Rebecca Ohana
Updated on 11.01.2023
Contextual Advertising: How SSPs Contextualize Data to Benefit Publishers
Imagine if the world would be cookieless.
And in a cookie less world, contextual advertising is the optimal solution for effective audience targeting and engagement.
Contextual advertising targets users’ interests in the context of the page they are visiting. For example, someone who is reading a blog on the newest summer fashion trends, might be considering buying a freshly minted cargo skirt. If not, it’s at least an indicator that they are interested in fashion. This provides a very strong context on how to target this specific user for future ad placements and campaigns.
In this blog, we want to deep-dive into what contextual advertising is and how it works.
What is Contextual advertising?
Contextual advertising describes the practice of matching website content with the most relevant ads. Meaning, a user who visits the Technology section of the New York Times to read an article about artificial intelligence (AI) and its ability to limit office meetings might see an ad for a new laptop. Or a user who browses a food blog might see an ad from Whole Foods Market.
This is done through contextual targeting, which is a strategy that helps marketers to target users based on contextual signals as described above, rather than third-party data. Meaning, this practice of programmatic ad targeting focuses on customers to target their particular lifestyle.
It is crucial for publishers to understand contextual advertising because it gives them an understanding on how they can benefit from supply-side platforms that deliver contextualized ads. This practice is called programmatic (program+automatic) advertising, which utilizes data and algorithms to target specific audiences based on various criteria.
A supply-side platform (SSP) is a core part of the process as it automatically and simultaneously connects publishers’ inventory. This happens together with programmatic advertising channels, ad exchanges, and demand-side platforms (DSPs) regardless of the format.
How does contextual advertising work?
Contextual advertising requires advanced and automated programmatic advertising technologies, such as data science, algorithms, and AI. This enables marketers to set parameters or implement segmentation to provide ads tailored for specific and successful contextualized placement.
However, contextualized targeting is only possible if advertisers can access contextualized data from SSPs. This data includes past browsing behavior which is used to create keywords which are gathered from high search volume terms for search engine optimization (SEO).
This process of dividing or segmenting a target audience based on the context or content in which they are engaging is called contextual segmentation. In other words, contextual segmentation involves analyzing and understanding the environment, topic, specific content characteristics, and keywords appropriate for an ad. The last step in the process is then to hope that an ad is picked up for content-appropriate programmatic display.
After setting parameters, the ad platform’s crawler will scan and categorize different sites’ content according to each web page’s phrases, keywords, alt text, and contextual information. When users visit a website, the ad server matches the page content with relevant ads.
What are the benefits of contextual advertising?
Advertising displays are no longer about casting a net as wide as possible in the hopes to catch a few tiny fish. Instead the digital advertising space has changed for several reasons:
The go-to system of behavioral-based advertising is centered on viewer’s past browsing behavior and determined by cookies. These cookies are tracking a user and creating a digital profile of them but are not truly offering a customized user experience. This situation has also spawned many privacy rules and regulations, upped the use of ad blockers, and will be ushered in the restriction of third-party cookies.
If a user once clicked on an ad, having it appear on every website they are visiting, defeats the purpose of paying for the ads display since it’s not relevant for a website user at this time.
Contextualized ads are based entirely on the web page content in which they appear. For example, showing an ad for a laptop on a tech news site is more powerful and personalized than the ad showing up when a user is reading about politics or watching a YouTube true crime video.
The power of contextual advertising
Contextual advertising has several advantages for publishers. SSPs that supply contextually sourced data help programmatic publishers flourish, because they use data to complete their web pages. This precision placement offers an enhanced overall user experience that spills over to the general UX and user engagement.
These ads accumulate higher CTRs, increasing publishers’ ROIs by raising transparency and trust between publishers and advertisers.
But contextual advertising helps advertisers thrive too. Thanks to the programmatic aspect of contextual targeting, the space purchase process is automated and thus more efficient. Contextual targeting is more accurate than other targeting methods and ensures brand safety – in other words, the ad appears in an appropriate environment.
Ad creatives and page context that match users interests inspire them to take action. Increased click-through rates increase the chance of achieving marketing goals while optimizing budget and ROAS (Return on Ad Spend). Since these ads are privacy-compliant, as users remain anonymous, they help advertisers succeed in a cookie less world.
Constant advances in content analysis technology sophistication enable even more accurate ad placement and targeting. For example, optimization algorithms and AI that analyze content to read sentiment and evaluate associated imagery can achieve more profound levels of segmentation.
Get more insights on contextual advertising
It can be hard to imagine an SSP that can further optimize the programmatic auction and help publishers generate more revenue through the use of targeted contextual ads. However, that’s what Rise achieves. The company’s powerful contextual engine uses contextual capabilities to run through web articles or content, find the main keywords and use them to categorize that content.
