Author name: khazi@cubera.co

The ‘Bidstream data’ is something we should know about since we live in a data-driven world where ads are auctioned in real-time within fractions of a second. Bidstream data is essential to the programmatic advertising system, where advertisers and publishers connect and transact through fully-integrated ad exchanges. Bidstream data is the valuable information the publisher sends, such as the ad unit, publisher information, the type of device customers interacts with, IP address, and ad formats. Depending on the advertisers’ preferences, the ad format can be video, image, third-party tags, and GIFs (Graphic Interchange Format). It may also contain valuable information that attracts buyers, such as location or audience demographic data. The most important and helpful among the bidstream data is the GPS (global positioning system) or location information. Publishers and app developers separately sell these most beneficial data to location data specialists to enable focused customer targeting and accurate attribution.  The investment outlay by marketers for mobile location-based targeting is expected to reach $32.7 Billion by 2023 and will rise continuously thereafter. Bidstream data plays a crucial role in programmatic advertising and ad exchanges which serves as a dedicated marketplace for publishers to sell their ad inventory to advertisers. To get access to the ad exchanges and successfully transact in them, advertisers use the Demand-side platform, and publishers use the supply-side platform. The ad exchanges will act as intermediaries collecting data from supply-side platforms on behalf of publishers and passing it along to advertisers via demand-side platforms. Advertisers receive this valuable information as a stream, which is why it is called bidstream data. With real-time bidding, these activities can all be accomplished efficiently, as the AdSpace value is determined and regulated in real time. This bidstream data or bid request is transferred to the advertisers, who can decide whether to bid for that particular bid through real-time bidding. Bidstream can be regarded as the lifeline of online businesses and can be transferred quickly just before the user accesses the webpage. Besides GPS or location info, bidstream data includes rich zero, first, and second-party data. In some instances, the bid stream data also incorporate third-party cookie information and other valuable users’ information. Nevertheless, Google’s announcement that it will phase out third-party cookies by 2024 has caused serious concern among advertisers around the world.  Advertisers find it challenging to run personalized marketing campaigns due to Google’s latest announcement, as the marketers solely relied on these third-party cookies to craft effective marketing campaigns. But there is still hope for advertisers worldwide as they can access valuable information from consumers without violating privacy standards. Advertisers may be able to target their ads based on all the information related to the bidstream data, such as the device of a consumer visiting a particular website.  Advertisers can access their preferred bidding areas by analyzing bidstream data such as location data. Upon successfully identifying prospects, advertisers can specifically target these custom audiences. Publishers can offer ad inventory related to particular demographics where their products and services will get maximum sales, creating influential audience segments. Advertisers sometimes use Bidstream data to assess the efficiency of some bidding areas based upon technical parameters such as the performance of dedicated browsers and uniform resource locators (URLs). The main benefits of Bidstream Data As discussed earlier, segmenting the customers based on rich zero and first-party data ,bidstream data has revolutionized advertising and made it more facile and less time-consuming. Publishers and advertisers rely heavily on bidstream data for their success. Bidstream data a boon to publishers With a detailed understanding of customers and ad inventory, publishers can sell their ad units at a much higher price. Publishers can sell their rich data to the data management platform (DMP), which gathers and organizes data from various sources. How bidstream data will benefit advertisers Advertisers can effectively segment based on rich zero and first-party data provided by the customers through online bidding with a robust Demand side platform. Advertisers can get a holistic view of their customers and how they respond to their content, products, and services. Customers are greatly benefitted because they can only view the advertisements of products or services that are suited to their needs and aspirations. Time ahead for Bidstream Data As per Google’s latest announcement, third-party cookies will gradually disappear by 2024, which may diminish bidstream data’s value and significance. An advanced tool called Universal ID (UID’s) gives publishers more sway over their customer’s data. As a first-party cookie, Universal ID helps publishers match their users’ credentials with their device IDs by obtaining login ids, such as email addresses. As a result, these UIDs are then exchanged commercially with the ad tech platforms, which are used to track visitor activity across the web. In a revolutionary way that could modify the bidstream data, Interactive Advertising Board came up with Real-time bidding standards in 2018. The primary purpose of this standard was to provide more security and transparency in the ad supply chain with appropriate conduct and rules on Real-Time Bidding on ad impressions. Real-Time Bidding 3 (RTB3) requires publishers and advertisers to write and revise new codes to ensure brand safety guidelines and to comply with the latest policies. With this state-of-the-art RTB (3) platform, bid term requests are safer and more transparent than ever before. With our robust programmatic advertising technology, Cubera helps its valuable clients to boost their ad revenue par industry standards.

