Why some agents finish and others don't: what GRPO tells us about agentic behaviour
Oct · 3 min read
How training shapes model behaviour in agentic tasks, examined through the Concourse v1 benchmark.
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What does it cost to run an AI media buyer?
Sep · 5 min read
Concourse Bench v1 recorded model API costs for eight AI buyers. Among completed buys, API expense ranged from $0.74 to $14.38 per buy. Total known API cost was $390.16. These figures are model API expense only, not full operating costs.
What Is Supply Path Optimisation and How Does AI Change It?
Sep · 4 min read
Supply path optimisation is the practice of identifying the most efficient and transparent routes from buyer to publisher inventory, and AI is making it both more precise and more dynamic.
News
What Is Demand Path Optimisation in Agentic Advertising?
Sep · 4 min read
Demand path optimisation is the sell-side practice of evaluating and prioritising the most valuable, transparent, and reliable buyers, and agentic advertising makes that evaluation significantly more data-rich.
Brand Safety in Agentic Advertising: A Guide for US Buyers
Sep · 4 min read
Brand safety in agentic advertising requires buyers to encode safety constraints directly into agent mandates, verify that those constraints travel with the agent across every negotiation, and audit outcomes against declared parameters.
Why Neutral Infrastructure Matters in Agent-to-Agent Advertising
Sep · 4 min read
When AI agents negotiate media deals on behalf of buyers and sellers, neutral infrastructure is what prevents one party's platform from disadvantaging the other, and it is the practical foundation of trust in an automated market.
How Alkimi Handles Agent-to-Agent Deal Negotiation
Sep · 4 min read
Alkimi is a neutral agentic advertising marketplace where buy-side and sell-side agents negotiate bilateral deals directly, producing a shared DealSheet that both parties hold independently. This piece explains how the connection is made, how proposals ...
Which Companies Are Building Infrastructure for the AAMP Standard?
Sep · 4 min read
AAMP is the IAB Tech Lab's Agentic Advertising Marketplace Protocol, which sets out the governance and operational requirements for marketplaces handling agent-to-agent advertising transactions. A small number of infrastructure providers are building to...
How Agent-to-Agent Advertising Differs from AI-Assisted Programmatic
Sep · 4 min read
AI-assisted programmatic uses artificial intelligence to optimise bids and targeting decisions within a conventional auction system. Agent-to-agent advertising replaces the auction entirely with bilateral negotiation between autonomous agents operating ...
What Is a Deal Sheet in Programmatic Advertising?
Sep · 4 min read
A DealSheet is the bilateral record of agreed deal terms written at the time of negotiation and held by both the buyer and publisher independently. It captures what was agreed before any impression is served: the CPM, the inventory scope, the audience c...
What Makes a Deal Record Tamper-Proof?
Sep · 4 min read
A tamper-proof deal record has three structural properties: it is written at the moment of agreement rather than reconstructed later; it is held by both parties independently rather than only by the marketplace; and it is held by a neutral marketplace t...
How an Agentic Marketplace Resolves Deal Disputes Between Buyer and Publisher Agents
Sep · 4 min read
When a dispute arises over an agent-negotiated deal, the DealSheet is the reference point. The marketplace provides deal record retrieval; both parties compare their delivery data against the agreed DealSheet terms. The neutral marketplace holds the rec...
How to Set Budget Controls and Limits for AI Advertising Agents
Sep · 4 min read
Setting clear budget controls for AI advertising agents requires defining spending ceilings, price floors, escalation thresholds, and review cadences before the agent begins operating.
What Is an Agent Mandate in Programmatic Advertising?
Sep · 4 min read
An agent mandate is a formal set of instructions, permissions, and constraints that defines what an AI advertising agent is authorised to do on behalf of a buyer or seller.
How to Evaluate an Agentic Advertising Marketplace: A Checklist for US Buyers
Sep · 4 min read
US buyers evaluating agentic advertising marketplaces should assess deal governance, mandate portability, audit log access, standards support, and human oversight design before committing to a platform.