For instance, the category sport may drill down to American college football, and food may become North Italian food recipes. Accessing such specific categories means better targeting, allowing advertisers to reach new audiences at scale and more precisely. For publishers, this ensures that users see ads more suited to the page and their interests while accumulating a higher ROI. For more information please visit our website and knowledge center.
How SSPs that Contextualize Data Benefit Publishers
Understanding programmatic SSPs underscores how advertisers and publishers benefit from SSPs that deliver contextualized ads. Simply put, programmatic (program + automatic) advertising uses programs or software to automate and simplify buying and selling digital ad space. An SSP is a core part of the process as it automatically and simultaneously connects publishers’ inventory – regardless of the format, with programmatic advertising channels, ad exchanges, and Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs).
Contextual Advertising Benefits
It’s all very well to have programmatic solutions that operate seamlessly, but what’s next? Advertising displays are no longer about casting a net as wide as possible in the hopes of catching a few fish. Instead, the digital advertising space has changed for several reasons.
Firstly, the go-to system of behavioral-based advertising is centered on viewers’ past browsing behavior and determined by cookies tracking a user and creating a digital and personalized profile of them, but not truly offering a customized user experience. This situation has also spawned many privacy rules and regulations, upped the use of ad blockers, and will be ushered in the restriction of third-party cookies. The abundance of ads has made it almost impossible for brands to break through saturated online ad channels.
Secondly, even if a user once clicked on an ad, having it appear ad nausam on everything and anything they watch, hear, or read online, defeats the purpose as it is rendered irrelevant at that given moment.
Enter contextualized advertising. While the practice is not new, it has regained popularity as it circumvents many of the problems above. Contextual ads are based entirely on the web page content in which an ad appears. In other words, placing ads on ad networks showing content relevant to the ad. For example, showing an ad for a laptop on a tech news site is more powerful and personalized than the ad showing up when a user is reading about politics or watching a Youtube true crime video.
How to Contextualize?
How is contextual and programmatic advertising achieved? By applying advanced, automated programmatic advertising technology, such as data science, algorithms, and AI, marketers can set parameters or implement segmentation to provide ads tailored for specific and successful contextualized placement.
However, contextual targeting is only possible if advertisers can access contextualized data from SSPs. So, what does this data comprise? Targeting potential leads via their past browsing behavior involves creating and using keywords gathered from high search volume terms for SEO. On the other hand, contextual segmentation involves choosing categories, topics, and keywords appropriate for an ad and then hoping they are picked up for content-appropriate programmatic display. In other words, after setting parameters, the ad platform’s crawler will scan and categorize different sites’ content according to each web page’s phrases, keywords, alt text, and contextual information. Then, when users visit a page, the ad server matches the page content with relevant ads. In other words, they appear in the right place at the right time. Also, choosing broad categories expands advertisers’ audience reach quickly.
Win-Win Situation
Overall, SSPs that supply contextually sourced data help programmatic publishers thrive. How? Firstly, SSPs with contextually sourced data complement their web page more than other ads. Secondly, this precision placement offers an enhanced overall user experience that spills over to the general UX and user engagement. Thirdly, these ads accumulate higher CTRs, increasing publishers’ ROIs. Lastly, the transaction raises transparency and trust between publishers and advertisers.
Advertisers thrive too. Firstly, thanks to the programmatic aspect of contextual targeting, the space purchase process is automated and efficient. Secondly, contextual targeting is more accurate than other targeting methods and ensures brand safety – in other words, the ad appears in an appropriate environment. Thirdly, better-matched ad creatives and page context inspire users to take action. Increased click-through rates ups the chance of achieving marketing goals while optimizing budget and ROAS (Return on Ad Spend). Lastly, since these ads are privacy-compliant, as users remain anonymous, they help advertisers succeed in a cookieless world.
Constant advances in content analysis technology sophistication enable even more accurate ad placement and targeting. For example, optimization algorithms and AI that analyze content to “read” sentiment and evaluate associated imagery can achieve more profound levels of segmentation.
Altogether Now
In sum, it can be hard to imagine an SSP that can further optimize the programmatic auction and help publishers generate more revenue through the use of targeted contextual ads. However, that’s what Rise achieves. The company’s powerful contextual engine uses contextual capabilities to run through web articles or content, find the main keywords and use them to categorize that content. Whether a category is health, lifestyle, sport, or eCommerce, the aim is to get more specific categories than contextual advertising has offered ever before. For instance, the category for sport may drill down to American college football, and food may become North Italian food recipes. Accessing such specific categories means better targeting, allowing advertisers to reach new audiences at scale and more precisely. For publishers, this ensures that users see ads more suited to the page and their interests while accumulating a higher ROI.
Key Takeaway
With Rise, high-precision contextual targeting combines all the elements for publishers and advertisers to enjoy a mutually beneficial, plain-sailing, revenue-generating programmatic ecosystem!