The concept of addressability is crucial in the world of advertising. It primarily refers to the capability of using media or tools to target custom audiences. Each marketing communication is strongly linked to a specific individual’s personal identifiable information (PII), such as name, email, or mailing address. This is comparable to the process of sending a person a direct mail. Although it is easy to communicate with customers, addressability is erroneous because customers visit many different websites on many devices. This blog majorly deals with addressability in marketing and how elements like cross-publisher IDs and mobile advertising IDs (MAIDs) are impacting addressability in advertising. What is Audience Addressability? An addressable audience is the total number of online customers a media platform can reach through targeted advertising campaigns. Prior to digital advertising, addressable targeting was mainly done by holders of postal addresses, such as newspapers and magazines. After that, online addressability was powered by third-party cookies that tracked consumers’ online behaviour and acted as an element for identity. Various advertiser platforms were able to effectively develop ad campaigns for specific audiences by utilizing the data obtained by third-party cookies. Third-party cookies are vanishing from the internet advertising ecosystem as consumer privacy concerns rise. Furthermore, Chrome, the leading browser globally with a market share of almost 70%, has announced that it will discontinue using third-party cookies shortly. The need for publishers and advertisers to build a robust,  scalable, cookie-free advertising ecosystem has increased due to Google’s move. What are the Factors Considering Addressability? Cross-publisher IDs and mobile IDs allow us to get ideal information about the users. With these vital IDs, it is easy for audience segmentation, audience targeting, and other audience-based ad delivery controls across devices. Thus, these two essential elements are considered significant for addressing the right audience in marketing. However, a large proportion of the populace is worried that gathering these IDs for advertising purposes will affect the user’s privacy. But the fact is that most of the risks related to consumer privacy stem from directly identifiable IDs that are linked to an offline identity. Therefore, this makes it clear that cross-publisher IDs are not a major element of concern as it doesn’t affect the user’s privacy issues. Addressability consists of mainly three notions. First and foremost, it has to engage audience, then should be able to get the feedback of the engagement. Finally, able to improve the engagement process after getting the feedback. To implement all these vital functions, marketers or advertisers are required to get an identity graph of the audience or users. It functions similarly to address, as the address enables the postman to deliver the post to the right location, and the ID graph aids the marketers in delivering the message or content to the custom audience. Addressability fundamentally depends on getting accurate information about the users. To get the most refined data, Cubera, the Big Data company, has introduced some products like Identity Graph, Audience Manager, Omni Channel Advertising Cloud, Data As A Service and Analytics As A Service. Let us have a closer look at all these essential products. Identity Graph A user’s real metrics can be vividly represented by an Identity Graph using information from several sources, including cookie ids, device ids, email ids, and customer ids. These components will make it possible for advertising to obtain an accurate portrait of a person. In essence, an identity graph is a collection of specific data on people that have been gathered from a variety of sources and media. Identity graph data is kept in the appropriate systems and is available at any time by typing queries to examine the most recent data, modify the data, and update the data. Advertisers are eagerly searching for the “Identity Graph” to recognize their clients through their digital channels as they engage with businesses through numerous websites, mobile applications, and social media platforms. Audience Manager The crucial task of compiling all the data assets is performed by the Audience Manager, which makes it easier to gather useful commercial data on visitors to different websites and streamlines the process of developing market segments. In the end, this aids in targeted advertising and the delivery of pertinent material to the custom-audience. Additionally, an Audience Manager must guarantee that data is properly acquired, safeguarded, and regulated. Omni Channel Advertising Cloud Omni Channel Advertising is the integration of various customer-interaction channels to produce a unified brand experience. These channels can be of any kind, such as online, offline, or mobile. To conveniently provide clients with a range of alternatives and to achieve a seamless customer experience, the Omni Channel Advertising model’s key goal.   Data As A Service (DaaS) Utilizing the internet to disperse computing services like servers, storage, databases, networking, and software analytics allows for quick innovation and adaptable resources to achieve economies of scale. Cubera can take advantage of massive data resources with DaaS and transform this valuable data into insights that benefit users. DaaS and predictive analytics enable businesses to give their customers customized experiences. As a result, the business will be able to serve its clients more effectively and cultivate a base of devoted clients. Analytics As a Service Companies who are unable to afford a fully operational in-house data creation center can now obtain effective data analysis tools by adopting analytics as a service. Organizations can fully or partially transform the data into insightful information using appropriate BI (business intelligence) technologies within a cloud infrastructure. This makes it easier for businesses to obtain the data they need to develop data-driven insights at a low cost and without the need for dedicated servers or data specialists. How to Address the Right Audience? As Google has announced the removal of third-party cookies short time soon, advertisers and publishers need to consider how to identify, target and engage the right audiences in a compliant, brand-safe way that does not adversely impact user experience. Predominantly, there are three alternatives for collecting pure data. Email addresses, unique IDs, and browser-based audiences are examples of first-party data. The advantages and disadvantages of each

