PubMatic is proud to announce its recertification for the IAB UK Gold Standard, a prestigious benchmark that upholds excellence in the UK’s digital advertising ecosystem. While tailored to the UK market’s unique preferences and regulations, this certification delivers global value by fostering trust and consistency among stakeholders – publishers, DSPs, SSPs, and buyers – in programmatic advertising transactions. This means all parties benefit from enhanced transparency, verified inventory quality, and streamlined operations that reduce friction across the entire programmatic supply chain.
The Gold Standard establishes a robust framework of requirements designed to ensure a seamless and reliable experience for all parties in programmatic advertising. This translates directly into improved campaign performance, reduced wasted ad spend, and enhanced brand safety for our clients. These requirements balance immediate, foundational standards, termed “implementation” requirements, with forward-looking “support” requirements that encourage innovation and long-term improvement within the programmatic ecosystem.
Implementation Requirements: Building a Strong Foundation
For adtech companies like PubMatic, the implementation requirements focus on critical standards for the UK market. These include:
- Ads.txt Adoption: Ensuring at least 90% of an SSP’s UK traffic originates from domains supporting ads.txt, enhancing transparency in inventory sources.
- Open Measurement SDK (OMSDK): Requiring custom SDKs provided to publishers and downstream partners to support OMSDK, enabling accurate measurement of invalid traffic (IVT) and viewability for mobile app inventory.
- Ad Quality Standards: Adhering to Better Ads Standards and participating in the “scam ads” program to maintain high-quality advertising experiences. Building on our recent elimination of Made-for-Advertising (MFA) inventory across our entire platform, PubMatic now delivers fraud-free, premium inventory, ensuring advertisers reach engaged audiences in brand-safe environments.
- Financial Compliance: Conducting mandatory financial checks for specific buyers in the UK to ensure secure transactions.
The Gold Standard complements the global certifications offered by the Trustworthy Accountability Group (TAG). A key requirement is maintaining good standing with TAG’s Brand Safety Certification, streamlining efforts for globally operating organizations and minimizing redundant compliance work.
Support Requirements: Driving Industry Progress
Beyond foundational standards, the Gold Standard encourages innovation through “support” requirements. These forward-thinking features deliver measurable improvements in campaign efficiency and cost-effectiveness for our partners. They require public commitments or evidence of inclusion in product roadmaps to adopt forward-thinking features, such as:
- RefSettings and Bidfloors: Committing to enforce these mechanisms to optimize transparency and pricing control. This results in more efficient bidding and improved return on ad spend for buyers.
- IAB Tech Lab Video Signals: Supporting the latest video signal standards to enhance programmatic video advertising. Early implementation ensures our clients gain competitive advantages in the rapidly growing CTV market.
Buyers.json and DemandChain Object: Enhancing Transparency
A cornerstone of the Gold Standard’s implementation requirements is the adoption of the DemandChain Object (DCO), an IAB Tech Lab specification that provides sellers with detailed buyer information within bid responses. When paired with buyers.json, DCO offers unparalleled transparency into the buyers accessing a publisher’s inventory.
PubMatic is proud to lead the way as one of the first adtech platforms to fully support DCO and publish a buyers.json file. This early adoption means our clients benefit from enhanced transparency and fraud protection that many competitors cannot yet provide. We commend the IAB UK for including DCO in the Gold Standard, as its adoption remains limited across the industry. This focus underscores the certification’s role in driving meaningful change.
The Gold Standard: A Catalyst for Industry Trust
PubMatic’s recertification for the IAB UK Gold Standard reflects our commitment to fostering a trustworthy and efficient programmatic ecosystem. With MFA-free inventory and full DCO implementation, we deliver measurable value: higher viewability rates, reduced invalid traffic, and improved campaign performance metrics across all client campaigns. By adhering to these rigorous standards, certified participants signal to the market that shared, common-sense principles strengthen trust among publishers, buyers, and other stakeholders.
As the digital advertising landscape evolves, the Gold Standard serves as both a foundation for today’s best practices and a catalyst for tomorrow’s innovations. PubMatic is honored to contribute to this vision, ensuring a safer, more transparent, and higher quality advertising ecosystem for all.
Contact our team to learn how our Gold Standard certification can enhance your campaign performance and deliver superior results in the UK market.
