Contextual ad targeting paves the way for new opportunities
Advertisers and marketers are always looking for ways to remain competitive in the current digital landscape. The challenge of signal loss continues to prompt marketers to rethink their current and future strategies. With many major browsers phasing out support for third-party cookies due to privacy and data security concerns, marketers will need to find new ways to identify and reach their target audience. Contextual ad targeting offers an innovative solution; a way to combine contextual signals with machine learning to engage with your consumers more deeply through highly targeted accuracy. Contextual advertising can help you reach your desired audiences amidst signal loss – but what exactly is contextual advertising, and how can it help optimize digital ad success?
In a Q&A with our experts, Jason Andersen, Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives and Partner Solutions with Experian, and Alex Johnston, Principal Product Manager with Yieldmo, they explore:
- The challenges causing marketers to rethink their current strategies
- How contextual advertising addresses signal loss
- Why addressability is more important than ever
- Why good creative is still integral in digital marketing
- Tips for digital ad success
By understanding what contextual advertising can offer, you’ll be on the path toward creating powerful, effective campaigns that will engage your target audiences.
Check out Jason and Alex’s full conversation from our webinar, “Making the Most of Your Digital Ad Budget With Contextual Advertising and Audience Insights” by reading below. Or watch the full webinar recording now!
Macro impacts affecting marketers
How important is it for digital marketers to stay informed about the changes coming to third-party cookies, and what challenges do you see signal loss creating?
Jason: Marketers must stay informed to succeed as the digital marketing landscape continuously evolves. Third-party cookies have already been eliminated from Firefox, Safari, and other browsers, while Chrome has held out. It’s just a matter of time before Chrome eliminates them too. Being proactive now by predicting potential impacts will be essential for maintaining growth when the third-party cookie finally disappears.
Alex: Jason, I think you nailed it. Third-party cookie loss is already a reality. As regulations like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) take effect, more than 50% of exchange traffic lacks associated identifiers. This means that marketers have to think differently about how they reach their audiences in an environment with fewer data points available for targeting purposes. It’s no longer something to consider at some point down the line – it’s here now!
Also, as third-party cookies become more limited, reaching users online is becoming increasingly complex and competitive. Without access to as much data, the CPMs (cost per thousand impressions) that advertisers must pay are skyrocketing because everyone is trying to bid on those same valuable consumers. It’s essential for businesses desiring success in digital advertising now more than ever before.
Contextual ad targeting: A solution for signal loss
How does contextual ad targeting help digital marketers find new ways to reach and engage with consumers? What can you share about some new strategies that have modernized marketing, such as machine learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI)?
Jason: We’re taking contextual marketing to the next level with advanced machine learning. We are unlocking new insights from data beyond what a single page can tell us about users. As third-party cookies go away, alternative identifiers are coming to market, like RampID and UID2. These are going to be particularly important for marketers to be able to utilize.
As cookie syncing becomes outdated, marketers will have to look for alternative methods to reach their target audiences. It’s essential to look beyond cookie-reliant solutions and use other options available regarding advertising.
Alex: I think, as Jason alluded to, there’s a renaissance in contextual advertising over the last couple of years. If I were to break this down, there are three core drivers:
- The loss of identity signals. It’s forcing us to change, and we must look elsewhere and figure out how to reach our audiences differently.
- There have been considerable advances in our ability to store and operate across a set of contextual signals far more extensive than anything we’ve ever worked with in the past and in far more granular ways. That’s a huge deal because when it comes to machine learning, the power and the impact of those machine learning models are entirely based on how extensive and granular the data set is that you can collect. Machine learning can pull together critical contextual signals and figure out which constellations, or which combinations of those signals, are most predictive and valuable to a given advertiser.
- We can tailor machine learning models to individual advertisers using all those signals and find patterns across those in ways that were previously impractical or unfeasible. The transformation is occurring because of our ability to capture much more granular data, operate across it, and then build models that work for advertisers.
Addressability: Connect your campaigns to consumers
How does advanced contextual targeting help marketers reach non-addressable audiences?
