can be
reached optimally.
10. There is a lot of hype.
Here is the famous
and intimidating luma
map.
There is a lot of VC
money around this
area.
VC money means PR.
The emptiest vessel
makes the loudest
noise when banged.
Aegis Trading Desks.
Xaxis Trading Desks.
(40% of European
buying).
25-50 campaigns a
month each.
11. Actually it’s a bit simpler and bit more like this. In fact you could split it into buy side, sell side.
12. Demand Side Platforms
These are agency and advertiser buying platforms.
Allows impressions based decision making
Allows agencies to bring in advertiser data for re-messaging
Optimises reach and Frequency across multiple inventory sources
Sampling algorythms find success for agencies
Platform pays the publishers. No IO’s.
13. The Turn DSP looks like a traditional adserver in terms of targeting
but it is focussed on audience and the making the most efficient spend use of client spend.
15. What type of data can you bid on?
Ad slot parameters: visibility (above or below the fold),
size
excluded creative attributes
excluded advertiser
URLsallowed vendor or ad technology.
• Geo parameters: country, region, metro, city.
• Content parameters: site URL, site language, seller network, vertical or category.
• User parameters: browser, operating system, anonymous cookie (hashed), cookie age.
16. Trading Desks
Agency buying/trading desks are Agency buying desks As some agencies don’t
specialized entities of represent the liaison between have core RTB technology, they
media buying agencies focusing advertiser or parent agency and may partner with a third-party
on media trading and RTB. Each the platforms used to facilitate company such as a Managed Service
desk represents an agency. RTB. or an DSP itself .
18. Xaxis the the Trading Desk for GroupM.
In depth study GroupM is owned by WPP.
Mindshare, Mediacom, MEC, Maxus
Uses Appnexus. BUT the MIG ( WPP’s
tech arm 247/Realmedia – has built it’s
own bidder called Zapp Trader 4.
Has sales teams across Europe that sells
the trading desk concept to each
advertiser.
Xaxis make 40-53% margin on the
media. Previously this went to an ad
network. Margin is a function in
Appnexus.
All European trafficking done from
London.
19. The Politics of Ad Exchanges and RTB Content
In the same way that publishers wouldn’t put all inventory onto RTB, so Ad Exchanges
do not either. They keep the best stuff to sell themselves.
Google Adx – will not have all of Youtube inventory. Youtube sell premium direct.
Yahoo will not sell all it’s inventory on the Right Media Exchange.
Right Media Exchange will not share any inventory with Appnexus.
Right Media demand that big agencies have a direct seat on their exchange.
Appnexus has exclusive access to MSN inventory because they own 30% of Appnexus.
There is a 10% discount on MSN inventory if bought through Appnexus.
20. Cliché Alert. – Data is the new oil
First Party Data – the cookies attached to users who
have been to an advertisers website. (e.g Abandoned
carts.)
Second Party Data – the data an agency might generate
through it’s own adserving. e.g. Creating a cookie pool
of all users that they know have been on a specific type
of content 3 times in a week. (Xaxis)
Third Party Data – Bought in cookie lists from the
providers named above.
Contextual Data - Contextual data provided by a 3rd
Party.
21. Geek Alert - Where do data providers get their data ?
They buy it from publishers, comparison sites, online shops
etc. They pay between 20p and 50p per thousand cookies.
They sell around £1.00.
DMP’s Data management platforms allow publishers
involved in media buying and selling to manage proprietary
data, facilitate the usage of third-party data or port
audience data to other platforms. As capabilities of DSPs
extend to integrate other media such as mobile, video and
social,providers of these emerging types of data and
analytics/DMPs will become an increasingly important part
of the display advertising landscape.
Anecdotal evidence suggest that in Europe – 3rd Party
Data Partners are not working. Only contextual and 2nd
Party Data is working consistently. This is not true of the
US.
22. DMP’s and Publishers
A DMP (Data Management Platform) aggregates all campaign
analytics (mediasources, creative, placements&audiences) into
one hub.
Having all of this data in one platforms implifies audience
segmentation and cross-channel media planning.
House all client audience data in one place for de-duplication,
scalability,and insights. Allow partners to login and utilize data.
Grant pre-defined sharing and security parameters.
Empower teams to buy audiences with minimal waste and
scalable insights. Allow you to see what kind of audience data
you are buying and how it performs.
23. Supply Side Platforms
Help Publishers manage their unsold
inventory. They help maximise yield.
