Override ad quality settings on a deal
By default, when you create a deal, the deal inherits any ad quality settings you have already established for a given network and publisher. For example, a network may prohibit animated or Flash ads and a publisher may ban certain specific brands or category. But, since deals are special arrangements with buyers, Microsoft Advertising allows you to ignore these settings and allow creatives that would normally be blocked to serve on a deal.
Note
These settings are configured when you create a custom deal. The settings they override are described in Working with Network Ad Quality and Working with Ad Quality.
Types of ad quality overrides
There are three types of ad quality overrides:
- Trust Level: You can override the default buyer trust level to give deal buyers additional options: you can allow all creatives to serve, or allow creatives that are pending review to serve.
- Attribute Overrides: For creative attributes (brands, categories, languages, and technical attributes), you can choose to ignore existing ad quality settings. For brands, categories, and languages, you can also restrict a deal to only use specific attributes.
- Creative Approval and Blocking: allows you to specifically approve or block individual creatives. This setting overrides trust level and attribute overrides. Approved creatives will always be eligible to serve, and blocked creatives can never serve on the deal.
Trust level
Trust Level is used to indicate what level of audit status you want to permit for creatives to serve for a deal.
Default: Default setting. If selected, this deal uses the default ad quality buyer trust level.
Allow pending creatives: if checked, the default setting is used but creatives submitted for Microsoft Advertising audit in the "pending" state are allowed to serve. Once the audit is complete, the creative uses the default ad quality setting.
Maximum: If selected, all creatives are allowed to serve for this deal (except for creatives specifically banned; see below). With Maximum trust level set on a deal, a buyer can serve on that deal even if the buyer has been blocked in network or publisher ad quality rules.
Note
If set to anything other than Default, this setting overrides both network and publisher ad quality settings and allows deals to serve creatives that would normally be blocked.
Attribute overrides
You can also override network and publisher ad quality attribute settings for a deal. The ad quality attributes consist of:
Brands: Creatives associated with a specific brand
Categories: Creatives in a particular category, such as sports or computers
Languages: Creatives associated with a language
Technical Attributes: Creatives with particular technical attributes, such as audio or expandable creatives
Note
When you ignore ad quality settings for a brand, creatives of that brand will be allowed to serve, even if the corresponding category of that brand is blocked. The exception to this rule is if the creative also has sensitive categories assigned to it; in order to allow those creatives to serve, you must either ignore ad quality for those sensitive categories or approve the creatives individually.
As with all deal overrides, by default, the deal will follow the default ad quality settings. However, for each attribute you can ignore the ad quality settings (use the Ad Quality Settings tab available when you click into Brand, Categories, or Languages), restrict the deal to specific attributes (use the Brand, Categories, or Language tabs available when you click into Brand, Categories, or Languages), or restrict and ignore: restrict the deal to specific attributes, and also ignore any existing ad quality settings. The following examples show how to configure each of these cases.
Note
Technical attributes are slightly different: you cannot restrict a deal to specific technical attributes, but you can ignore ad quality settings for them.
Example 1: Ignore ad quality settings for some attributes on a deal
You want deals to use the existing ad quality settings for languages, but allow any English, Chinese, or Spanish creatives to ignore the ad quality settings and always serve. From the Deals screen, click Edit under Language and then click the Ad Quality Settings tab. All languages are displayed; for English, Chinese, and Spanish, click Ignore. All other languages will now follow the existing ad quality profile for this deal, but English, Chinese, and Spanish creatives will always be able to serve.
Example 2: Restrict deal to certain attributes
You want to restrict the deal to only use Scandinavian language creatives. From the Deals screen, click Edit under Language. On the Languages tab, select Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian. Those languages are listed under Selected Languages. Only creatives in one of those languages will be able to serve in this deal.
Example 3: Restrict deal to certain attributes and ignore ad quality settings for an attribute
You want to restrict the deal to only use Scandinavian language creatives, but you also want creatives in Swedish to ignore any other ad quality settings. From the Deals screen, click Edit under Language. On the Languages tab, select Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian. Those languages are listed under Selected Languages as in Example 2. Now click the Ad Quality Settings tab. For Swedish, click the Ignore button. Creatives in all three languages will be able to serve in this deal, but while Danish and Norwegian creatives may be limited by other ad quality settings, Swedish creatives will ignore any language settings.
Creative approval and blocking
You can also specifically approve or block specific creatives from deals by typing their creative IDs in the Approve or Block fields.
Note
Creatives on the approve list will always serve, regardless of any other network or publisher ad quality settings. Similarly, creatives on the block list will never serve, regardless of any other ad quality settings.
How overrides work with ad quality settings?
Consider a more complex example: you are creating a deal for toy manufacturers in Scandinavian countries.
| Requirement | Ad Quality Setting |
|---|---|
| You trust your buyer and do not want them to have to wait for their new ads to be approved. | In Trust Level, check Allow Pending Creatives. |
| You want your deal only to serve relevant categories, and for sporting goods, you want any ads to serve for that category, regardless of network ad quality settings. | Click Edit under Creative Category. In Categories, include Sporting Goods and Toys and Games. On the Ad Quality Settings tab, click Ignore for Sporting Goods. Now we have restricted creatives so that only the listed categories can serve. Further, Sporting Goods ads can ignore any other restriction. |
| You want your deal only to serve in Scandinavian languages. For Swedish only, you want to ignore network ad quality settings to permit any ad in that language to serve. | Click Edit under Language. In Languages, include Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish. On the Ad Quality Settings tab, click Ignore for Swedish. We have restricted further: now, only creatives in the allowed categories and which are in the selected languages can serve. Swedish language ads can ignore any other restriction that might be set for those ads. |
| You want your deal to include any types of technical attributes, but you want to make sure audio ads will always serve. | Click Edit under Technical Attributes. Click Ignore for the two types of audio ads. (You cannot restrict technical attributes on a deal.) Creatives in the allowed categories and languages, and which are audio, in Swedish, and in the Sporting Goods category will be allowed to serve despite any other network or publisher level ad quality setting. |
| There are two particular creatives that you know you always want to serve and three creatives you always want to block. | Click Edit under Specific Creatives. In Creatives, type the creative IDs you want to allow in the Allow box, and the IDs you want to block in the Block box. Any creative in the Allow list will serve, regardless of any other setting. Any creative in the Block box will not serve, regardless of any other setting. |