Criteo Commerce Max vs. Kevel

Well suited--customizable enough to go to market efficiently and quickly. Not well suited--Plug-in multiple demand sources, improved targeting integrations with first-party data.

For ad serving, implementing client-side header bidding with prebid was actually easier with Kevel than it is with Google Ad Manager in most cases, particularly for display advertising. I found though that with more complex integrations (like video), there were more solutions and code snippets available with other larger ad servers (Google).

Incentivized

• Intuitive dashboards and reporting
• Custom templates for display media
• Flexibility in terms of setting guardrails for targeting

• More personable team that can address customizations needed to the product.
• Easy to use interface.
• Frequent product updates with notifications via email.
• Well documented API.

Incentivized

• Exportable insights at a brand, page, and placement level
• Segmentation API service to better manage first-party data
• Opportunity for non-custom implementation to allow for scalable solutions, such as programmatic backfill

• User interface could be faster to load.

Incentivized

Intuitive and easy to use.

Retail Media by Criteo's support at the start (with ERMS and Hooklogic) was pretty poor, with support SLAs exceeding 72 hours. This has changed over time to having a dedicated team--therefore the 7 rating and not 8.

Cost of integration is low with Retail Media by Criteo, and Criteo's network of sponsored products is strong.

Kevel was an easier initial implementation for header bidding with prebid. The team worked alongside us to make sure everything was operating as intended. We ultimately switched to Ads Manager to access AdX demand and other features that were not possible with Kevel (for instance, EBDA). There are benefits to both but I appreciated the attention we got from Kevel support when we were first working through the implementation. We are still using Kevel for many things, just not as our primary display advertising ad server.

Incentivized

• Increased net revenue
• Increased profit
• CTR is unchanged (but this can be improved with better opportunities for targeting)

• Kevel enabled us to get up and running with client side header bidding when our team was still small and the technology was still new. This improved our ability to monetize our inventory.

Incentivized