FatTail worked together with Qinshift to design and build their AdBookPSP solution — an innovative SSP tailored exclusively for deal-based programmatic transactions.
About FatTail
FatTail is a global enterprise advertising technology company that offers AdBook+, a unified direct and programmatic supply platform.
Their cloud-based solutions enable publishers to have complete control over media planning, sales, and revenue, while offering buy-side systems exclusive access to top-of-the-funnel inventory from trusted brands.
FatTail and Qinshift teamed up to create a groundbreaking premium supply platform (PSP), blending FatTail's deal-based expertise, AdBook+ technology, and Qinshift's programmatic know-how and resources.
This platform, called AdBookPSP, is specifically designed for conducting programmatic transactions based on deal IDs.
We consider this solution to be well-suited for the current market conditions due to the growing privacy restrictions that are negatively impacting identity resolution.
As a result, audience-driven programmatic strategies are limited and there is a rising need for direct transactions with premium publishers.
FatTail engaged Qinshift to help us implement a new component in our AdBook+ system — AdBook Premium Supply Platform (AdBookPSP). We chose Qinshift for their experience with header bidding technology and that expertise proved valuable in the implementation of our system. Qinshift has a well-structured process for discovery that allows for collaboration on all requirements of the project.
During the implementation phase, the team was easy to work with and we are happy with the solutions they delivered in terms of performance, scalability, and long-term maintenance of the system. When the team completed the project, they supplied FatTail with all the necessary documentation on all aspects of the system and were available for questions to support the launch of the system.
It was a pleasure collaborating with the Qinshift team and we’re looking forward to working with them on future initiatives.
Gerry Bates
CTO at FatTail
The challenge
FatTail aimed to create a new programmatic demand channel by integrating common infrastructure for direct sales and executing deals through industry-standard header bidding (Prebid) and publisher ad server (Google Ad Manager) technology.
They partnered with us to help them build a new platform, called AdBookPSP.
FatTail’s main requirements were to:
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Build an ad exchange.
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Create an official Prebid adapter.
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Integrate the ad exchange with DSPs and Google Ad Manager (GAM).
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Integrate the ad exchange seamlessly with AdBook+.
The solution
During our partnership, we:
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Designed and built AdBookPSP (an ad exchange).
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Ingested deal data from AdBook+
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Built FatTail’s official Prebid adapter.
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Developed the programmatic lab environment for business testing.
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Set up integrations with EngageBDR and RTBiQ.
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Built a reporting service.
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Developed customized JavaScript and logic for creative execution on winning deal-based bids.
AdBookPSP
AdBookPSP functions as a platform that pairs Prebid adapter impressions with AdBook+ deals, creating bid requests that are then forwarded to the integrated DSPs. After receiving the responses, the exchange proceeds to process them and transmits them to GAM through Prebid.
Usually, an SSP initiates bid requests, conducts an auction, and selects the winning bid.
FatTail's AdBookPSP allows multiple deal types, such as programmatic guaranteed, preferred deal, private auction, open market programmatic, and direct deals, to compete within a publisher's ad server.
This introduced challenges in sending data back to Prebid & GAM as well as for retrieving the winning creative (downstream) from one of any number of bids received (upstream).
The task at hand involved analyzing bid responses and providing a set of signals that accurately represent the level of demand involvement across various deals to GAM for final decision-making.
We achieved this objective by utilizing AdBook+ to receive deal instructions, conducting real-time processing, integrating with the DSPs, making informed decisions, and facilitating post-RTB processing.
Prebid
By default, Prebid only collects the highest bid from the connected SSPs.
Given that AdBookPSP facilitates the execution of multiple simultaneous deals of different deal types and varying priority levels, the auction clearing process cannot rely solely on price.
After collecting bid responses, AdBookPSP performs post-processing and passes signals to GAM that reflect the demand received from DSPs, facilitating the final decision-making process.
The focus shifted to addressing how AdBookPSP utilizes Prebid as a header bidding layer to transmit those signals effectively to GAM.
By conducting research and employing problem-solving methods, we successfully devised an appropriate key-value signaling strategy and utilized the "sendAllBids" method in Prebid to transmit all relevant bids from various deals to GAM.
Programmatic lab environment
We built the programmatic lab environment for business and performance testing.
FatTail has the capability to establish a replica of their production environment, incorporating all the identical components, albeit utilizing simulated DSPs and websites.
FatTail can generate their own deal files, scenarios, and upload creatives, encompassing all the essential components found in the live environment.
Private auction workflow (aka private marketplace)
This resembled the programmatic guarantee configuration we developed. It essentially functioned as another auction, but instead of sending all bids, we just sent the highest bid across all deals assigned to this workflow.
Reporting services
The reporting service runs via APIs. We chose not to develop a UI for this functionality and instead exposed an endpoint. In the future, we plan to seamlessly integrate it with AdBook+."
The benefits of working with Qinshift
By working with Qinshift, FatTail was able to develop and launch their AdBook+ platform without having to take their internal technical teams away from their other platforms.
The keys to the project’s success were:
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Qinshift’s experience, skills, and knowledge of designing and building custom advertising technology.
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Our incremental and agile approach to software development.
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Our cooperation with our client and their internal teams.
The Main Challenges and How We Solved Them
Adjusting the Prebid adapter
The most formidable task we encountered was adapting the Prebid adapter to redirect all bids from the demand sources to GAM, rather than the default restriction of 3 bids.
We had to change the character string to include all of the bids from the demand sources. Moreover, one of the challenges we encountered was adapting FatTail's Prebid Adapter in a manner that could effectively replace the key-value pairs, enabling seamless integration with GAM (Google Ad Manager).
We were also required to individually create each line item for the private auction workflow, resulting in a significant amount of manual work. We had to do this manually, but AdBook+ will automate this process for publishers on live deals.
This challenge arises due to the inherent nature of integrating Prebid with the GAM ad server in order to facilitate the passage of programmatic demand.
Learning about configuring Google Ad Manager
Although it was a new experience for us, it simply involved familiarizing ourselves with the process of integrating with GAM, configuring it, and effectively matching key-value pairs such as line items.