Reducing dependence on a single partner Lately, I can't shake the feeling that we are too dependent on one large advertising network. On paper, everything looks convenient: one contract, one control panel, stable payments. But as soon as they change their policy or tweak their algorithm, our revenue graph goes crazy, and there's practically nothing we can do about it. I'm starting to wonder if it makes sense to create our own mini-ecosystem with several partners, perhaps even something closer to our own technology. Have any of you already gone down this path?
We had almost the same situation a year ago. One partner was giving us 80–85% of revenue, which felt great until they shifted their pricing model and suddenly all our forecasts fell apart. That pushed us to look beyond “just plug into the biggest network” and think more about what the best supply-side platforms look like for our specific case. We ended up exploring custom and semi-custom options and talked to teams like https://geomotiv.com/industries/adtech/ssp/, who focus on building supply-side stacks you can actually control and extend. It’s more work than just signing up with another network, but having your own rules, reporting and partner mix gives a lot more confidence when someone decides to change terms overnight.
From my perspective, a lot of digital projects hit the same fork in the road: stay on a single convenient provider and keep operations very simple, or accept extra complexity in exchange for more stability and flexibility. Some companies are totally fine trading control for peace of mind, while others slowly build out their own tools, contracts and processes so they’re less dependent on any single player. Neither approach is automatically right or wrong; it mostly comes down to your risk tolerance, how predictable your cashflow needs to be, and whether you’re ready to invest time into setting up alternatives before they become a necessity.