How BigBasket Rebuilt Fixed Tenancy Ads to Unlock Scalable Search Monetization

Challenge: A System That Hit Its Limit

The team had identified about 300 keywords that advertisers would be interested in. The keywords were high-volume and high-intent.

But the sales process was entirely manual.

Media sales called advertisers one by one. Prices were set through individual negotiation. There was no standard interface and the entire process was managed through spreadsheets. If an advertiser didn't get a call, they never found out the inventory existed.

This created major problems:

• Ad slots frequently sold for less than their true value, as inventory couldn’t be competitively priced hence capping revenue potential.
• Many advertisers were excluded from the process altogether.
• The current system couldn’t scale beyond the bandwidth of the sales team without heavy reliance on internal resources.

To unlock the full value of its high value Top of Search inventory, the retailer needed to transition to self-serve, auction-based media sales.

Solution

Osmos worked with the retailer to move Fixed Tenancy Ads from a manual sales process to a self-serve, pre-auction system.

Each keyword, or group of keywords, was turned into an ad package. The retailer’s team could define a base price, auction start and end dates, and campaign flight dates.

Once published, these packages became visible to all eligible advertisers. They could place bids directly through the white-labeled advertiser portal. The retailer had visibility into all bids as they came in. At the end of the auction, the highest bidder won the slot.

This removed the need for sales-led negotiation. Advertisers no longer had to wait for someone to call them. The process became visible, accessible and structured.

Impact

Since the transition, Fixed Tenancy Ads have become a much larger part of retailer’s monetization:

• 50% of total Ad Revenue in the first 30 days came from Fixed Tenancy Ads.
• 27% growth in advertiser participation within two months.
• 92.7% average uplift from base price to final auction price