In an industry that’s expected to grow by 64.83 billion U.S. dollars by 2024, you can bet that things are changing on a monthly basis. It’s hard to keep up with new demand partner requirements, as well as changes in cookie and ad blocker policies. And by the time you understand the latest CCPA and GDPR regulations, they’ve already released a whole new set of rules.
On top of overly technical regulations, many publishers lack the tools to test what is and isn’t working when it comes to monetizing their sites. The process demands either an ad operations team, or for the publisher to spend valuable time combing through optimization techniques.
In this chaotic and overwhelming market, digital publishers are left feeling powerless as they are missing out on huge revenue potential.
The Importance of A/B Testing
Placing ads on your site is only the first step in increasing your revenues. Once these ads are up and running, how do you know which ad format has a real impact on your bottom line? And how do you know which user segment is more tolerant of display ads versus video ads? The answer is you don’t, unless you implement A/B testing.
Publishers who don’t use A/B testing are leaving money on the table. It’s as simple as that. Analyzing user behavior is the only way to truly evaluate the effects of your decisions.
With A/B testing, publishers can see exactly which ad layouts, ad formats, and demand partners are the most effective in terms of ROI and user experience. This concrete data not only enables publishers to optimize their site layer by layer, but also to avoid making potentially expensive mistakes.
Impact on Ad Viewability
The correct ad positioning affects viewability, which is crucial for digital publishers. Advertisers target sites that have a viewability rate of 70%, which means that 70% of their ads were seen for at least a second. Why is the metric important? Because it validates what demand partners are paying for. If your site’s viewability is high, then demand partners will want to work with you, which ultimately increases your CPM.
Bidding Optimization in Ad Auctions
Bid optimization requires quite a bit of time and attention; however, it is crucial for optimizing your site’s monetization. While adding more demand partners can increase your CPM, too many can have an adverse effect on your users’ session.
It’s important to not only find the optimal number of demand partners, but to also look at the marginal benefit of each one. How do their ads affect user engagement and, in turn, your ad revenue?
While most digital publishers know the importance of floor price optimization, pre-bid timeout optimization is often brushed to the side. The timeout setup allows more time for bidders to respond to auctions which therefore increases timeout rates. But it isn’t an end-all solution. Increasing timeout rates can slow down your site and decrease user experience. The key is to increase advertising performance, while finding the perfect balance between optimal user engagement and a high yield.
The Need for Granular Analytics
Knowing why certain user interactions result in conversions while others don’t is the secret to optimizing monetization. Real-time granular analytics provides publishers with powerful data insights to run better A/B testing and optimize their site on the deepest level.
For each user, you can track their session length, how many pages they viewed, which ads they looked at (and for how long), where the user came from, and the list goes on. This is especially helpful when purchasing users. Consolidating income data from ad impressions informs publishers about which users have higher conversion rates.
The Bottom Line
The digital publishing market is difficult to navigate, but there are ways to gain more control over your site’s monetization. By using platforms like ReigNN, you can optimize the number and type of demand partners you work with, implement A/B testing on everything from ad layouts to floor pricing, incorporate insights from granular analytics into your decision-making, and, as a result, increase your revenue.
While it takes time to learn your users and tailor your site to their needs, with the right tools, the possibilities for optimization are endless.