Google, Facebook, and Amazon dominate online marketing eco-space as digital ads become more prominent worldwide due to their increased acceptability. According to research done by the renowned marketing research company eMarketer, around 64% of the total ad spend goes to Google, Facebook and Amazon. These three major companies have the lion’s share in this competitive and thriving industry. Their efficient use of the ‘walled garden’ approach makes them highly successful in the online marketing ecosystem. As the name implies, a walled garden is an enclosed platform where the platform provider has complete control over its content and applications.  The platform provider may even restrict the flow of information through media to create a monopoly for itself. The walled garden concept has gained popularity in the ad tech industry due to the rapid growth of conversions. Let’s first understand the history of the walled Garden before diving deep into this topic. The term Walled Garden was initially coined by a company called Telecommunications Inc which AT&T later acquired. In 1970s, when big players like Google, Facebook, or Amazon were still in the ideation stage, telecom providers such as Bell system used the walled garden approach.   This telecom provider had exclusive control of its hardware and little control over the information transmitted through its telephone lines. It’s not surprising that big players like Apple have total control over their iOS ecosystems, just as Bell Systems did over their hardware. This control extends from devices to applications for Apple. In marketing terms, advertisers use closed platforms to run their marketing campaigns through walled gardens, which is quite different from traditional marketing methods. The concept of a walled garden refers to data that is stored and used only for marketing purposes within silos. Walled garden platforms can keep the data in-house, facilitating the prevention of data leakage in the process. Installing a walled garden is difficult, but over time it can be one of the productive strategies for an ad tech service provider. The benefit of the Walled Garden approach to the Publishers Even if walled gardens seem to be menacing at some point, they are advantageous to publishers in many ways. It offers publishers an expansive audience outreach, efficient opportunities for monetization, and boosting referral traffic. Besides advertisers, publishers will also use the walled garden approach very effectively. To utilize the benefit of the walled garden approach constructively, they will bring on some exciting contents that induce the users to a subscription model. Publishers keep continuously catering to the audience with high-value content, engaging with them for a monthly fee. Following this strategy effectively helped renowned publishers like the New York Times gain 8 million subscribers recently. Regardless of size and reach, small and large publishers can use this strategy successfully. Large publishers immensely benefit from the walled garden approach as they possess an expansive audience and boundless reputation. The benefit of the Walled Garden approach to the Tech Companies As we discussed, three major conglomerates- Google, Facebook, and Apple, effectively utilize the walled garden strategy. With Facebook, it is effortless to target a large audience since it has over 2.89 billion users at its disposal, representing different age groups, genders, and ethnicities. All campaign performance data is housed on Facebook, and advertisers can access these platforms through its Demand Side Platform, Data Management Platform, and Dynamic Creative Optimization. Google employs an entirely different approach to target users with Gmail accounts, numbering 1.5 billion, and searches totaling 2  trillion   a year, it is easy to reach large audiences. With a data lake of rich zero, first-party data and a robust ad manager service, Google is efficiently using the walled garden approach. With its huge e-commerce platform, Amazon is generating an ad revenue of 31 billion USD in 2021 through its Amazon Ads Services platform. While Amazon is employing the same walled garden approach as other major players in this field, it is also acquiring second and third-party data from others. Apples’ business game is entirely different from its competitors as they are not using its platform for advertising purposes. Their user base is estimated to surpass 2.2 Billion by 2022 as a result of their multitude of hardware devices, including MacBook, iPads, and smartphones. Advantages of Walled Garden Through Walled gardens, companies may turn themselves into monopolies, hamper the spirit of competition, and create an unfair advantage over the other. Despite this fact, it is a magnificent tool for advertisers, publishers, and users in many ways. Major players like Facebook, The New York Times, and Google use walled gardens so that advertisers can target and customize their campaigns to maximize Return on Investment (ROI). In companies employing the walled garden strategy, user data is adequately encrypted, protected, and secured, and the former obtains the users’ consent before tracking their data. Since most users access these companies through laptops, cellphones, and tablets, they utilize cross-device data that is shared with advertisers regardless of the device customers use. Disadvantages of Walled Garden  The process of creating and maintaining a full-fledged walled garden approach can be extremely competitive and strenuous for companies. Keeping up with the competition is indeed a challenging task for all websites, but bringing forth quality content is a key to staying ahead.  The ability to constantly innovate and adapt to competitive pressures is key to a company’s success in social media, e-commerce, and search engine results. Walled gardens are beneficial for advertisers, marketers, and publishers alike. The effective walled garden strategy enables first-party data targeting, serving advertiser portals, and auction pricing.

Advertising is one of the essential steps that are required to make a business successful. The evolution of the advertising techniques expanded its horizons over the course of time. Advertisement through publishers is one such technique. In 2023, businesses want to target their advertisements and place them in strategic locations. Your website could be one of those locations, allowing you to earn money while providing a platform for advertisers to promote their goods and services.  With the help of ad networks, advertisers can manage their campaigns from a single location while running ads with multiple publishers using these online services. Defining Ad Network An ad network makes ad spaces available to the advertisers according to their requirements.  It enables advertisers to connect with the publisher websites in the AdTech industry that are in the pursuit of advertisements to host. The websites that are related to the industry to which the advertisers belong or those which have an audience base that overlaps with the advertiser’s audience, make the best locations to put up the advertisements. An ad network centralizes all of the advertisements for the advertisers. This facilitates to have a comprehensive information that includes the location, target audience, performance metrics, etc. Publishers could view the revenue generated by their advertisements on their dashboard. Importance of Ad Networks In order to facilitate business transactions between publishers and advertisers, ad networks are used. They serve as a crucial component of monetization within the advertising ecosystem. Publishers would have to haggle over contracts with each independent advertiser if ad networks didn’t exist. Ad networks are also renowned for working quickly to sell leftover ad inventory. They basically segment the leftover inventory of publishers on the basis of demographics, and then sell the segmented impressions to advertisers who are specifically seeking similar impressions. This ensures that the publishers’ inventory reaches the appropriate advertiser on time. While on the subject of the importance of Ad Networks, it is crucial to note that 47.3% of websites across the globe use Google Ads as the primary ad network. While this share seems to be less than half of the general population, it should be noted that this figure also denotes a 98.5% market share in the Ad Network industry, way more than any other competitor around. 