Hibu Display – Product FAQs

There are four networks that we use for Display Inventory: 

1. Hibu Network – Our Hibu Network is a selection of 150-200 brand-safe sites. We periodically review and add or delete sites from the network based on performance and inventory. Ads on our Hibu network will show on desktop, mobile, web, and in-app. 
2. Microsoft Audience Network – Microsoft owned and operated properties including MSN.com, Outlook, Microsoft Edge and more. Also includes an extensive network of 3rd party sites.
3. Amazon Sponsored Display Network - Exclusive owned and operated inventory on Amazon.com, IMDB and Twitch. Plus, inventory across thousands of partner websites and apps. Available at $300 per month and up. 
4. Facebook - In order to be eligible for FB inventory, a client must complete the FB connection process. FB inventory with Display is Newsfeed only and will show on a desktop or in the FB app. Available at $300 per month and up. 

The Facebook connection is not required, but it is recommended. If Facebook is not connected, the campaign will be built and published using our Hibu network, the Microsoft Audience Network and Amazon Sponsored Display where the budget allows. 

With Display, Facebook ads will run on NewsFeed only and will not contain any of the additional inventory (Instagram and Marketplace) or advanced features you get with Social – such as A/B testing. Additionally, Facebook with Display does not have flexibility with ad objectives. All Display campaigns with Facebook run with the Traffic objective, whereas with Social, clients have the opportunity to select an Awareness campaign, Lead an objective campaign, or a Traffic campaign. 

Absolutely! There are a lot of good reasons to sell Display and Social together. FB has no restrictions on running multiple campaigns that drive traffic to the same URL, so running FB with Social and Display provides advantages and flexibility. There are zero downsides to having 2 Facebook campaigns. 

We have also seen lots of creative options regarding selling Display & Social together, such as: 

• Create a different FB ad for the Social vs. the Display campaign to focus on a different motivating factor, offer, or even a different part of the business. 
• Use the Awareness or Lead campaign with Social and the Traffic objective with Display to maximize FB campaign options and visibility. 
• Use Social for FB and then choose not to connect the Display campaign to FB, allowing the full budget to be used across the Hibu network, the Microsoft Audience Network and Amazon Sponsored Display. 

In April 2021, Apple updated its privacy policy for IOS users. The change Apple made requires users to specifically opt-in to permit cookies to track them across the web or across apps. If you are an iPhone user, you probably see this regularly now, where a website you access or an app you download asks for permission to use cookies on your device. If a user opts out of tracking, this means that we (nor anyone else) will be able to serve them a retargeted impression by placing a cookie on their device. 

In addition to Apple’s change Google has announced to Chrome users that 3rd party cookies will be deprecated at some point in 2024. What all of this means is that the volume of retargeting inventory using 3rd party cookies will shrink over time and may eventually go away altogether. 

The great news is the Hibu Display has already evolved beyond the need for 3rd party cookies. With Microsoft’s Audience network and Amazon’s 1st party audience options, Hibu Display is leveraging the most advanced 1st party targeting solutions in the industry. Best of all, these audience targeting solutions through Microsoft and Amazon have zero reliance on 3rd party cookies. 

Yes. When you create a spec ad, that ad has a unique ID associated with it called a spec ID. During the consultation, you can provide the spec ID to the Digital Services Consultant (DSC) and ask that they use the spec ad you created to create the display ad we will publish. Keep in mind that spec ads today are used for the Hibu Network only. Images and ads for Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook cannot pull directly from the spec ad. 

Yes. When making changes with the DPS team, provide the spec ID and ask to have the campaign updated exactly as you have it built. 

Yes! Audience targeting is available with the Microsoft Audience Network and with Amazon Sponsored Display. 

With Microsoft Audience Network, Display clients can target their ads based on demographics and in-market audiences. Clients/reps can request specific age and gender targets. Microsoft has over 1000 audience targets to select from, giving Display ads a more targeted approach. 

The audience options with Amazon Sponsored Display are vast – over 30k different audience options. Like Microsoft, audience selection allows for a more targeted Display ad. Amazon does not offer demographic targeting at this time. 

Audience targeting for both Microsoft and Amazon will be mapped on that backend based on business category. Audience targets for active campaigns will be visible in the “My Ads” section of the Hibu Performance Dashboard.  

 *Note: Operations reserves the right to amend demographic and audience targeting if we are unable to spend a client’s budget, based on the targeting being too restrictive. 

We don’t get full transparency into apps within the Hibu network because of agreements that exist between the publishers, ad exchanges, and/or our partners. This is something we continue to press our partners on and hope to make Display impressions more transparent in the future. 

The primary way to measure Display value is in our delivery of impressions and clicks. We routinely meet and often overdeliver on impression and click volume expectations for our clients, helping put their business in front of consumers wherever they are online. 

The clicks we deliver from Display help bring those consumers one step closer to conversion by seeing and learning more about our client’s business. So the tangible items we can measure from Display (Impressions & Clicks) create brand awareness and help move consumers from the awareness to the consideration phase of the buying cycle. 

Audience Targeting with Microsoft & Amazon allows us to run a more targeted Display ad and get ads in front of clients who are “In-Market” for a particular product or service. 

Retargeting allows us to re-deliver Display ads to consumers who have already visited the client’s site. With retargeting, we’re putting Display ads closer to the purchase phase of the buying cycle. 

If a client has a Hibu site and Solutions Call Tracking, we will capture any form fills or calls that Display generated directly. 

While we don’t typically expect Display to drive many direct leads, we can see that clients with an active Display campaign see more unique visitors to their site, more GBP actions, and more calls with Multi-Channel Lead Tracking. Display may not have driven those leads directly, but Display certainly helps assist in the lead generation process.

