DV releases fresh updates to News Accelerator

The software platform provider for digital media measurement and analytics, DoubleVerify Holdings (DV) has introduced updates for its DV News Accelerator solution. Following its conversations with advertisers, platform players, and publishers, DV has made changes to the keyword controls of its solution and unveiled fresh working groups to streamline its collaboration with news publishers.

Addressing the impact of misused keyword lists that limited advertiser reach and affected publisher revenue, DoubleVerify has issued these modifications to its News Accelerator platform that it had launched in October 2024. DV initiated these regular direct conversations with advertisers and news publishers after Mark Zagorski took over as its CEO last year.

“As a news publisher, we recognise that advertisers need a level of control over how their ad dollars are spent, and brand suitability is important. However, the broad application of keyword blocklists, which have been the norm, has had unintended consequences limiting advertisers’ reach and impacting publisher revenue, particularly for news organisations. DV’s changes provide a much-needed solution by ensuring that classified, suitable content isn’t unnecessarily blocked,” said Anthony Roque, VP - ad operations, The Daily Beast.

According to DV data, advertising on news content generates nearly 10% greater engagement than non-news content, and 99.99% of content across the 500 most trafficked news sites is brand safe. By investing in news, brands can expand their reach and improve campaign outcomes without compromising on brand safety, says a company press release.

Advertisers use keyword lists for brand suitability, safeguarding brand equity, and resolving specific issues. However, when these lists are applied without appropriate targeting, they tend to limit an advertiser's reach and the revenue possibilities of publishers. Some brands had applied keyword lists without regular review resulting in reducing campaign effectiveness and blocking inventory.

DV has taken these steps to address these issues by updating the operation of its keyword solution. Advertisers will now be able to apply keyword avoidance only to URL paths of site pages that have not been classified into one of DoubleVerify’s content categories. This approach allows brands to prioritise content that is included in the company’s content categories, which cover over 100 distinct areas. The update is designed to help advertisers access inventory at scale while meeting brand suitability requirements without blocking content that has been appropriately classified.

As part of these updates, DoubleVerify has also unveiled an AI-driven feature to help advertisers optimise keyword lists. The tool leverages historical data insights and trends in media to spot obsolete keywords. With this feature, the system can alert advertisers asking them to review and change their keyword lists, thus minimising the risk of overblocking and ensuring that the lists stay relevant even with the passage of time.

DV also has a few other tools that support news monetisation. In the year 2024, it launched 'News Plus: News' and 'News Lite: News' to help advertisers access premium news inventory by placing ads next to professionally produced news content in the open marketplace. Available across major DSPs, these segments can be activated by all advertisers, including those who are not DV clients.

DoubleVerify has also set up a formal working group to facilitate regular conversations with publishers. It has created News Accelerator Publisher Council for news publishers to share their insights on monetisation challenges and provide feedback on DV’s technology solutions. The council holds roundtables for discussions and collaboration for DV to incorporate publisher perspectives and priorities in its technology roadmap.