Many webmasters and affiliate marketers who actively use Google Ads are unaware that the corporation has an alternative advertising network called Display & Video 360 or DV360. This article aims to shed light on its functionality and provide guidance on how to use it effectively.
What is Display & Video 360?
Display & Video 360 is a programmatic tool from the Google Marketing Platform that allows you to purchase advertising, automate and optimize campaigns, test creatives and hypotheses, segment and manage target audiences for various promotional tasks.
The word "programmatic" in the description of DV360 is not accidental. It denotes a model of complete automation of advertising purchase, sale, and optimization through precise adjustment of promotion algorithms.
The programmatic system includes:
- Data management platform or DMP
These are data management technologies that marketers use to collect, analyze, and store various types of data in separate platform systems.
Popular DMP platforms include LiveRamp, Lotame, Weborama, and others.
- SSP or supply-side platform
These are platforms through which advertising networks and webmasters sell their own advertising space. The sale of advertising inventory in SSPs usually occurs through RTB auctions, but some also offer direct sales.
Major SSPs include Google Ad Manager, Appnexus, PubMatic, Between, Rubicon.
- DSP or demand-side platform
This technology enables the purchase of traffic with highly precise targeting based on configured parameters. Among the well-known DSPs are Yandex Direct, MyTarget, Soloway, and DV360.
Thus, Display & Video 360 is a programmatic platform where advertising agencies and media buyers purchase ad impressions at rates with automated pricing. The bidding process is controlled by the DSP itself.
Difference between DV360 and Google Ads
With Google Ads, you can promote advertising only through Google's contextual media network and the corporation's own services, such as YouTube, Google Play, or Gmail.
The Display & Video 360 platform offers more possibilities, as the system allows for advertising purchases with an extended set of settings, and formats on different websites, and media platforms.
Google Ads promotion is conducted through an open auction for selecting the price for a click on an ad. Whereas the DV360 system is a closed programmatic auction with an extended internal inventory.
Advantages of DV360:
The system's audience reach capabilities are higher than those of Google Ads because it has access not only to Google AdSense's network but also to other exchanges.
According to the platform's internal statistics, DV360 is connected to over 80 major exchanges, promoting products and services to 80% of users worldwide. The total number of websites that the DSP platform works with exceeds one billion pages.
Display & Video 360 has access to third-party data that allows for detailed targeting of relevant audiences beyond Google targeting. In the service, you can combine target audiences collected from different partner sources.
Unlike Google Ads, the DV360 system does not support text ads. Instead, it allows promotion through a wide range of graphic, multimedia, video, and audio ads on YouTube and major streaming services.
DV360 is the only DSP platform in the world that allows for direct purchase and launch of advertising video ads on YouTube. Among other media tools in the service are Live Stream Ads for creating ads during live YouTube broadcasts. There is also the option to showcase products in 3D format using Swirl creatives.
Ads can also be created using built-in Format Gallery services based on Google Web Designer templates. The Ad Canvas tool allows you to create your graphic ad with a real-time preview.
- Direct access to traffic sources
DV360 connects buyers directly through the inventory with advertising platform providers without intermediaries.
Collecting a large amount of data through DMP technologies allows for targeting displays to relevant audience segments. Among DV360's tools are algorithms for automatic optimization by CPM, CPA, CPC, CPI, etc. Target audiences can also be optimized within the visible zone of specific pages, in video inventory tools — by total views of the video, seconds viewed, and so on.
Combining proprietary data with data from other Google platforms and third-party services allows displaying ads to the target audience at the moment when the probability of conversion is highest.
- Accuracy and timeliness of statistics
Display & Video 360 provides real-time statistics for effective management of advertising campaigns without budget leakage.
- Service integration capability
The platform works with many Google tools — Google Ads, Search Ads, Data Studio, Tag Manager, Analytics, Optimize — and integrates with third-party CRM services, increasing campaign effectiveness.
How to set up a campaign in DV360
On the platform's website, there is an option for authentication using a Google account, however, access to the platform is available only to serious media buyers with medium and large budgets. To do this, you will need to fill out a form, providing information about your company and selecting the products of the service to which you need access.
The dashboard of the partner account looks like this:
After determining the budget, target audience, and placement period, you need to select channels and promotion formats. Target audience search can be conducted when configuring direct and indirect targeting, and planned values can be calculated by impressions, coverage, cost, and other parameters.
To create a new campaign, you need to go to the advertiser tab and click on the "Campaigns" button in the menu. When filling out the form, you need to specify the name, goal, and type of KPI.
In the system, there are several options for choosing a goal:
- Increasing product or brand awareness;
- Increasing user visits;
- Increasing sales;
- Increasing the number of app installations or interactions with them.
When choosing KPI, you can specify:
- Price per conversion;
- Price per click;
- Price per viewed impression;
- Price per thousand impressions;
- Percentage of visible impressions;
- CTR.
Next, choose the creative format. At the stage of determining the planned budget, its boundaries are set for tracking expenses. But this parameter itself does not affect expenses, budget constraints are set at the next steps.
Once you've decided on the budget, set the campaign's start and end dates, and establish the cap on how often it will run overall.
When choosing advertising inventory in DV360, you can select targeting for public inventory, private/group deals, or auction packages. You can also choose inventory sources by quality, including target audiences in mobile applications.
