Ep 5: SPO from the buyer’s side

One industry analysis found the typical publisher uses over twenty-five SSPs.

Supply path optimization, or SPO, is a buyer keeping only its best routes to you.

Look from the DSP’s side. One impression on news.example arrives through four SSPs. Four bid requests, one ad. The buyer can only win once, and may bid against itself. So it scores each path. Is your ads.txt line DIRECT? Does the SSP’s sellers.json list you as the publisher? Is the supply chain object, or schain, complete? How big is the fee? Paths A and B are direct and cheap. C and D run through resellers. The DSP keeps A and B, and drops C and D. If a buyer reached you only through C, that spend shrinks.

For each SSP, check that your DIRECT line matches a publisher entry in its sellers.json.

Next: ads.txt hygiene, owner domain and manager domain.