Upon request, we can access Google Display Network inventory for budgets of $1499+. As per the Display spec sheet, we will only build custom ads for GDN with a budget of $4999+. This means that if a client has a Display budget from $1499 - $4998 and requests GDN inventory, they will need to provide the ads for GDN in the proper ad sizes. See the Display Spec Sheet for ad size details. 

1. Ad Inventory: MSAN provides inventory on Microsoft owned and operated properties like MSN.com, Outlook, Microsoft Edge and in addition has an extensive network of 3rd party sites.  
2. Native Ad Placements – MSAN included native ad placements allowing ads to adapt and blend in to the look and color scheme of any website, resulting in increased consumer engagement. 
3. Demographic Targeting – MSAN allows clients to granularly target their campaigns to a specific age range or gender. 
4. In-Market Audiences – MSAN allows clients to target consumers using Microsoft 1st party data. MSAN employs curated audience lists based on consumer browser behavior, search history, profile data and more. 
5. Responsive Ads – MSAN ads run with multiple headlines and versions of ad copy and leverage Microsoft machine learning and AI to test and serve the best performing or most relevant ad copy for every impression. 
6. Retargeting – All MSAN Display clients with a Hibu site will automatically have the Microsoft Universal Event Tag or (UET) installed. This tag will allow us to retarget previous visitors to the website. Clients spending $499+ with Display can request the Universal Event Tag code and add it to their website to take advantage of the retargeting feature.

*Note:  Apple has eliminated 3rd party cookies and Google has announced plans to eliminate 3rd party cookies as well. Retargeting will be less impactful moving forward, but MSAN allows us to take advantage of retargeting where possible. 

Microsoft processes billions of data points daily to create, maintain and update their in-market audiences on an ongoing basis. Some of the signals Microsoft users to build their in-market audiences include browser behavior, search history, profile data and many more. Microsoft has over 1000 curated “In-market” audience segments to choose from. Consumers in these audience segments are ‘in-market’ for a particular product or service. 

Amazon also generates a huge volume of 1st party data based on consumer browsing and shopping signals on Amazon.com, streaming signals from Twitch, IMDB, Fire TV and listening signals from Audible. Amazon uses these signals to create and maintain over 30k 1st party audiences that are available via Hibu Display. Amazon has a huge list of in-market audiences and also has Lifestyle, Life Events and Interest Based audience segments. 

Together, Amazon & Microsoft allow Hibu Display to leverage world class 1st party data to help drive more targeted Display impressions and clicks. 

For Hibu Display clients, audiences will be applied to campaigns based on the appropriate business category. 

1. Inventory – Amazon Sponsored Display has ad inventory that no other channel has, including inventory on Amazon.com, IMDB and Twitch. 
2. Audiences – Amazon has unparallelled data to create 1st party audiences that can be used for targeting. Amazon has over 30,000 audience options available to target. 
3. Cookieless Solution To Targeting – Because Amazon creates their audiences using their own 1st party data, their audiences and targeting options will not be impacted by the decline and ultimate elimination of the 3rd party cookie. 
4. Competitive Cost Per Click – Amazon’s CPC’s in testing were competitive with other big name inventory sources and Amazon has the added advantage of their audiences which allow Hibu clients to take advantage of a more advanced, more highly targeted Display ad. 

Like other networks, there are standard categories that are prohibited with Amazon – alcohol, tobacco, drugs, CBD, weapons, etc. But Amazon has a more extensive list that currently prohibits a few common Hibu business categories. Amazon currently has restrictions for Lawyers, Healthcare Services (including Dentists), Finance, Insurance and Real Estate. Amazon also has restrictions for retail categories because those serve as competition to Amazon.com. 

Please consult the Display spec sheet for a full list of category restrictions. 

Because some of these categories are new types of advertisers for Amazon we are expecting this list will evolve in the future. We are already working with Amazon’s moderation team in an effort to get some of these category restrictions lifted. 

Amazon Sponsored Display ads are available for Hibu Display clients spending $300 per month and up.

 Yes, Facebook is still available with Display, however the budget rules have changed a bit with the introduction of Amazon. Here is the full set of rules for new and existing clients.

New Clients (starting April 1st 2024):

$250 - $299: Microsoft Audience Network and Hibu Network

$300 - $499: Amazon Sponsored Display OR Facebook, Microsoft Audience Network & Hibu Network.

• If client is in a business category eligible for Amazon, client will have ad distribution on Amazon, MSAN and Hibu Network.
• If client is in a business category NOT eligible for Amazon, they will have the option to connect Facebook and run on FB, MSAN, and Hibu Network.

$500+: Client is eligible for and will have all 4 networks if FB is connected (depending on business category and FB connection status).

Existing Clients:

Below $300 : Have to up-sell to $300 to be eligible for Amazon.

$300 - $499 : Eligible to have Amazon OR Facebook, plus Microsoft Audience Network and Hibu Network.

• If client has existing $300 - $499 budget or is up-sold to $300 - $499 and the ask is to add Amazon, FB will be dropped (if connected) and ad distribution will be on Amazon, MSAN and Hibu Network.
• If client has existing $300 - $499 budget or is up-sold to $300 - $499 and no FB connection exists, Amazon will be added. Ad distribution will be Amazon, MSAN and Hibu Network.

$500+ : Whether existing budget is $500+ or client is up-sold to $500+, client is eligible for all 4 networks (depending on business category and their FB connection status).

No – for a few reasons. In order to best optimize our Display campaigns our Operations team needs to have controls in place to shift budget as necessary. This ensures we can spend budgets and generate the click and impression volumes required to meet expectations. Some networks also have certain budget minimums that exist that we need to maintain to keep campaigns running and to avoid rejections. 

For those reason, the Operations team will dictate where display budgets get allocated.