The inventory functionality allows you to:
- Gain access to television streaming;
- Enable Brand safety — an anti-fraud tool;
- Set up YouTube Reserve agreements, as well as use any inventory of the popular video platform;
- Automate purchases using audience data in real time with the Guaranteed deals tool.
In the targeting settings for each campaign, parameters are set for geo, demographics, platforms, browsers, ad visibility, etc.
The Customer Match Audience tool allows you to upload a file with contact data from the customer base from the landing page or online store. To display ads to such customers, just the phone number or email is sufficient.
The YouTube Remarketing Audience tool helps to form a list of users who have viewed the video. This option can only be used in creatives with view metrics. In other words, this means that from videos that cannot be skipped, such a database cannot be compiled — only views are taken into account.
Targeting by content category in DV360 allows advertising on specific thematic resources. If, for example, you choose "news" in targeting, the ad will appear on sites with news content.
Creatives in DV360
The platform allows promotion in several creative formats:
YouTube
These are videos of 6 seconds with the option to skip. They can be used in cases when a medium-length video is used based on views, not impressions.
Videos up to 6 seconds without the option to skip.
Videos from 6 seconds with the option to skip.
This is a hybrid option of Bumper Ads and Trueview for reach. When choosing such placement, you can simultaneously launch both videos up to 6 seconds without skipping and videos from 6 seconds with the option to skip.
Videos up to 20 seconds without skipping.
This is the so-called "video storytelling" format. With its help, a series of videos are shown in a specific sequence, setting display parameters for each of them.
A format for displaying a creative with optimization for further conversions on the site. In this case, not a purchase model is selected, but a goal, for example, "maximum conversions" — the system algorithms are optimized accordingly.
Display
For banner ad format in DV360, there are several placement algorithms based on CPM:
- Standard purchase on auctions with a fixed rate.
- Purchase with click optimization.
The algorithm uses the best click-through rates without the ability to set bids but with the ability to determine the upper price threshold.
- Purchase with conversion optimization.
The algorithm is optimized for the specified conversions. In this case, the system focuses on maximizing conversions within the set budget.
App Install
This format of promotion in DV360 allows advertising applications, to pay for their installation. Algorithms work on the principle of maximum installations within the allocated budget.
Video
Placement of videos on pages with embedded players except YouTube.
Ads in mobile apps
This format involves displaying banner ads and videos within mobile applications.
In the creative settings, you can choose non-standard presentations: panorama, parallax, a blank state, flipbook, cue-card, or audio mixer. Native banners and videos are also available, which are adapted to different advertising spaces on websites.
The creative format in Display & Video 360 has its algorithm for displaying data-driven creatives. With its help, changes are made to specific creatives. For example, having access to weather server data, you can automatically change the background of creatives based on weather conditions in a specified location — with rain, snow, or sunshine. Creatives themselves can be created using third-party services.
To save and launch a campaign, you need to click on the "Save" button. Any campaign can be copied to a template: to do this, in the menu of a specific campaign, click on the "Actions" button and then on "Copy".
To test multiple campaign variations, in the "Inventory" menu, click on "Plans". Here you can determine the forecasted effectiveness indicators based on targeting settings and the allocated budget. The forecast takes into account available data for no more than 92 days.
Line Items Position
Line Items tools in DV360 determine which ads will be shown to a specific audience and at what time. Line Items include budget parameters, bids, creative selection, and targeting criteria. Additional parameters include information about the cost of partner services and the commission size.
There are several positions in the placement format options:
- Display — banners, including graphic creatives, HTML5, native, or RichMedia advertising;
- Video;
- Audio;
- Mobile;
- TrueView — for YouTube and partner sites.
To create Line Items, click on the "Campaign" button, then select the desired one or create a new one. Next, select an existing placement order or create a new one. In the "Mixed" tab, find the settings of a specific campaign and click on "Create" — "Position", then specify the order to add it.
After configuring the campaign, it is important to check the correctness of the set parameters. Among the common mistakes are:
- Setting a daily budget limit at the Campaign level instead of the Line Items level. In this case, the DV360 system will ignore the restriction.
- Setting geotargeting for a YouTube campaign only in the Insertion Order position. Without specifying targeting settings, ads will be shown to users worldwide.
- Adding different videos to one AdGroup. In this case, the system will show the video with the highest VTR attractiveness rating.
When setting up Line Items targeting, set the start and end date of the position. In the settings you should also specify the budget, schedule impressions, and set a frequency cap.
Insights Analytical Module
All the data analysis for the platform is compiled in a special Insights section. Active View technology allows you to track the visibility of ads in real-time. With the tools provided by the service, you can easily generate pivot tables and diagrams right within the Display & Video 360 interface.
TV ad statistics allow evaluation of campaign effectiveness based on broadcasts, genres, user demographics, viewing time, etc.
DV360 also allows integration with third-party analytics services.
Conclusions
Display & Video 360 is a versatile tool within the Google Marketing Platform that allows for a complete advertising cycle with placement.
Trying promotion through the service is more advantageous for buyers accustomed to working with large traffic volumes without wasting budgets on illiquid assets. The advantage of working with DV360, in addition to automation, is that the service provides full control over expenses with precise parameter settings in advertising campaigns.
Additionally, DV360 allows finding a similar audience on other placements. For example, by collecting a target audience on Facebook, you can use the platform for retargeting on other platforms and reach a similar audience on YouTube or third-party websites.
