UserDB

Overview

User-level targeting refers to targeting that knows information about the particular individual seeing the ad. This data is tied to a persistent ID called the UserKey, which is passed in the key value of the user object of the Decision API request. This information is stored in Kevel's UserDB in JSON format.

The main uses cases of user-level targeting are:

• Interest / Behavioral Targeting
• Excluding Ads Based on Behavior
• Demographic / Custom Properties Targeting
• Retargeting / Segment Targeting

Passing the UserKey

For user-level targeting to work, you'll need to send the same persistent UserKey ID as the key value in the user object in the Decision API request every time the user sees an ad.

Kevel will cross-reference this UserKey with UserDB and see if there's a record associated with the User. If there is a match, this information will be used by the Ad Decision Engine to pick the right ad, based on what type of user-level targeting you have set up.

An example Decision Request with a Userkey (key) included is:

JSON

{
  "placements": [
    {
      "divName": "homepage",
      "networkId": 23,
      "siteId": 667480,
      "adTypes": [5],
      "eventIds": [12,13,14]
    }
  ],
  "user" : {
    "key": "ad39231daeb043f2a9610414f08394b5"
  }
}

UserDB Logs and Properties

Logs of your account's UserDB endpoint activity can be made available via data shipping. In addition to UserDB endpoints, userKeys and payloads, the logs can contain arbitrary properties set on the endpoints. These are key/value pairs that you can use to track metadata about the request (like a version number, for instance) that will persist after the request is complete. All UserDB endpoints support properties.

For example, if you wanted to track a version number and a nickname when a userKey is loaded via the azk cookie, you would append those via two property: query parameters:

HTTP

https://e-1234.adzerk.net/udb/1234/set/i.gif?userKey=abc123&property:version=1&property:nickname=George

The resulting logs will include those properties:

JSON

{
  "Meta:schema": "userdb",
  "Meta:version": "1.0",
  "NetworkId": 1234,
  "Timestamp": 1539104456290,
  "Action": "cookie",
  "UserKey": "abc123",
  "Properties": {
    "version": "1",
    "nickname": "George"
  }
}