DSPs are hindering universal adoption of the IAB Tech Lab’s new standard for classifying video ad inventory, which was released in 2023.
While the majority of supply-side platforms have adopted the new standard and are passing the new video.plcmt signal in their bid requests, most demand-side platforms have yet to adopt, according to a Jounce Media report released in September.
Based on AdExchanger’s outreach to DSPs, not much progress has been made on adoption since that Jounce Report. Buyers therefore aren’t always sure if they’re bidding on instream video as defined under the new standard or the old standard.
The buy-side’s concerns are well founded. Some publishers (and at least one SSP) are using the transition period to continue classifying what’s now defined under the new standard as “accompanying content” – AKA, those annoying floating video players – as instream video. The IAB Tech Lab strongly advises against this practice.
AdExchanger reached out to a number of major DSPs to gauge the current state of adoption of the new standard and the new video.plcmt signal.
Who has already adopted the new video standard?
The Trade Desk, Google’s DV360, Amazon DSP, Criteo and Basis Technologies all confirmed that they are currently decisioning on video.plcmt when it’s present in bid requests.
Yahoo DSP and Beeswax by Comcast told AdExchanger they have yet to adopt the new video.plcmt field but are in the process of doing so. Both Yahoo and Beeswax teased that they will have more to share on adoption of the new spec by Q2.
Nexxen, which operates an end-to-end platform that includes both an SSP and a DSP, said that it’s migrated its SSP to the new standard but has yet to do so for its DSP. For the time being, buyers using Nexxen can target instream inventory within its DSP using deal IDs for instream private marketplaces. Nexxen declined to share a timeline for when its DSP will fully adopt the new standard.
Microsoft Advertising, Viant, Adform, Infillion and Epsilon either declined to comment or did not respond in time for publication.
Why not adopt?
Adopting the new standard isn’t a particularly heavy engineering lift for DSPs, according to Jounce Media CEO Chris Kane on a recent episode of AdExchanger’s The Big Story podcast. But there are other incentives for DSPs to stick with the old standard, he said.
There is strong evidence that DSPs are willing to bid higher and more often on instream inventory than on other forms of video, Kane said.
But, if a DSP were to adopt the new standard – with its stricter definition of what constitutes instream video – that would reduce the amount of instream supply available for the DSP to bid on. Reducing the amount of instream supply would, in turn, drive up prices for any remaining supply and therefore make it harder for DSPs to hit a client’s targets for buying instream video with existing budgets.
Some DSPs are waiting for a critical mass of bid requests to contain the new video.plcmt field before fully migrating to the new standard. Although most SSPs have adopted the new standard, that doesn’t mean they always send the video.plcmt field in all bid requests.
What’s in the bid requests?
Meanwhile, even DSPs that have adopted the new standard may also be waiting for critical mass to be reached before revamping their buying interfaces so as to adhere to the Tech Lab’s new criteria for classifying video ad inventory.
For example, although Basis adopted the new spec in 2023, it only just recently started redesigning its buying interface to comply with the new standard. It was waiting for more than 50% of bid requests to contain the new video.plcmt field, said Chris Coupland, platform operations director for supply integrations at Basis Technologies.
That threshold has now been reached, Coupland said, and he expects the process of updating Basis’ buying interface to be completed within a few months from now.
Functionally, that update means that Basis’ DSP will allow the new video.plcmt field to override the old video.placement field when both are present in a bid request, Coupland said.
If only the old video.placement field is present, Basis will map the old classification criteria against the new ones. And when that happens, Basis will also use proxy signals, such as roll position and start delay, to infer whether inventory that’s been labeled as instream should really be considered instream under the new standard, Coupland said.
So, what’s the current state of bid requests passing the new field? Basis provided AdExchanger with some recent numbers.
During a 24-hour period in January, Basis saw that 57% of bid requests that contained a video object included both the new video.plcmt field and the old video.placement field. Currently, the majority of SSPs are passing both signals, according to Basis.
Meanwhile, just 1% of bid requests contained only the new video.plcmt field – and these requests mostly came from a single SSP, which is currently the only exchange sending the new field without the old one, according to Basis. Basis did not name this SSP.
In contrast, 36% of bid requests included only the old video.placement field. So, while SSPs have mostly adopted the new signal, it’s not always there for DSPs to ingest.
However, the more DSPs that adopt the new standard, the more pressure will be placed on SSPs to include the new field in all of their video ad bid requests.
Ultimately, it’s up to buyers to push their DSPs to adopt the new standard, said Jounce’s Kane on The Big Story. But to do so, he added, they need more transparent reporting on which DSPs have already adopted it.
Here’s to the humble hope that AdExchanger’s reporting helps move those conversations along.