What Is Agent-to-Agent Deal Governance?
Sep · 4 min read
Agent-to-agent deal governance is the set of rules, records, and oversight mechanisms that ensure AI agents on both sides of a media transaction operate within authorised boundaries and produce auditable outcomes.
What Is Bilateral Deal Ownership in Programmatic Advertising?
Sep · 4 min read
Bilateral deal ownership means both parties to an advertising deal hold the same document: the agreed terms written to a shared record that neither party can alter unilaterally. In conventional programmatic, each party holds their own version. The bilat...
How SSPs Are Adapting to Agent-to-Agent Media Buying
Sep · 4 min read
SSPs are adapting to agent-to-agent media buying by building sell-side agent capabilities and integrating with neutral marketplaces that provide bilateral deal record infrastructure. For publishers who currently route inventory through an SSP, the key q...
How Publishers Set Deal Terms for AI Buying Agents
Sep · 4 min read
Publishers set deal terms for autonomous buying agents through a sell-side mandate: a human-approved governance document that defines the parameters within which the sell-side agent can act. A well-structured mandate covers CPM floors, inventory categor...
How Agent-to-Agent CTV Buying Differs from Programmatic Guaranteed
Sep · 4 min read
Programmatic guaranteed and agent-to-agent CTV buying both aim to transact premium inventory at pre-agreed prices. The structural difference is in who holds the deal record, how that record is written, and how reconciliation works post-campaign. In prog...
The Difference Between an Exchange and an Agentic Marketplace from a Publisher's Perspective
Sep · 4 min read
An exchange runs auctions: the SSP manages deal setup, price is determined by the highest bid, and the publisher holds no shared deal record. An agentic marketplace runs bilateral negotiations: the sell-side agent evaluates proposals against the publish...
What a CTV Media Buying Mandate Should Contain
Sep · 5 min read
A CTV media buying mandate is more specific than a general display mandate. It needs to define which broadcaster and content categories the brand will appear against, what CPM ceilings apply by category, what audience data permissions the agent holds fo...
How US Brand-Direct Buyers Are Adopting Agentic Advertising
Sep · 4 min read
US brand-direct buyers are adopting agentic advertising by starting with mandate-bounded pilot campaigns, focusing on direct publisher relationships, and building internal governance frameworks before scaling agent autonomy.
How Agentic Buying Is Changing the Role of the US Agency Trading Desk
Sep · 4 min read
Agentic buying shifts the agency trading desk from execution management to mandate governance, supply path strategy, and agent performance oversight.
What US CMOs Need to Know About Agentic Advertising
Sep · 4 min read
US CMOs need to understand that agentic advertising shifts the strategic conversation from campaign configuration to mandate governance, requiring new accountability frameworks and cross-functional alignment before agents are deployed at scale.
How an Agentic Marketplace Protects Against Bid Manipulation
Sep · 5 min read
The manipulation vectors that exist in auction-based programmatic do not apply in a bilateral agent-to-agent marketplace. There is no auction, so there is no bid shading, no floor price manipulation, and no bid inflation. The DealSheet records the agree...
How CTV Publishers Set Deal Parameters for Agentic Buyers
Sep · 5 min read
A CTV publisher preparing to receive agentic proposals needs a sell-side mandate that goes further than a standard programmatic floor configuration. It needs CPM floors by content category and daypart, buyer category restrictions, audience data conditio...
How to Know an AI Agent Is Negotiating a Fair Deal on Your Behalf
Sep · 5 min read
There are three concrete checks for whether a buy-side agent has negotiated fairly on your behalf. First, retrieve the DealSheet and confirm the agreed CPM is within your mandate parameters. Second, review the agent's decision log to confirm it applied ...
What Audit Rights Does a Buyer Have Over Agent-Negotiated Deals?
Sep · 5 min read
A buyer running agent-negotiated deals should have three audit rights: deal record access, decision log access, and delivery comparison capability. Deal record access means the ability to retrieve the DealSheet for any deal independently of the counterp...
