Advertisement space bidding is not a new concept. The advertisement spaces have been sold since the advent of newspapers and magazines. However, with the digital world taking center stage, the sphere has witnessed a drastic development.
The online advertising industry has grown in its reach and size. The tech giants like Google, Facebook, etc., vouch on the digital advertising medium for their earnings. The websites have predefined spaces or ad stacks that are available for bidding. Header bidding is the most preferred option for buying the ad stacks but has not been present since the beginning.
It is, in fact, an evolving form of bidding for publishers and advertisers alike. If you are an advertiser, you can reap many benefits from the market like
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Better Opportunities
In the earlier days, the publishers were skeptical about selling the inventories through open bidding. They used to follow the practice of auctioning the superior ad stacks in the private market. Hence, the open market had access only to inferior quality ad stacks. This made online bidding a worthless option.
Later, header bidding was available, which gave a lot of options to both consumers and advertisers. The advertisers could then view all the slots available for advertisements. As an advertiser, you can research the various scopes available and the price related to each stack. Hence, it provides better opportunities for an advertiser.
Better Ad Targeting
You may choose the best ad slots on any given website and bid according to your preferences. You may also view the number of visitors and demographics of a webpage. All the available information will help you to plan the targeting strategy accordingly. Thus, better ad targeting is achieved by header bidding.
Waterfall Bidding
As an advertiser, you get more say as a header bidder than in comparison to waterfall bidding. Earlier the bidding was mainly for the benefit of consumers. Premium ad spaces were sold to the elite advertisers in this practice. The unsold inventory would come to the access of other bidders. This kind of bidding ensured that no inventory was left unsold. However, it was not a transparent and effective form of auction. Therefore the header bidding came into existence.
Avoids Waterfall Technique
The waterfall technique was used in earlier times. In this method, the consumer used to sell the preferred ad spaces to the chosen advertisers through personal liaison and direct relation with the advertisers. The remaining unsold ad space would then be sold by bidding to all the ad networks in descending order of importance.
This method would continue until the entire inventory of the consumer’s space was sold. The consumer’s yield marked the advertisement networks according to their contribution. The consumer would benefit from this method. However, it was not a very lucrative idea for ad networks. Header bidding has completely replaced the older form of the waterfall technique.
So, it is the tried and tested method of bidding for advertisement spaces in the digital platform. Both consumers and advertisers accept this form of bidding. Thus, it is a popular and effective way to bring more attention to your brand.
