Selling Rules

Publishers

Last updated on December 2, 2019

If enabled, you can designate inventory to sell through OpenX Ad Exchange using selling rules, which specify the inventory you want buyers to have the opportunity to bid for, along with the minimum price you are willing to accept for the ad space.

on this page

• About Selling Rules
• Creating Selling Rules
• Rules Details
• Managing Real-time Selling Rules

NOTE

Some features mentioned here may not be available in your region or based on your user role. For more information, visit the OpenX Community.

About Selling Rules

When OpenX receives an ad request for inventory defined by a selling rule, it proceeds with the selection process and selects an eligible line item for the ad space.

• If the selected line item is for non-guaranteed delivery, before serving the ad for the selected line item, OpenX will give buyers in the real-time bidding exchange the opportunity to bid on the ad space.
• If a bid is higher than the selected line item, and it matches or exceeds the floor price set for the selling rule, then OpenX serves the ad of the winning bidder, rather than the ad for the line item originally selected by the ad server. In cases where the ad space matches multiple selling rules, then OpenX selects the rule with the highest floor price. By default, instances are created with both “Master Network” (parent) and “Network” (child) ad network accounts that publisher accounts can be created under. The inventory on a publisher account inherits the real-time selling (RTS) rules associated with one of its managing ad network accounts.

NOTE

RTS rules should only be applied to one of the managing accounts. If rules exist on both the “Master Network” and “Network” levels, the system uses only the more restrictive rules from the “Network” level, preventing the “Master Network” rules from being applied, even if they target different inventory. It is therefore our recommendation to apply all RTS rules on the “Network” level.

Example

• Account A (instance level account) has real-time selling rule 123.
• Account B (child of Account A) has real-time selling rules 456 and 789. An ad request from an ad unit for this account will have real-time selling rules 456 and 789 available, but not 123.
• Account C (child of Account B) has no real-time selling rules. An ad request from an ad unit for this account will have Account B’s real-time selling rules (456 and 789) available.
• Account D (child of Account A) has no real-time selling rules. An ad request from an ad unit for this account will have Account A’s real-time selling rule (123) available. Account D stops working if a rule (456 or 789) is applied to Account B because Account D is a direct descendant of Account A.

Selling rules main components

Selling rules have three main components:

• Targeting criteria: This defines the ad space that you want to make available to bidders. It can contain content, geographic, technographic, audience segment, or custom targeting criteria. For example, if you want to make all of your leaderboard ad space, outside of your homepage, available for real-time selling, then you can specify targeting criteria for that. Alternatively, if you want to make ad space viewed by users in Los Angeles available for real-time selling, then you can specify targeting criteria for that.
• Floor price: This is the minimum price that you are willing to accept for this ad space.
• Filters: This specifies any advertisers, brands, domains, ad categories, creative types, or languages that you want to block from serving ads to your ad space, or types of ad content that you want to block from your ad space. This means that if the highest bid belongs to a blocked advertiser, or if the selected ad contains selected content attributes, then OpenX will not accept the bid or serve the ad.

Creating Selling Rules

Last updated on October 18, 2018

You need to create selling rules to opt inventory into the OpenX Ad Exchange for real-time selling.

To create a selling rule:

1. Go to Inventory > OpenX Market Rules.

   NOTE

   The actual name of the page will display the brand name of your market, for example, OpenX US Rules or OpenX Market Japan Rules. This also applies to the Add Rule button and the Create Rule page.

2. Click Add OpenX Market Rule. The Create OpenX Market Rule page is displayed.

3. In the Rule Details section, enter a unique name for the rule, select an ad network account, inventory type, and enter a floor price, if needed.

4. To change the default targeting settings from All to target specific inventory, geographic locations, or other dimensions, in the Targeting section, click Add Targeting Dimensions and specify the targeting details as needed.

5. In the Industry, Brand, Domain & Application ID Filters section:

   • Select to allow or block all industries and brands or specific ones, as needed. If you choose to allow or block individual industries and brands, type and select their names to add them to your lists.
   • To block certain domains, enter their full domain names and extensions, one per line.
   • To block certain application IDs, enter them one per line, using the com.example.app format for Google Play apps or the numeric format, such as 123456789, for iTunes App Store apps.

   NOTE

   The filters give you more control over the ads that display on your sites, but potentially decrease revenue by blocking bids that would otherwise compete for your inventory.

6. In the Creative Filters section, use the default selections or type and select which creative types, content attributes, and languages you wish to block.

7. In the Demand Filters section, for each OpenX market that you are interested in, select to allow or block all buyers or specific ones, as needed. If you choose to allow or block individual accounts, type and select their names to add them to your lists.

8. Click Create Rule.

   As necessary, you can change settings for a particular selling rule.

Rules Details

Managing Real-time Selling Rules

Last updated on October 18, 2018

Selling rules allow you to opt inventory into the OpenX Ad Exchange for real-time selling. You can create and manage selling rules on the Inventory > OpenX US Rules page.

NOTE

The actual name of the page will display the brand name of your market, for example, OpenX US Rules or OpenX Market Japan Rules. This also applies to the Add Rule button and the Rule Name column on this page.

Each selling rule is listed in the Rule Name column with the following details. You can click the column headings to sort the list as needed.

Editing Selling Rules

You can change certain settings for the real-time selling rules that you have access to, such as targeting criteria, filters, or the floor price, as needed.

NOTE

You can edit the rule name directly in the list. Just click the rule name, enter the new name, and click Save Changes at the end of the row on the right.

To edit a selling rule:

1. Go to Inventory > OpenX Market Rules.

2. For the real-time selling rule you want to edit, click the edit icon in the Actions column.

3. On the Edit Selling Rule page, change any of the editable settings for the rule, as needed.

4. Click Save Rule.

Deleting Selling Rules

You can delete selling rules that you no longer want to use to make your inventory available to real-time bidders.

To delete a selling rule:

1. Go to Inventory > OpenX Market Rules.

2. For the real-time selling rule you want to delete, click the delete icon in the Actions column.