To help publishers maximize advertising revenue, fill rates, and efficiency for their available ad space, ad mediation is a digital advertising technique that manages several ad networks using a single SDK.
By far the most profitable kind of ad mediation is in-app bidding. Before the emergence of in-app bidding, which is sometimes referred to as real-time bidding occasionally, the waterfall model was the most often used ad mediation technique.
Publishers can acquire ad inventory with complete flexibility and detailed control over who can buy it, when it can be purchased, and how. It increases income generation profitability and lessens the burden of managing several ad networks.
Continue reading to learn more about ad mediation, including its definition, methods of operation, and platforms that publishers and developers can use to meet their KPIs (key performance indicators).
Origin of Ad Mediation:
Although ad mediation or mediation advertising has been around for a little more than ten years, because some ad mediation platforms can outperform a single ad network by up to twenty percent, more publishers and developers are looking into the possibilities that ad mediation platforms provide.
Given that there are more than 5 billion internet users worldwide, it makes sense that publishers and developers have focused on the digital advertising market as a significant source of income.
It seems sense that publishers and developers would want to optimize their ad revenue potential, given that Statista reports that global spending on digital and media advertising is rising annually.
Introduction to Ad Mediation
By the use of ad mediation and mediation platforms, publishers can employ technology to make their ad inventory available to some advertisers. By raising the effective cost per mille (eCPM), display ad fill rates, and overall efficiency, the objective is to maximize ad monetization.
With the help of technology, publishers and developers may manage several ad networks with a single software development kit (SDK) thanks to a management solution called mobile ad mediation.
Publishers no longer need to manually look for and select the best-performing ad networks because ad mediation systems usually optimize and automate this process.
Let’s first examine the following formula to see how ad mediation services might assist publishers in raising their ad revenue:
How Ad Mediation is Calculated?
Ad revenue = Ad requests * fill rate * eCPM
To optimize the amount of money made from each ad request, ad mediation platforms aim to maximize either the fill rate, eCPM, or both.
How does Ad Mediation Work?
Ad mediation technologies analyze some variables, including CPM/eCPM, fill rates, ad formats, and user demographics, to automatically select the optimal ad network for each ad impression. The platform compares the performance of ad networks using algorithms and then chooses the network with the best chance of making money off of a given impression. By doing this, the publisher is guaranteed to always get the most ad income for their inventory.
There are various steps in the ad mediation procedure. The publisher first incorporates the SDK of the ad mediation platform into their application. By using audience information, this SDK directs users to the ad mediation platform. The mediation platform then chooses the best advertisement from its pool of ad networks after the SDK receives a request for an ad from the user when they open the app. At last, the chosen advertisement appears in the app, and the publisher gets paid for each impression of the advertisement.
To assist publishers in monitoring ad performance and revenue, ad mediation platforms can also offer real-time data and analytics. As a result, publishers may increase total ad income and optimize their ad inventory. Ad mediation services can also assist publishers in preventing ad network conflicts and lowering ad latency, both of which can have a detrimental effect on user experience and income.
How is Ad Mediation Preferably Conducted?
Ad publishers can access a variety of ad networks using ad mediation platforms. Next, for the available ad inventory, advertisers place bids against one another.
In the end, the advertisers that will yield the highest return on investment (ROI) are chosen by the ad mediation platforms. In other words, the highest bidder prevails.
Once more, publishers sort various ad networks according to their preferences and then search for the top network to fulfill their ad requests. However, the ad mediation platform advances to the next ad network to fulfill the request if that one is unable to.
Until the request is fulfilled, the publisher keeps submitting ad requests to the particular ad networks on their list.
What Are the Applications of Platforms for Mediation and Ad Mediation?
Increasing ad income for publishers is the primary objective of mediation platforms and ad mediation services. By using a single integration, the platforms link to several ad networks. Using the data produced by each network, they do ad mediation to fill an ad inventory with the highest CPM available.
Ad mediation platforms sell ad space via waterfall bidding or in-app header bidding to maximize return on investment.
The more traditional of the two methods, waterfall bidding, entails ranking and ranking various ad networks according to their overall earnings from advertisements. When an app developer requests that an ad be filled, for example, the mediation platform chooses the top-performing ad network until the demand is satisfied, at which point it proceeds to the next ad network in line.
