Five Problems When You Use Ad Networks to Sell Your Advertising Space
If you have created a new website and have allocated spaces within the website design for advertising, you will probably want to start filling them with some paying ads as quickly as possible. This is easier said than done, as many advertisers will want you to show that your site attracts quality visitors before they choose to spend their marketing money on you. One way around that is to fill your available ad spaces using an ad network. While this will quickly get the ads rolling in, it does come with some potential problems, five of which we will discuss below:
Trust
Some ad networks may present problems in terms of displaying malware, or inappropriate ads, and may not be financially stable. Hence, it is very important to find an ad network that is well trusted in the industry and has a good reputation. Find out how long they have been in business, and what sort of feedback they have received from their previous clients. These are questions that need to be answered before you commit to one network or another. You will also want to take a look at their payment terms, just so you can know exactly when to expect the money you are owed. Ask for references and find if the network pays their clients on time and also if they pay the full amount they owe to avoid any surprises.
Control
Another thing that you really need to pay attention to is the level of control that you have over the ads that are shown on your site. For example, if you have a website devoted to children’s toys, do you really want ads for gambling sites and Russian brides showing up on your pages? Make sure that you can setup ad filters that will block certain types, formats and categories of advertisements that you do not want to be shown on your site.
Performance
A major part of the design of your website is ensuring that it loads quickly. Customers will not sit around and wait for a slow loading site no matter how good your products and services may be. You need to look at how the addition of ads will affect the speed of your site. If you find that they are dragging the loading speed down, you may need to re-consider what is being shown or how the third-party ad tag is setup on your site. There are several tools you can find online that provide data on how long each section of the site takes to load. Use one of these tools to ensure you are satisfied with the performance of the ad network.
Fill Rate
You are most likely looking at putting ad networks on your site in order to create a new stream of revenue. But are the ads being shown actually making you any money? If most ads are public service ads or default ads instead of premium ads, your effective ad rates might be very low and you will earn very little from these ads. You will want to monitor the ad performance closely and check ad targeting, frequency cap restrictions, and other related settings by the advertisers that can affect your revenue. There are many different ad networks so shop around and stick to those ad networks that pay you the highest amount for your ad spaces while still considering everything else mentioned above (timely payments, respectable ads, fast loading ads, etc).
Transparency
The only real way to tell if you are making money or being successful with ads on the network is to get a look at a detailed report with meaningful statistics. You do not want just a summary report showing total amount of ads shown. A good ad network will give you access to all sorts of data, which will allow you to monitor and tweak the types of ads that are being shown on your site so that you can make even more money. A clear payment schedule and prompt answers to your questions are also things you should strive for when choosing an ad network.