Jason: Advanced contextual targeting allows us to take a set of known data (identity) and draw inferences from it with all the other signals we see across the bitstream. It’s taking that small seed set of either, customers that transacted with you before that you have an identity for, or customers that match whom you’re looking for. We can use that as a seed set to train these new contextual models. We can now look at making the unknown known or the unaddressable addressable. So, it’s not addressable in an identity sense, it is addressable in a contextual or an advanced contextual sense that’s made available to us, and we can derive great insight from it.
One of the terms I like to use is contextual indexing. This is where we take a set of users we know something about. So, I may know the identity of a particular group of households, and I can look at how those households index against any of the rich data sets available to us in any data marketplace, for example, the data Yieldmo has. We can look at how that data indexes to those known users to find patterns in that data and then extrapolate from that. Now we can go out and find users surfing on any of the other sites that traditionally don’t have that identifier for that user or don’t at that moment in time and start to be able to advertise to them based on the contextually indexed data.
Historically, we’ve done some contextual ad targeting based on geo-contextual, and this is when people wanted to do one to one marketing, and geo-contextual outperformed the one to one. But marketers weren’t ready for alternatives to one to one yet. We want marketers to start testing these solutions. Advertisers must start trying them, learning how they work, and learn how to optimize them because they are based on a feedback loop, and they’re only going to get better with feedback.
Alex: Jason, you described that perfectly. I think the exciting opportunity for many people in the industry is figuring out how to reach your known audience in a non-addressable space, that is based on environmental and non-identity based signals, that helps your campaign perform. Your known audience are people that are already converting – those who like your products and services and are engaged with your ads. Machine learning advancements allow you to take your small sample audience and uncover those patterns in the non-addressable space.
It’s also worth noting that in this world in which we are using seed audiences, or you are using your performing audiences to build non-addressable counterpart targeting campaigns, having high-quality, privacy-resilient data sets becomes incredibly important. In many cases, companies like Experian, who have high quality, deep rich training data, are well positioned to support advertisers in building those extension audiences. As we see the industry evolve, we’re going to see some significant changes in terms of the types of, and ways in which, companies offer data, and make that available to advertisers for training their models or supporting validation and measurement of those models.
Jason: Addressable users, the new identity-based users, are critical to marketers’ performance initiatives. They’re essential to training the models we’re building with contextual advertising. Together, addressable users and contextual advertising are a powerful combination. It’s not just one in isolation. It’s not just using advanced contextual, and it’s not just using the new identifiers. It’s using a combination to meet your performance needs.
It’s imperative to start thinking about how you can begin building your seed audiences. What can you start learning from, and how do you put contextual into play today? You are looking to build off a known set and build a more advanced model. These can be specialized models based on your data. You can hone in and create a customized model for your customer type, their profile, and how they transact. It’s a greenfield opportunity, and we’re super excited about the future of advanced contextual targeting.
Turn great creative into measurable data points
Why does good creative still play an integral part in digital advertising success?
Jason: Good creative has always been meaningful. It’s vital in getting people to click on your ad and transact. But it’s becoming increasingly important in this new world that we’re talking about, this advanced contextual world. The more signal that we can get coming into these models, the better. Good creative in the proper ad format that you can test and learn from is paramount. It comes back to that feedback loop. We can use that as another signal in this equation to develop and refine the right set of audiences for your targeting needs.
Alex: If you imagine within the broader context of identity and signal loss, creative and ad format becomes incredibly powerful signals in understanding how different audiences interact with and engage with different creative. In the case of the formats that serve on the Yieldmo exchange, we’re collecting data every 200 milliseconds around how individual users are engaging with those ads. Interaction data like the user scrolling back or the number of pixel seconds they stay on the screen, fills this critical gap between video completes and clicks. Clicks are sparse and down the funnel, and views and completes are up the funnel. All those attention and creative engagement type metrics occupy the sweet spot where they’re super prevalent, and you can collect them and understand how different audiences engage with your ads. That data lets you build powerful models because they predict all kinds of other downstream actions.
