Header Bidding, also referred to as “pre-bidding” or “advanced bidding”, is a programmatic advertising technique in Real-Time Bidding (RTB) which allows publishers to put their available ad space impressions (also referred to as “ad inventory”) up for auction across multiple demand sources at once.
Here’s how it works:
- Publishers send bid requests to multiple ad exchanges and other demand partners simultaneously.
- Bids from multiple demand sources can be placed on their ad inventory at the same time.
- This increases ad space competition, raises average bid prices, and allows for optimizations like seeking the best ad network payout from various channels.
Compared to the traditional waterfall method, which often caused page loading latency, header bidding is capable of reducing the time needed to conclude auctions and display ad creatives on a web page. It was introduced around 2014-2017, several years after RTB’s introduction in 2009.
The key advantage of header bidding is that it enables publishers to maximize their revenue by increasing competition for their ad inventory. It also provides advertisers with more opportunities to access premium ad inventory.