DSP as a Key Element of the Programmatic Advertising Ecosystem
Modern digital marketing is impossible to imagine without programmatic advertising — an automated way to buy ad impressions in real time. At the center of this system are DSP platforms that allow advertisers to effectively manage purchases, optimize budgets, and target the desired audience with high accuracy. However, with the growth of advertising volumes and speed, there is a risk of fallacies in advertising — errors that can temporarily attract attention but, in the long term, undermine consumer confidence. Fortunately, modern tools, particularly from TeqBlaze, allow you to minimize such risks. In this article, you will learn about the features of DSP.
What Is DSP?
The development of automated advertising purchasing technology is gaining momentum, and systems such as DSP are an integral tool in programmatic. The concept behind the abbreviation DSP (Demand Side Platform) unites all the platforms through which traffic is purchased. Such platforms greatly simplify the work of marketers and free them from monotonous processes during advertising campaigns. In this case, the human factor is excluded and the risk of advertiser error is reduced.
Internet marketing involves sellers and buyers of advertising. And each has its own tools.
The selling side uses SSP platforms to sell places from publishers — sites that place advertising banners. They operate on a kind of virtual market called Ad Exchanges and within the Ad Networks, which include all resources that sell advertising space.
DSP in a programmatic system works on the buyer's side. And since it does not have its own interface for managing campaigns, an additional extension for the platform is used — Trading Desk, which is necessary for setting up advertising purchase parameters.
This approach eliminates the human factor. This is due to the high speed of the processes taking place, in which a person is simply unable to intervene in order to achieve such efficiency.
There are two purchasing options:
1. The full-service model is when DSP specialists carry out all the settings and adjustments of advertising campaigns. Most often, business owners order this option from agencies that have this platform at their disposal and are responsible for the entire process from start to finish: coordinating the media plan, settings, indicators, adjustments, providing materials, etc.
2. Independent purchase of impressions by an advertiser who has access to the DSP. In this role, agencies act as intermediaries between businessmen and publishers. As a commission, the platform takes a percentage accrued on the purchased traffic of all media content.
It is important that with any method, the auction is held for each impression, which makes it possible to achieve precise targeting.
The Role of DSP in Programmatic
On the one hand, the process of purchasing traffic is quite simple, on the other hand, it is constantly being improved in order to save time and money, which requires tracking changes and using new opportunities in a timely manner.
The standard algorithm of programmatic advertising with the participation of DSP looks like this:
1. When a user gets to the site, it sends a request to the exchange via SSP to show the ad to the visitor. This is the lot at the RTB auction.
2. DSP, participating in the exchange, checks the information about the user profile in its database, as well as in the database purchased from DMP.
3. Based on the information received, if the user matches the advertiser's settings, DSP makes a bid.
4. SSP checks all bids and, using the second price tactic, chooses the highest one, reducing it to the penultimate in size.
5. The site shows the user the ad whose advertiser won the auction.
The algorithm known as Header Bidding allows you to conduct an auction directly on the publisher's site. In this case, the resource-selling advertising space immediately sends an offer to the SSP, which then sends it to all DSPs. With the advent of such a mechanism, it became possible to work directly with the DSP.
Unlike the standard algorithm, where there was a risk of not having time to sell an impression, Header Bidding allows you to save up to 50% of the time on the purchasing process. For publishers, this method provides greater profit and for advertisers, increased savings since when working directly with the DSP, the SSP commission is excluded as another participant in the process.
Advantages of DSP Platforms
There is quite a large selection of these systems on the market, which act as intermediaries between advertisers and publishers. They all differ from each other in functionality, but also have many common features. The main advantage is the ability to fine-tune the selection of the target audience. DSP has its own database of user profiles with various characteristics, which allows you to build ultra-precise targeting.
Other advantages of the platform:
- Ease of managing the entire advertising process. The ability to connect several additional resources to the platform and use them from one interface saves the advertiser's time and expands the range of advertising materials.
- Campaign reporting. Working within the platform with a large amount of information allows you to generate complex and detailed reports for each advertising campaign.
- You can view data and analyze advertising effectiveness in real time, which gives the advertiser full control over the progress of campaigns.
Wrapping It Up
Today, DSP platforms are not just a tool for purchasing traffic, but a full-fledged control center for digital advertising strategies. Their capabilities for segmentation, optimization, and analytics make advertising more accurate, timely, and personalized. However, efficiency loses its value if fallacies in advertising occur in the process. Fortunately, programmatic advertising solutions from TeqBlaze help avoid such mistakes by providing tools for ethical and transparent interaction with users.