Throughout my career, I learned that designing or tailoring your creative to different audience groups is one of the best ways to improve performance. We ran many lift studies with analysis to understand how you can tailor creative customized for individual audiences. That capability and the ability to do that on an identity basis is starting to deteriorate. The ability to do that using a sample of data or using a smaller set of users, either where you’re inferring characteristics or you’re looking at the identity that does exist in a smaller group, becomes powerful for being able to customize your creative to tell the right story to the right audience. When you layer together all the interaction data collected at the creative level on top of all the contextual and environmental signals, you can build powerful models. Whether those are driving proxy metrics, or downstream outcomes, puts us in a powerful position to respond to the broader loss of identity that we’ve relied on for so many years.
Our recommendations for marketers for 2023 and beyond
Do you have recommendations for marketers building out their yearly strategies or a campaign strategy?
Jason: Be proactive and start testing and learning these new solutions. I mentioned addressability and being in the right place at the right time. That’s easier in today’s third-party cookie world. But as traditional identity is further constricted, you will have these first-party solutions that will not be at scale, so you’re less likely to find your user at the scale you want. It would be best if you thought about how to reach that user at the right place at the right time. They may not be seen from an identity basis. They might not be at the right place at the right time when you were delivering or trying to deliver an ad. But you increase your chance of reaching them by building these advanced contextual targeting audiences using this privacy-safe seed ‘opted-in’ user set; this is a way to cast that wider net and achieve targeted scale.
Alex: Build your seed lists, test your formats with different audiences, and understand what’s resonating with whom. Take advantage of some of the pretty remarkable advances in machine learning that are allowing us, really, for the first time to fully uncork the potential and the opportunity with contextual in a way that we’ve never done before.
Jason: At the end of the day, it’s making the unaddressable addressable. So, it’s a complementary strategy; having that addressable piece will feed the models. But also, that addressable piece still needs to be identity-based, addressable still needs to be part of your overall marketing strategy, and you need to complement it with other strategies like advanced contextual targeting. The two of them together are super complimentary. They learn from each other, and it’s a cyclical loop. Now is the time to take advantage and start testing and understanding how these solutions work.
We can help you get started with contextual ad targeting
Contextual advertising can help you stay ahead of the curve, identify your target audience, and continue to drive conversions despite signal loss. We’ve partnered with Yieldmo to help make sure that your marketing campaigns are reaching the right target audiences on the platforms that are most relevant. To get started with contextual ad targeting to reach the right audience at the right time and drive conversions, contact our marketing professionals. Let’s get to work, together.
Find the right marketing mix in 2023
Check out our webinar, “Find the right marketing mix with rising consumer expectations.” Guest speaker, Nikhil Lai, Senior Analyst from Forrester Research, joins Experian experts Erin Haselkorn, and Eden Wilbur. We discuss:
- New data on the complexity and uncertainty facing marketers
- Consumer trends for 2023
- Recommendations on finding the right channel mix and the right consumers
Get in touch
About our experts
Jason Andersen, Senior Director, Strategic Initiatives and Partner Solutions, Experian
Jason Andersen heads Strategic Initiatives and Partner Enablement for Experian Marketing Services. He focuses on addressability and activation in digital marketing and working with partners to solve signal loss. Jason has worked in digital advertising for 15+ years, spanning roles from operations and product to strategy and partnerships.
Alex Johnston, Principal Product Manager, Yieldmo
Alex Johnston is the Principal Product Manager at Yieldmo, overseeing the Machine Learning and Optimization products. Before joining Yieldmo, Alex spent 13 years at Google, where he led the Reach & Audience Planning and Measurement products, overseeing a 10X increase in revenue. During his time, he launched numerous ad products, including YouTube’s Google Preferred offering. To learn more about Yieldmo, visit www.Yieldmo.com.