How Agent Mandate Governance Compares to Human Campaign Controls
Sep · 5 min read
In conventional programmatic, human campaign controls are platform configuration settings that enforce buying behaviour at the DSP level. In agent mandate governance, controls are expressed as mandate parameters that the agent evaluates before acting. T...
What Governance Does an Agent-to-Agent Marketplace Provide?
Sep · 4 min read
An agent-to-agent marketplace provides four governance functions: identity verification, mandate enforcement, deal record integrity, and audit access. Together, these functions mean that buyers can demonstrate every deal their agent agreed was within th...
How Artificial Intelligence Is Changing Programmatic Advertising in the US
Sep · 4 min read
AI is shifting programmatic advertising from rule-based automation to reasoning-based decision-making, with consequences for how inventory is bought, how deals are structured, and how campaign performance is governed.
How US Advertising Agencies Are Using AI for Programmatic Buying
Sep · 3 min read
US advertising agencies are deploying AI across planning, bidding, and optimisation to reduce manual work, improve targeting, and respond to campaign signals faster than human teams can manage alone.
What Does Agentic Advertising Mean? A Definition for US Buyers
Sep · 3 min read
Agentic advertising is an emerging model where AI agents handle media negotiation, deal-making, and campaign execution on behalf of buyers and sellers, with humans setting the rules and approving key decisions.
Alkimi vs a DSP: What Is the Structural Difference?
Sep · 4 min read
A DSP connects buyers to inventory through a bidding interface, charges a percentage of spend, and holds the buyer's record of what happened. Alkimi is a neutral agentic marketplace where buy-side and sell-side agents negotiate bilateral deals directly,...
What Is the AAMP Standard and Which Platforms Implement It?
Sep · 4 min read
AAMP (Agentic Advertising Marketplace Protocol) is IAB Tech Lab's governance standard for agentic advertising marketplaces. It specifies what a compliant marketplace must provide: neutrality, deal record integrity, mandate disclosure, and audit access. ...
What Is the Agentic Advertising Organisation?
Sep · 4 min read
The Agentic Advertising Organisation is an industry body formed to develop standards, guidance, and governance frameworks for agentic advertising. It exists to ensure that the transition from human-directed to agent-executed advertising transactions is ...
How Programmatic Buyers Get a Verifiable Record of What Was Agreed
Sep · 4 min read
In conventional programmatic, there is no single document both parties agreed before the campaign ran. In agentic advertising, the bilateral DealSheet is written at negotiation time, timestamped, and held by both parties independently. This piece explai...
Agentic Advertising and the US Upfront Market: What Buyers Should Know
Sep · 4 min read
Agentic advertising is beginning to intersect with the US upfront market by enabling AI agents to manage the negotiation, documentation, and governance of forward commitments in a more structured and auditable way.
How AI Agents Handle Contextual Targeting in Programmatic Advertising
Sep · 4 min read
AI agents are making contextual targeting faster and more precise by analysing content signals at scale, enabling programmatic buyers to reach relevant audiences without relying on third-party cookies.
The Role of Independent Ad Tech in the Agentic Advertising Ecosystem
Sep · 4 min read
Independent ad tech companies are building the neutral infrastructure that agentic advertising needs to function fairly, giving buyers and sellers an alternative to walled garden automation.
Alkimi and AdCP: How They Work Together
Sep · 4 min read
AdCP (Agent Communication Protocol) is the open standard published by AgenticAdvertising.org for agent-to-agent advertising transactions. Alkimi is the marketplace infrastructure through which those transactions run. The two are complementary: AdCP defi...
What Publishers Need Before They Can Accept Deals from Autonomous Agents
Sep · 4 min read
Publishers need three things before they can accept deals from autonomous buying agents: AdCP-compliant integration so their systems can receive and parse structured proposals; a sell-side mandate that defines the parameters for autonomous acceptance; a...
Which Marketplaces Let Publishers Accept Agent-Negotiated Inventory Deals Directly?
