I recently caught up with Mike Hauptman, CEO and Founder at Adlib, a company whose programmatic DSP (Demand-Side Platform), dubbed “The Adlib Meta DSP,” makes it easier for marketers to access premium audiences and publishers at scale while eliminating waste.
Mike and I discuss the company’s origin story, the market needs met by its software, and the challenges of prioritizing features in product development, with Mike emphasizing the importance of listening to clients when contemplating the addition of new features and capabilities. I query Mike about specific client requests for integrations, and Mike mentions YouTube as an example of an integration that was added based on client demand.
Adlib differentiates itself from other self-serve DSPs by not maintaining its own supply connections and data marketplaces, instead using best-in-class connections through larger DSPs. This allows for head-to-head competition between DSPs to determine the best performer for a campaign. It’s also earned high marks for being easy to use and fast to set up.
Mike highlights the benefits of partnering with vendors for dynamic creative optimization and provides an anecdote about using Magic Ads, an Adlib product, to help a beauty brand create banners in just a few hours and achieve a 3-1 return on ad spend within 2-3 weeks.
Mike has high hopes for Adlib in 2024 and beyond, believing its capabilities and contract-free engagement model qualify it as a credible candidate to serve as the media buying system of record for agencies. As he notes, “Adlib is now a centralized platform, which, at the push of a button, distributes your campaigns and creatives to multiple DSPs without having to re-traffic them. We think media buyers need this and we can become that singular, known workflow tool, no matter what DSP it ultimately runs across.”
