White Paper DoubleClick Ad Exchange

DoubleClick Ad Exchange’s impact on publisher revenue in Europe The DoubleClick Ad Exchange is a real-time marketplace that helps publishers maximise yield and enables ad networks and advertising agencies to maximise ROI across millions of ads and sites.

Background Since the launch of the first Ad Exchange, display advertising has developed rapidly and advertisers are increasingly focused on how to improve the targeting and effectiveness of their buys. According to a recent US survey carried out by Google and DigiDay, buying behaviours are undergoing significant change.

This rotates in higher-paying ads from ad networks and other third-party media buyers when the net CPM is higher than what’s been booked directly into the ad server. Combined with Dynamic Allocation, DoubleClick Ad Exchange’s real-time auction mechanism enables publishers to receive the highest yield across all participating buyers for any given ad impression. Research

The study shows that 88% of display advertisers are planning to buy in real-time going forward. However, content remains critical and 74% of real-time bidding buyers will pay a premium for quality environments. In the survey, buyers also revealed that programmatic channels would see the biggest increase in investment over the next year. Dynamic Allocation Publishers often rely on multiple sales channels, both direct and indirect. Through direct sales teams, publishers sell their highest-value ad space on a guaranteed basis and the remaining ad space is sold on a non-guaranteed basis. This is done through direct and indirect sales channels, which may include a handful of ad networks. Ad servers like DFP rotate other non-guaranteed ads into a particular ad slot to maintain a steady rate of delivery for guaranteed ads. Instead of randomly rotating other ads into a slot, the DoubleClick Ad Exchange uses Dynamic Allocation.

To gain a better understanding of how much more money publishers could expect to earn by selling inventory in the DoubleClick Ad Exchange, an internal research study was launched that aimed to quantify the impact of the Ad Exchange on European publishers’ revenue. To calculate incremental revenue, researchers looked at the Ad Exchange clearing price across both branded and anonymous inventory when it won the auction, for all transactions during a four-week period. They multiplied this by the publisher revenue share and summed the total in order to compare net revenue. This was then compared with the reserve, or fixed, price for all instances where the auction did not win. In Europe, the Ad Exchange beat competing sales channels – including direct sales teams, other networks and backfills – 25% of the time. In these instances when the Ad Exchange won out over the alternatives, the revenue it achieved for that inventory was 73% higher than it would have been if the Ad Exchange not been used. And what about inventory that would have gone unsold? The DoubleClick Ad Exchange demonstrated significant success in monetising these ads. For inventory for which there was no other demand, it delivered a fill rate of greater than 90%.

White Paper DoubleClick Ad Exchange

Conclusion & Takeaways One in every four times inventory goes on sale, the DoubleClick Ad Exchange finds the best price against all other competing sales channels, both direct and indirect. And in these cases where the Ad Exchange wins, it delivers a price that’s 73% higher than other channels would have delivered. Publishers today are benefiting materially from upward pricing pressure and increased spending through agency trading desks, AdWords buyers and ad networks. These buyers frequently use innovative real-time bidding and targeting technologies to meet advertiser goals. Commenting on the research, Rob Brett, Head of Data Trading, Future Publishing, offered his opinion about the incremental revenue impact he has seen since using the DoubleClick Ad Exchange.

“The DoubleClick Ad Exchange has delivered a significant increase in revenue for our unsold inventory. Coupled with the time saved managing networks, and the controls and insight we now get on buyers and prices, it’s proving to be a very valuable product.”

Scott Spencer, DoubleClick’s Product Development Director said

“We’re delighted to see research confirming what publishers using the Ad Exchange already know – that revenue increases significantly when using the Ad Exchange in conjunction with direct sales.” “Many of the tools we roll out are designed to help publishers maximise revenue across their multiple channels. Most recently we introduced minimum CPMs and pricing recommendations. These followed the introduction of private ad-slots and direct deals. We believe that these new tools will continue to help our Ad Exchange publishers make the most out of their inventory.”

Dynamic Allocation

Directly Booked Ad Networks

€1.50

€1.10

Highest paying available ad

€0.50 €2.00

€2.00

€0.75

VS.

€1.85

2

1 Directly booked non-guaranteed inventory competes for the available ad impression

3 The highest paying booked ad available competes in real-time with thousands of advertisers through the DoubleClick Ad Exchange

[email protected]

Impression sold to the highest paying bidder

doubleclick.com

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