Every time an ID hops from platform to platform, it gets less accurate – and in programmatic, there are a heck of a lot of hops.
Against that backdrop, Magnite just rolled out a new integration with data validation provider Truthset on Thursday that pipes Truthset’s Data Rated Audience directly into the SSP to help buyers and sellers more accurately reach their target audiences across CTV, mobile and the open web.
Having direct access to Truthset’s data will help improve match rates across different channels, which is a priority for advertisers, Truthset CEO Scott McKinley told AdExchanger, adding that data gets gradually “watered down” as it passes from platform to platform through the ad tech supply chain.
“You basically lose about half your data, and you introduce about 50% error every time you move it through one of these ID resolution hops,” he said.
For buyers, the question is how to build checks on audience quality and match rates into their day-to-day workflow.
“Instead of matching our audience directly into a platform and then going to another audience and matching into a platform, we could put it through this lens of accuracy,” said Mike Treon, head of CTV and video strategy for independent media agency PMG.
Truth in data
Introduced last April, Data Rated Audiences scores the accuracy of the data sets from third-party data providers in Truthset’s data collective, including Experian, Alliant, MRI-Simmons and TransUnion. Those companies give Truthset free access to their data so it can compare providers and assign independent accuracy ratings to their audiences.
Truthset’s goal, said McKinley, is to produce the closest thing as possible to an independent source of truth for the ad tech data ecosystem.
In an ideal world, data providers would see this as a win-win, he added, because they can start pricing their data based on quality. For example, they could sell smaller, more accurate pools of data at higher prices, while larger, less precise data sets could go for less to marketers that prioritize reach and low cost over precision.
“The seller is ostensibly going to be able to get more yield for the same asset by being able to parse it into super premium, premium, regular and inexpensive,” said McKinley.
For PMG, the appeal of that approach is that it doesn’t “incentivize scale” for the sake of scale, Treon said, especially on connected TV, where inventory and data are already split across lots of separate services and devices.
“We’ve always embraced this fact that CTV is going to further isolate these islands of data and inventory,” he said.
It’s a match!
PMG also has its own direct relationship with Truthset through Alli, the agency’s AI-assisted analytics platform. Through their partnership, PMG can use Truthset’s data to evaluate audiences across other digital channels and inventory sources.
The setup works well for PMG, said Treon, because the agency would prefer not to engage in principle-based buying or operate its own identity spine the way many of its competitors do.
“We are solution providers,” Treon said, describing PMG’s role in activating audiences to that of sherpas. “We’re going to work with whoever the client has their data with wherever it is.”
But Truthset’s Magnite integration allows PMG to do more with those audiences, including activating them directly across the SSP’s inventory, which McKinley said can help save money and produce higher match rates.
“It’s not data that’s valuable; it’s the intelligence around it,” Treon said. “You could have 25 billion IDs, but unless you know which ones accurately represent your clients, you’re not going to be able to do the things that matter.”