Sep · 4 min read
Publishers evaluating marketplaces for agent-negotiated inventory deals should look for four things: AdCP compliance, sell-side agent support with mandate governance, a bilateral DealSheet held by both parties independently, and a neutral marketplace st...
How AI Agents Negotiate CTV Inventory Deals Directly with Broadcasters
Sep · 4 min read
Connected television inventory has long been traded through direct insertion orders or programmatic guaranteed arrangements that require significant human involvement at every stage. Agentic buying changes the process, not the principles. A buy-side age...
Alkimi vs AdCP: What Is the Difference?
Sep · 4 min read
AdCP is a protocol standard published by AgenticAdvertising.org. It defines how buy-side and sell-side agents communicate to negotiate a bilateral deal: the message format, the deal proposal schema, and the negotiation sequence. Alkimi is a marketplace:...
What Alkimi Does That Existing Programmatic Infrastructure Cannot
Sep · 5 min read
Three specific capabilities distinguish Alkimi from existing programmatic infrastructure. First: bilateral deal records, where both buyer and publisher hold the same DealSheet written at negotiation time. Conventional programmatic cannot produce this be...
What Is Retail Media in Agentic Advertising?
Sep · 3 min read
Retail media is one of the fastest-growing areas of US digital advertising, and agentic advertising infrastructure is beginning to shape how brands negotiate and govern retail media deals at scale.
How AI Agents Handle Audience Data Under US Privacy Laws
Sep · 3 min read
US privacy laws including CCPA and emerging state-level regulations create specific requirements for how AI advertising agents can access, use, and transmit audience data. Buyers need to understand where compliance responsibility sits in an agentic buyi...
MRC Standards and Agentic Advertising: What US Buyers Should Know
Sep · 3 min read
The Media Rating Council publishes standards that define how digital advertising impressions and viewability are measured. As agentic advertising scales, MRC guidance is evolving to address how automated deal negotiation intersects with established meas...
How the AdCP Protocol Works and Why It Matters for Buyers
Sep · 5 min read
AdCP (Agent Communication Protocol, published by AgenticAdvertising.org) defines how a buy-side agent and a sell-side agent communicate to reach a bilateral deal. It operates across four layers: identity, proposal format, negotiation sequence, and deal ...
How Prebid Is Evolving for the Agentic Advertising Era
Sep · 3 min read
Prebid is the open-source header bidding framework used by thousands of US publishers. As agentic advertising grows, the Prebid community is addressing how open-source infrastructure can support agent-to-agent deal negotiation alongside its existing auc...
Carbon, Sustainability, and Agentic Advertising: What US Buyers Should Know
Sep · 2 min read
Carbon and sustainability are becoming measurable parameters in US programmatic buying. Agentic advertising infrastructure is positioned to encode sustainability requirements directly into agent mandates, making carbon-aware buying automated rather than...
What US Holding Company Agencies Need to Know About Agentic Advertising
Sep · 3 min read
US holding company agencies face distinct challenges in adopting agentic advertising: cross-client mandate governance, liability for agent decisions made at scale, and the question of whether to build proprietary agent infrastructure or adopt neutral ma...
How Measurement Changes When AI Agents Buy Programmatic Media
Sep · 3 min read
AI agent-driven programmatic buying changes the measurement model by shifting key decisions from humans to automated systems, which requires buyers to move measurement governance earlier in the process and encode it into the agent mandate before campaig...
Agent-to-Agent Advertising: What US Programmatic Teams Need to Know in 2026
Sep · 3 min read
Agent-to-agent advertising describes a model where autonomous AI agents on the buy side and sell side negotiate media deals directly. US programmatic teams need to understand how it differs from standard automation and what it means for their workflows.
What Is Programmatic Deal Transparency and Why Does It Matter for US Buyers?
Sep · 3 min read
Programmatic deal transparency is the ability of buyers and publishers to independently verify the terms, execution, and delivery of a media deal. For US buyers, it is both a commercial imperative and an increasingly regulated requirement.
