Skip to main content Skip to main content

Welcome to a new era of ad tech

Flashtalking + Innovid =

Innovid Logo
Learn more
X
Flashtalking Logo
Search
Solutions
Solutions
AI
Creative Personalization
Social
Ad Serving
Audience & Identity
Creative Intelligence
Verification
Partners
Platform
Platform
Create: Design & Build
Automate: Version & Feeds
Activate: Distribute & Traffic
Iterate: Learn & Optimize
Industries
Industries
Automotive
CPG
Financial Services
Retail
Sports Betting
Travel
Video Gaming
Resources
Resources
Creative Showcase
Reports
Events
Blog
Press Releases
Press Coverage
About
About
Diversity, equity, and inclusion
Careers
Contact Us
Newsletter
Support
Support
Help Center
Ad Server Migration
Flashtalking Training
Creative Production Services
Strategic Planning Workshops
Contact Us
Log in to Innovid
Home
Solutions
Solutions
Innovid unleashes the power of creative in advertising with AI.
AI
Better business outcomes powered by AI
Creative Personalization
Real-time relevancy at scale across social, open web, and CTV
Social
Advanced automation in a unified platform
Ad Serving
Independent, unbiased delivery across open web and CTV
Audience & Identity
Cookieless measurement and personalization
Creative Intelligence
Insights connecting content and performance
Verification
Holistic brand protection
Partners
Integrations across the ecosystem
Platform
Platform
Innovid connects the silos across teams, processes, and technology.
Create: Design & Build
Make it beautiful. Creative Tools
Automate: Version & Feeds
Make it scale. Creative Versioning Creative Labels
Activate: Distribute & Traffic
Make it connect. SocialOpen Web & CTV
Iterate: Learn & Optimize
Make it better.Operational Dashboards & Reporting
Industries
Industries
We build trusted partnerships with global advertisers through our deep industry expertise.
Automotive
CPG
Financial Services
Retail
Sports Betting
Travel
Video Gaming
Resources
Resources
Catch up on the latest events, announcements, and thought leadership from the Innovid team.
Creative Showcase
Best-in-class omnichannel executions and client success stories
Reports
Industry trends and best practices
Events
Upcoming engagements and featured recordings
Blog
Insights and thought leadership from our team
Press Releases
Official company announcements
Press Coverage
Industry publications featuring Innovid
About
About
Innovid is part of Mediaocean, the foundational partner for omnichannel advertising.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion
Diversity of thought and experience makes us stronger.
Careers
Explore open roles and discover how we bring our passion to work every day.
Newsletter
Keep up-to-date with news, industry trends, events, and more.
Contact Us
We want to hear from you!
Support
Support
As your trusted partner, count on us for strategic and creative services, platform certification, and more.
Help Center
Task-level eLearning, articles, on-demand webinars, and technical content
Ad Server Migration
Seamless migration process back by our experienced client solutions teams
Innovid Training
Self-paced credential programs and instructor-led training
Creative Production Services
Creative expertise from our team of designers and producers
Strategic Planning Workshops
Collaborative sessions to strategize across brand, creative, and media teams
Contact us
  • SSAI Works For Now, But It Will Limit The Long-Term Future Of Personalized Video

    Brian Pozesky
    13 Apr 2020
    Brian Pozesky
    13 Apr 2020
    If marketers are going to continue to properly orient digital video in their media mixes and execute effectively, they’re going to require the two-way street that enables dynamic creative and analytics. That means “business as usual” with SSAI will have to change.

In recent years, server-side ad insertion (SSAI) has seen a tremendous surge in adoption as a means of stitching video ads into content. The seamless ad loading process reduces video buffering, recovers inventory and greatly improves the user experience.

Unfortunately, there are also negative side effects: In limiting the real-time exchange of information between publishers and advertisers, SSAI inherently limits the dynamic capabilities of video advertising.

That’s because the process requires publishers to take extra steps so they can pass ad servers signals such as client IP address and device information that advertisers can use to optimize and personalize creative. While not particularly complex, most publishers – especially small ones – never take that extra step. As a result, SSAI effectively makes video a static medium resistant to creative optimization and personalization.

