Olga Zharuk
Grigoriy MisilyukAs the programmatic industry evolves and transforms, it undergoes dynamic changes. The drama is that many changes become noticeable only when revenue decreases. Oh yes, we are talking about the supply side. So, monetization revenues and platform profits are declining; what to do? Spoiler alert: curate traffic!
This article will explain how traffic curation affects the real CPM (rCPM) and becomes a lifeline for publishers and SSP providers to increase profits and attract premium demand partners.
Please note: traffic curation is a multifaceted process, with the most significant impact on the long term. At the same time, even minimal short-term effort to filter and enrich (curate) traffic will have a positive outcome, both at the publisher level and at that of the supply-side platform. So, let's get started! As the guy from the hundred-dollar bill said, "An investment in knowledge pays the best interest."
What does rCPM mean for the supply side?
While rCPM is the prominent metric by which demand partners assess the supply efficiency, it is of great importance for the sell-side as well:
For publishers, rCPM helps to track real monetization results. If your eCPM remains at an acceptable level, but rCPM has decreased, it indicates a decline in the inventory value during trading (too many requests without responses). This decline may result in problems with retaining demand partners and lower monetization results over time.
The parity between rCPM and eCPM metrics for SSP owners indicates the best settings for trading ad inventory. The lower the rCPM value compared to eCPM, the more growth points are hidden in inventory management. In other words, the higher the need for traffic curation.
But with great curation power comes great monetization responsibility. The deeper we dive into this topic, the higher the risk you'll decide to improve your profits with curation. So let's make it closer!
How traffic curation contributes to maximizing rCPM on SSP platforms
Impact delivered | How it works | Why it matters |
Enhanced inventory quality | The platform filters out bot traffic, MFA (Made-for-Advertising) sites, and non-engaging users to ensure that only high-quality, relevant traffic is presented to advertisers. | By curating traffic effectively, SSPs increase advertiser trust, improve bid density, and boost rCPM, ultimately driving higher revenue for publishers. |
Targeted ad placements | SSPs leverage advanced algorithms to analyze user behavior and preferences, enabling precise traffic curation and strategic ad placement optimization. | This approach boosts click-through rates (CTR) and overall ad performance by ensuring ads are more relevant to users. The result is higher returns on investment (ROI) for advertisers, encouraging further acquisition of premium ad placements. |
Optimized fill rates | Traffic curation ensures that the right ads match the right inventory in real time. | Serving relevant ads improves the user experience and maximizes the use of available ad space. Optimized fill rates contribute directly to increased rCPM as more inventory is effectively monetized. |
Reduction of ad fraud | SSPs maintain a clean, trustworthy inventory by curating traffic and filtering out fraudulent activities. | This enhances advertisers' confidence, as they can be sure their ads reach real users. The increased trust leads to higher bids for ad spaces, which results in a higher rCPM as the perceived value of the inventory rises. |
Compliance and brand safety | Traffic curation ensures that ads are displayed in a brand-safe environment that adheres to industry standards and regulations. | This compliance safeguards the publisher's reputation while attracting premium advertisers who prioritize brand safety and are concerned with maintaining their brand’s image. |
Traffic curation on the sell side: defining impact points
Both publishers and SSPs can handle traffic curation, but the best results come from combining their efforts. Generally, the publisher must use the right strategy to define the value of its audience and transmit first-party data plus contextual signals to the SSP. For its part, the advertising platform should optimize ad delivery based on auction data and data on the behavior of demand partners that publishers do not have.
The terms on which the supply-side platform will sell curated traffic should not cross the boundaries of the publisher's monetization strategy. Let's discuss this in more detail.
For publishers: turn your inventory into a premium asset
Bundle inventory into premium deals
Rather than relying solely on open auctions, publishers can curate their most valuable impressions into private marketplaces (PMPs) and curated deal IDs. These offer a higher yield per impression, as advertisers prefer direct access to engaged audiences.
2. Prevent revenue drops from oversupply
Oversupply leads to price erosion in an open auction. By curating their traffic, publishers limit excess inventory flooding the market, helping sustain competitive CPMs while maintaining steady rCPM levels.
