As a publisher, it’s in our best interest to find a good Ad network to work with. But good is not enough. You want to work with an Ad network that will listen to you whilst giving you RPMs (revenue) without a hitch on your site performance or user experience.
Well, most of the reviews you’ll read out there are sponsored by the same Ad networks you wish to join, and not to be overly conclusive, but most of those reviews are biased in support of the paying client.
Therefore, just to be clear, this is not one of those reviews. I’ve personally been in a long and painful process of searching for an advertising partner; the network that will understand my needs and deliver on their promises.
In this article, I’ll share with you my experience after having tried 5 of the best Ad networks for publishers in search of one that will understand my needs and meet them.
I cover my experience having tried out Adsense, Ezoic, Newor Media, Mediavine and Adthrive, now Raptive.
Each Ad network has its own requirements; your traffic demographic (Geo locations), monthly traffic and a lot more.
Let’s get dive into it.
1. Adsense for Publishers
Google Adsense is the most popular Ad network out there. For most publishers, myself included, this is the first Ad network they work with. Getting accepted into the Adsense program is not as hard as getting into any of the other Ad networks.
In fact, as you read on you’ll realize that all other Ad networks require that you’re in good standing with Google, which means that you must first have been accepted into the Google Adsense program.
Joining Adsense
There are generally a few requirements to get accepted into the Adsense program;
- Have about 5 -10 originally published articles on your site. You may start by creating a storyboard for your website.
- Have a visible navigation menu on the site with an About page included.
- Have a visible privacy policy page on your website.
- Lastly, you should have a Contact page on your website.
Tip:
These requirements cut across all other Ad networks and if you’re to join any, first make sure you meet them.
Now that you have all the requirements for Adsense, you can go ahead and submit your application to join Google Adsense. It may take from a few hours to a few weeks to get feedback from Google with a YES or NO regarding your application.
Having been in the Adsense program for some time, I discovered that it wasn’t the best Ad network in terms of user experience and revenue. Google Adsense tends to push a lot of Ads on your articles so that you get more revenue. This, however, worsens the user’s experience.
Google Adsense also has some of the lowest RPMs. By RPMs I mean, Revenue per 1000 impressions. To calculate your RPM; divide your estimated earnings by the number of page views you received, then multiply by 1000 (revenue/page views x1000).
During the time I was monetized by Adsense, my site, which is in the EdTech niche averaged an RPM of $3.54.
Yes, the RPMs may rise or fall based on seasonality and how long you have stayed with the Ad partner. The longer, the more their Adtech will understand your site and content hence bringing in competitive Ad bids for space on your site.
However, from the word go, I knew that an RPM of 3-4 wasn’t good enough. Not only that, I had to have more than 10 Ads running on the page which is something I disliked personally.
Secondly, the Adsense program does not offer any Support. I have not seen any email address or phone number to call in case I need help getting things fixed. So don’t expect that from Adsense.
Overall, if I’m to rate Google Adsense out of 5 stars (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐) and 5 being the best.
Advertisement - Continue reading below | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Rating (out of 5 stars) |
Requirements | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 4 |
Support | ⭐ | 1 |
Integration | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Advertisement - Continue reading below | 4 |
Ads/performance | ⭐ | 1 |
Revenue/RPMs | ⭐⭐ | 2 |
Google Adsense take home is ⭐⭐ 2/5
So, I started on my search for a better Ad network with more gains, which led me to discover Ezoic.
2. Ezoic for Publishers
After you make a few pennies with Google Adsense, you’re excited when you discover a possibly higher-paying Ad network for publishers.
I came across Ezoic.
I watched videos and read blog posts especially from creators already using Ezoic on their sites. I was pumped to see creators shoot RPMs between $10-20 for 1000 views. This was insane compared to what I was getting with Adsense.
Note that Ezoic uses a metric they call ePMV (earnings Per Thousand Visitors). To ease the calculations, I could just get what I earn in Ezoic and divide it with the page views I got in Google Analytics and then divide the answer by 1000 impressions. That could give me the RPM I was getting in Ezoic.
I later realized that I was getting even lesser RPMs in Ezoic as compared to Adsense. I was averaging about $3.2 RPM ($2.77 ePMV) for 1000 views.
