The Adx.txt initiative was released in May 2017 and allows advertisers to spend those important marketing budgets on authorised supply platforms. The IAB Tech Lab developed Ads.txt to assist publishers in the fight against ad fraud and to receive the revenue owed to them and increase market transparency.
Ads.txt is an acronym for Authorised Digital Sellers. This piece of technology has been introduced by the IAB in an effort to eliminate the ability to profit from counterfeit or spoofed inventory in the open digital advertising ecosystem supply chain. Ads.txt allows publishers and content owners the ability to authorise and publicly declare who is allowed to sell their inventory.
Ads.txt gives publishers the ability to control who gets to sell their inventory legitimately. This creates transparency in the market and thus limits the ability for digital criminals to profit off their inventory. Fraudsters have been getting really good at spoofing domains and this has resulted in an increase in “fake news” articles and ads as well as revenue being paid to illegitimate resellers. The adoption of Ads.txt assists in creating a fairer market in that advertisers will be sure that their marketing budgets are being spent on legitimate sites. It also ensures that publishers are earning the revenue they work so hard to get.
How does Ads.txt work?
Who is currently using adx.txt?
Some examples of popular international publishers who have implemented ads.txt:
Which ad exchanges are plugged into Ads.txt inventory? (Pixalate: 2017)
Why is this relevant?
The state of Ads.txt adoption?
Adoption rate amongst global publishers has been steadily increasing. According to Adopsinsider, adoption rate has grown from 13% in September 2017 to 44% in October
2017. Perhaps one of the biggest contributors to this is Google Doubleclick Bid Manager’s announcement that they would stop buying unauthorised supply paths by the end of October.
Adoption from a South African context mimics the slow adoption globally. At the time this article was written six of the top twenty publishers (Effective Measure,2017) in the country had Ads.txt files implemented on their sites. That is only 30% of the country’s top publishers. This means that popular sites who receive a chunk of the digital ad spend could be victims of domain spoofing and perhaps worse; advertisers making use of those channels wouldn’t be getting their money’s worth. EWN, Sharenet and iAfrica, who are part of the 365 Digital stable are some of the publishers leading this movement in South Africa. We hope to see the more publishers get on board the fight against ad fraud and contribute towards a digitally transparent and fair ecosystem.
365 Digital offers publishers solutions like these and ensures new developments and trends are highlighted in order to keep publishers ahead of the curve and in touch with the martech industry.
https://www.effectivemeasure.com/