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Key Terms

Ads to Content Ratio (A2CR)

Ads to Content Ratio (A2CR) measures the proportion of pixels dedicated to advertisements versus those allocated to content on a web page.

We offer detailed analysis at multiple levels:

  • Publisher-level aggregation of A2CR based on the pages we have visited
  • Page-level aggregation based on the viewport level values
  • Granular viewport-level A2CR

You can read more about our methodology in the methodology section.

Ad Element ID

An Ad Element ID is a unique identifier assigned to a specific ad element within a webpage or application. This ID plays a crucial role in the digital advertising ecosystem, particularly in programmatic advertising and ad tracking.

This identifier is important to both Publishers, Adservers and Advertisers as it can help with reporting and optimizations.

Ad Overlap

Ad Overlap refers to the scenario where multiple ad units are displayed in overlapping (or “colliding”) positions. Ad Overlap is a key metric used to ensure proper ad placement and maximize visibility.

This can result in reduced visibility for ads, as portions of one ad may be hidden beneath another. Ad overlap negatively impacts the performance of ad campaigns by decreasing viewability and reducing the effectiveness of impressions.

By monitoring overlap, advertisers and publishers can optimize page layouts to ensure each ad is fully visible, improving viewability scores and increasing engagement potential. Reducing ad overlap is crucial to maintaining high-quality user experiences and delivering effective campaigns.

You can read more about our methodology in the methodology section.

Ad Server

An Ad Server offers a technology platform that manage the delivery, tracking, and reporting of digital advertising across websites, apps, and other digital channels. They serve as the backbone of digital advertising by handling the placement and optimization of ads, ensuring that the right ad is shown to the right audience at the right time.

An example of an Ad Server is Google Ad Manager (formerly DFP).

Ad Slot

Ad slots are predefined areas within a web page or application where advertisements can be displayed. These slots are determined by publishers and are crucial for the organization and layout of digital advertising.

Please note, the rendered creative in a given Ad Slot may not take up the entire Ad Slot and can differ in size.

Ads in View

Ads in View is a key metric that represents the number of ad units visible within a user’s viewport at any given moment on a webpage.

By measuring “Ads in View,” publishers and advertisers can better understand what a user is seeing on a page and make adjustments to improve ad performance, such as by optimizing placements.

You can read more about our methodology in the methodology section.

Affiliate Provider

Affiliate Providers are platforms or networks that facilitate the marketing and promotion of products or services through affiliate marketing. This model allows advertisers to leverage third-party publishers (affiliates) to drive traffic and sales, offering them compensation based on performance metrics such as clicks, leads, or sales. Affiliate Providers play a crucial role in connecting advertisers with affiliates and managing the entire affiliate marketing process.

An example of this would be publisherA.com writing an article about the “best TVs” and linking out to advertiserB when their product is referenced.

Some examples of Affiliate Providers include:

  • Amazon Affiliates
  • ShareASale
  • Skimlinks

Audience Provider

Audience Providers refer to companies or platforms that collect, aggregate, and distribute data on user behavior, interests, and demographics. They enable Publishers to target specific groups of people more effectively by categorizing users based on their online activities, preferences, and other data points.

This data is then, usually, passed to the publisher’s Adserver or into the open marketplace through Bid Adapters.

Some examples of Audience Providers include:

  • Adobe
  • Lotame
  • Permutive

Authentication Provider

Authentication Providers are entities or services that verify a user’s identity, ensuring that the person interacting with a platform or website is who they claim to be. They play a crucial role in securing the digital advertising ecosystem by providing mechanisms to verify users, ensuring better targeting, and enhancing data security.

While some companies focus solely on authentication, companies can also be included if they offer single sign on (SSO) for Publishers to use to authenticate their user base.

Some examples of Authentication Providers include:

  • Auth0
  • Okta
  • OpenPass
  • Google

A Consent Provider is a solution that facilitates the management of user consent for data usage, ensuring compliance with privacy laws such as GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) and CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act). These providers offer tools and frameworks that enable businesses to collect, store, and manage consent preferences from users regarding the use of their personal data in advertising and marketing activities.

Some examples of Consent Providers include:

  • OneTrust
  • Didomi
  • Google Funding Choices

Contextual Signature

At Sincera, a Publisher’s Contextual Signature is based on the classification of pages we have visited with our synthetic fleet, into the IAB taxonomy. These classifications define the nature and content of the page, helping advertisers and ad platforms understand the context in which ads will appear.

By analyzing the page’s content, contextual signatures identify the most relevant categories from this taxonomy. These signatures allow for more precise targeting in contextual advertising, enabling advertisers to place ads that align with the page’s content, enhancing relevance, user engagement, and ad performance.

More information about the IAB Taxonomy can be found on their website.

Domain Speed Metrics

Sincera uses Google’s lighthouse metrics to calculate Publisher speed metrics. For more information on how the calculations are made, please visit Google’s website.

You can read more about our value to text conversions in our methodology section.

Identity Provider

An Identity Provider (IdP) is a service or platform that manages digital identities. In the context of adtech, IdPs enable advertisers to create a cohesive and secure environment for user identification, data privacy, and personalized advertising experiences.

