Julia Angwin’s recent Wall St. Journal article (about ads purchased through networks showing up alongside racy content) underscores the point that there could be better controls in place around network buys. One observation in particular is a point we bring up a lot around here: in order to gain access to more media, ad networks often buy and sell from each other. So, while an advertiser thinks it’s buying on Network A alone, part of its order may be placed on unknown Network B, and its ads may end up on some objectionable sites as a result.

Loss of control over where ads serve is a very real problem when networks trade inventory. This is why we’re putting so much work into our MediaGuard product. Advertisers, publishers and ad networks using the Yield Manager platform need to feel confident that content and ads within the network are being classified properly.

But while loss of control over content is the most visible problem of inter-trading between ad networks, it’s not the only one.

Why Networks Trade with Each Other
The inter-trading of ads between networks is a means for networks to fill gaps in their supply and demand. Why else would a network sell inventory to a competitor, while another buys inventory from a competitor? This practice is a way for ad networks to create a proxy for liquidity in their closed (and relatively illiquid) markets.

Networks see a compelling reason to remain closed. Think of them like ticket brokers. The great thing about being a ticket broker is that you know how much the buyer is willing to pay for a certain ticket, and you know how much the seller is willing to sell for. Neither the seller nor the buyer has information about the other (otherwise, what would they need the broker for?). The broker can sell the ad to the buyer for maximum price, and from the seller for minimum price, keeping an undisclosed (and often huge) margin.

Now what happens when your friend (who’s also a ticket broker) has the buyer as a client, and you have the seller? Well, you cut a deal and split the margin.

The Resulting Friction
Ad networks operate on different platforms, with different pricing structures, counting methodologies and other disparities. Ask enough network ad operations people and you’ll hear a horror story about an ad being brokered back and forth between two networks, each buying and selling the ad to/from each other several times in a nearly endless loop. In short, when networks sell to each other, complications abound. Controlling content of ads and sites becomes impossible. Buyers and sellers see discrepancies in reporting. Reconciling payments becomes a formidable task. When we talk about these dynamics here at Right Media, we talk about friction.

Solving the Problem in an Open Exchange
This sort of friction is eliminated when networks, publishers and advertisers share a common platform (with a single counting methodology and set of pricing structures). Today there are over 50 ad networks using Yield Manager, interconnected to all other buyers and sellers on the platform, that have open, immediate access to media and trade it seamlessly. If, at a given moment, a network lacks needed inventory, it naturally acquires more in the open media exchange (what we’re currently calling the “Right Media Exchange”). Likewise, if it runs out of paying ads, buyers are available in the exchange.

The point is that networks, like any brokers, will continue to have relationships with each other. But many are realizing that they owe it to their advertiser and publisher constituents to eliminate as much friction and uncertainty from those transactions as possible. With Yield Manager’s community linking capabilities and ever-expanding Media Guard features, we are striving to eliminate as much friction as we can.

As the exchange expands and the benefits of an open, transparent market become more obvious, there should be less reason for any of its participants to look externally to increase scale. With that, problems like ads showing up where they shouldn’t and multi-platform conflict should be greatly diminished.

In our effort to continually broaden our suite of solutions we’ve released an interstitial ad size to Yield Manager.

What is an interstitial?
An interstitial is often considered the web version of the TV commercial.  It’s an ad that is shown alone on a page before the originally requested page appears. The interestitial page contains the ad, your logo and a link for the user to skip the ad and go directly to the content.  It also has a set number of seconds before the page auto-refreshes and goes to the originally requested page.  View a demo here.

What size are the ads?
Interstitial ads are usually 720×300 and often contain the types of similar that you’d see in popup or popunder ads.  Although it’s possible to display any ad size on the interstitial page.

What CPM do they earn?
As with all Yield Manager ad sizes, each impression is auctioned off so CPMs will vary per publisher and network, but they generally pay more than any ad size except popups.

What sort of control do publishers have?
Publishers can choose the following:

• Logo used on interstitial page
• Page background color
• Text color
• Link color
• Frequency cap of interstitials per user
• Time it takes to refresh and move on to content

How do I get started with interstitials?
Getting started depends on what type of business you are.

Publishers: Log in and pull an interstitial ad tag under the pops category.

Advertisers: Let your sales rep know you’re interested in running  interstitial ads with Right Media or with another Yield Manager network partner.

Networks: Activate this new tag in your available tag sizes, let publishers know it’s available, and let your ad sales team know that they can sell it.

In recent weeks, more and more companies have been trying to scam ad networks by spawning pops off of regular banner ads. These scammers–usually unknown third parties–think that they can make “free money” by buying cheap banner inventory and using that inventory to sell pops. This illegitimate business hurts everyone in the entire industry.

At first the pops spawning off of banners (“banner pops”) were mostly limited to third party tags. In recent weeks the problem has spread to actual flash creatives as well. Scammers are embedding some bad javascript code into creatives which run infrequently and are often targeted to only show to certain geographical regions. Sometimes they even pop at certain small time intervals throughout the day! These companies set it up so that the networks that they buy from never actually see these pops. 

Everyone gets hurt by these scams. Those on the front line, the publishers, have to fend off complaints by their visitors about bad pops showing up on their sites. They, in turn, complain to the networks, who have to track down the bad creative (which of course can be nearly impossible if it’s set to only pop at strange hours of the night in Canada!!).

The Right Media tech team is working on several tools to both detect bad creatives before they hit publisher’s sites and help users track down misbehaving creatives faster. We also work around the clock making sure we track down any bad creative that gets reported to us. Moreover, we’re always trying to pinpoint the companies that are perpetuating the scam, and keep them out of the marketplace.

The other day I went to see a company that has been buying media on the Right Media Network for years. This Market Research Company acts like an ROI-focused advertiser, with conversions defined as a completed survey. The situation is more complex on second glance: surveys change frequently (more or less complex with different topics, etc.), as do their targets. Above all, the company is concerned about unduplicated reach (which should be high) for sampling validity. So the goal of ROI optimization (zeroing in on the targets) and the objective of maintaining high reach need to be re-balanced continuously.

Proposing a self managed advertiser solution is obvious. The Advertiser will gain operational efficiencies – trafficking, unified reporting and comparable data sets. They will also be able to change things on the fly at any time without having to talk to Account Managers at the ad networks. But beyond these benefits, which can be accomplished with pretty much any third-party ad server, implementing Yield Manager for Advertisers will provide them with some crucial benefits.

First off, the client will be able to control exposure globally across networks, thus giving them the ability to manage unduplicated reach — particularly important for the research client. Furthermore, the client will have instant access to the Yield Manager Marketplace — an open exchange of media for all clients on the platform. It will enable the company to evaluate all impressions across the entire marketplace (not just on the Right Media Network) and only bid on and buy those impressions that meet their goals. This drastically increases acquisition efficiencies, allowing massive scale at tightly managed ROI.