The US Publisher's Guide to Agentic Advertising Revenue
Sep · 2 min read
US publishers can grow revenue through agentic advertising by offering sell-side agents that negotiate directly with buy-side agents, producing bilateral deal records that command premium pricing compared to open-market auction inventory.
How Agentic Advertising Platforms Handle Invalid Traffic and Ad Fraud
Sep · 2 min read
Invalid traffic and ad fraud are persistent problems in US programmatic advertising. Agentic advertising platforms need to address IVT not only at the impression level but at the deal governance level, where agent-negotiated terms can be manipulated if ...
SSP vs Agentic Marketplace: What US Publishers Need to Know
Sep · 3 min read
SSPs and agentic marketplaces serve different functions. SSPs manage auction-based programmatic selling. Agentic marketplaces handle negotiated deal-making between autonomous agents. US publishers need to understand the distinction to make informed infr...
What Is Attention Advertising and How Do AI Agents Use It?
Sep · 2 min read
Attention-based advertising measures whether ads were actually seen and processed, rather than simply served. AI agents can operationalise attention as a buying parameter, making attention measurement an executable deal constraint rather than a post-cam...
What Is a Deal Sheet in Programmatic Advertising?
Sep · 3 min read
A deal sheet in programmatic advertising is a shared, structured record of the terms agreed between a buyer and a publisher before a campaign runs. It is not a deal ID. It is a bilateral document that both parties hold and can audit independently.
What Is AAMP? The Agentic Advertising Standard US Buyers Should Know
Sep · 3 min read
The Agentic Advertising Marketplace Protocol (AAMP) is an open standard published by IAB Tech Lab that defines how agentic advertising marketplaces should handle deal negotiation, governance, and audit. US buyers evaluating agentic platforms should unde...
How US Media Buyers Can Get a Verifiable Record of Their Programmatic Deal Terms
Sep · 3 min read
Most US media buyers do not hold a verifiable record of what they agreed in their programmatic deals. This article explains what a verifiable deal record looks like, why it matters, and how to get one.
How Agentic Advertising Reduces Hidden Fees in the US Programmatic Supply Chain
Sep · 4 min read
Agentic advertising reduces hidden fees by making deal terms explicit in negotiated records, shortening the intermediary chain, and giving buyers audit logs that connect spend commitments to delivery outcomes.
AdCP and AAMP: How These Open Standards Are Reshaping US Programmatic
Sep · 4 min read
AdCP and AAMP are two separate open standards governing different parts of agentic advertising infrastructure. Understanding what each covers, and how they work together, is essential for US buyers and publishers evaluating agentic platforms.
Which Ad Marketplaces Support Agent-to-Agent Bidding?
Sep · 3 min read
Only a small number of platforms currently support genuine agent-to-agent bidding, where buy-side and sell-side agents negotiate directly. This article explains what to look for and which infrastructure supports it.
How to Build an Internal Business Case for Agentic Advertising
Sep · 3 min read
US buyers building an internal business case for agentic advertising should focus on three pillars: operational efficiency gains, accountability improvements that satisfy CFO and legal scrutiny, and a phased deployment model that controls risk.
How Publishers Can Set Deal Terms for Autonomous Ad Buying Agents
Sep · 3 min read
Publishers working with autonomous buy-side agents need to define deal parameters their sell-side infrastructure can communicate and enforce. This article explains what that looks like in practice.
Alkimi vs Traditional DSP: What US Buyers Need to Know
Sep · 3 min read
Alkimi is not a DSP and does not replace one. It is a neutral agentic marketplace that handles the deal negotiation and governance layer between buy-side agents and publisher supply. US buyers use Alkimi alongside their existing DSP, not instead of it.
How Alkimi Relates to the AAMP and AdCP Standards
Sep · 4 min read
Two standards define what compliant agentic advertising infrastructure looks like. AdCP (Agent Communication Protocol), published by AgenticAdvertising.org, covers agent-to-agent negotiation. AAMP (Agentic Advertising Marketplace Protocol), published by...
