Ask HN: An Ad Industry Primer?

Hey Everyone,

I've recently started building out an ad platform with some fellow engineers - we're learning a lot and seeing some early successes after a bit of a rough start. That said, I'm hoping to get out in front of the curve over the next few months and get a better understanding of what the state-of-the-art is wrt ad tech and really just get a better grasp on the industry and what's expected from potential buyers/advertisers.

In iteration one, we've built a solid but familiar and antiquated system - CPM-based media adversting. That's not so terribly difficult. What I'd like to get in front of is the industry parlance for the things we're likely to encounter as we start to built a more sophisticated platform.

So - if anyone out there is in ad tech - and if anyone would care to point me to a recent primer on the business of ads, I'd be most grateful. A cursory glance at Google has yielded very little. I think I'm just looking to understand the (seemingly) very large ecosystem of the ad world and find a natural entry point into understanding the key roles and responsibilities.

From a newcomer's perspective - there's a dizzying amount of stuff happening: There are the SSP folk, the DSP folk, the Networks and Exchanges - there's CPM, CPC, CPA - there's Fixed-Cost, RTB, and Auction-based models - there's CTC, CTA, DR, etc. - there is Targeting, Retargeting, and Personas. And I'm sure this represents probably 10% of the total surface area.

The answer is probably: find someone that has worked in the business for 10 years and ask them to coach you but I'm hoping that one of you has come across some valuable presentations or pdfs that you'd be willing to share to help me start sorting through some of this before I encounter it.

Thanks for listening.

EDIT: Grammar