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Dynamic Ad Insertion is shifting from client to server side as content owners seek to better monetize online video delivery.
The concept of Dynamic Ad Insertion (DAI) has been around for several years and is widely considered the future method of presenting ads to viewers of live, linear or VOD content delivered by cable or OTT. The main reason is that ads inserted into individual video streams on the fly, rather than baked in alongside the content, can generate more revenue by being regionalised and personalised.
First iterations of the software switched out ads within the set top box, or the client/player side. This has the disadvantage of potentially serving ads that are out of date while manually reediting and adding fresh ads is a costly exercise. Attempts to change the approach required significant changes to the hardware infrastructure or too much manual processing and therefore could not scale. It was also susceptible to ad blockers resulting in suspect analytics.
“The profileration of devices and platforms make DAI on the client side a nightmare,” says Amagi, co-founder, KA Srinivasan. “At a time when viewing on mobile is increasing this means lot views are completely unmonetized.”
The industry is now intent on locating DAI in the network – or server side. The initiative is driven by OTT-only players like Netflix and by broadcasters like HBO which launch online-only services.
“Server side ad insertion is a process of modifying manifest files of the content stream to reference ad content during the breaks,” explains Jim Duval, Telestream’s DAI specialist. “This process defeats ad blockers, and because of HTTP/ABR delivery, can be scaled by adding disks and network connections. Efficiency in the manifest manipulation process is the key to making this work well at scale.”
Since the ads are stitched into the stream before it reaches the player, server-side DAI is important in attaining multi-platform reach. “That means far less work is needed on the part of app development teams to support the widest possible spectrum of platforms/devices than older client, or player, based solutions,” says Paul Davies, communications and marketing manager, YoSpace.
“The move to server side is new but accelerating,” reports Lionel Bringuier, director, product management at Elemental (part of AWS). “With server side there is no change in visual quality between regular content and ads whereas if you use client side your player has to download a MP4 from the ad agency, there will be some loading time (buffering) and different bit rates and aspect ratios in some cases.”
STV were the first UK broadcaster to implement DAI in live channels online before the FIFA World Cup 2014. Now all the major UK broadcasters are on board.
“DAI is essential for any commercial broadcaster with online aspirations,” says Davies. “Audiences are watching more and more television online so live channels simply must be monetised to ensure a long-term business case.”
It’s even more important, he says, since the inventory opened up by DAI in live is often sold at a premium rate compared to advertising in VOD or catch-up.
Sports rights-holders commonly launch DAI ahead of a major event. Seven Network in Australia did this for its Australian Open coverage at the start of the year. “They ran 16 online channels for the event, one from each court, and were able to open up a huge amount of inventory they otherwise wouldn’t have been able to access,” reports Davies.
The complexities of targeting ads to specific viewers involves not only identifying the viewer, but then acquiring and delivering the ads in viewable formats for the device that they are using to view the stream.
“The first step has been developing manifest manipulation services that respond to embedded triggers in the published stream,” says Duval. “The next step will likely be better and faster versions of that service that also has provisions for qualifying the content format for the viewer to optimise the experience. Concurrent with these efforts are better and more reliable reporting of the viewer engagement for maximising monetisation.”
The latest version of Video Ad Serving Template (VAST 4.0), a standard for structuring ad tags that serve ads to video players provided some extensions for server side insertion but more work needs to be done.
While vendors claim DAI has already had significant impact on broadcaster revenues, they also admit the technology is still in the foothills in terms of potential. Most broadcasters with DAI apply some form of targeting but not many have advanced to a level of hyper-targeting where they’re really making the most of the technology.
“The available data about consumer preferences is limited,” explains Srinivasan. “Deeper integration with data management platforms will improve targeting. Additionally, as users switch between devices, operators don’t have a reliable standardised way to track consumption habits unless you run a subscription-based platform.”
He Above that, he suggests that major brands, such as those selling fast moving consumer goods or cars, are more interested in broader demographic reach than individually addressable targeting.
This may be related to the ad creative. “The cost of creating high-end ad content is certainly an area that needs to be addressed if there’s to be a move towards fully addressable,” says Davies. “On the other side of the scale are the ads from local businesses, to which broadcast-grade standards need to apply at an affordable rate. A unified broadcast-standard approach will be needed on the ad stitching side, too, particularly around encoding and tracking when there is so much ad creative entering the system.” This is something Yospace says it’s discussing with ad platform Adstream at NAB.
Live streaming audiences will continue to grow, which means the opportunities to optimise yield through addressable advertising will also grow. Those opportunities will be supported by ever more advanced programmatic infrastructure (using machines to buy ads) and, possibly, though by no means certainly, widespread adoption of real-time bidding (virtually instantaneous buying and selling of online ad impressions).
“Today’s content preparation systems have automated what was a very manual process so that the scale of DAI-enabled programming, DAI ad impressions and revenue growth is strong and consistent and a part of the business plan of most major content production networks,” reckons Duval. “It will likely be more so as the physical infrastructure converts to centralised IP which is far more capable of precise targeting.”
Much further away, but nonetheless a possibility using similar technologies, is dynamic insertion not just of ads but all video content to create a personalized streaming channel.
“It is very early days but the idea is to stitch linear or VOD content to create a playlist based on viewer preferences,” says Srinivasan.
“It’s technical possible but too expensive to implement just now,” says Bringuier. “Ad insertion is built around a stream of the same content – a football match for example. If you want to build a dynamic channel for every user there will be considerable scale to overcome.”
What they do:
Amagi: Claims expertise at delivering DAI for live streams and uses a patented watermarking technique for ad-detection and replacement which is “100% frame accurate”.
Telstream: Its ability to automate DAI stream conditioning for OTT delivery from live and recorded broadcast signals is claimed “unique”. Upcoming developments similarly automates server side live streaming.
Yospace: Considers its primary focus to be stream manipulation, as opposed to other vendors which may consider “DAI as secondary to their efforts in encoders/packagers”. Also enables other functions like geo-based content blocking and automated live-to-VOD for catch-up viewing.
Elemental: Can offer full DAI via the video delivery platform Elemental Delta as well as integration with third party ad insertion services like Yospace.
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