However, using more advanced advertising technology, publishers use the header bidding method to have many advertisers compete in real-time bidding (RTB) for a particular ad spot. To secure the ad space, the highest bidder makes a $0.01 greater payment than the second-highest bidder. This allows publishers to sell their inventory at the best price while the mediation platform chooses high-paying advertisers.
The distinction between RTB mobile and ad mediation is in how they go about things. When distributing ad inventory to various demand channels, ad mediation entails using a platform to look for the best ad networks available. Publishers will be able to place more relevant adverts in their ad slots as a result. The best way to fill the space with ads is the main concern.
RTB mobile, on the other hand, is audience-focused. As the name implies, it enables bids from advertisers on open slots, which facilitates the tracking and independent assessment of each impression. Advertisers can choose how much to bid on hundreds of ad exchanges by considering the value that each audience has for them. Because advertisers can deliberately target valuable customers, it becomes more cost-effective for them.
What Advantages Does Ad Mediation Offer?
Using ad mediation and ad mediation systems for your website and app has a lot of benefits. Below are a handful of them:
1. Boosts Fill Rates for Display Ads:
Ad inventory sold through ad mediation contributes to higher ad fill rates. To allow advertisers to place bids for their ad space, publishers might grant access to their ad inventory to several ad networks. This makes it possible for advertisers who are prepared to spend more for space to compete more fiercely.
2. Offers a Harmonious Structure for Ad Management:
Publishers can use a single platform for ad mediation, and app developers can integrate SDKs to manage numerous ad networks. eliminating the requirement to oversee every ad network separately.
3. Raises CPM Prices:
Ad mediation services interact with several ad networks to help publishers increase CPM rates. CPM rates increase when multiple advertisers are vying for impressions.
There wouldn’t be any competition and just one choice would be to sell inventory to a single offer without ad mediation and various networks.
What is mediation with waterfalls?
In digital advertising, waterfall mediation is employed to maximize the choice of ad networks or ad exchanges for a given ad impression. This approach arranges several ad networks or exchanges in a “waterfall” or sequential fashion.
The first network or exchange on the list starts the process, and if they have any ads to serve, the ads are sent back to the app or website. The request is forwarded to the next network or exchange in the list if they don’t have an advertisement, and so on, until either an advertisement is discovered or the list’s end is reached.
Several parameters, including fill rate, CPM/eCPM, past performance, and other considerations, might determine the order in which networks or exchanges appear in the waterfall. By making sure that the highest-paying ad is served and reducing the amount of time it takes to discover an ad, the objective is to maximize revenue.
Although waterfall mediation was the most often used technique, in-app bidding has emerged as the go-to approach for mobile ad mediation.
In-app bidding: what is it?
A programmatic advertising technique called “in-app bidding” enables real-time bidding for ad inventory inside a mobile app by several demand sources, including ad networks and DSPs.
The ad server of the app publisher sends a request for adverts to different demand sources when a user opens the app. The highest bidder wins the auction and has their ad shown in the app after each demand source makes a bid for that specific ad impression.
The way waterfall mediation and in-app bidding manage demand sources is the primary distinction between them. While waterfall mediation prioritizes some demand sources in a specific order and only gets in touch with other sources if the first option doesn’t work, in-app bidding handles all demand sources equally and lets them compete in real-time.
Higher fill rates, better ad revenue for the app publisher, and more effective use of ad inventory are some benefits of in-app bidding.
Conclusion:
Are you trying to make money off of a popular app or website? Publishers who struggle to scale and effectively manage their monetization methods can find relief through ad mediation.
Publishers and developers may oversee several networks with a single, unified platform, which boosts ad revenue.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Mobile Ad Mediation: What Is It?
By integrating a single SDK, mobile ad mediation is a revenue-generating solution that guarantees a considerable boost in in-app revenue for app developers.
What’s the primary source of income for app publishers?
The primary source of income for app publishers or developers is in-app advertisements. To optimize ad monetization, app developers can manage and optimize in-app ads from several ad networks with the help of an ad mediation platform. The ad inventory is accessible to numerous ad networks using the ad income generation tool. It makes it possible for ad networks to compete with one another, selecting the highest bid to increase a publisher’s earnings.
What Is the Best Ad Network for Mediating?
The most popular and commonly utilized ad mediation tool among publishers is Google AdMob.
Some of the top ad networks for mediation or app mediation partners are mentioned below.
- smaato
- Oneness
- InMob
- ironSource
- PressJoy
- AdColony
- Instagram and Facebook