Ad Quality FAQ

General

What is ad quality?

Ad quality encompasses a wide range of considerations aimed at ensuring that advertisements align with the specific content, policy, and technical requirements set forth by a given publisher or platform.

Whereas malvertising refers to security threats and OBJECTIVELY bad ads, ad quality addresses ads that are subjectively bad and may be unwanted or restricted for policy or competitive reasons. 

How does it block ads? What specifically happens?

There are two layers of defense in place for preventing unwanted ads:

1. In the bidding process, HUMAN will prevent the bid from proceeding if the domain or category matches what is declared in the bid.
   Only the bid is blocked, auction still completes and the ad request  is filled by the highest remaining bid. This ensures that revenue is still collected.
2. If the domain or category is either undeclared or declared incorrectly, HUMAN will examine the HTML of the winning creative and block the ad if it determines a match.
   Creative will be blocked from serving.  Creative will not be displayed, and tracking events will not be fired.

How should I use these features? Are there any best practices or guidelines to keep in mind?

These features are for blocking unwanted ads, not for selectively curating a list of advertisements. It is best to be judicious in your selections based on firm requirements and known issues/complaints.  Additionally, we recommend that Publishers start with Domain Blocking, as this is the most surgical approach.

So do I need to reach out to my suppliers to get rid of bad ads, or should I just use this?

We still recommend working with partners to apply your own requirements, and reduce the amount of bids from unwanted advertisers. This will help maximize efficiencies of the auction. We are ‘last mile’ of protection, enabling swift responses to complaints across multiple sources and providing a  to block ads that may get through or evade filter settings with partners. 

Setup

What do I need to do if I need to block a different group of domains and/or categories for my different sites?

You can create and manage different Ad Quality Profiles for each site or groups of sites. Each individual profile can be assigned to 1 or more distributions. To have a new Profile made available in the Dashboard, please contact your Customer Success rep (via [email protected]) 

Can I combine profiles? Can I set a global profile and then add custom profiles for different groups of sites?

Yes, you can apply more than one profile to a distribution using the management panel.

What if I have different domains and categories to block for different sites but I only have 1 distribution?

You can create a brand new distribution within the Deployment section of the dashboard. Once created, integrated and deployed on the specific sites/domains, please contact [email protected] to create your distribution specific Profile for Ad Quality. Once created you will be able to assign that Profile to the specific Distribution in the console. 

Does this protect all ads, including video and native?

At this time, bid blocking only applies to ads that come through Prebid. Ad blocking applies to all ad formats. We are actively developing future improvements to broaden bid-level coverage.

Is prebid available running through Prebid web and AMP or just web? 

Both.

Features

Is it possible to report / block advertiser technology across our sites?

Blocking specific advertiser technology is not a current capability but something that is being considered for future enhancements. If there is a need, please do share your requirements.

Can we block ad formats or specific creative features like in banner video ads?

Not at this time. These are great examples of future use cases that the team is considering

Can we configure different settings for different regions? E.g. ad that was subjectively offensive to users in a certain region or country

Not at this time. These are great examples of future use cases that the team is considering.

Is the goal to make it wider so Amazon and Google demand will be included?

Yes. This is currently planned in our roadmap.

What about a creative library that we can review ads blocked or potentially block?

We have received requests to provide views of the ads themselves, what is actually being delivered and what they want to block. We are considering adding this feature to future roadmaps. 

Dashboard

What does “Report Only” mean?

The 'Report Only' option is accessible for tracking the count of potentially blocked ads for each choice, in case blocking was activated.

What is the source of the different Categories?  Is it IAB and if so, what version?

We’re using a custom list, more detailed IAB versions. To block specific IAB categories, choose equivalent options from our comprehensive list.

What if I have a large list of domains to block?

There is an option for uploading a CSV list of domains. Please follow the formatting and uploading instructions listed on the prompt.

Do I need to include ‘www’ or other URL components?

No, do not include this.

Where can I get more detailed reporting? I want to see volumes and trends for individual entries.

Dashboard provides volume trends on number of blocked ads (or Report Only) based on specific Category, Brand or if blocked by Domain. More granular reporting on specific domains of any blocked ad (even if blocked by Category or Brand) will be made available in the dashboard soon. 

Technical 

Is image recognition incorporated into any part of the current set of ad quality components?

Computer vision and image recognition is not being used for category or brand identification. Though these capabilities are being actively explored for future Ad Quality controls, especially as it relates to sensitive or restricted categories.

Does any re-auctioning take place? What happens if we block an ad?

No, we won’t initiate a new auction; however, when blocked at the bid level a new auction would not be needed because the auction would still result in a winning bid and an ad being served.

If an ad is blocked through that secondary check, no ad will be served. There is not another auction.

Support

What if I receive a report of an ad that I think should be blocked?

Please first verify the general category, brand or domain is in fact selected or added to the Ad Quality settings. If you are unsure you may also grab a live sample of the creative to validate that exact domain has been or should be added. The rendered creative may be loading because the domain related to the brand, category or domain blocklist does not match the expected domain precisely.

How do I get new Ad Quality profiles?

Reach out to [email protected] to request new profiles or rename existing profiles.