Case Study
HIRO + Freestar: Unlocking Addressable Revenue at Scale
Freestar is a leading monetization partner helping publishers maximize revenue through advanced header bidding tech, expert ad ops, and a publisher-first approach.
The Results
HIRO has become a critical part of Freestar’s monetization strategy, helping publishers increase addressability and unlock real, measurable revenue uplift. Freestar is seeing strong results across its network, with HIRO helping to boost CPMs and drive increased overall monetization for publishers of all sizes.
Freestar Publisher Spotlight:
Sports Reference, a publisher brand running eight domains with Freestar, saw a 21% revenue lift on impressions where HIRO’s ID was present over a six-month period.
The Challenge
In today’s increasingly complex advertising ecosystem, publisher success hinges on addressability. For Freestar, identity wasn’t just a buzzword — it was a business imperative. With a growing share of traffic falling into the non-addressable category, significant revenue was being left on the table. The team needed a scalable, low-friction identity solution that would perform across their diverse publisher network and stand up to rigorous internal validation.
Known for being first-to-market with innovative solutions, Freestar also wanted to lead the charge in identity. Freestar wasn’t just looking for any plug-and-play solution. They weren’t looking for a black box. They were looking for proof.
The Solution
HIRO is one of the foundational products within the Zeta Publisher Cloud and is purpose-built to help publishers unlock more revenue by converting non-addressable traffic into high-value, identity-rich impressions. HIRO empowers Freestar to increase the value of non-addressable inventory by injecting enhanced identity signals into every impression.
HIRO fits seamlessly into Freestar’s programmatic ecosystem, interoperating with every major SSP and demand partner. This frictionless integration makes HIRO more than a plugin solution; it becomes the connective tissue driving better performance across the board.
Freestar deployed HIRO across its publisher base and validated the performance through their own internal testing framework. The outcome was higher CPMs, increased yield, and clear, attributable revenue gains, results Freestar could take directly to their clients.
With those results in hand, Freestar is expanding its use of HIRO into Flex — its new platform built for scalable, self-managed monetization. HIRO will power addressability in Flex from day one, proving again that when something works, you scale it.
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