5 Best Ad Networks Publishers must follow in 2023 Google AdSense When we talk about the best Ad Networks, Google AdSense is the one which mostly tops the list. Google AdSense is the best way for publishers to list ads on their sites. It has become one of the top ad networks that connect publishers and advertisers in the web and mobile advertising space as a result of Google’s propensity to lead the way in the industry in which it operates. Every ad is screened by Google, which also offers significant customization options and makes the implementation process as simple. One of the helpful features that demonstrates your potential gains from adding AdSense to your stack is the earnings estimator. Amazon With the most extensive connections to SSPs, Amazon provides access to a diverse range of buyers through a single ad network. It is simple to set up and manage because Unified Ad Marketplace is connected through Google Ad Manager. There are two ways to access Amazon Publisher Services‘ expansive ad network: Unified Ad Marketplace Transparent Ad Marketplace. Small to midsize publishers generally use Unified Ad Marketplace, which can be accessed through Google Ad Manager. While larger or enterprise publishers can be invited to access Transparent Ad Marketplace. Adcash With more than 10,000 active campaigns worldwide, Adcash DSP+ is an online advertising platform that stretches its scope from web to mobile ad networks. Pop-under, push notifications, banners, native ads, and interstitials are just a few of the best-performing ad formats it offers for monetizing websites and mobile apps. They have a variety of features and tools that assist publishers in more efficiently monetizing their traffic. They provide publishers with high eCPMs, flexible payment terms, real-time statistics, and support. Publishers can also take help from their experienced, multilingual account managers to advance their monetization strategy. Adroll AdRoll, which focuses on eCommerce businesses, performs numerous marketing-related tasks for businesses that want to increase their product sales. On the publisher’s end, AdRoll excels at connecting you with advertisers eager to place every targeted ad impression that is most likely to result in a sale. Scale is the main advantage of AdRoll for publishers. By connecting with 70% of shoppers and producing over 1 billion ad placement recommendations daily, this ad network attracts premium brands, who pay premiums for ythe premium inventory. Epom Market Epom Market is a cross-platform advertising network that connects advertisers and publishers working across 15 verticals in more than 40 countries. It collaborates with publishers of all sizes and serves more than 13 billion ad impressions each month, assisting in the monetization of mobile apps and website content. With category-targeting for higher eCPM rates, Epom Market supports a variety of ad formats, including standard banner ads, video ads, in-text ads, and mobile-specific ad units. Customers who sign up for a 30-day trial with Epom Market can get up to 1 billion free impressions. Conclusion It is crucial for a publisher to be a part of ad networks to ensure the right ads are published on appropriate platforms expanding across geographies. And, to guarantee success of the advertising techniques, you need to find and include appropriate publishers to your network. Cubera not only enables you to do so but also considers the proper methods for approaching other networks of this nature in order to gain additional insights. Publishers now have a streamlined and refined revenue flow based on the inflow of advertisements on the desired locations; thanks to Cubera’s creation of Ad networks. If you are looking for a competent Ad Network to expand your horizons across various geographies, Cubera is the best place to start.

The placement of ads is one of the many factors that determine how much money the websites make. There are many options available to publishers when it comes to creating ad placements. This frequently confounds them and prompts inquiries like which ad placement is the best and what are the highest paying ad placements. Ad placement cannot be guaranteed to increase ad revenue. Personalization is the key to finding the best ad placement, and publishers should follow best practices to stay on top of market trends. Since every website is different, there is no way to monetize them all using the same methods. This self-help manual assist publishers in choosing the ideal ad placement, its style and size for their website. Understanding Ad Placement Ad placement is the practice of placing advertisements on a publisher’s website in order to increase visibility for potential viewers, taking into consideration factors like the time of day, the number of available ad slots, and the particulars of the advertisement. Ad viewability and ad revenue are, both, significantly influenced by an advertisement’s placement on a page. Advertisers, seeking the highest return on their advertising investment, frequently ignore ads with low viewability. Publishers can select from automated placement criteria or create their own using Google Ads. We are all aware that in order to maximize ad earnings, ad viewability is a crucial metric to consider. With a click-through rate (CTR) of 3.17% on Google Ads, publishers must choose the best ad placement for their web pages, as well as ad sizes and formats, to ensure user engagement and boost revenue on their display ads. Why Ad Placement Matters? It’s crucial to keep track of where each advertisement is placed. The effectiveness of your campaigns depends heavily on where you place your ads. Imagine this scenario: If you’re watching a video on gardening and you come across an advertisement for a new television, you might not be particularly interested in it because you’re indulged into content about gardening at the moment. Rather, you may be much more motivated to click if you see an advertisement for a novel gardening tool. Likewise, if you show your ads to your target audience at the incorrect time and location, they won’t be well received. Utilize all the various online platforms available to you in order to optimize the way your ads are placed. 3 Best Ad Placement Strategies for Website Consider User’s Perspective By taking into account the user journey and what they anticipate from their interactions with your site, you can better understand where your ad placements should and shouldn’t be placed. This stops the user experience from being hampered by ad placements. Analyzing user intent is crucial when selecting ad formats. You must review previous data that was used to analyze user behavior on landing pages. Check to see if users are reading the content thoroughly or just skimming it. Additionally, based on user behavior, think about whether adding additional products or services to your website would work. When selecting which ads to display, ‘where the user’s attention will be’ is an important aspect. You should also consider how to include ads in this section of the page without interfering with users’ experience. Let the Site Data Guide You Utilize data and research to identify the most effective ads before deciding where to place them on your website. Below are some tools and data points that can be help you to decide and optimize the placement of your ads. Heat and Click Maps Heatmaps show you the areas of your page where visitors seem to be spending the most time. It will aid in your comprehension of the information they are viewing, their usage of the page, and their expectations of it. Although your content posts may have ad placements, you may find that no one scrolls down your page past the fold. Click maps show where users are clicking on the page. In order to get real-time accounts and understand the