3. Attract brand-safe and audience-targeted advertisers
Traffic curation enhances ad placements by ensuring that only quality impressions get served to demand partners. This reduces ad fraud, improves user experience, and attracts advertisers looking for reliable, high-converting audiences.
For SSPs: elevate inventory value and strengthen demand relationships
Optimize inventory and create premium ad packages
SSPs can package high-value impressions into exclusive curated deals by analyzing audience data, engagement patterns, and bid density. This increases their attractiveness to premium demand partners who seek more precise targeting.
2. Reduce DSP overload and improve auction efficiency
Traffic curation helps SSPs eliminate non-performing or redundant bid requests, reducing strain on DSPs. This leads to faster, more efficient auctions, where high-intent impressions are prioritized—ultimately improving campaign results and raising rCPM.
3. Strengthen advertiser and agency relationships
SSPs build trust with demand partners by offering curated traffic with well-defined audience attributes. Advertisers are willing to bid higher when they know they get quality, fraud-free impressions in brand-safe environments. This creates a virtuous cycle of stronger demand relationships and better monetization.
The main mistakes during traffic curation
Misjudging the volume and variety of traffic that should be curated: Suppose an SSP overestimates the available high-quality inventory. In that case, it risks setting unrealistic pricing expectations, which can deter demand partners or temporarily reduce bidding activity as adjustments are made.
Relying too heavily on open-market curation: While open exchange transactions have their place, they lack the precision and exclusivity that private, structured deal mechanisms like Deal IDs can offer. Advertisers often choose curated deals to achieve more control and transparency. Ignoring this demand preference means leaving money on the table and reducing long-term monetization potential.
Insufficient or too aggressive inventory filtering: Including made-for-advertising (MFA) sites or low-quality placements in curated deals dilutes their value, making them less attractive to premium advertisers. Vice versa, over-segmenting inventory to the point where scale becomes an issue can limit the availability of ad placements, restricting revenue potential instead of enhancing it. The key is finding the right balance: filtering enough to ensure quality without narrowing the inventory pool so much that it loses competitive scale.
Ignoring query-per-second (QPS) constraints: Poorly optimized curation processes can flood DSPs with redundant or unnecessary bid requests, leading to inefficiencies that drive up buyers' costs. This harms short-term revenue and erodes trust in the long run.
Avoiding these mistakes requires a strategic, data-driven approach. Curation endeavors go far beyond filtering—ensuring the right traffic reaches the right buyers most efficiently. You can read more about traffic curation, discover its technical basis, and learn how it boosts revenue for publishers and advertisers.
One tech to curate them all
Besides knowing all the moves and pitfalls, the advanced curated platform will help you take monetization and ad delivery to the next level. Such a platform must be equipped with a broad set of tools. Take, for instance, the curation toolkit available on our white-label SSP + Ad Exchange:
The platform supports advanced filtering, allowing precise control over ad inventory by domain, publisher ID, app/site ID, and more. This ensures that only high-value impressions reach demand partners.
Another game-changer is identity matching. With pre-integrated support for ID5 and the option to integrate other universal ID solutions like UID 2.0 and LiveRamp, our platform enables secure first-party data targeting, boosting privacy compliance and monetization potential.
Fraud prevention is also a core part of our curation toolkit. Integrated fraud detection scanners work behind the scenes to block invalid traffic and brand safety threats in real-time.
To top it off, the platform is empowered with optimization tools based on machine learning, like the Traffic Shaping Tool. These features provide dynamic price adjustments, filter out low-value impressions, and maximize revenue opportunities, giving publishers and SSPs an edge in an increasingly competitive market.
Conclusions
The concept of curation combines broad approaches to filtering and enriching traffic with signals, managing ad inventory at the platform level, optimizing its delivery, and other actions that increase revenue and strengthen trading relationships.
Is it necessary to invest in traffic curation? We think so. However, it is not a one-way game. Publishers and SSPs must join forces to maximize their profits, each at their own level. The power is in synergy.
May your profits soar and your trading relationships flourish—because in the programmatic world, fortune favors the curated. If you have any questions, you can always contact us for advice on reaching new heights in the programmatic world. Stay tuned; there are many insights ahead!
