If you hear your terrestrial or 'filler' ads being interrupted by programmatic ads (rather than being seamlessly replaced) or you hear the tail-end of your filler playing out after the programmatic midroll break has elapsed, it's likely down to one of two issues: a delay to the stream or a playout misconfiguration. We'll review each of these and how to improve the timings of the online ad delivery.

Delay to stream 

The most common issue is that there is a mismatch in delay-to-stream for your encoder audio in comparison to the trigger metadata. Usually, this means the ad is triggered early (in relation to the audio), but the inverse can also be true. 

If this discrepancy is consistent (i.e. you find that every midroll is delayed by the same duration every time), we can configure a 'start-shift' rule to compensate for this duration. This will adjust the trigger time in relation to when the metadata is sent. 

If you believe a start-shift adjustment is recuired for your stream(s), contact our support team.

Playout misconfiguration

The second potential issue is that the metadata configuration in your playout system is not set up correctly. This is more likely the case when discrepancies between trigger time and the audio timings are not consistent. In this scenario, we recommend seeking advice from the playout developers on how to best set up your system for ad triggers.