interactions of the user better, these tools will also provide recorded screencasts of actual users interacting with your website. Google Analytics Google Analytics provides comprehensive information on user behavior on your website and the sources of traffic. It assists you in: Identifying your best-performing content. Evaluating the effectiveness of a specific landing page. Whether your most devoted users come from direct traffic or organic search. Which devices or nations generate the most profitable search traffic. Split Testing To bring the most out of your website, A/B testing should be done for ad placements and user experience. Utilizing Optimize, tool offered by Google, you can direct search traffic to a particular link to view a variety of pages. You can also test ad placement and user experience optimizations by doing so. Ad placement for better customer experience At times your high performing ad might not be on par with the competitors due to the simple reason that its placement was managed haphazardly. At the end, what you want is the bounce rate to go down and the on site time to go up. Such an experience, when given to the user with a fine balance of placement and quality, works wonders for your ROI. So, focus more on the fact that you want the user to hang around and explore your website more. Ads shouldn’t pop up like jumpscare moments from a horror movie. Their repetition can be damaging to the view that you have in mind. The Final Words As previously stated, personalization is critical when developing an ad placement strategy. Knowing your audience is essential for providing an engaging and hassle-free experience. Understanding your audience and targeting them with the right ads at the right time and on the right platform is only possible with authentic and reliable data. Cubera provides one of the most comprehensive sets of zero-part data on which you can base your understanding of your target audience. Cubera‘s cutting-edge solutions, which adhere to all data rules and regulations, can assist you in developing website ad placement

The size and format of your banner ads play a crucial part in determining their effectiveness. If you are a Google AdSense user, it is imperative for you to explore all the available options it offers to ensure best performance of your banner ads. Ad formats that are more noticeable get more clicks and bring more revenue home. This is why certain sizes and formats of banner ads are preferred by publishers who have delved into this realm long enough. Why do the Banner Size and Format of an Ad matter? You can add different banner sizes and ad formats from Google AdSense to your website. Although, not all of them deliver the same caliber of outcomes. You’ll get a higher CTR with ads that are more prominent and easily visible when the page loads. Make sure to select an ad size that is straightforward to see. Some of the Google AdSense banner sizes, which are either too small or too large, may negatively impact the user experience. The number of advertisers that are running ads in that format on your website is also a factor that has an impact on ad performance. Since certain ad formats and banners are more popular with publishers, using them will give you access to a wider ad selection and higher revenue from them. The mobile-friendly ad formats will perform better than others on your website if mobile users account for the majority of your website’s traffic. 5 Best Performing AdSense Banner Sizes and Formats Leaderboard (728 X 90) One of the most popular ad sizes, leaderboard, has a high demand from publishers. Google claims that compared to other formats, leaderboard ads typically have the most available ad inventory. This indicates that it outperforms the majority of other ad formats. It works well on forum websites and when positioned above the main content. The placement of the ad after the page’s header makes it the first thing a user sees when they arrive at the page, making it highly visible without detracting from the user experience, as long as the quality of the ads is high. The leaderboard supports both text and image formats. When both formats are enabled, the leaderboard can aid in boosting ad revenues. Publishers will encounter fewer difficulties when selling slots of this size because these banner ads adhere to Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standards. Leaderboards work best on desktop and with forums, but you can also use it with pages designed for tablets. Medium Rectangle (300×250) Publishers and advertisers alike favor this ad unit. It is small but noticeable, especially when positioned above the fold. It can fit most sidebars alongside the content. It works on both desktop and mobile platforms and supports both text and image ads. It is a very popular ad size among publishers due to its adaptability and the abundance of available inventory, making it one of the higher-paying ad sizes. Placing a Leaderboard alongside a Medium Rectangle ad unit is a well-liked pairing that you might want to experiment with on your pages. Large Rectangle (336 X 280) As the name suggests, this ad size is bigger than the medium rectangle. However, it is less adaptable because it is not mobile-optimized and may only fit larger sidebars without degrading user experience. It works best at the end of an article or in between paragraphs of content and supports both text and image ads. Because of its size, it is more noticeable, which encourages more interactions and higher click-through rates. Due to this, it has become yet another popular ad size and a fantastic inventory choice for your website. Mobile Leaderboard (300 X 50) Designed specifically for mobile devices, this ad size is gaining popularity as more people use them to access the internet and view content. A mobile banner fits all smartphone screens, regardless of width, making it simple for mobile users to see. Publishers and advertisers typically place it at the top or bottom of content. However, since some visitors might find such banner ads annoying, it is advised that publishers prominently display the “close” or “skip” functionality to provide a positive user experience. Wide Skyscraper (160×600) Wide skyscraper is an ad format that is significantly taller than it is wide. This ad format is less intrusive when compared to others since it can be placed on the sides of pages. Advertisers are increasingly drawn to it because of its size and visibility. It is compatible with the vast majority of themes, ad formats and was created specifically for desktops. The skyscraper might not be rendered on the mobile platform to its full potential due to its constrained size and screen. When visitors land on a page and scroll down to read the content, they can see the skyscraper. Due to the fact that many users do not scroll down, advertising experts frequently advise placing ads above the fold. However, the ad is somewhat resistant to such challenges due to its visibility and design. Conclusion There are numerous ways for your website to generate income. Most bloggers still prefer AdSense as their primary source of income because it pays out quickly and is excellent for beginners. The simplicity of implementation and high potential for profit make banner advertising a preferred option for publishers and advertising. Publishers have a number of options for monetizing their website thanks to the wide range of banner ad sizes. But before choosing a particular ad size, it is always preferable to comprehend your inventory. Even if you find an ad size that is working well, testing out different sizes is a good way to approach website optimization.

