How this Google ad tech change could win over programmatic publishers

Publishers and ad tech providers, freshly emboldened after Google’s turn in the hot seat at its antitrust trial last month, are pushing for fairer programmatic ad auctions that could counter the search giant’s power in the marketplace. Since the trial ended last week, more voices have come out with proposed fixes they think could reset the scales, including encouraging Google to work more closely with Prebid.org, a group of programmatic advertising companies that develop standards for the industry. Also, Google rivals on the demand side of internet advertising, such as The Trade Desk, have been quick to capitalize on the trial and keep pressing the case against Google. In one example of the bolder stance against Google, this week, The Trade Desk gave space on its website to Justin Wohl, chief revenue officer at Snopes, who posted a blog arguing that Google should integrate with Prebid.org. Wohl shared his opinion piece on The Trade Desk’s website, The Current, titled “Beyond U.S. v. Google: It’s time for ad exchanges to bid fairly in header bidding.” Wohl argued for a fix that many publishers and rival ad exchanges have been considering: calling on Google to develop a prebid adapter to participate in header bidding auctions. Header bidding is an alternative ad auction that publishers adopted in the mid-2010s to access ad demand from sources outside Google. The exchanges that participate in header bidding have to build adapters to join these auctions that typically occur before (pre-bidding) the ultimate auction within Google Ad Manager. Check out the latest Ad Age events and award programs “The ad tech industry as a whole must call on Google’s ad exchange [AdX] to bid at the same time as others, during the header bidding process, with a prebid adapter,” Wohl wrote in his opinion piece this week. “This is not just an idealistic plea for fairness; it’s a rallying cry for the longevity of the open internet.” Google’s antitrust case, brought to trial by the U.S. Department of Justice, hinged on Google’s role in programmatic ad markets, as about 90% of online publishers use Google Ad Manager to run their ad operations. The case delved into ways that Google allegedly stymied header bidding. In the antitrust trial, Google was accused of holding power over publishers by giving them access only to advertising dollars from its AdX ad exchange if they used Google Ad Manager. Google attorneys argued that there are ways for publishers to configure their ad operations to access its pool of advertisers without forcing them to use its other publishing tools. Judge Leonie Brinkema of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia is expected to issue a ruling before the end of the year. In the meantime, publishers such as Snopes want to shake up online ad markets. Fact-checker’s ad stack Snopes is an example of a publisher that is reliant on Google for its ad tech and advertising revenue, Wohl told Ad Age this week. Snopes generates about 20% of its ad revenue through Google’s AdX, Wohl said. “If they were a small player, [Google] would never have been in our stack for years and years and years,” Wohl said. “But the truth is that they make up 20% or more of most publishers’ programmatic yield. They're a tremendous buyer of open market impression opportunities. So, publishers have been shackled to this in terms of building the most efficient, most fair, most publisher-controlled … sales machine.” See Ad Age’s 2024 Breakout Brand Leaders and Work here Snopes raised similar concerns as other publishers that testified at the trial, including Gannett and News Corp. Google declined to comment for this story. However, Wohl spoke about changes Google could make to integrate with header bidders. The way header bidding works is the publisher runs an ad auction and then sends the winning bid to Google Ad Manager, which gets a last lick at determining if it can provide a winning bid. Publishers have complained about a lack of transparency in how Google runs the auction in its ad manager. Wohl suggested that many ad exchanges, not just Google could make better integrations with header bidding and prebid’s pipes to make the market fairer for publishers. “There are many, many buyers who are missing from the open market,” Wohl said. Wohl’s view is a sign of growing tension between publishers and parts of the real-time bidding, internet advertising community. In mid-October, Prebid.org will host its annual summit in New York City where the ramifications of the Google ad tech trial are sure to be a topic of conversation. Wohl is not the only one calling for Google to change its stance about header bidding and how it interoperates with independent ad tech. Patrick McCann, senior VP of research at Raptive, an ad platform for influencers and publishers, also has been highly critical of Google’s ad tech operations. This week, McCann suggested Google should be more transparent with its ad auctions, giving publishers more details about its bids on their inventory. “Prebid hasn't asked AdX to build an adapter or integration, we just asked them to just return their price,” McCann said in a LinkedIn post. “Everyone else (we) can take it from there. That's all that's needed to integrate other systems with them, just tell us how much you want to pay for the ad.” Level the field Google has likely considered developing better interoperability with the rest of the ad markets, if that would appease regulators, including the Department of Justice. The case against Google could take years still to reach a conclusion, but the DOJ has been angling to breakup Google’s ad tech business, separating Google Ad Manager and AdX. Integrating AdX with prebid, would essentially do the same thing, according to Garrett McGrath, senior VP of product management at supply-side platform Magnite and a member of Prebid.org. “If Google were inclined to participate in prebid, it would very much level the playing field, because AdX would operate basically like any other exchange,” McGrath said, “and [Google] would have the opportunity to participate in the header bidding auction, which would then presumably make GAM, the ad server, just an ad delivery mechanism. It would kind of decouple GAM from AdX.” “It doesn't solve everything, of course, but it would certainly help a lot,” McGrath said. How Google configures its ad manager is not a small point, as it is the main software that most publishers use to run their ads. Also, Google’s Chrome web browser team has been on a mission to deprecate third-party cookies, a privacy move to lock down data, but it’s a change that could upend programmatic ad markets again. Google is running into resistance from U.K. regulators about its plan to deprecate cookies, with the watchdogs claiming it could harm online businesses. Google has already made concessions, agreeing not to turn off cookies without providing alternative technology that would keep ad operations going for the rest of the web. Google’s Chrome team, which is separate from the ad team that was in the spotlight at the antitrust trial, has been developing what it calls Privacy Sandbox. That project has hit roadblocks, but it would essentially move ad auctions into the Chrome browser and limit how much data it returns to publishers and advertisers. Some rival ad exchanges and ad tech collaborators with Google, including the major participants in Prebid.org, have been concerned about how Privacy Sandbox could give Google Ad Manager even more power. The rivals are worried that Google’s black box, which already obfuscates data about ad auctions, will become even more impenetrable. At the upcoming prebid conference, aside from Google and Privacy Sandbox, the ad tech community will also discuss how prebid mechanics could help other parts of the digital ad industry, including connected TV, out-of-home and audio, according to Mike Racic, president of Prebid.org. NextGen Marketing Summit Join us for a crash course on Gen Z, DTC marketing and the creator economy Register today

How this Google ad tech change could win over programmatic publishers

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