You can dance around it, you can equivocate, you can point out there are other factors involved. But when you break it down, you have to concede: Running multiple header bidding partners tends to increase page latency. This is a significant concern for publishers, who find themselves in a position of figuring out how to implement more header partners (increasing overall revenue) without making a dent in page performance (threatening your ability to monetize the site to its fullest potential).
Server-to-server integrations can sound like a fine way to manage bids without increasing latency. But there are good reasons publishers are working with header instead of jumping right into server-side pipes: Server-side integrations require resources not every publisher (or tech vendor) can fully support, and there are benefits to staying on the page for both pub and demand partner. In this video, Chegg VP of Advertising Emry DowningHall talks about some of the ways server-to-server might reduce latency–but he also gets into what pubs should be looking for in server-to-server, where the server-side landscape can stand to grow, and what pubs should do to make sure their own server-to-server integrations are really delivering the speed they’re supposed to. Check out this video interview, and the rest of the video series AdMonsters developed with Index Exhange at PubForum 38 earlier this year.