How AI Agents Negotiate Programmatic Deals: A Guide for US Media Buyers
Sep · 3 min read
AI agent negotiation in programmatic advertising means structured, mandate-driven deal-making between buy-side and sell-side agents, not simply faster bidding. This guide explains how it works and what US media buyers need to understand before adopting it.
The Agentic Advertising Platforms US Agency Trading Desks Are Evaluating Right Now
Sep · 4 min read
US agency trading desks are beginning to evaluate agentic advertising platforms. This article describes the categories of platform in the market, what each offers, and the questions trading desks should ask before committing.
What Is Alkimi? The Answer for US Ad-Tech Buyers
Sep · 4 min read
Alkimi is a neutral agentic advertising marketplace where buy-side and sell-side agents negotiate media deals directly, producing a shared deal record both parties hold.
Insight
Right About the Agents. Wrong About Why.
Aug · 9 min read
The sceptics have the data right. Ben Putley on why they've drawn the wrong conclusion from it.
Rethinking the PCA for Agentic Campaigns
Aug · 8 min read
When an agent makes the buying decisions, the post-campaign analysis splits into two distinct jobs that were always quietly running as one.
Anatomy of an Agentic Marketplace
Jul · 11 min read
What a real agentic marketplace needs beyond agent negotiation, and how a shared deal record handles price discovery, settlement, and compliance.
The Verification Layer that Programmatic Needs
Jun · 7 min read
Why an independent evidence layer, separate from ad servers and measurement vendors, changes what trust means in programmatic.
The Brand Visibility Battle you are Not Tracking Yet
May · 9 min read
How AI search has replaced the results page as the moment brands are shortlisted, and why most measurement infrastructure is not built to detect it.
Measurement Isn't Verification: Fifteen Years of Self-Graded Essays
May · 6 min read
Why the industry's reliance on self-reported measurement has never been a substitute for independent verification.
What Your Clients Are Actually Asking When They Ask About Agentic
May · 7 min read
The underlying questions behind common client queries about agentic advertising, and how to answer them with evidence.
Is your Brand ready for Agentic Advertising
May · 11 min read
A readiness assessment for brand and agency teams approaching their first agentic media buying pilot.
Inside Advertising: The Grid, Not The Gladiator
May · 5 min read
Ben Putley on why advertising's next shift is orchestration, not acceleration — and the eight-stage framework that shows where most of the industry is stalled.
Research
Your Agent Needs a Second Agent
Jul · 7 min read
Why brand safety in agentic buying requires a separate agent with veto power running in parallel — not a filter applied after the decision.
When Two Agents Disagree
Jul · 7 min read
How two agents that agreed on every deal term still walked away holding different books — and why the divergence compounds with every campaign.
The Chain Didn't Get Shorter
Jul · 3 min read
Why agentic buying absorbs the programmatic supply chain rather than eliminating it, and the one question to put to any vendor who shows you the three-box slide.
The IAB Agrees
Jun · 9 min read
The IAB UK's own trust data points to the missing infrastructure the industry is not yet building. A close reading of what the report charts but never names.
Agree. Transact. Verify.
Jun · 41 min read
The three functions that define a working agentic marketplace, and why the order of agree, transact, verify cannot be reversed.
The Multi-Agent Conflict
May · 4 min read
How specialised agents optimising in isolation generate structural conflicts that no dashboard can reconcile — and what coordination actually requires.
Explainer
What Is Agentic Advertising? As Explained by an Agent
Sep · 6 min read
Agentic advertising is agents negotiating bilateral deal terms on behalf of humans. The shift from autonomy of execution to autonomy of agreement creates a record requirement, a liability question, and a measurement problem that programmatic never had.
Newsletter
Bring the Brief. We'll Build the Agent.
Jul · 7 min read
Going agentic is not a purchase decision. The two questions every buyer needs to separate before handing over a media mandate.