DV360 supports a wide range of audience types, including first-party audiences from website, app, CRM, or YouTube data; Google Audiences based on intent signals; Combined Audiences built from first-, third-party, and Google lists; as well as tag-based, demographic, geographic, and contextual targeting options.

DV360’s automated bid strategies optimize each impression based on its likelihood to drive a desired outcome – such as a click, conversion, or view – while considering inventory availability and cost. The system uses real-time signals, including audience data, inventory context, and historical performance, to adjust bids dynamically.

Audience personas in DV360 help translate customer descriptions into actionable targeting. By entering key traits – such as demographics, lifestyle, or interests – Google AI suggests relevant audience lists and demographic segments for your line item. This simplifies audience setup and supports reach into the most relevant user groups without manual selection.

DV360 is organized around five modules – Campaigns, Audiences, Creatives, Inventory, and Insights – enabling media, creative, analytics, and digital teams to collaborate in a single environment. This unified workspace means teams can plan campaigns, manage creatives, organize and build audiences, transact inventory, and monitor results together, reducing manual handoffs and improving transparency.

DV360 provides granular user role management, so advertisers can add users with different access levels (Admin, Standard, Read-only, Reporting only, Planner), either at the partner or advertiser level. Admins can manage user invites and permissions, ensuring each team member has access only to what they need. This fosters safe and organized multi-user collaboration on the same campaigns, reports, and resources.

DV360 supports the integration of audience lists from Google Analytics, external data management platforms, PAIR data clean rooms, and customer match partners. Once linked, external partners can push audience segments directly into DV360. These integrations allow advertisers to activate audiences from CRM data, modeled attributes, or privacy-safe clean room environments.

DV360’s Marketplace allows advertisers to discover and activate premium inventory from top publishers in one centralized interface. Advanced search matches keywords with audience segments, content categories, and domains, while filters help refine results by targeting needs. Advertisers can review inventory details, assign packages to campaigns, or submit RFPs directly – streamlining deal discovery and activation across display, video, and CTV.

DV360 advertisers can instantly reserve premium YouTube inventory at a fixed CPM using Instant Deals – no negotiation required. Formats include in-stream, Shorts, Pause ads, and YouTube TV. Deals are configured in Marketplace, with real-time quotes confirming availability and pricing. Once accepted, campaigns are set up automatically. Ads must meet eligibility requirements and use public or unlisted YouTube videos.

Packages are non-guaranteed inventory bundles curated by sellers and available in DV360’s Marketplace. They include display, video, CTV, audio, and out-of-home inventory, and can be filtered by media type or audience attributes. DV360 also features curated CTV bundles and highlights packages from underrepresented publisher groups. Packages require enabled exchanges and are not supported by the troubleshooting tool.

Reach reports in DV360 provide detailed insights into how many unique users saw, viewed, or clicked ads – across devices and formats. These reports support both standard and co-viewed reach metrics, enabling analysis of exposure frequency, demographic composition, and incremental reach over time. Metrics include total and viewable reach, average frequency, and unique user actions across impressions, views, and clicks. Incremental reach metrics help quantify new audience exposure within each time period. Co-viewed metrics account for shared viewing on connected TV devices.

These reports provide advertisers with insights into the quality and visibility of their ad impressions, helping ensure ads are seen by real people in brand-safe environments. DV360 uses Google's Active View technology to measure the viewability of ads, which tracks whether an ad was in view for a minimum duration and percentage of pixels. Advertisers can also define custom viewability metrics, adjusting thresholds for pixel visibility, view duration, audible requirements, and video quartiles. Verification reports provide insights into brand safety, fraud detection, and context suitability of inventory where ads ran.

In DV360, performance & pacing widgets are key dashboard elements designed to provide monitoring and visual insights into how campaigns are performing and spending. Performance widgets display key metrics such as impressions, viewable impressions, clicks, CTR, conversions, and other custom KPIs relevant to the set campaign goals. Pacing widgets track budget spend over time relative to planned budgets and campaign duration. Some widgets highlight how campaigns are pacing toward specific goals. Graphs and trend lines visualize performance and spend across the campaign period.

Creative optimization in DV360 controls how the platform selects among multiple creatives within a line item before bidding when using multiple video creatives, same-size display creatives, or data-driven creatives with variants. For display, optimization can focus on even rotation, clicks, or conversions. For video, it can follow the line item’s bidding strategy, prioritize completions, or favor creatives likely to stay on screen longer. Settings can be updated anytime and help improve performance.

The Format Gallery in DV360 helps advertisers explore available creative formats with visual previews and detailed specifications. It’s designed for teams looking to evaluate options or discover new formats for upcoming campaigns. Formats can be filtered by type, such as video or display, and example creatives explored across different brand verticals. Each format includes animated previews, technical specs, and available templates. Once a format is selected, brands can begin building a creative directly.

If a creative is rejected or restricted by policy, DV360 allows advertisers to submit an appeal directly within the platform. Advertisers can either resubmit the creative for approval after making changes or dispute the policy decision if they believe it was applied in error. Resubmissions are used when issues – such as landing page errors or missing certifications – have been resolved. Disputes are for challenging policy decisions directly. Appeal results can be tracked under Appeal History in the Creative section.