Overview

FreeWheel MRM will be enhancing its creative detection logic for Programmatic Guaranteed (PG) Deals on August 1221, 2024. This update will not have a major impact on the programmatic creative workflow, and no immediate action is required on the part of the user.

Background

Programmatic module detects incoming creatives from DSP partners by parsing various fields in the bid response. As part of this update, Programmatic module's new creative detection logic will use information from the final inline VAST tag containing the actual creative, including media file URLs. This refined creative detection logic has already been operational  for PMP Deals since earlier this year.

This enhancement allows Programmatic module to more efficiently detect unique creative media files and generate corresponding Creative External IDs, which can then be used to initiate creative approvals and other creative features. Publishers will be able to approve creatives swiftly and with confidence, maintaining a high standard of quality and compliance with industry regulations.

How Are Users Affected?

No action is needed from users. Any creatives ingested using the old logic will continue to use that logic for creative identification, so you will not need to re-approve creatives and you won't experience discontinuity in your creative reporting. Only creatives new to the Programmatic Module will use the new logic.

All creative features, including creative approval, will continue to work as usual. However, following the change, the "Creative External ID" value (visible in reporting, the Programmatic Creative Library, and Creative Approval Queue) will be formatted differently for creatives new to Programmatic Module. The "Creative External ID" format for Programmatic Module creatives from DSPs will look something like "74:bb6baf56221d752628502b6aa8a36a8a1658783297399601" instead of "5:234:234:234." 

It is expected that a greater quantity of creatives associated with PG deals will now require approval, as different creatives submitted by the DSP with the same ID will now be correctly identified and listed as individual creatives within your MRM network. This is because the new logic reduces the risk of buyers changing creatives for PG deals without the changed creatives being correctly flagged for creative approval. This will allow you to better enforce your creative quality standards.

Sharing Creative IDs with Buyers

The new appearance of the Creative External IDs introduces a potential change in how you communicate these IDs to buyers for troubleshooting reasons. Because the Creative External ID cannot be directly used for buyers to look up a creative in their DSP, FreeWheel is implementing measures to ensure that publishers and buyers can effectively troubleshoot creative issues both now and in the future.

Navigate the change with these tools today:

• VAST tag in the Programmatic Creative Library: FreeWheel will continue to store the associated VAST tag for all programmatic creatives in the Programmatic Creative Library. When combined with other details such as the deal ID and advertiser, buyers should be able to easily identify the creative in the DSP.
  
  
• Bid-level log files: Three fields – DSPCreativeId, DSPAdId, DSPCampaignId – were previously added to the FreeWheel bid-level log files. You can still use the bid-level log files to see which DSP IDs are used in conjunction with a particular FreeWheel internal Creative ID (using the CreativeId field). Under the new logic, a consistent 1:1 relationship is maintained between “Creative External ID” and the FreeWheel internal Creative ID, which can then be used for log level reporting.
  
  
• Programmatic Creative Library: within the Edit Creative page for each creative in the Pogrammatic Creative Library you will be able to see a ‘DSP Creative ID’ field, including the most recently submitted DSP Creative ID for that creative.

Timeline

FreeWheel will update the logic on July 30thAugust 21, 2024.