Setting up an AVOD service with ads

Setting up a DAI Service for AVOD is a straightforward 3-step process.

The following playbook is an example based upon the web app but it can be done identically through the API.

Before you start, do not forget to go through the preparation checklist: it will help you speed up the creation of your Service and test your AVOD use case more efficiently.

Creating your Asset Catalog source

Within the broadpeak.io environment, a VoD library can be defined as an Asset Catalog source. This source is basically defining the URL of your VoD asset catalogue on your origin. Note that you can have different asset formats (e.g. DASH and HLS) in your VoD catalog.

1. Go to the Source label on the left-hand side of the web app.
2. Click Create new at the top right.
3. Select Asset Catalog type in the drop-down menu.
4. Fill up the required fields.

The following snapshot shows an example:

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Note

An asset sample is required as it is the way broadpeak.io can verify it can retrieve manifests for at least one asset on your origin. You can also use this item in the Service Preview page to verify the AVOD workflow on at least one asset (only if it is in the clear, i.e. without DRM, otherwise the embedded demo player will not be able to decrypt your stream).

Creating your Ad Server source

The ad server is the third party service with which broadpeak.io is going to communicate to request ad decisioning and to get responses whenever a targeted ad opportunity can be leveraged (pre-roll, mid-roll or post-roll). The backend API is using the IAB VMAP protocol in this case. All ad pods definition are being returned in the same VMAP response.

1. Go to the Source label on the left-hand side of the web app.
2. Click Create new at the top right.
3. Select the Ad Server type in the drop-down menu.
4. Fill up the required fields.

The following snapshot shows example:

Note that the Ad Server queries are optional. However, they are almost always required to customize the requests broadpeak.io is going to forward to the Ad Server using query parameters extracted from the end user client request.

For more information about how to use some specific values from the system or from the CDN/Client request, please visit the following page

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Ad Server Timeout

If the status of your Ad Server is in timeout, you may want to check that the Ad Server that you use has whitelisted the broadpeak.io IP addresses (see section)

Creating your AVOD DAI Service

The DAI service is the base play URL which will be created by broadpeak.io and that the end-user clients can use to access your VoD catalogue. The client will add several parameters at the end of the URL to play an actual asset (possibly asset sub directory, asset name, and query parameter)

The first step is to click on "Create a Service" button in the top left part of the Webapp. You then need to select "Ad Insertion" in the service type drop down menu, specify a unique name for your Service, and select the Content source which you've just defined at the beginning of this playbook (pick the Asset Catalogue name in the drop down menu).

The second step is to configure the way the DAI Service operates, by choosing:

• what Ad Server to use
• optionally, what transcoding profiles to use for the ads

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Transcoding Profiles

The selection of an optional transcoding profile is very often related to the way your Ad Inventory is being monetized by the SSP. Typically Direct Sales will use already prepared ad creatives (so no need to specify a profile), whereas Programmatic format will be unknown as it is based upon real time decisioning (in which case transcoding is recommended)

If you need to use ad creative transcoding, please reach out to Customer Success team through the chatbot or by email ([email protected]), and the team will help you to create a suitable profile. Don't worry, this step will soon be removed so that you can create your own profile templates in a self-serve way. Note that transcoding profiles also include packaging parameters and can generate both DASH and HLS formats.

Last step is to review your configuration before creating the DAI AVOD Service

As soon as you click on Run, your Service is created and a "Well Done" pop up window appears such as the one below:

Checking your AVOD with the Preview

Now that your Service is created, you have the possibility to check that it is streaming, directly into the Webapp.

To do so, you simply need to go to the right hand side of the Service output URL and to click on the eye icon, in the Actions column.

The embedded player will automatically play the sample asset you have specified in the definition of the Asset Catalog. If none was specified, all you need to do is to point to a specific asset by entering its relative path, asset name and optionally query parameter in the Input source URL field.

In any case, the embedded player will play the asset through the DAI AVoD Service. So you should see targeted ads being played (depending upon query parameters entered above). Pick an asset which is not protected by DRM, as this embedded player won't be able to decrypt it.

The example below is showing a pre-roll ad playing before the sample asset and fetched for the 'teenager' ad targeting segment:

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Behaviour with new ads

If you have specified a Transcoding profile (Programmatic mode), and if you do not see any ads on the very first play attempt: this is normal. The very first request is going to trigger the offline ad creative transcoding. Depending on the duration of that creative, the ad will be available soon after for subsequent requests.