Welcome

This guide is for anyone who wants to learn more about online advertising and ad trading. It contains information on:

• Ad tech concepts
• How ad trading and ad serving work
• Key industry terms that will help you understand online advertising and ad tech
• Important issues related to online advertising and the Internet, like privacy and data collection

Contents

Please browse our table of contents below to see our current topics and pages, and be sure to visit the Industry Reference regularly for new updates, articles, and information on the world of ad tech.

• Online Advertising and Ad Tech Glossary: Provides definitions of commonly used industry terms.
• Introduction to Ad Serving: Introduces the key concepts and processes involved in ad serving.
• Ad Tags: Introduces the concept of ad tags and describes how they function to result in the display of online ads.
• Creatives: Introduces the concept of creatives and describes how they are displayed as online ads.
• Ways of Buying Ad Inventory: Learn about the different ways of buying inventory along with the various pricing models available.
• Under the Hood of Your Browser: Explains what's going on behind the scenes when a browser is running.
• Introduction to Mobile Advertising: Provides an overview of how mobile advertising works and challenges unique to mobile ad serving.
• Introduction to Viewability: Introduces what viewability is, why it's important to ad serving, and how it works.
• Introduction to Video Inventory and Formats: Descriptions of video inventory quality and the various formats available.
• Online Advertising Self-Regulatory Organizations: A list and description of some of the primary organizations active in the online advertising sector.