For most adops and revenue teams, ad security still sits in the “deal with it when it breaks” pile, treated as a hygiene issue rather than a structural feature of how programmatic now works. In this interview, Danielle Koffler, Staff Product Manager at Confiant, explains why that framing leaves publishers a step behind.
Start ’em, sit ’em is back, with Craig Leshen, President of adops.com, once again in the interview chair. It’s time to drill down into which aspects of adtech deserve real focus in H2 2026, and which ones should stay on the bench until the plan, or the market, is ready.
Programmatic still runs as a buyer’s market: buyers hold the classification power, buyers make the go or no-go call on your site, and often you’re being judged without knowing it’s happening.
For the last few years, digital publishers have been playing a defensive game. The foundation that powered publisher growth for more than a decade is rapidly changing. Search engines are moving toward AI-driven, answer-first experiences that increasingly satisfy user intent without requiring a click.
That combination of a curiosity about adtech and a genuine respect for the role publishers play is what pulled me across the fence. That shift gave me a rare vantage point: I know what advertisers are thinking when they open a media kit or decide which partners make the plan.
Everyone is obsessed with predicting the “Big AI Shift.” Conferences are packed with futurists talking about how AI will reshape marketing, creativity, and entire industries. But while everyone is staring at the horizon, they’re missing the ground crumbling beneath their feet.
As third-party cookies decline, browser restrictions increase, and page performance becomes ever more closely tied to revenue outcomes, publishers are under pressure to make decisions that balance monetization, user experience, and operational stability. And often without clear, comparable data to hand.
Nothing in our industry is evolving slowly, and Ad Ops is squarely in the center of that shift. Media, technology, creativity, data workflows, compliance, and automation are all colliding. And somehow, we’re still the ones stitching together the revenue engine with a mix of expertise, stubbornness, and well-timed Google Sheets magic.
Why digital publishers should invest in revenue diversification BY ZIV MISHAN, VP OF REVNUE AT KUEEZ AI is accelerating traffic declines, CPMs are trending downward, and privacy regulations are becoming increasingly complex. Diversifying revenue streams is no longer optional. The thing about a single river When Rome built its empire, it also built a weakness. … Read more
Publisher considerations for partner consolidations BY EMRY DOWNINGHALL, PROGRAMMATIC REVENUE & STRATEGY AT UNWIND MEDIA This article was originally published in March of 2023. The cold air cloaking Newport Beach during last week’s Base.Camp felt fitting given the chilly state of the programmatic market. YoY CPM growth is declining, addressable audiences continue to shrink, once … Read more