It seems like “brand safety” is getting to be like “transparency” in our industry; everyone offers it in one form or another but like transparency, brand safety means different things to different people.  And just like transparency, everyone defines brand safety differently.  There is one thing that separates effective brand safety from all the other forms of impression analysis and delivery verification out there today.  Preemptive.  Is your flavor of brand safety truly preemptive?  Or is the brand safety you are getting from your demand-side platform (DSP) provider post impression analysis?  Is it reactive?  This is another of the industry myths perpetuated by other solutions rushed to market.  Real brand safety, meaning a demonstrably safe environment for a brand advertiser to promote their message online, comes from truly preemptive brand safe filtering.  But in practice pre-impression analysis for applicability and safety is very difficult to do.  Evaluating a billion impressions a day for applicability takes a robust platform and intelligent integration with real-time sources.  But it pays huge dividends in efficiency.  With truly preemptive brand safety the pass back is meaningless.  With truly preemptive brand safety you only buy what is safe and there is no waste.  No wasted targeting, optimization, time, or ad spend.  Make sure your brand safety is preemptive before you put your message out there.