A publisher spends a lot of time formulating and designing the right ad inventory and its designated strategy. However, at times certain aspects of this management strategy might slip past the careful eyes and run amok. Over the years, advertising techniques have evolved to a great extent. While there are a number of perks associated with their development, there also exists a number of elements that pose a threat to the publisher’s strategy. Invalid traffic happens to be one major contributor to the set of major problems faced by publishers. While its awareness and detection has increased, there are ways still being devised to combat its threat. What is invalid traffic? Invalid traffic refers to advertising impressions produced by bots or any other type of nonhuman traffic. According to a study by Cheq, bots and fake users make up 27% of organic and direct traffic, and IVT costs the advertising industry $42 billion annually. Although Invalid traffic and ad fraud are frequently confused, not all invalid traffic is malicious. The protection of advertising costs and ensuring the validity and viewability of impressions depend on the ability to identify all types of IVT (Invalid Traffic). A few common practices make up the bulk of all IVT. These practices include the accidental interactivity of a publisher with their own ad space on a programmatic advertising platform, bot traffic to increase the number of impressions in general, and other tools deployed for increasing the number of impressions. These practices are quite common and can be found almost on a thorough investigation of the matter. The dichotomy lies in their ability to sabotage the publishing efforts and ruining the landscape for the advertisers as well. What causes invalid traffic? There are, basically, two ways through which invalid traffic can hit a Publisher’s website. The first one being, where the Publisher himself is voluntarily creating the bot or nonhuman impressions, or the other one, where the invalid traffic is unintentional. In the second case, the causes of the created impressions are generally unknown to the publishers. Here are three major causes that can cause unintentional invalid traffic: Getting Hacked Bots now make up a significant portion of web traffic, and their usage is on the rise. While there are helpful bots like search engine bots, SEO crawlers, monitoring bots, etc., the existence of malicious bots cannot be disregarded. According to a 2019 Imperva study, malicious bots made up a staggering 24.1% of all web traffic. Bad bots that hack credentials and stuff credentials have seen the biggest increase in usage. The frequent DDoS attacks put a heavy burden on networks and, sometimes, even completely shut them down. Purchasing Traffic Purchased traffic, as the name suggests, entails paying to bring customers to your website. There are numerous ways to accomplish that. Pay per click campaigns, display ads, and content discovery campaigns are a few popular ways to buy website traffic. While it might seem like a good way to increase traffic on your website, this is ultimately bad for a brand’s reputation and revenue regardless of their advertising techniques. Expired and Redirected Domain Publishers frequently purchase expired domain names and redirect their websites to them. The rationale behind buying an expired domain is that, once the redirecting process is complete, the existing backlinks, rankings, and domain authority might benefit. Publishers may, however, send unwanted bots and crawlers to their new website while redirecting traffic, and they may also get Google warnings about invalid traffic as a result. Due to users searching for the old website, the website may also experience high bounce rates. Publishers who receive transferred impressions might also find it challenging to pinpoint the sources of and reasons for the traffic that is coming to their websites. How do we deal with invalid traffic? Be informed Being informed about your traffic and users is the key to deal with invalid traffic. Start by segmenting your audience according to their usage of various channels, devices, locations, etc. Be on the lookout for any unusual user behavior or sudden change in their number. Bot/invalid traffic can be identified by if the visits last less than one second and in most cases, if the user is not scrolling past 10% of the page depth. Ad codes on channels, geos, and traffic segments with high risk may need to be removed based on what you observe. Refrain from Purchasing Traffic Purchasing traffic is a costly idea as whether or not a lead is generated by a click on your advertisement, you are still charged for that click. Along with that, purchased traffic is a short-term solution. Once your subscription expires, the traffic dries up. Also, scammers abound in the website traffic buying industry. You might end up spending hundreds of dollars on ineffective fake traffic. Rather than purchasing traffic, invest in top-notch content, search engine optimization and user experience to organically increase traffic on your website. As a result, you would eventually benefit because advertisers would be willing to pay more for the high caliber of your website and the conversions it produces. Do not click on ads on your own website Do not click on ads on your own website. For fraudulent ad clicks, AdSense has a very strict policy. Self-click detection and elimination techniques are available from some ad providers, but doing so runs the risk of suspending accounts. If you must click your own site, whether for testing purposes or simply because you are curious about the destination URL, do it in a controlled setting using Google Publisher Console. Keep in mind that the true goal of advertisements is conversion, and Google pays you for each genuine click. Inform Google as soon as you can if you accidentally clicked on one of your ads. Also, ensure that the advertisements don’t interfere with the user experience. Clicks will result in Invalid Traffic if your ad tags overlap other content or are hidden behind other page elements. You can also make use of the best practices for ad viewability. To sum it

