Real-Time Bidding technology is online bidding or auction. Three parties represent their interests here: customers, site owners, and the advertising network like Bidmind. The object of the auction is the privilege to promote services on websites. The advertiser who has set the highest price takes away the display rights.
A brief history of RTB
RTB technology was invented by Admeld and bought in 2011 by Google. In less than a year, most users switched to this format for the following reasons:
- The click-through rate of ads rises to tens of percent.
- Advertisers show their ads to an interested audience, which increases sales.
- Users see banners that are relevant to the subject of the site – any resource participating in the system becomes thematic.
The privacy of users remains out of danger since RTB operates with virtual metrics based on behavioral factors – to delete a profile, a visitor just needs to clear the cookies in the browser.
Programmatic has completely replaced the outdated flat format with a single source of monetization. The Real-Time Bidding technology made it possible to maximize the income from displaying ads because many systems with different packages, targeting, and data began to participate in the auction.
RTB traffic
RTB also has its advantages for arbitration – the purchase of targeted personalized traffic, in essence, cannot be ineffective. However, this format did not make a serious revolution in marketing, remaining an additional source for the target audience. What are the reasons for this?
Most likely, there is no incentive to invest certain efforts and funds (more or less serious campaigns in Programmatic start with large investments), and in the niche of arbitration, there are now more offers for nutriment, gambling, and goods (it is unlikely that there will be an RTB network that will allow flooding traffic to these verticals). In addition, some marketers are afraid of getting low-quality traffic.
On the other hand, in Real-Time Bidding, you do not have to deal with a bunch of PCs individually, which saves time. Here, you can achieve success if you understand your goals and use new approaches. In the future, the process will become automated and eliminate much of the arbitrage burden.
Undoubted advantages of traffic received by the RTB model:
- Targeting is applied according to various parameters – geo, IP, age category, and education.
- If desired, their bases and pixel tag are used.
- Events for retargeting are set.
Thus, the affiliate receives a huge amount of information about targeted traffic, which will give its advantages. No wonder Google, Yandex, Mile Group, and Avito have their systems of programmable advertising purchases. It is with the help of RTB that it will be possible to get to large, highly visited rating sites while spending a relatively small budget.
If you have already decided to resell traffic using RTB, determine the target resources. To do this, merge into geo tests. Only this method will make RTB more effective. Although this format has huge potential, it is not magic or a miracle technology – you also need to work here.
RTB auction
Bidding takes place online. Advertisers receive information about potential customers in milliseconds while the site is loading. The process is organized in the following way:
- The owner registers the site in RTB, a request is automatically sent to display ads in SSP, Ad Exchanges, or Ad Network.
- The system compiles a portrait of the target audience using the maximum available parameters based on cookies, analytics, etc.
- The site is put up for auction – the DSP acts as the buyer, while the SSP can request additional traffic data from the DMP (for example, the age category of the majority of users, their age, and preferences).
- Advertisers bid.
- SSP selects the highest bid, then discounts it to the minimum price required to win the auction.
- The site owner receives advertising banners from the winning bidder and launches them on their pages.
The advantages of Real-Time Bidding for advertisers and affiliates over outdated formats are undeniable. The budget is not spent on a useless audience, and even with a decrease in the site’s target audience, the advertiser does not lose anything. There is an opportunity to buy cheap traffic, and the conversion increases since the target audience see only targeted ads that may be of interest to them.
