Floor Prices

A floor price is the least an organization will accept for one slot on one face. It is the number a demand partner is shown when it is offered the opportunity, and the number its bid is measured against when it answers.

This page is for an organization’s owner, admin and manager employees. A viewer can read floor prices and change none of them.

Where a floor lives

A floor price belongs to a price list, not to a face.

A face is priced by the price list that covers it. Because a face is covered by at most one RTB price list, and by the organization’s default price list if no other names it, exactly one floor price applies to any request — there is nothing to resolve between competing prices.

Two consequences worth stating plainly:

  • Changing a price list’s floor changes it for every face that price list covers, at once.

  • Giving one face a different floor from its neighbors means putting it in a different price list.

The three ways to write a floor

A floor can be written three ways. Which one prices a given request is decided by two switches on the price list itself.

One floor, rescaled by slot length

The default. The price list carries a single amount for a slot of a stated length — for example 20 for a 10-second slot.

When a request arrives for a slot of a different length, the platform converts the floor to a per-second rate and multiplies it back out to the requested length. A 20-for-10-seconds floor answers a 15-second request at 30, and a 5-second request at 10.

This is the form to use unless you have a reason not to. One number covers every slot length the screens actually run.

A price for each creative length

Turn off the single-floor switch and the price list carries a table instead: one amount for each creative length you are willing to sell.

Each row is an amount and a length. The platform prices every length in the table and offers the whole table to the demand partner, which then answers with a creative of one of those lengths.

A creative whose length is not in the table is refused, even if the demand partner bid well above the floor. If you price 10 and 15 seconds and a partner returns a 12-second creative, that answer is discarded.

A price derived from the audience estimate

Turn on the audience-based switch and the price list carries an amount for a stated number of opportunities to see — for example 5 for every 1000.

When a request arrives carrying an audience estimate, the floor for that request is the amount scaled to the estimate: an estimate of 2400 against a 5-per-1000 floor gives a floor of 12. Slot length does not enter the calculation.

The estimate used is the one the platform has corrected, not the raw number the content management system sent. See Availability and saturation for where that correction comes from.

An audience-based floor does not replace the ordinary one; it sits alongside it. If a request arrives with no audience estimate, or an estimate of zero, the platform falls back to the length-based floor on the same price list. Leave that floor set to something you are willing to sell at.

Only the requested length

A separate switch, strict by slot length, narrows any of the forms above to the exact length the content management system asked for.

With it off, the platform prices every length the price list knows about and lets the demand partner choose among them, provided the creative is no longer than the slot. With it on, only a creative of exactly the requested length is accepted, and only that length is priced.

If nothing in the price list prices the requested length, the request ends with no answer.

The minimum underneath every floor

The platform enforces a minimum floor price, set by the platform administrator. Saving a price list whose floor falls below it is refused, and the message names the minimum. The comparison is per second, so a minimum written as 1 for 5 seconds refuses a price list floor of 3 for 20 seconds — 0.2 per second against 0.15.

Limits

Field Limit Note

Floor price amount

At least 0.01

Zero is not a valid floor.

Slot length on a floor

At least 1 second

Entered in seconds.

Audience-based amount

At least 0.01

Number of opportunities to see it is written against

At least 1

Number of floor prices when the single-floor switch is on

Exactly one

Saving more than one is refused.

What the floor does to a bid

In a second-price auction, the default, one thing happens between the number typed into the price list and the number a demand partner sees: the platform’s commission is added on top. The demand partner is asked to bid at least the amount that covers both the organization’s floor and the platform’s cut.

Which commission applies to a given face and a given partner is the subject of Fees and commission. Only the commission rate is added to the floor; a minimum commission set on a face is not, although it still applies when the sale settles. The floor is sent in the deployment’s single currency.

On a price list in auction mode, where the platform administrator has set a first-price auction for a partner, the floor that partner sees is further multiplied by the floor coefficients set on the face — by day and time, by audience estimate and by saturation — and on the price list, by day and time.

Once the answer comes back, the floor is used three times.

It refuses a low bid

A bid below the floor is discarded and the demand partner is told the floor it missed. That answer takes no further part; it is not counted as a losing bid in a comparison it was never admitted to.

It refuses an empty bid

A missing or zero bid is discarded as well, unless the platform administrator has allowed that partner to bid zero for this organization.

It sets the bottom of the clearing price

The amount the winner is charged is computed from the runner-up bid and the floor, and never falls below the floor. How the winner is chosen has the rule in full.

Two further refusals depend on how the floor was written: a creative longer than the slot is discarded, and a creative of a length the price list does not price is discarded.

Example 1. A floor at work

A price list carries a single floor of 20 for a 10-second slot, and covers a face whose commission resolves to 10%.

  1. The content management system asks for a 15-second slot on that face.

  2. The floor is converted to a per-second rate of 2, and back out to 30 for 15 seconds.

  3. Commission is added: the demand partners in the price list are offered the slot at 33.

  4. One partner answers with 32.50. It is discarded, with the floor of 33 given as the reason.

  5. Another answers with 40 and a 15-second creative. It is admitted, and wins.

  6. What it is charged is decided by the clearing rule, and is somewhere between 33 and 40.

See also