Real-time data integration method

Integration Partners
Last Updated: April 30, 2026•

The Real-Time Data integration method enables partners to apply real-time enrichment decisions during auction processing. This integration method allows partners to analyze an incoming OpenRTBClosed An open industry standard for communication between buyers and sellers of online advertising in real-time bidding auctions. It's published by the IAB. request and response and return enrichment signals that influence how the auction is evaluated. These enrichment decisions may be applied at different stages of an OpenRTB auction, such as at the Media Owner slot level or during DSPClosed Demand-Side Platform (DSP). A software platform that automates bidding decisions in real-time and efficiently connects buyers and audiences through an ad exchange or SSP. Also known as a buy-side platform. bid responseClosed An OpenRTB response that is sent by the DSP in response to the SSP's or ad exchange's bid request. It is an event directed back to the seller expressing a valuation for the request and conditions of sale. processing.

Depending on the implementation model and supported capabilities, partners may provide enrichment such as:

  • User-level signals (for example, audience segments or cohorts)

  • Impression-level decisions (for example, activating or suppressing eligible deals)

  • Content-level metadata (for example, contextual attributes) (coming soon)

  • Bid-level modifications (for example, bid shading or price adjustments)

These services can be hosted by the partner or deployed in the Index Cloud.

How does it work?

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A user visits a media owner's site, triggering an OpenRTB ad request that is sent to Index.

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Based on implementation guidelines, Index sendsOpenRTB structured requests to the API endpoints exposed by your container.

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Your API returns a structured response specifying decisions related to segment and dealClosed A private auction that allows media owners to offer specific inventory directly to selected buyers identified by a deal ID. Terms are negotiated and are agreed upon before the auction occurs. activations, as well as pricing and scoring adjustments. The response format depends on the integration model (JSON for HTTP integrations, structured mutations for gRPC integrations).

Based on your API's response, activations and adjustment decisions are applied based on the model output.

The optimized request is forwarded to DSPs for bidding.

DSPs send bid responses back to Index

The winning impression is served in the ad slotClosed The location on a publisher's website where an advertisement is served. Also known as inventory..

Integration implementation options

The real-time data integration supports the following transport implementations:

Functionality comparison of gRPC and HTTP

RTD conceptHTTP integrationgRPC integration

Signal enrichment

segment_ids[]

ACTIVATE_SEGMENTS

Deal eligibility

❌

ACTIVATE_DEALS SUPPRESS_DEALS

Content metadata

❌

ADD_CONTENT_DATA

Bid price modification

❌

BID_SHADE

Deal floorClosed A pricing control used by media owners and exchanges to set a minimum sale price on inventory. modification

❌

ADJUST_DEAL_FLOOR

Encoding

JSON

Protobuf

Errors

HTTP status codes

gRPC status