Troubleshoot your deals and line items

Overview

The Troubleshooter is a powerful, easy-to-use tool for analyzing problems with private auctions, guaranteed deals, non-guaranteed fixed deals, and open auction line items. With the Troubleshooter, you can:

See at a glance why a deal is not spending.
Troubleshoot deals from any exchange that has deals integrated with Display & Video 360.
Use a filter to troubleshoot specific deals if the line item is targeting multiple deals.
See specific reasons and quantifications for why impression availability was lost, at three separate levels.
See why a line item is not winning available inventory.

Data is available within one hour for Total available requests, Impressions won, and Win rate. More detailed data (e.g. Targeting, Creatives, etc.) may take longer to become available.
Native creatives tend to be aspect ratio-based (instead of creative dimension-based) and therefore are not supported by the Troubleshooter.

Using the Troubleshooter

Navigate to a line Item.
In the top menu, click the Troubleshooter tab.
You’ll see the following displays: (data is shown in the advertiser’s timezone)
1. Inventory dropdown: Either select All inventory to see results across all targeted inventory sources or a specific deal, by name, that this line item is targeting. All inventory will be selected by default.
  
  When viewing Troubleshooter for a specific deal, data for incoming bid requests can be seen by clicking Total available requests below the chart.
2. Date range dropdown (Last 7 days selected by default)
  - Current day: Troubleshooting issues that surfaced on the same day
  - Previous day: Troubleshooting the past day’s delivery (likely in combination with the Current Day view)
  - Last 7 days: Troubleshooting the delivery over the past week
  - Last 14 days: Troubleshooting the delivery over the past 2 weeks
3. Total available requests: The total number of available requests
4. Bid responses: The total number of bid responses
5. Impressions won: The total number of impressions won
6. Win rate: The % of impressions won when a bid response occurred

Total available requests

The number of impressions matching the inventory sources selected in the Inventory dropdown.

Filtered impressions

The number of impressions that were not bought for one of the following reasons:

Prebid

Targeting

The number of impressions not bought due to targeting criteria for this line item that did not match the bid requests or requests being rejected for technical reasons.

Click to analyze the incoming potential impressions, including ones not matching targeting or being rejected for technical reasons, across the following dimensions:

Note that this data is not available for the "Current day" date range option.

Targeting setting	Description
A/B or brand lift experiments	Impressions were filtered because there is an A/B or brand lift experiment running that is discarding 30% to 50% of traffic with cookies.
Ad position	Impressions that did not match the ad positions used in the line item's targeting.
Apps and URLs	Impressions that did not match the apps and URLs (websites) being used in the line item's targeting.
Audience list	Impressions that did not match the audience lists used in the line item's targeting.
Authorized Seller state	Impressions were filtered because the advertiser excludes inventory that does not have an ads.txt file.
Brand safety	Impressions that did not match one or more brand safety (including sensitive category blocks and third-party brand safety targeting) tiers used in the line item's targeting.
Browser	Impressions that did not match the web browsers being used in the line item's targeting.
Carrier and ISP	Impressions that did not match the wireless carrier or Internet service provider used in the line item's targeting.
Categories	Impressions that did not match the categories used in the line item's targeting.
Connection speed	Impressions that did not match the Internet connection speed (tier) used in the line item's targeting.
Day and time	Impressions that did not match the days or times being used in the line item's targeting.
Demographics	Impressions that did not match the demographic targeting options used in the line item.
Device	Impressions that did not match the device types used in the line item's targeting.
Environment	Impressions that did not match the environments being used in the line item's targeting.
Geography	Impressions that did not match the geographic locations being used in the line item's targeting.
Inventory source	Impressions that did not match the inventory sources used in the line item's targeting.
Keywords	Impressions that did not match the keywords used in the line item's targeting. Note: When no keywords are used in a line item’s targeting but a custom audience list with sensitive keywords is in place, the sensitive keywords are used for contextual targeting, not collecting audience users. As such, the UI will show the keywords filter even without keyword targeting.
Language	Impressions that did not match the languages being used in the line item's targeting.
User-rewarded content	Impressions were filtered because the advertiser is excluding inventory that is not eligible for user-rewarded content.
Video targeting	Impressions that did not match the video player sizes being used in the line item's targeting.
Viewability	Impressions that did not match the predicted viewability tiers used in the line item's targeting.

