Supply path tests
What remnant display actually delivered when we bought it: placements, domains, SSPs, ads.txt, and the excludes that work.
ads.txt did not save this buy
99.85 percent of observed Supply Bench spend was already ads.txt authorized. Unauthorized was $0.48. ads.txt did not remove the waste we actually found.
Authorized inventory can still be junk
ads.txt authorization answers who may sell a domain. It does not answer whether the traffic is usable. 99.85 percent of this buy was already authorized.
Bid down a bad placement instead of killing it
Bid modifiers can scale a bid, for example multiplier 0.3, on placement, site, or inventory_source. That path is seat-verified and not productized.
Deals vs open exchange on a small daily budget
This child seat has historically had zero deals. We will not invent a private-marketplace result. This page is the test we still owe.
Delivery modifiers as budget weights
Delivery modifier terms are targeting, rank, and weight, plus a required fallback_weight. This seat has had zero delivery modifier objects.
Domain waste after we filter exchanges
Exchange excludes do not remove domain waste. Domain findings still need seat-level reference list objects. That is an honest product limit, not a custom_list myth.
Most placements we bought did nothing
On the 2026-09-02 Supply Bench pull, 93.4 percent of placements had zero clicks and still took 64 percent of observed spend.
msn.com showed up twice
msn.com ran about 3.7 percent CTR on the July 2026 learning flight and 5.35 percent on Supply Bench. The host repeated. The creative did not have to.
Open exchange waste, mapped by grain
There is no Beeswax object named supply route. Waste shows up in reports by placement, site, domain, and exchange, and only some of those grains can be excluded today.
Placement vs site vs domain: which exclude actually works
Placement and site are direct targeting keys. Domain and app_bundle need seat-level reference lists. The old custom_list sentence blocked 59 percent of findable waste.
QPS is not targeting
Front-end QPS filters decide which auctions enter the bidder and consume contracted QPS. Line-item targeting decides which already-received requests may bid.
Reseller paths clicked 2.3x more than direct
Authorized-Reseller CTR was 0.423 percent against Authorized-Direct at 0.184 percent on the same Supply Bench creative. That is an arbitrage signature, not a quality win.
Same creative, 28x CTR spread by SSP
OPENX ran 0.111 percent CTR on 44 percent of spend. SMARTADSERVER ran 3.074 percent. THIRTY_THREE_ACROSS ran 18.18 percent. The creative and format did not change.
Scan then exclude, because you cannot pick the list first
1,073 zero-click placements cannot be known before a flight. The working order is deliver, read grain, then exclude at a key the seat can compile.
Seven domains produced two fifths of the clicks
Seven domains produced 41.3 percent of Supply Bench clicks from 4.7 percent of impressions. That is a concentration finding, not a certified IVT verdict.
Web-only still bought browser games
environments=['web'] held. app_agg rows were 0. The flight still bought worldofsolitaire.com, wheelofnames.com, and tftcomps.gg.
What we mean by a supply path
There is no Beeswax object named supply route. A path is targeting plus lists plus deals plus modifiers plus reports, read back after delivery.
Why an empty allowlist serves nothing
inventory_source is an allowlist. An empty list compiles to an expression that matches no inventory. The apply path returns 409 rather than shipping a campaign that cannot serve.