Publishing companies are always on the lookout for originating good quality content that kicks off alluring high traffic to their websites. If the publishing company is set to mint money, it can sell its ad spaces to advertising companies. If all the right elements are in place, publishers who wish to monetize their websites through advertising can do so successfully and profitably. The essential criteria to sell ad spaces for web publishers Advertisers strive to communicate their message and ensure that the right audience receives it. For marketers to accomplish this, they need a robust and highly engaging website that can reach the appropriate audience leading to further reductions in advertising expenses. As a result, we can now begin identifying the requirements for selling advertising spaces High Traffic– It is easy for publishers with a large reputation to attract advertisers to their sites because of the massive traffic they receive. Advertisers often flock to websites with good traffic figures. While it is a general sentiment shared among all advertisers, it isn’t a mandatory factor that determines a campaign’s success. Certain ad networks have their own criteria which the advertisers need to fulfill. Maintaining brand safety is crucial for publishers to avoid inappropriate ad placements that may adversely affect their revenue streams. For publishers, the quality and quantity of people visiting their webpage are crucial. Therefore, they have to focus more on increasing page views, which is the primary metric for measuring the number of visitors. Quality of the Content- A publisher must come up with original, relevant, and engaging content that hooks their readers and encourages them to return to their sites. It is imperative that publishers avoid containing illicit content on their sites, such as pornography, hate speech, weapons and ammunition, illegal drugs, alcohol, tobacco, gambling, and malware. Competent design– Publishers must ensure that their websites are aesthetically designed, and provide a great user experience. They should create their website with elegant designs that appeal to the eyes and should be made so the users can easily navigate between the pages. Websites should be designed to provide a holistic user experience while reducing latency and loading time to maintain user experience. Publishers must ensure that their website supports mobile platforms. The value of loyal audience – The most important thing for publishers is generating website traffic and building a loyal following. A website’s utmost paradigm is its engaging and loyal audience. Companies are willing to pay high prices for exposure to an active, engaged, and loyal audience that will visit their websites repeatedly. Transparency – Publishers need to provide credentials and contact information on the website’s home page to meet the standards of transparency. Digital advertising nowadays is bugged with problems encountered by both publishers and advertisers in dealing with unauthorized resellers, domain spoofing frauds (mimicking a reputed business with fake websites), and security breaches. In such a situation, publishers should highlight their transparency standards by displaying their metrics, content guidelines, and authors, so advertising companies clearly understand who they are dealing with. The use of Ad servers– Every publisher needs a robust ad server to collect data, impressions, and clicks, which will generate valuable insights about advertisements on their websites. With this information, the publisher can make wise and informed decisions about the kind of advertisements most relevant to the visitors. This can help improve advertisers’ advertising techniques by delivering quality ads to their custom audiences. The methods to sell advertising space Those publishers who attract a lot of traffic, have large audiences, and produce original, engaging content should monetize their ad spaces using well-crafted strategies. The most prominent strategies followed by publishers are as follows: Utilization of Programmatic advertising – Ad spaces are traded on real-time auctions through automated platforms in programmatic advertising, automating the buying and selling process between publishers and advertisers. Advertisers compete for ad spaces enabling publishers to maximize their revenue. Through effective programmatic advertising, publishers can know the intrinsic value of their ad inventory through dynamic real-time insights. This helps them to craft customizable ad inventory for highly competitive bidding environments. A Real-Time Bidding process uses an auction process to buy and sell ad impressions for a targeted audience. Publishers and advertisers are connected via ad exchanges via Demand Side Platforms (DSPs) and Supply Side Platforms (SSPs). Through a robust Supply-Side Platform, website owners can manage and sell ad inventories through Real-Time Bidding. Through SSP, publishers can monetize their ad spaces and receive bids from various advertisers through DMP. The importance of Ad Networks–Ad networks link advertisers and publishers, and more importantly, this platform facilitates more efficient data and creative management.  Ad networks are a good choice for publishers who want more control over the whole process and are interested in selling custom cohorts to brand-safe advertisers. Sell Ad Spaces Directly – Publishers can directly sell their ads to brands and advertisers. In this scenario, there is no need for an ad network or SSP. To effectively accomplish this feat, publishers should build a solid and everlasting relationship with advertisers by manually sourcing them and negotiating the terms and cost parameters. Once publishers have established a long-term and durable relationship with specific advertisers, they can reserve ad space on their websites specifically for them. While this is time-consuming, publishers can set pricing terms once a relationship has been established. The Affiliate Advertising Method – The best method for selling ads is through Affiliate Advertising, where publishers put their affiliate links on their websites, blogs, and social networks. Affiliate advertising offered by publishers allows influencers, big companies, small and medium websites to earn commissions based on sales. In 2022, it is estimated that the total business spending in the US will exceed USD 8.2 billion through affiliate marketing. As we briefly discussed how publishers could monetize their ad spaces to maximize their returns, they must consider the kind of ads that work best for their website’s specialty. In deciding whether to use direct, programmatic, affiliate marketing, or ad networks, publishers should weigh the pros and cons of each strategy.