Latest posts
Audigent, a part of Experian, is excited to announce that curated audience and contextual inventory packages are now accessible on Google Display and Video 360 (DV360), delivered via Index Marketplaces. These premium deals offer industry-leading targeting solutions, combining high-quality data and inventory to enhance scale, value, and performance across connected TV (CTV), display, and online video (OLV). The integration launches with over 250 ready-to-run deals covering various sectors, including some available for DV360 buyers for the first time, such as automotive, B2B, seasonal retail, sports fandom, travel, and weather, among others. Each deal combines exclusive audience data with premium inventory under a single DV360 deal ID. The supply-side activation lets you scale campaigns without cookies or device IDs, so results stay consistent even as traditional tracking disappears. "We’re excited to expand Audigent’s curated, data-enriched packages in DV360 with Index Exchange. Putting Experian’s audiences and Audigent's premium supply inside a single deal ID accelerates smarter decisions for marketers—letting brands activate, test, and see results right away.”Chris Feo, Chief Business Officer, Experian Why these packages stand out Unique targeting and supply packages Each package fuses exclusive data with handpicked inventory and ships as a single, ready-to-trade deal ID. Deep partner bench Audiences are sourced from first-party publisher data as well as data leaders such as Experian, Affinity Answers, Acxiom, Bombora, Circana, Dun & Bradstreet, Resonate, Sports Innovation Lab, The Weather Company, and more, providing buyers with deterministic purchase, intent, behavioral, and lifestyle signals in one flight. Future-proofed addressability Packages rely on Audigent’s identity framework, contextual intelligence, and supply-side data activation rather than third-party cookies or device IDs, keeping reach intact as identifiers fade. Three reasons these packages drive results Signal-agnostic reach: Cookieless, device-less targeting preserves scale today and tomorrow. Instant activation: Traders simply add the pre-curated deal ID to a DV360 line item and go live in seconds. Built-in quality assurance: Exclusive audience data is paired with hand-vetted inventory, so you start closer to KPIs from day one. Direct-to-source media buying that pays off By packaging curated, data-enriched deals directly atop Index Exchange, via the Index Marketplaces platform, Audigent eliminates extra hops and integrates premium partner data into a single price, with no additional data management platform (DMP) fees. That means higher match rates, simplified audience management, and a cleaner, greener path that concentrates spend on top-tier publishers. Paired with Index Exchange’s omnichannel reach, brands see stronger performance and lower waste, no trade-offs required. "Our goal with Index Marketplaces is to streamline access to premium supply, high-quality data, and measurable outcomes. Hosting Audigent's ready-to-run deals on Index lets DV360 buyers tap addressable inventory curated for scale, sustainability, and speed – no extra steps, just better results."Paul Zovighian, Vice President of Marketplaces, Index Exchange Real-world use cases Audigent’s deep data collaboration bench isn’t window dressing; it’s baked into every package. Deterministic signals from Experian and fellow data leaders come pre-loaded, so you tap high-intent, high-match audiences the instant you activate a deal ID. In-market auto shoppers Reach consumers actively researching specific vehicle types, such as compact cars, SUVs, trucks, or luxury models, using deterministic data from Experian. These segments predict purchase intent within the next 180 days, enabling the delivery of accurate messaging at the moment of consideration. B2B account growth Target decision-maker employees at companies segmented by employee count: 11–50, 51–250, or 251+, using Dun & Bradstreet’s data. Or reach small business professionals and business decision-makers via deals utilizing Bombora’s data assets. Sports fandom Engage verified MLB fans based on purchase behavior, powered by Sports Innovation Lab. Extend reach to contextual sports content, including live sports and sports-related programming across CTV and OLV. Seasonal retail bursts Engage gift-givers and in-market segments for gifts and occasions. Target DIY home improvers and verified affinity audiences for home projects. Reach back-to-school families by targeting parents preparing for the school year with Affinity Answers’ event-based segments. Weather-driven behavior Activate campaigns based on how real-time or forecasted weather conditions (like sunny days, outdoor activity suitability, or severe weather alerts) influence mindsets and decisions, powered by The Weather Company's data. "This collaboration integrates The Weather Company’s industry‑leading weather forecast data into DV360, the world’s largest buying platform, enabling real‑time relevance through curated deals. Experian contributes deep expertise in consumer audiences, The Weather Company delivers unmatched precision in timing and location, and Index Exchange adds efficiency and transparency – together creating a streamlined, turnkey solution for activation." Dave Olesnevich, VP of Data and Ad Product, The Weather Company Ready to activate? Search Audigent in DV360’s Marketplace, select the Audigent package that fits your KPIs, and add the deal ID to your line item. Prefer a custom build? Reach out to us at partnershipsales@experian to curate a package tailored to your campaign goals. The quickest path to performance is just one deal ID away. Contact us now Latest posts
