Direct Sales Channel Defined in Digital Advertising Context
· 2h ago · Originally reported by PPC Land
A direct sales channel refers to when a media owner's in-house sales team sells advertising inventory directly to advertisers or agencies, bypassing auctions and third-party resellers. This approach contrasts with programmatic or indirect sales methods.
Why it matters
Understanding direct sales channels helps clarify how digital ad inventory is bought and sold, which affects pricing, transparency, and relationships between publishers and advertisers.
Explain it like I’m new here
It's like a store selling its products straight to customers instead of using a middleman.
Terms in this story
Direct-sold advertising
Direct-sold advertising is ad space sold by a publisher straight to an advertiser or agency through a negotiated deal, usually with a fixed price and guaranteed volume.
Publisher
A publisher is any owner of content or a digital property, such as a website, app, streaming service, podcast or screen network, that earns money by selling ad space to advertisers.
Ad inventory
Ad inventory is the total amount of advertising space a publisher has available to sell, usually counted in impressions across its ad slots, pages, apps or screens.
Advertiser
An advertiser is the company, organisation or person that pays to place ads in order to sell products, build a brand, recruit, or spread a message.
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