Used by most premium publishers.
They protect Data Leakage
Admeld and Rubicon = 65% of all RTB
impressions in the UK.
Admeld owned by Google. Is in process
of being Googlified.
Rubicon has largest footprint in UK.
The facilitate private exchange
relationships between agencies groups
and publisher groups. Including special
data relationships.
24. Supply Side Platforms
The problem with this model for the
publisher is that with distressed inventory –
It lumps really valuable users with those that
have no value.
RTB facilitates the right user, right time and
Right place. Which through an auction
Process unlocks the true value of each cookie.
Increased ECPM across the board.
Anecdote. – The 4th best sales person at the
whole of Future Publishing is in fact the
trafficker who manages the SSP relationships.
25. CLASSIC VERSUS NEW SSP’s
CLASSIC SSP’s
Focussed on connecting publishers
to new advertisers.
Managing the logistical nightmare
of dealing with multiple ad
networks
Managing the cannibalisation of
direct sales by indirect sales efforts
Managing data leakage – cookie
stealing.
NEW SSP’s
Allows Publishers possibility of
using own cookie data to buy extra
impressions from RTB.
26. In Depth Study
AND
• A&Nmedia - sells unsold inventory on behalf of the biggest online
newspaper in the world Daily Mail.
• It also sells Northcliffe Press Regional sites.
• It has access to 3bn ad impressions a month.
• It is sophisticated enough to have it’s own data strategy and
understands the value of it’s own cookies.
• It retargets valuable Daily Mail audiences on open RTB
It uses AppNexus as a DMP
For it’s own cookies.
It also buys on RTB
contextually using the
AppNexus Apps.
27. RTB Trading Desks splits
the classic purchasing
funnel into 2 distinct
campaign types.
PROSPECTING
Contextual
2nd Party Data
3rd Party Data
Look-alike
RE-MESSAGING
1st Party Data
28. The biggest single problem on RTB….
The graphic above is taken from Grapeshot and it shows the volume of impressions
That it blocks on a daily basis on channels built to represent the old IASH standard
Brand safety category.
This is for one single day.
29. An example of some the dodgy URLs in
Appnexus
Brands can be routinely found on these sites, due to badly set up re-messaging campaigns.
Brand Safety is big business.
30. Brand Safety aka – content verification tools
CV products block or report, in real time, the serving of an online advertisement onto
destinations that have been defined as inappropriate to the campaign.
This refers to any words that are deemed by the advertiser to be unsuitable for a campaign,
including brand conflicting content.
These tools mostly send blank ads when they detect a negative page. In RTB this wastes a lot
of money. Only Grapeshot and Double verify can now block sites at a bidding level.
A serious issue for all these guys is - Lack of source level transparency is primarily an
unfortunate side effect of inventory “daisy-chaining” (or inter-network reselling)
31. The Ultimate lists of what Content Verifications tools –
SHOULD be able to do.
1. Block the serving of advertising on to pages which contain content deemed innapropriate.
2. Block the serving of advertising on to pages which contain words in content delivered via a linked file.
3. Register changes in page content and then block the serving of advertising. E.g Forums
4. Block the serving of advertising on to domains and sub-domains, deemed inappropriate.
5. Block the serving of advertising on to pages which contain words in the URL, deemed to be inappropriate.
6. Block the serving of advertising on to aliases of an URL or domain, deemed to be inappropriate.
7. See through iframes and block the serving of advertising if keywords or URLs, deemed to be inappropriate
8. Operate consistently in allowing or blocking advertising when JavaScript is disabled.
9. Be capable of incorporating any list of keywords or URLs, deemed to be inappropriate by the advertiser
10. Be configurable to block the serving of advertising to any URL not previously checked.
No one can do all of it. IASH is gone.
32. In Depth Study
On the Luma Map Appnexus is on
It’s own. Why is this?
AppNexus is more of a platform than a
Traditional adserver. More Oracle than Doubleclick
It has the most Open API and a vast team to help developers create tools for advertisers.
This is called the App Market place.
It is a great SSP and DMP for those publishers confident with data.
It is a great DSP for those who can develop their own reporting apps.
It is all things to all People.
34. Dynamic Creative Partners
Adacado
Dapper This is the Smart Ad Space.
Criteo Data + Rich Media
Struq
AdExtent
Adexcel
Eye Return
This is the self-assembly
Skinected SMB Space, Studio Tools.
Chargeads