The number of email users has tremendously increased to 4.25 billion (Statista) people by 2022. Considering the world population of 8 billion people by 2022 (un.org) was a phenomenal achievement. Email marketing campaigns generate the most leads and the highest return on investment for marketers across the globe. The drive to increase personalized content across all emails has become the need of the hour for reaching new customers while retaining the existing customer base. Such desperate situations call for the inclusion of creativity and practical solutions in all the emails the marketers send to their customers.  Recent studies suggest that personalizing your emails increases the conversion and opening email rate by 25% (business. com). As time progressed, advertisers resorted to finding innovative ways to create the most effective and revenue-generating campaigns with the tremendous popularity of email campaigns. Microsites and personalized email marketing To accomplish the purpose of effective email marketing to its core, email experts across the globe devised a contemporary and revolutionary artifact called microsites. We can now delve into understanding a microsite and how it helps personalize email marketing. Microsites can be best described as customized and dedicated mini websites or a multi-page newsletter that allows users to skim and engage deeply through each content in the email newsletter. A microsite can be best described as a minuscule website that provides concise information but will detail specific market information, products, and services or that has generic content. Advertisers mainly use microsites to target a specific audience or to attain a particular outcome. The microsite’s content should be different from the content of the brand’s main website. Microsite emails allow their prospects to finish off their marketing actions without leaving their inboxes. Customers can go through the content they prefer, which substantially aggravates email campaigns’ personalization. By using microsite emails, readers find it convenient to read and click the articles and cruise between the articles, thus increasing the click-through rate. By keeping personalization as its top priority, micro-site emails help advertisers create marketing campaigns with a higher chance of conversion. The surge in the volume of emails is virtually bombarding our mail inboxes, adversely affecting the engagement and reader’s connection to the various brands. A recent study found that microsite emails have facilitated effective conversions by email campaigns astonishingly over the past three years. Effective marketing campaigns should focus on the needs and aspirations of their valuable customers and should incessantly strive to deliver the products and services that cater to their requirements. Brands must understand their trusted customers’ growing appetites and communicate with them effectively without being intrusive to succeed and stand the test of time. Advertisers are trying to craft microsites to reduce friction, ensuring a seamless browsing experience, display offers and purchases to their customers without leaving their inboxes, thus gradually replacing the concept of click-through rate (CTR). Personalization is the key to productive marketing campaigns, and microsite emails place baggage of opportunities for achieving the true essence of personalization.  Brands thriving in advertising have brand newsletters smartly showcasing ideas and issues relevant to the products and services. Brands should consciously incorporate data visualization, elegant images, and thoughtful product placement in their microsite emails to be more creative and remarkable. By using microsite newsletters, brands can guide customers through the customer journey and influence every decision they make with knowledge and insight. The best possible ways to create wonders in microsite emails Following are some prime practices for creating highly effective, engaging email microsites for advertisers: 1.  An alternative gateway for brands, microsite emails should be designed in such a way that they are simple, crisp, visually engaging, and relevant to the content. This ensures that visitors will like your microsite email and consciously try to understand the site’s contents, thus increasing the session time. 2. Advertisers must effectively capitalize on the richest zero-party data enriched with first and second-party data to unveil what customers like and suit their needs, thus banging on the concept of personalization. Integrating carousal formats in the microsite emails will invigorate the best web experience and take the visual experience to the next level. 3. Advertisers should ensure that they should refrain from bombarding their customers’ mail inboxes with various kinds of brand emails. Advertisers should ensure that their emails are not pushy and that the email communication should be well thought off to efficiently promote customer engagement. Marketers can better understand their products and services’ latest and future market trends by adequately engaging with their valuable customers. Advertisers should ensure that their mails should be exciting to attain a wholesome web experience. 4. Advertisers should ensure that they enrich their zero-party data with first and second-party data, which, if fruitfully utilized, can make a huge difference in their marketing campaigns overnight. Gaining a deeper understanding of their customers through online and offline data through effective Omni channel advertising will help advertisers to craft high-performing personalized messages. The factors to be considered before developing a full-fledged microsite Advertisers must consider economic factors, as developing a microsite can be costly especially for successfully running one marketing campaign. Advertisers must also implement AI and machine learning tools to accurately analyze patterns of customer behavior in order to create relevant, trend-driven content for microsites. Advertisers must ensure that the contents of the microsite emails should be condensed, crisp, and customized without incorporating too much information, flamboyant color themes and distracting images. As microsites are not the main websites, advertisers must consider that the contents in the microsite have only what the users need, which helps seamless customer engagement. It is important that advertisers ensure users are not confused by personalized messages and actions and that they are aligned with the brand tone and voice as effectively as possible.   The future is bright for microsite emails if they are designed creatively and personalized to target a specific audience which would boost conversion exponentially.