EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
SCID (Shared Campaign Identifier) is a key that enables tracking campaigns across platforms. This post describes the technical details of SCID and the use within OpenRTB.
BACKGROUND
OpenRTB enables advertisers to run campaigns in the real-time bidding (RTB) advertising marketplace. Typically there are a number of entities/tech platforms between the publishers and buyers – Supply Side Platforms (SSPs), Demand Side Platforms (DSPs), exchanges, etc. There are also a number of enabling systems like measurement vendors, Data Management Platforms (DMPs), etc. Even though OpenRTB is used across all (or most) of these entities, they all face lack of information and misunderstanding regarding the reconciling of campaign data around platforms.
With the enforcement of laws and the advertising ecosystem getting more complex, the systems need to work better together transparently, while ensuring that user privacy is respected. Traceability is also an important goal. Even if you know technically how each individual platform works, you can still struggle from a lack of information regarding campaign display. For example:
- On the sell side, the buyer behind a campaign is unknown or some data can be badly declared.
- On the buy side, it can be difficult to see where the money goes.
CHALLENGE ADDRESSED
When you examine the food chain as an example, any food or substance is strictly traced from the producer to the consumer in order to address risks and protect public health. The result is every side gets all the needed information. On the consumer side, they mostly know the producer and get all the info about the product. On the producer side, risks are minimized as they are able to identify the source of contaminated products and can either block the seller or reach the consumers.
The goal is the same when you compare the food chain with the programmatic ecosystem because publishers and buyers want more traceability and transparency to track a campaign, which means:
- Traceability of advertiser campaign end-to-end
- Reconciliation of advertiser spend with publisher revenue
- Publisher to pull cross SSP advertiser report
- Better creative / advertiser assignment
WHAT IF WE SPOKE THE SAME LANGUAGE WITH SCID?
The Shared Campaign Identifier (SCID) is a key that enables tracking of a campaign throughout its lifecycle. The goal is to keep following a campaign, provide more transparency, and bring the links in the programmatic chain closer during the reporting operations.
Trading desks are used to working with multiple DSPs. This unique and dedicated SCID field helps to efficiently track the campaign, regardless of the DSPs, and SSPs used.
WHO IS INVOLVED?
- Advertisers
- Trading desks (independent and agencies / disclosed and undisclosed)
- Demand Side Platforms (DSPs)
- Supply Side Platforms (SSPs)
- Publishers (direct or through saleshouses)
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