That shocked me because coming from Adsense, I expected more. Also not to forget that Ezoic counts their page views differently. You’ll have more page views in Ezoic than you do in Google Analytics.
Joining Ezoic
To join Ezoic as a publisher is pretty easy. As long as you’re in good standing with Google (Adsense approved) and you have the aforementioned pages on your site, Ezoic will get you in.
You’ll have to take a short onboarding course, install the Ezoic plugin, change your DNS, and voila! you’re in to enjoy more benefits from Ezoic like Leap and Humix.
I find the Ezoic dashboard more clear and it provides much more needed details for your analytics.
However, on the flip side, Ezoic Ads are very intrusive; they try to show as many Ads as possible on your website, and this is where the speed/performance issues kick in. Although their Leap extension tries to help, it didn’t do it for me.
They have an excellent support team already available to help you.
However, most times when I wanted to know why my site was performing worse than it did in Adsense yet Ezoic promises more earning potential, the support team always recommended solving it by adding more Ads, using their Humix video extension etc. I tried them all but they didn’t work for me.
For instance, I used the Humix app and added over 200 videos and got about 300k views all combined, but it didn’t make me anywhere close to $5. So, not worth it.
Overall, if I’m to rate Ezoic out of 5 stars (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐) and 5 being the best
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Rating (out of 5 stars) | |
Requirements | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 4 |
Support | ⭐⭐⭐ | 3 |
Integration | ⭐⭐⭐ | 3 |
Ads/performance | ⭐⭐ | 2 |
Revenue/RPMs | ⭐⭐ | 2 |
Ezoic take home is ⭐⭐⭐ 3/5
3. Mediavine for Publishers
Before I moved on from Ezoic, I kept my eyes wide open still in search of a better Ad network. By this time, I had started feeling like my content isn’t good enough, or the tech setup I’m using, or this or that…
But this didn’t stop me. I kept searching until I came to know about Mediavine, Newor Media, and Adthrive. I’ll come to the other two in the next part of this article. Mediavine markets itself as an Ad management company for content creators. I was like “This is it!”
Joining Mediavine
I contacted Mediavine since I knew that I met their requirements. Firstly, they require you to have at least 50,000 sessions in the last 30 days which is roughly 60,000 page views.
Secondly, you must have your biggest audience coming from the top English-speaking countries, that is the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. My site met both requirements.
So, I sent in my request to join, and guess what, I was rejected a week later! They looked into my analytics and I guess they were not impressed by a couple of things.
Note that Mediavine is one of the most respected Ad networks out there with some of the highest RPMs in the industry. I have seen creators get RPMs over $30 per 1000 page views, which is really insane!
There I go, my journey ends here? Yes. Well, maybe Not. Remember I mentioned Newor Media and Adthrive.
4. Newor Media for Publishers
By this time, I had transferred my site back to Adsense from Ezoic and it was already performing much better than in Ezoic when it came to earnings (RPMs) and performance.
As I kept searching the internet, I came across Newor Media. They have invested in collaborating with bloggers to write sponsored reviews. For most of the reviews I read, I discovered that they were not only sponsored but also writers claimed that Newor Media performs way better than Adsense.
Newor Media states that they’re a premium Ad network and you’re guaranteed higher RPMs if you’re moving from Adsense. I was somewhat convinced to check out their website and that’s when I come across the earnings calculator.
After keying in the requested information, I discovered that their estimates on the calculator were way less compared to what I was getting in Adsense. A few days later, a Newor Media rep reached out to me and requested to have a call and discuss some opportunities for Newor Media as a publisher.
All went well and I was promised a guaranteed $15 RPM or higher if I joined them.
I was pretty excited and curious to see how this turns out.
My account was set up, Google Ad Exchange MCM approved and in we went.
Joining Newor Media
Newor Media setup is quite fast and straightforward. You only get about 7 Ads per page with the option to introduce a video Ad as well. Their team setups up your Ads and if given access they can do all the installations on your website’s back end.
Once the Ads were set up it took 4weeks to access my dashboard to see how my Ads were performing.
Before we go into my disappointment with them, I was very impressed at how they handled everything, from support to site speed and performance, to clean Ads and layout, etc.
However, from the very start, all I wanted was to earn more from my site content.