Identity Providers differ from Authentication Providers mainly due to the fact that identity providers strive to create and maintain a comprehensive user profile while Authentication Providers main focus is to verify a user’s identity when logging in.

Some examples of an Identity providers include:

  • ID5
  • The Trade Desk (UID and UID2.0)
  • Liveramp (ATS)

Paid traffic refers to traffic that a publisher (a website or app owner) acquires through paid advertising or promotion to increase the number of visitors or users on their platform. The goal is to drive more visitors to the publisher’s website or app, ultimately increasing engagement with content or ad inventory that can be monetized through ads or subscriptions.

PreBid Adapter

PreBid Adapters are components within the PreBid.js framework that facilitate communication between a publisher’s ad server and various demand sources, such as ad exchanges, demand-side platforms (DSPs), and other programmatic advertising networks. They play a crucial role in the header bidding process, allowing publishers to receive bids from multiple advertisers simultaneously before making a decision on which ad to serve.

Publisher Asset

Publisher Assets refer to the collection of data and information gathered from publisher pages within the digital advertising ecosystem. This data is used to help advertisers understand the characteristics of a publisher’s content, audience, and overall site performance.

At Sincera, this refers to the page texts, videos, and images collected by our Synthetic Fleet on a Publishers property.

SSP Adapter

An SSP adapter acts as the connector between a publisher’s Prebid.js implementation and various SSPs, enabling real-time bidding and allowing publishers to maximize revenue by receiving bids from multiple demand sources simultaneously. This improves competition and transparency, key benefits of header bidding through Prebid.

SSP Bidder

SSP bidders (Supply-Side Platform bidders) are demand sources integrated into the header bidding process. These SSP bidders represent different demand-side platforms (DSPs), ad exchanges, or networks that compete to buy ad impressions from a publisher’s website or app in real-time. By participating in the auction managed by the Prebid wrapper, SSP bidders submit bids for the available ad inventory before the ad server (such as Google Ad Manager) selects the winning ad to display.

Supply Path

A supply path refers to the route that an ad takes from the advertiser to the publisher’s website or app where the ad is displayed. It represents the series of intermediaries, such as ad exchanges, supply-side platforms (SSPs), and other resellers, involved in the process of selling and delivering the ad inventory (the space where ads are shown).

Understanding and optimizing the supply path is crucial for advertisers and ad buyers to ensure transparency, cost efficiency, and quality control in the ad-buying process.

Session

A Session in AdTech is usually defined as the browsing activity of a user over a 30 minute time frame on a given website. Once the time frame or window is closed, a new session will be started on the next visit to the site.

Survey Provider

Survey providers are companies or platforms that facilitate the creation, distribution, and analysis of surveys, typically for market research, consumer feedback, or data collection purposes. They play a crucial role in helping businesses, advertisers, and researchers gather insights from their target audiences.

Technical Sales House

Technical Sales Houses (TSHs) are specialized organizations that act as intermediaries between advertisers and publishers, primarily in the digital advertising ecosystem. They offer technical expertise and sales support to help maximize advertising revenue for publishers and optimize advertising campaigns for advertisers.

Traffic Rank

We use the Tranco Traffic Rank at Sincera. The Tranco Traffic Rank is a ranking system that provides a list of the most popular 1M websites based on a combination of traffic data from multiple sources. It was created to improve upon existing web ranking systems (such as Alexa and Majestic) by offering a more transparent and academically rigorous methodology.

More information about the Tranco Traffic Rank can be found on their website.

Video Player

Video Players are tools or technologies that facilitate the streaming and playback of video content, including advertisements, across different devices and platforms. They are essential for integrating video ads into digital marketing strategies, enabling advertisers to reach audiences with engaging visual content.

Some examples of Video Players are:

  • Dailymotion
  • Brightcove
  • Vidazoo

Wrapper

A wrapper is a key component used to facilitate header bidding by managing multiple demand sources or bidders. The Prebid wrapper helps standardize and streamline the auction process by allowing publishers to invite bids from various ad exchanges, networks, or demand-side platforms (DSPs) in parallel before the ad server decides which ad to serve.

More recently, you will notice there can be multiple wrappers on a given publishers. Some are served directly by the publisher and others can be created by 3rd party scripts.

Global Placement Identifier (GPID)

A Global Placement Identifier (GPID) is a unique, publisher-specified placement ID (or tag) that remains unchanged across all supply-side platforms (SSPs).

In traditional programmatic auctions, the TagId property of the OpenRTB Impression object typically contains an exchange-specific placement ID. Each exchange maintains its own unique set of placement IDs, which do not overlap with other exchanges. With the rise of header bidding, however, buyers can acquire inventory from multiple sources. This introduces a challenge: buyers lack a consistent way to identify which placement is being transacted in any given auction.

GPIDs solve this problem. By allowing publishers to specify a consistent GPID that is propagated across exchanges, buyers can easily track and recognize which placement is being auctioned, regardless of the supply path.

For more detailed information, refer to the Global Placement ID documentation on The Trade Desk’s website.