Brands want more from their media investments: better insights, more efficient reach, and clear proof of performance. Whether you’re starting with high-quality first-party data or need help reaching new audiences, Experian offers flexible solutions to drive reach among key audiences and to measure the impact. We’ve built two primary activation and measurement solutions tailored to how brands operate, so you can spend less time managing data and more time driving outcomes. Use case 1: First-party insights to activation and measurement Best for: Brands with first-party data looking to deepen their understanding of existing customers, activate intelligently, and measure what matters – all through a single trusted partner. Solution: Audience Engine + Outcomes Audience Engine Audience Engine is our self-service platform designed to help you onboard first-party data, gain key insights into your customers, build custom audiences using our powerful data assets, and activate them across 200+ platforms — all within a single workflow. Outcomes Experian Outcomes closes the loop by measuring real-world results of your campaigns (such as visits, purchases, and website actions) and tying them back to specific media exposures across digital and TV channels. Together, these tools offer a full-funnel audience and measurement solution, from planning and activation to proving performance. Let’s bring this to life A leading athletic retailer partnered with Experian and Yieldmo to drive in-store foot traffic, targeting shoppers likely to buy from their competitors during key sales windows. Using Experian’s Audience Engine, which includes our proprietary and third-party data marketplace, Yieldmo built a high-performing, self-serve targeting strategy for the retailer. By combining Experian Audiences with Partner Audiences from Alliant, Circana, Webbula, and Sports Innovation Lab, Yieldmo was able to build apparel and footwear audiences from the data marketplace including: In-store shopper segments Athleisure purchasers Competitive purchasers Audience Engine also enabled Yieldmo to tap into Experian’s identity graph, expanding cross-channel reach and maximizing campaign scale and precision. And while not used for this campaign, our Outcomes solution allows advertisers to tie media spend to in-store activity, so retailers can measure true business impact. Benefits Understand your customers more deeply To reveal behavioral, demographic, and lifestyle trends. Reach your first-party audiences at scale Across top activation platforms, using Audience Engine’s onboarding capabilities. Increase your brand awareness By reaching prospective audiences, using Experian Audiences, Partner Audiences, and lookalike audiences. Measure campaign effectiveness With Outcomes, which correlates media exposures (digital and/or TV) with offline and online conversions, visits, or sales. Optimize future media buys By using attribution insights to refine targeting, creative, and channel mix based on what’s actually driving results. Use case 2: Activation and measurement Best for: Brands that already know who they want to reach and are looking to activate high-quality, data-driven audiences across their preferred media platforms and want to clearly understand what’s driving performance. Solution: Audiences + Partner Audiences + Outcomes Audiences Experian Audiences are pre-built audience segments grouped by shared attributes from Experian Marketing Data built for activation on-the-shelf of top programmatic, TV, and social destinations like FreeWheel, Magnite, and Madhive, in addition to Audience Engine. Partner Audiences Experian's Partner Audiences are high-quality audience segments sourced directly from 30+ leading third-party data providers like Affinity, Circana, and Dun & Bradstreet. These segments are curated across verticals like Business, CPG, Health, Retail, and Travel, and are available through on top media destinations, in addition to our data marketplace for easy selection and deployment. Outcomes Experian Outcomes helps close the loop by tying real-world results back to media exposures across digital and TV channels. Together, these products empower marketers to activate smarter and prove success with confidence. Let's bring this to life A leading fashion brand set out to grow their customer base by reaching high-intent shoppers where they spend their time: online. Their goal: drive e-commerce conversions through a programmatic campaign powered by The Trade Desk. To do it, they needed more than just reach, they needed accuracy. That’s where Experian