Observed Signal · Jun 30, 2026 · Partnership · Source: AdExchanger · Impact: 2/5 · Sentiment: Positive
Nonprofit Uses First‑Party Data for Year‑Round Donor Targeting
Direct Relief partnered with agency Kindling Media and programmatic platform Nexxen to run a donor-acquisition and retention campaign in the Los Angeles market from mid-November 2025 through January. Nexxen built custom audiences by matching Direct Relief’s zip-code donation data to its Nexxen Discovery ID graph and combined that with third-party segments from TransUnion and Comscore. The campaign emphasized CTV (notably Peacock), used a Jane Lynch PSA, and applied cross-channel pixels to retarget ad-exposed viewers. Nexxen-driven audience segments produced 1,453 site visitors versus 1,236 from off-the-shelf third-party audiences. Direct Relief reported a 9.4% increase in donors and a 7.9% increase in revenue year-over-year. The case demonstrates how matched first-party data and a DSP ID graph can boost year-round fundraising beyond news-driven spikes in public attention.
Practical case study showing first-party data matched to a DSP identity graph improved targeting and fundraising performance; useful but not industry-shifting.
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Key Takeaways & Evidence Grounding
- Direct Relief ran a Los Angeles-focused awareness and fundraising campaign from mid-November 2025 through the end of January.
- Direct Relief contracted Kindling Media (independent ad agency) and selected Nexxen as its programmatic tech partner.
- Nexxen matched Direct Relief’s zip-code donor data to its Nexxen Discovery ID graph to retarget previous donors at the individual level.
- Audience segments built by Nexxen drove 1,453 site visitors vs. 1,236 from third-party audiences; campaign delivered a 9.4% increase in donors and 7.9% year-over-year revenue growth.
- Campaign emphasized CTV (performed well on Peacock), used a Jane Lynch PSA, and targeted roughly four impressions per user to avoid fatigue.
Connected Companies & Entities
3 Entities mapped“Kindling Media selected Nexxen as its tech partner due to its targeting capabilities and the fact that a brand lift study was included as pa...”
“The campaign targeted preexisting audiences from third-party providers like TransUnion and Comscore that are available through Nexxen’s DSP,...”
“The campaign targeted preexisting audiences from third-party providers like TransUnion and Comscore that are available through Nexxen’s DSP,...”
Ontology Mapping & Concepts
Related Market Signals & Shifts
Recent verified developments and strategic activity across this market segment.
Nexxen Enhances Health Ad Tech with Real-Time Optimisation Tools
Nexxen announced measurement and optimisation features for Nexxen Health, expanding its data-driven advertising capabilities for health advertisers. The update includes Auto Allocate in Nexxen DSP, a first-to-market capability that uses real-time signals to identify high-quality audiences and shift spend toward engaged users during campaigns. The feature is powered by PurpleLab, a healthcare analytics database with extensive US medical and pharmaceutical claims data. Nexxen DSP applies offline action data to dynamically optimise budgets toward strategic audience quality and verified patient metrics. PurpleLab measurement and reporting will be added to Nexxen DSP to support mid- and post-campaign validation, delivering outcome reporting on audience quality, script lift, and other metrics. The integration aims to provide a unified workflow for targeting, activation, optimisation, and measurement, enabling health and pharma advertisers to act on real-world signals with improved data integrity and accountability. Executives from Nexxen and PurpleLab describe the approach as a real-time, outcome-driven step forward.
Multicultural Publishers Use First-Party Data to Extend Reach
Multicultural publishers facing shrinking referral traffic and cooling diversity budgets are turning to first-party data and audience-extension tools to regain scale and qualify for RFPs. The article describes how AdGrid’s Audience Accelerator helps publishers convert device, IP and contextual signals into audience segments that can be activated across CTV, digital audio and the open web. Publishers cited include Q Digital (Queerty, LGBTQ Nation) and AURN, which use the tool to build sub-affinity segments, capture event-level digital signals and target by ZIP code rather than relying solely on Nielsen panel approximations. Executives note trade-offs — notably platform and ad-tech fees that reduce publisher margins and the need for brand alignment — but say granular first-party segments enable new buyers and more flexible campaign structures for brands without national-scale budgets.
Nexxen Teams with Yahoo DSP for Enhanced Audience Targeting
Nexxen has licensed its automatic content recognition (ACR) audience segments to Yahoo DSP, enabling targeting across the Yahoo DSP platform in the US, UK, and Germany. The data will be available as part of Yahoo DSP’s Unified TV Audience offering and will be strengthened with Yahoo ConnectID, allowing advertisers to reach audiences using off-the-shelf or custom ACR segments. The segments provide genre, network, and programme-level insights along with brand-level ad exposure data to support incremental reach, cross-platform frequency management, and competitive conquesting across linear TV and connected TV. Nexxen executives and Yahoo executives described the collaboration as expanding access to global TV-viewing insights and precise cross-channel targeting.
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