Ep 4: Who takes the curation fee?

Myth: a higher bid always pays you more.

A curator packages impressions, often with data, into deals. Its cut is the curation fee.

Say an impression on recipes.example gets a two dollar bid in the open auction. Your SSP keeps fifteen percent, so you get one dollar seventy. In a curated deal, the same impression sells for two dollars twenty. The curator keeps ten percent, twenty-two cents. The SSP keeps thirty-three cents. You get one dollar sixty-five. Higher bid, less money. The fee is often built into the floor the buyer sees, so it hides inside the price. Curation pays you only when the bid rises by more than the fees. And one industry analysis found roughly half of curated deals carry no curation fee.

Ask your SSP for a report of curated deals on your inventory, with the curator and the fee type.

Next: SPO, and why DSPs cut your SSPs.