🎯 Jeff Green’s Manifesto
(a.k.a. “Agencies, You’re Lucky We Still Invite You to the Zoom”)

For years, The Trade Desk was the industry’s favorite underdog—the plucky DSP that could. A company built on the promise of independence, objectivity, and open-web idealism. A tech partner, not a threat. The anti-Google in Patagonia vests.

🧠 Agencies adored them. Really.
They whispered sweet nothings like “transparency” and “media neutrality,” and handed over billions in programmatic spend while Jeff Green smiled, nodded—and took notes.

But somewhere between retail media exploding and CTV taking over, something shifted.
The tone changed.
The meetings changed.
The power dynamics flipped.

Now?
Jeff Green doesn’t think agencies are obsolete. He thinks they’re inefficient.
And that’s arguably worse.

🔥 Let’s Translate Jeff Speak Into Plain English

Here’s what Jeff Green actually said on the Q4 2023 earnings call: “Our fastest-growing segment is brands working with us directly through Joint Business Plans. These relationships are growing 50% faster than traditional agency-led spend.”

📉 Translation:
"We’ve stopped waiting for agencies to catch up—and started planning without them."

Here’s another: “Brands want a closer relationship with technology, but they still want agencies to manage those.”

🧠 Translation:
“You can still sit at the kids' table—as long as you’re quiet and don’t ask for strategy.”

Let’s be crystal clear:
Jeff Green is not shy about how he sees the future of advertising.
He believes it’s going to be:

✅ Data-first
✅ Automated
✅ AI-powered
✅ Platform-driven
❌ Not necessarily built by agencies

🧩 They’re Not Becoming an Agency. They’re Becoming Your Replacement.

The Trade Desk isn’t trying to build an agency.
They’re trying to build the one machine agencies wish they had—and then sell it directly to brands.

Let’s break it down like a good pitch deck never will:

🧃 Joint Business Plans (JBPs) = Strategy Without Strategy Consultants

These aren’t partnerships—they’re power moves.
Private dinners. Invite-only “planning summits.” Whispers to CMOs over dessert.

Suddenly, brand media leads are syncing with TTD before an RFP is even drafted. Agencies used to define strategy.

Now they’re being handed a pre-loaded Kokai dashboard and told to “optimize.”

🛍️ Retail Media = Trojan Horse for Agency Bypass

Walmart, Kroger, Albertsons—the retail holy trinity—are all tied into TTD’s platform.
Not as clients, but as collaborators.
TTD built their tools, trained their traders, and locked in advertiser access.

📉 Who’s not in the room?
Every major agency trading desk that used to charge 12% just to interpret shopper data.

🤖 Kokai = AI That Does in Seconds What Agencies Bill for in Weeks

Media plan? ✅
Budget allocation? ✅
Attribution? ✅
Optimization across CTV, video, display? ✅✅✅

One buyer told Digiday: Why are we paying planners to do what Kokai does before lunch?”

And let’s not forget the real kicker:
🧾 Kokai is priced as software, not headcount.
So it doesn’t need billable hours. It just… works.

📺 CTV & OpenPath = The End of the Arbitrage Game

Remember when agencies made bank buying TV at scale, repackaging it, and selling it at a markup?

Yeah, Jeff remembers that too.

That’s why OpenPath exists—to give brands direct access to top-tier CTV inventory (Netflix, ESPN, Hulu) without the agency middlemen. No pass-throughs. No margins. No “preferred partner” markups.

💀 Agencies didn’t just lose their margin. They lost their moat.

🧬 UID2 = The Data Play Agencies Can’t Touch

It’s not just about cookies going away—it’s about who owns the next-generation identity graph.
TTD’s UID2 is rapidly becoming the plumbing for the open web.

And guess what?
It’s built for brands—not agencies.
Because when identity lives inside the buying platform… well, there’s not much left to “strategize” about.

📰 The Trojan Blog: TTD’s Not-So-Secret PR Weapon

Let’s talk about that little content hub they quietly launched.
You know the one—polished articles, smart-sounding op-eds, thought leadership galore.

🧠 It’s not journalism.
It’s not thought leadership.
It’s controlled narrative engineering—a direct line into the CMO’s inbox, bypassing the press, the agencies, and frankly, the messy reality of independent scrutiny.

😬 The Complaints Are Getting Louder

🧾 Data fees are rising.
🎭 Transparency is declining.
📞 Clients are getting calls directly.
💰 Agencies are being asked to justify 10% fees on something Kokai now automates.

And here’s the big irony:
Agencies used to love The Trade Desk because it wasn’t Google.
Now, some are quietly wondering if it’s becoming something worse: a Google that’s nice to your face but slowly absorbs your entire role.

🧨 Bottom Line: Jeff Green Doesn’t Need to Replace Agencies. He’s Already Done It.

• Planning? Done by Kokai.

• Buying? Done through OpenPath.

• Data? Owned via UID2.

• Strategy? Embedded in JBPs.

• Measurement? Baked into the dashboard.

• Creative? Not yet—but they’re shopping.

🧠 Once they acquire that last piece of the puzzle—an AI-driven creative platform—it’s checkmate.
TTD becomes the full-stack solution. Agencies become… vendors. Optional ones.

📢 TL;DR for Agencies:

You're not out yet.
But you're not in like you used to be.
And Jeff Green’s not sending a breakup text.
He’s just moving your toothbrush into the guest bathroom.