AppNexus vs. StackAdapt

Appnexus is specifically well suited for CTV campaigns. They have the full technology stack to help you scale campaigns in any format, whether you need a lot of volume in traditional formats like banners and interstitials or if you need high-impact formats like video and other alternatives. Appnexus has a very strong set of unique publishers which makes it a great DSP for branding campaigns.

Incentivized

StackAdapt's programmatic buys are great for a quick awareness campaign to reach the most eyeballs. Solid user segmentation from 3rd party sources that is available almost immediately. The platform is less proficient at converting users, though I've never had sufficient volume to test if this works better for enterprise-level clients with more conversion data

Incentivized

• As per my experience they have strong support personnel. Solving the issues as and when required.
• We can solve certain issues like campaign performance, inventory optimization and more with the help of AppNexus wiki. We get all the required information in the Wiki itself.
• They have given the right platform to both buyers and sellers to workout and meet their digital marketing needs and goals.

• Audience targeting - there are so many options for both B2C and B2B audiences, from browsing behavior audiences to account-based marketing audiences to CRM lists. There's a way to find your ideal audience no matter their industry.
• Pixel setup and management are pretty easy. It uses a universal pixel that you can easily place on your site. We use Google Tag Manager for this. Then, you can create any number of conversion events and easily implement them, also with Google Tag Manager, so we can trust we're getting good tracking.
• It seems many display ad platforms lack optimization tools, but StackAdapt makes it easy to adjust, add, or remove audiences, pause certain website categories, exclude batches of websites, pause individual ads, and really fine-tune the targeting as you see what works and what doesn't.

Incentivized

• The platform is incredibly complex and requires a great deal of understanding of how the platform works that caught us by surprise.
• The wiki is not enough and when we resorted to reaching out to AppNexus it was a nuisance of having several emails going back and forth.
• No phone support is offered which would have made several things easier than exchanging confusing emails.
• Video inventory is still not implemented.

Incentivized

• There has been occasional slopping maintenance of the campaigns, and we have to follow up with questions about spending spikes or significant changes in delivery CPMs.
• Account rep knowledge can sometimes be lacking. When we question our reps about performance, we sometimes get confusing or nonsensical answers.
• The reporting UI is definitely clunky and unintuitive.

Incentivized

I love almost everything about AppNexus because I feel like the user data is easy to track because of the identifiers, you can see which adverts got clicked and which were ignored. We can track the location of the ad on the page fold and this makes it so much easier for future campaigns. The only thing I don't like is that the data is only kept for a year, and I'd like it for a longer period of time

The platform is easy to use and understand whether it is being used as self-serve or a managed service. The audience targeting is solid, and array of placements is versatile. With these, the level of engagement for video content is usually great

Incentivized

Because I think the interface is kind of confusing at the beginning and it confuses you a lot.

Incentivized

It is very user friendly and if any team members need further help, we are able to easily access their customer service team for hands on assistance with an actual human being, not a robot. Their team has been incredibly kind, understanding and thorough. It is really a great all in one tool for a business who relies greatly on advertising campaigns.

I've never had any problems with appnexus - the software is always available

Incentivized

Yes, everything works great in that sense

Incentivized

Because the support team does give you support, they take 24hrs to get back to you but once they open a ticket they focus on resolving the issue for you. My only problem is that you don't have a specific account representative assigned to you.

Incentivized

Support has been exceptional. Our dedicated team is always available and ready to answer any questions that may arise. We receive updates from them on a regular basis and they go above and beyond providing assistance when needed. The team is absolutely one of the bright spots in our relationship with StackAdapt

Incentivized

Online training are not user friendly and not easy to understand

Incentivized

The TTD platform seems to have better CTV/OLV inventory, so that is typically preferred over AppNexus (APN). Usually, if clients have an internal desk, they will use TTD, which can often lead to us bidding against them, which is also another benefit of running campaigns within AppNexus (APN). Google DSP is typically used to increase the scale for display and build larger re-messaging pools.

Incentivized

StackAdapt is significantly less expensive than The Trade Desk. StackAdapt doesn't have campaign minimums, unlike The Trade Desk, meaning you can experiment with a lower ad spend to gain client confidence before investing at a larger level. Plus they don't lock you into an annual contract or anything long term. It feels very similar to The Trade Desk but without the high contract.

Incentivized

Because it's a great DSP but not the best

Incentivized

• The 1 USD audit fee makes it very hard to A/B test creatives and improve performance, hurting ROI.
• We have been able to reach some users that we weren't able to get before, increasing spending, which is good for ROI.
• We can run campaigns on TV, which is a big boost for the business, and very ROI positive.

Incentivized

• Excellent traffic from our ads. Traffic exceeded our forecast.
• Excellent management of our budget. We did not spend near as much as we budgeted for the response we received through our test.
• The lead conversion was not expected to be high due to the type of content we deployed, but we received zero conversions, well below anticipated when compared to other ads for the same content.

Incentivized