From the first 5weeks with Newor Media, my site earned the least from Ads. It averaged an RPM of $2.40 based on how much I earned and the page views I got via Google Analytics. They use a metric called eCPM (effective cost per mille).
Yes, I was very disappointed since I had been promised by their team that my site would perform exceptionally well with their Ad tech. That I would get $15 RPMs, but now it could not even outperform the RPMs I got with Adsense.
Overall, if I’m to rate Newor Media out of 5 stars (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐) and 5 being the best.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Rating (out of 5 stars) | |
Requirements | ⭐⭐ | 2 (Must have at least 30k pageviews and majority US, Canada & UK traffic) |
Support | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 4 |
Integration | ⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 4 |
Ads/performance | ⭐⭐ | 2 |
Revenue/RPMs | ⭐ | 1 |
Newor Media take home is ⭐⭐⭐ 3/5
5. Raptive for Publishers (formerly Adthrive)
After my frustration with Newor Media, I wondered what was there to lose. I’ll try one more Ad network and if it fails me, I’ll get back and settle with Adsense.
Now, a little bit of background, Adthrive before it became Raptive had been in a head-to-head battle with Mediavine when it came to who offers the best Ad management experience, optimization, performance, support, and overall revenue.
Though Mediavine is on the downside when it comes to requirements, it is known to slightly outperform Adthrive when it comes to RPMs. At least from what I have read across several blogs. But that doesn’t make Adthrive any less.
They (Raptive – Adthrive) offer some of the best Ad management experiences and revenue. They offer some premium Ads and have a very steep requirements list.
Joining Raptive
To join Raptive, you should have had at least 100,000 page views in the previous 30 days, your traffic should come from the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and the list goes…
Since I had all the boxes checked when it came to requirements, I decided to fill in the application form and I gave them access to my analytics to do some pre-checks.
And guess what, a few days later, I got a congratulatory email from Raptive support that my was site accepted. I couldn’t stop the excitement! However, after my previous experiences, I really wanted to see it work.
So, a few more emails later, I could get my Ads setup up on the site. The Raptive team literally did everything after accessing my site’s backend, and they optimized Ad placements.
By the way, they only show 7 Ads on a post including a sticky out-stream video Ad, unless otherwise decided. It took another 3 days to have access to the dashboard to see how my Ads are performing.
Upon accessing my dashboard just after 3 days in, RPMs are more than double what I was getting in Adsense and Newor Media. My site’s performance is way better and Ads aren’t intrusive to the visitors.
In just a space of 3 days, my Raptive Ads earned 255% more than I could with the previous networks.
That’s an average of $8.52 RPM (earnings per 1000 sessions) compared to the a$2.40 RPM I earned with Newor Media. I’m pretty excited to share about Raptive in the coming weeks as Ads are getting more optimized for my site, and to see how the RPMs perform.
So far, Raptive feels like the missing piece in the puzzle and now that I have got it, seems like all is fixed. I can’t forget to mention that Raptive guarantees a 20% revenue increase within the first 2 weeks if you integrate with them, and I can confirm that in just days, I’ve seen that.
Overall, if I’m to rate Raptive for Creators out of 5 stars (⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐) and 5 being the best,
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | Rating (out of 5 stars) | |
Requirements | ⭐ | 1 (Must have at least 100k pageviews in last 30 days and majority US, UK, Canada, and Australia traffic) |
Support | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 5 |
Integration | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 5 |
Ads/performance | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 5 |
Revenue/RPMs | ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ | 5 |
Raptive’s take home is ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4/5
What’s the best Ad network for publishers?
Well, there is no direct answer to this. It depends on what you want and what the Ad network offers. If these merge, then you’re good.
For me, it was increased revenue without negatively impacting my site speed, performance, and user experience. After several trials and errors, I’m into the Raptive network, I feel it’s where I belong.
Conclusion
It’s hard to write and conclude this article and not sound like I’m pushing for something. Yes, that’s not it. I was not paid by anyone to write this. It is out of utter frustrations and disappointments from Ad networks that either promise and do not deliver or that my site couldn’t work well with their Adtech.
The ball is in your court, but for me, Raptive is it for now.
Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Kwehangana Hamza. The Author blogs at Gotechug.com and creates content around building websites for non-techies. You can read some of his content on his blog or watch his video tutorials on his youtube channel.