Things to consider

Default reservation line items lack targeting functionality and therefore will never show targeting rejections.
Recently activated line items (e.g. line items activated the day before) will not show data.
Line items with parent insertion orders that have no budget segment set will not show data.
Line items that did not have more than 200k valid queries within the last 7 days will not show data.
Line items with parent insertion orders that was paused within the last 7 days will not show data.

Creative(s)

The number of impressions not bought due to an issue with creatives assigned to this line item. Click the link to see each creative assigned to the line item and information you can use to identify any creative rejection reasons that are limiting delivery. Learn about best practices for getting creatives approved

Creative rejection reasons
Click-through URL not allowed by publisher
Creative content is in a category restricted by publisher
Creative dimensions don't match inventory
Creative doesn't match brand safety requirements
Creative format doesn't match inventory
Creative isn't approved by exchange
Creative isn't approved for secure (SSL) inventory
Creative requires companion slot, but doesn't match
Creative type doesn't match inventory type
Creatives with unidentified third party vendors aren't allowed (to serve in a given region)
Direction of expandable creative doesn't match inventory
Landing page is blacklisted by publisher
Language of creative doesn't match inventory
No creatives in the ad group meet the creative restrictions
Product category of creative is blocked by exchange
Publisher doesn't accept creative assets of this type (e.g. most commonly Flash)
Skippability of video doesn't match inventory requirements
Skippable video ads are not allowed
The ad slot requires a skippable video ad
The ad is filtered because the creative is not classified
The ad is filtered because the creative is not classified for the sensitive category
The content rating does not meet the requirements set by the publisher
The user has not agreed to share their cookies with one of the creatives As of May 25, 2018, creatives may be impacted by the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Third-party creatives are not allowed - If you're using third-party ad servers to serve creatives or pixels, your line item will only be able to purchase personalized ad inventory. For more information on this restriction, see non-personalized ad inventory. The user has not agreed to share their data with one of the creative's third-party domains - This may be related to inventory not allowing all of the ad technology providers in your creative. Learn more about troubleshooting the GDPR's impact on creatives
The creative could not be served due to local policies
The creative is classified with a sensitive category that is blocked by the request
The creative type is not allowed
The landing page is blocked by the publisher
Third-party creatives are not allowed
Too many VAST wrappers
Uses a 4th party URL not allowed by publisher
VAST bitrates are above the inventory’s allowable maximum of 30,000 Kbps
VAST bitrates are below the inventory’s allowable minimum of 10,000 Kbps
Video format doesn't match inventory
Video has playback errors
Video is too long

Eligible impressions

The number of impressions that were not filtered impressions

Filtered eligible impressions

The number of impressions that met the targeting criteria and had eligible creatives, but bids on these impressions exceeded one of three limits:

Frequency - Frequency cap(s) set at the campaign, insertion order, or line item levels. Click Frequency to see which level the impressions were filtered from, which level the rejections were coming from, as well as rejections due to not having cookies set in the inventory. Learn more about how to set frequency caps
Budget - Budget limit(s) set at either the insertion order or line item levels. Learn more about how to set budgets
Pacing - Pacing limit(s) set at either the insertion order or line item levels. Learn more about pacing

Bids submitted

The number of eligible bids that were submitted into the auction (internal)

Filtered by the auction

The number of impressions that met targeting criteria, had eligible creatives, and were not blocked due to any frequency, budget, or pacing settings, but were not bought for one of the following reasons:

Below the minimum bid - Due to a bid below the floor of the deal or the exchange/publisher floor when in open auction.
Auction lost (internal) - Due to another Display & Video 360 campaign outbidding the one in question

Bid responses

Filtered bid responses

Number of impressions that met targeting criteria, had eligible creatives, and were not blocked due to any frequency, budget, or pacing settings, but were not bought for one of the following reasons:

Auction lost (external) - Due to another bidder outbidding Display & Video 360. To help optimize your bids, you can use automated bid strategies. Learn more about Automated bid strategies.
Ad did not render - Due to the user navigating away from the webpage before the ad was rendered. You may also get this response if you prefetch your ads. To help ensure your ads render correctly, review your landing page and follow best practices. Learn more about how to Review your landing page.

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