 

A necessary, albeit Imperfect, intervention

As ad technology evolves, the challenge has been to balance its promise with the need to preserve and improve the user experience.

A big part of that is speed, an especially large challenge in video. By combining video and advertising assets in a single stream, SSAI reduces buffering and eliminates scenarios where ads load but video content does not.

Brands benefit from seamlessly delivered messages, and consumers benefit from a smoother experience. Publishers, too, benefit since delivering one stream of video is much easier than requiring a mechanism to stop a stream, play an ad and start the stream again.

Thanks to these benefits, SSAI has to date had a positive effect on the adoption of digital video as a medium.

 

The clock is winding down on SSAI benefits

The major challenges posed by SSAI involve targeting and measurement. Thanks to the same processes that streamline the delivery of ad content within video, many publishers implement SSAI in such a way that prohibits them from passing data back to advertisers at the time of an impression.

Problems occur when the media is purchased through a DSP, which tend to serve to an unlimited number of publishers that might or might not have configured the SSAI service correctly. If the personalized video campaign is running through a DSP, the ad server will see a significant number of requests coming from a single data center IP address or missing user device information signifying that the SSAI service was not implemented correctly.

Overcoming this challenge requires publishers to configure their SSAI solution to deliver critical information, such as device type and IP address, through request headers so that ad servers can deliver customized creative. Routine SSAI implementations will insert ads into video content without request headers or any other feedback mechanism, hindering further measurement and device-level targeting.

Getting it right requires publishers to work with their SSAI providers to adhere to the IAB’s VAST 4.2 guidance, which outlines specific steps to ensure that client IP address and device info is passed to the ad server when the ad is requested, and in such a way that doesn’t appear fraudulent. Essentially, the SSAI provider will introduce two HTTP headers: X-Device-IP and X-Device-User-Agent, and ensure that the information included in these headers matches the information in the original ad request payload.

These steps are not tremendously hard to implement on their own, but they do require extra work and proactive action. And the real impact of this opt-in framework is that very few publishers have done the extra work to opt in.

Most large video-centric publishers have taken these extra steps to follow VAST 4.2 so they can capture the data they need to better target and measure ads delivered via SSAI. But most other publishers, especially smaller pubs on the open web, lack the resources and incentive to make this a priority. Until they do, real-time targeting, customization and optimization are only possible if the impressions occur within these select publisher environments. SSAI has made video a more static medium at a time when the industry is striving to make creative more interactive and personalized.

In order for digital video to mature into a full-funnel medium, data-driven creative will prove critical, as it allows advertisers to personalize messages to customers’ path to purchase. But dynamic creative and video require two-way communication that most of today’s SSAI implementations simply don’t permit.

If marketers are going to continue to properly orient digital video in their media mixes and execute effectively, they’re going to require the two-way street that enables dynamic creative and analytics. That means “business as usual” with SSAI will have to change.

 

By Brian Pozesky, VP Strategy

Originally published by AdExchanger

 

Schedule a demo with Innovid

CONTACT US
logo
Solutions
AI
Creative Personalization
Social
Ad Serving
Audience & Identity
Creative Intelligence
Verification
Partners
Platform
Create
Automate
Activate
Iterate
Industries
Automotive
CPG
Financial Services
Retail
Sports Betting
Travel
Video Gaming
Resources
Creative Showcase
Reports
Events
Blog
Press Releases
Press Coverage
About
DE&I
Careers
Newsletter
Contact us
Support
Help Center
Ad Server Migration
Training
Creative Production
Workshops
Solutions   
Solutions
AI
Creative Personalization
Social
Ad Serving
Audience & Identity
Creative Intelligence
Verification
Partners
Platform   
Platform
Create
Automate
Activate
Iterate
Industries   
Industries
Automotive
CPG
Financial Services
Retail
Sports Betting
Travel
Video Gaming
Resources   
Resources
Creative Showcase
Reports
Events
Blog
Press Releases
Press Coverage
About   
About
DE&I
Careers
Newsletter
Contact us
Support   
Support
Help Center
Ad Server Migration
Training
Creative Production
Workshops
Youtube Icon
Privacy Policy
Your Privacy Choices
Modern Slavery Policy
Opt-Out
Publisher Certification
Terms and Conditions
©2025   Mediaocean