came in. On The Trade Desk, the brand quickly discovered Experian’s prebuilt audience segments, readily available and easy to activate. They selected: Age Range: 25–44 Women’s Fashion Frequent Spenders: Households identified as frequent purchasers of women’s apparel, cosmetics, jewelry, and accessories—based on verified, consumer-reported transactions from the past 24 months. These segments gave the brand confidence that it was putting its message in front of the right consumers, those most likely to engage and buy. To understand whether their campaign was driving results beyond impressions, the brand implemented a site pixel to capture both top-of-funnel visitation and bottom-of-funnel conversions. Using Experian’s Outcomes solution, they were able to close the loop—tying ad exposure directly to e-commerce sales. The Outcomes report showed clear campaign lift, highlighting which channels and audience segments performed best. Armed with these insights, the brand refined their targeting and messaging for future media buys—boosting ROI with each iteration. Benefits Reach your ideal audience at scale By activating Experian Audiences and Partner Audiences off the shelf at digital and TV platforms. Access privacy-conscious, diverse data Curated by 30+trusted data providers in verticals like Business, CPG, Health, Retail, and Travel without needing to manage multiple data contracts. Understand what’s working Through Outcomes reporting, which connects media exposure to offline and online outcomes like conversions, purchases, or visits. Continuously improve performance By using attribution insights to inform audience selection, creative strategy, and media channel mix for future campaigns. Bring this to your brand Experian’s activation and measurement solutions for brands gives you the tools to act with clarity: from onboarding your first-party data to reaching new customers and tying media back to real results. Whether you’re starting with deep customer insights or building campaigns from scratch, here’s how our solution helps: Audience Engine Onboard your first-party data, gain insights into audience composition, build custom audiences using Experian and Partner Audiences, and activate them across 200+ leading platforms — all through a centralized, self-service platform. Audiences and Partner Audiences Reach high-intent prospects using Experian’s syndicated audiences or custom-built segments from partners like Circana, Dun & Bradstreet, and more. Outcomes Understand what worked. See how media exposure correlates with actions like store visits, quote requests, site activity, or purchases. Every element is built to help you scale campaigns, improve addressability, and tie media spend to results that matter—without the overhead of multiple vendors or disjointed systems. Ready to see it in action? Get in touch with our team. Latest posts
1,000+ ready-made segments, available for activation within Nexxen Audigent, a part of Experian, has officially launched its audiences in the Nexxen demand-side platform (DSP), pairing premium publisher audiences with Nexxen’s streamlined connected television (CTV) and omnichannel buying workflow. Audigent transforms real engagement from premium publishers into over 1,000 ready-to-activate segments—spanning beauty, finance, travel, and more. Three key benefits Signal quality Verified publisher data drives higher match rates and wider look-alike reach. Media impact Reach up to 92 million entertainment fans, 78 million retail shoppers, or 71 million finance intenders across CTV, online video (OLV), and display without guesswork. Privacy and compliance Every segment is built from opt-in, first-party data and delivered through Audigent’s privacy-by-design framework. How Audigent and Nexxen boost your campaigns Now live in the Nexxen DSP, Audigent’s premium audiences plug directly into your existing buying workflow—making it easier than ever to plan, activate, and optimize at scale. Audigent utilizes cookieless, first-party IDs sourced directly from its premium publisher network, allowing advertisers to future-proof campaigns and continue to reach real people across browsers, devices, and CTV. Vertical use cases Auto Target auto intenders as they research new models, then retarget them on CTV during primetime motorsports broadcasts. Retail and CPG Engage retail shoppers with dynamic product ads ahead of peak sales weekends, bridging display and CTV for sequential storytelling. Travel and Hospitality Reach travel planners with destination-specific offers the moment they begin searching for flights. Finance Serve relevant credit card or fintech messaging to finance enthusiasts researching personal finance content. Premium audiences, measurable performance As a part of Experian, Audigent’s audience solution complements our broader identity resolution and activation capabilities, ensuring consistency across every channel. Together with Nexxen’s unified tech stack, advertisers can launch ads faster while respecting consumer privacy. Audience data, targeting, and media all sit in one workflow, making results easy to see and optimize. Contact us Latest posts