The Trade Desk MCP Server
Programmatic
Connect any AI assistant to The Trade Desk to analyse, optimise and report on programmatic campaigns — with human approval before anything executes.
What is the The Trade Desk MCP?
The Trade Desk MCP Server is an OpenAds integration that connects your AI assistant — ChatGPT, Claude, Claude Code, Cursor or Codex — to your The Trade Desk seat through a single secure Model Context Protocol (MCP) connection. It lets the AI read campaign data, research inventory and audiences, model budget changes and draft optimisations across the open programmatic ecosystem, while keeping every account action under your direct control.
This matters because programmatic buying on The Trade Desk is uniquely complex: bid factors, private marketplace deals, data segments, contextual signals and multi-channel supply all interact across display, video, audio, native and connected TV. OpenAds gives you the speed of conversational analysis without surrendering governance. The AI proposes; you approve. Analysis, proposal, approval and execution stay separate, so nothing changes in your seat until a human signs off.
Key capabilities
Read campaign, ad group and creative performance across all channels in your seat.
Analyse spend, win rate, viewability, CPM and conversion metrics on demand.
Research audience segments, third-party data and contextual categories.
Evaluate private marketplace and programmatic guaranteed deal performance.
Model bid factor and budget changes before anything goes live.
Detect wasted spend across supply vendors, domains and placements.
Draft new campaigns, ad groups and targeting for review.
Generate clear, shareable performance reports in seconds.
What you can do
Analyse performance
Ask plain-language questions and get grounded answers pulled directly from your seat. OpenAds surfaces spend, impressions, win rate, viewable CPM, completion rate and conversions by campaign, channel or flight, so you can understand what is working on The Trade Desk without exporting a single spreadsheet.
Research keywords & audiences
Explore the data marketplace and contextual signals conversationally. The AI can compare audience segments, look-alike models and contextual categories, then summarise reach, cost and expected overlap so you prioritise the segments most likely to lift performance on your open-web and CTV inventory.
Find wasted spend
OpenAds inspects delivery by supply vendor, domain, app and placement to flag low-viewability inventory, poor-converting deals and sites draining budget. It presents the evidence and a recommended block or bid-down list — you decide what to apply.
Create campaigns
Describe your objective, budget and audience and the AI drafts a complete campaign structure: channel mix, targeting, bid strategy, frequency caps and flight dates. The full proposal is shown for your review before any ad group is created in The Trade Desk.
Optimise & pace budget
Track pacing against flight goals and let OpenAds model bid-factor and budget shifts toward the best-performing channels, deals and dayparts. Every reallocation is presented as a clear before-and-after proposal you approve or amend.
Generate reports
Turn raw delivery into narrative reports for clients or stakeholders. Ask for a weekly CTV summary or a cross-channel pacing update and OpenAds assembles metrics, trends and plain-English commentary ready to share.
Supported campaign types
Campaign typePrimary useTypical workflow DisplayOpen-web reach and retargetingAnalyse viewability, propose domain blocks, reallocate budget Video (online)Awareness and considerationOptimise completion rate, cap frequency, refine supply Connected TV (CTV)Premium large-screen reachResearch inventory, model budget, pace against flight goals AudioStreaming and podcast reachCompare deals, adjust bid factors, monitor delivery NativeContextual in-feed engagementDraft targeting, review creatives, track conversions Private marketplace (PMP)Curated premium supplyEvaluate deal win rate, optimise bids, report performance
Getting started
Sign in to OpenAds and open the integrations directory.
Select The Trade Desk and start the secure connection flow.
Authorise OpenAds against your The Trade Desk seat with your credentials.
Choose the advertiser and campaigns OpenAds may access.
Confirm your approval preferences for write actions.
Once connected, link your AI assistant of choice. ChatGPT, Claude, Claude Code, Cursor and Codex all speak to The Trade Desk through the same MCP endpoint, so you can start asking questions and requesting optimisations from whichever tool you already work in — no separate setup per assistant.
First prompts to try
"Show me last week's spend and win rate by channel on The Trade Desk."
"Which domains had viewability below 50% and how much did they cost me?"
"Compare my top three audience segments by CPA this month."
"Draft a CTV awareness campaign with a ₹5,00,000 monthly budget."
"Where should I move ₹1,50,000 to improve completion rate?"
"How are my private marketplace deals pacing against goal?"
"Find wasted spend across supply vendors this flight."
"Summarise this campaign's performance for a client report."
A complete workflow example
Objective: Improve return on a CTV video flight that is over-pacing but under-converting.
The user prompt: "My CTV flight is spending fast but conversions are flat. Find the problem and propose fixes within a ₹8,00,000 budget."
What OpenAds analysed: delivery by supply vendor, deal and daypart; completion and conversion rates; frequency distribution; and pacing against the remaining flight window.
Findings: two supply vendors accounted for 40% of spend at half the average conversion rate, evening frequency was well above the optimal cap, and one PMP deal was outperforming the rest on cost per acquisition.
Proposed actions: bid down the two weak vendors, tighten the frequency cap to three per day, and shift ₹1,20,000 toward the high-performing PMP deal — each shown with expected impact.
The approval step: OpenAds presented the changes as a single reviewable proposal. Nothing executed until the user approved it. The user accepted two changes and edited the third before confirming.
The result: only the approved actions were written to the seat, with a logged record of what changed, when and why.
Best practices
State your objective and budget ceiling in every optimisation request.
Review proposed supply blocks before applying them at scale.
Ask for expected impact so you can compare options quickly.
Run pacing checks mid-flight rather than only at the end.
Keep approval on for bid, budget and targeting changes.
Safety and control
OpenAds draws a hard line between read and write actions. Reading data — pulling metrics, researching audiences, modelling scenarios — happens freely so you can analyse without risk. Any write action that changes your The Trade Desk seat, such as adjusting bids, moving budget, editing targeting or launching a campaign, is held at an approval checkpoint. You see exactly what will change before it happens, and nothing executes without your explicit sign-off.
OpenAds vs manual The Trade Desk management
TaskOpenAdsManual management Performance analysisConversational answers in secondsManual exports and pivot tables Finding wasted spendAutomated vendor and domain scanLine-by-line report review Budget reallocationModelled with expected impactManual estimation and entry ReportingNarrative reports on requestBuilt by hand each cycle ControlApproval before every writeDirect edits, easy to slip
Limitations
OpenAds acts within the permissions your The Trade Desk seat grants; it cannot exceed them.
Data reflects The Trade Desk reporting availability and may lag real-time delivery slightly.
Creative assets and production still happen outside the integration.
Recommendations inform decisions but do not guarantee campaign outcomes.
Frequently asked questions
Does OpenAds change my campaigns automatically?
No. OpenAds analyses and proposes, but every write action to your The Trade Desk seat waits for your explicit approval before it executes.
Which AI assistants work with this integration?
ChatGPT, Claude, Claude Code, Cursor and Codex all connect through the same secure MCP endpoint, so you can work from whichever tool you prefer.
Can OpenAds see my whole seat?
Only the advertisers and campaigns you authorise during setup. You control the scope of access and can adjust it at any time.
Is my The Trade Desk data secure?
Yes. The connection is authorised through your own credentials over a secure MCP channel, and OpenAds operates strictly within the permissions you grant.
Does it support connected TV and audio?
Yes. OpenAds works across The Trade Desk channels including display, video, CTV, audio, native and private marketplace deals.
Connect it through one secure MCP connection.