Account Dashboards as a Monetization Opportunity

Many publishers have a login feature (either using social login like Facebook or Twitter or using their own homegrown system). For publishers, these login systems can be a great way to gather information on their audience and perhaps provide them with better targeting. That being said, these account dashboards also provide a unique opportunity to monetize a user given the intent of the user when they log in.

A User's Intent Drives Clicks

It can be reasonably assumed that when users are logging into an account on your site, they are doing so for a purpose: checking alerts, updating their payment information, setting up a new billing address, etc. In fact, users are really logging in to perform a very specific action. This is really the underlying reason why they could be monetized so well with a properly placed advertisement.

Even if the user hasn't already completed the task they are doing, and it isn't that important to the user at that time, the advertisement provides a compelling opportunity to monetize the user upon exit. If the user was already going to navigate away from your account because either a) their task is completed or b) they felt compelled to leave and take care of it later, it would be best to monetize both options using an advertisement.

Placement, Placement, Placement

Monetizing your users on an account dashboard will provide a great way to properly monetizes users once they are ready to exit a page. The placement can really define whether or not the ad performs well or under performs. Central to this idea is that we are not trying to bombard the user with advertisements; rather, we are trying to place the advertisement in such a way that they are able to discern the message without really harming their user experience flow while completing tasks within the account dashboard environment. When executed properly, publishers can more effectively monetize this audience of users, and grow revenue as a result.

Competition & DFP SB's Dynamic Allocation

Many publishers find themselves at a unique point where it makes financial sense to invest in an ad server in order to bring in new sources of demand that compete with each other. For these publishers, a secure and easy to use ad server will help them grow their ad operations and enable them to source new streams of revenue.

This post will cover DoubleClick for Publisher's dynamic allocation feature, which allows publishers to set different demand sources to compete with Google's own AdSense ad network.

Competition is a publisher's best friend. Inherent to the dynamic allocation feature is the notion that competition will yield more buyers who will bid higher for inventory thus driving up revenues for a publisher. This concept is so critical that many publishers have seen double digit increases in their revenue simply because of more non-guaranteed competition.

A few things to note:
1. Make sure you have a valid AdSense account associated with your DFP account.
2. When trafficking new demand sources, be it other ad networks, etc., always traffic these demand sources at a Price Priority and ensure the right CPM is being used within DFP. This will allow DFP to accurately price impressions within the auction, ensuring you as the publisher will win out over the long run.
3. Check to make sure that dynamic allocation is enabled for each new ad unit. This will ensure you have some demand to fill even if there are no other sources of demand in the ad server.

The goal here is and always will be to drive more revenue to publishers in a smart and methodical way. In another post, we will explore direct sales and specifically the concept of direct non-guaranteed ad sales, thereby allowing you to maximize the value of your remnant inventory while also commanding higher premium CPMs.

Know Your Audience

It goes without saying that in any industry or field, knowing your audience is crucial. Whether you're a speaker about to give a presentation or a company about to enter a new market, understanding the people who will be consuming and using your product/service/good will ensure that your efforts are not in vain.

In this vein, publishers need to start focusing on understanding their own audience in order to take advantage of the growing opportunity to attract buyers who want to know this information. Online publishers are starting to see their bottom lines get hammered as advertisers look towards audience targeting and buying to guide their buying decisions, rather than traffic volume and pageviews. In this increasingly competitive world, publishers who don't know their audience are at a total disadvantage, as they are unable to service these increasingly sophisticated (and higher paying) online advertisers.

Comscore by Cirino, Zheng [Paperback] (Google Affiliate Ad)

Why is it important for publishers to know their audience? Simply put, knowing your audience allows you to offer targeted offerings to advertisers, which in turn allows you to command higher CPMs when offering deals to buyers. In the increasingly data-driven and ROI-focused world of online advertising, publishers need to make sure they are servicing their advertising clients by offering demographics and (hopefully) psychographics on their user base and audience.

Luckily for publishers, there are a number of ways to approach this unique problem. Many data companies exist to anonymously track and monitor audiences, providing publishers with the data they need to command higher CPMs in any direct deal negotiations. Companies that publishers should look for include Quantcast, comScore and eXelate. For each of these companies, a simple bit of code is dropped on the publishers website which then sends back information via the code or "pixel" to the companies, providing the publisher with valuable information on their audience and demographics. This data, in turn, can then be used to make informed decisions on where to focus outreach efforts to buyers, ensuring that any sales efforts taken forth will thus be put to good use.

Know your audience, and command a higher CPM. It's that simple.

Guaranteed Inventory: The Ideal Publisher Setup

If you're a publisher who is currently looking to secure direct deals for your website, good work; many publishers find that direct deals can bring in a much higher CPM than their remnant inventory, further boosting their revenue and strengthening their monetization efforts. This post will focus on a way of creating something akin to guaranteed inventory while also creating price pressure within the auction. As you will see, both advertisers and publishers will win with this strategy.

Guaranteed inventory generally sits at the top of your waterfall. It's highly coveted by advertisers who want to be the first impression that a user sees on your site and highly lucrative for publishers who can charge a premium to said advertisers for the opportunity to sit above the auction and get a first look. Typically Guaranteed inventory means you as the publisher are setting aside a certain amount of your available impressions exclusively for the advertiser.

This does carry some risk for the publisher. As a publisher, you have to feel confident that the CPM you are getting directly will almost always clear the vast majority of bids you are seeing in the auction. If the CPM you are receiving from a direct advertiser doesn't comfortably sit above the auction, you may leave money on the table as the guaranteed advertiser gets to display an ad that may be worth less than the one from the auction that could have potentially ran had the guarantee not been in place.

That being said, for the publisher, the ideal situation is an advertiser who pays a very high CPM but doesn't actually have guaranteed first look. In this scheme, the advertiser effectively takes first impression since their CPM bid is far above the normal remnant CPM that the publisher is seeing from their networks. For DFP users, you effectively create a line item that isn't guaranteed inventory but rather normal inventory that goes through the auction. As a result, if there is ever a situation where the network can beat the advertiser's CPM, it behooves the publisher to provide that specific impression at auction to the network, thereby maximizing publisher revenue. By making the advertiser go through the auction, you theoretically create price pressure within the auction by inducing network buyers to raise their bids and hopefully beat out the higher paying direct advertiser.

A lot of advertisers may not like this setup since they feel they are paying more for not much benefit. In fact, the advertiser should stand to achieve a much more effective campaign as well as ROI on that campaign since theoretically they are now paying the exact price they would like to hit for the exact number of impressions that will convert best for them (assuming they are optimizing their CPM bid based on their KPIs). First impression is thus determined by the auction, but generally goes to the higher paying CPM advertiser in most (if not all cases) and the difference between them getting guaranteed all first impressions versus getting close to all first impressions is negligible.

If you find yourself in the middle of negotiations where you can obtain a higher paying non-guaranteed advertiser, ensure that their CPM bid is well above the remnant CPM you are seeing so as to effectively give them "first impression" without guaranteeing the inventory (for legal reasons you will always have to state this in your IO so as not to misrepresent yourself); you maximize revenue optimization efforts since the advertiser has to go through the auction and will (most likely) win while (most likely) putting price pressure on the other networks, thereby increasing their bid at auction and delivering more overall revenue to you, the publisher. Your advertiser still gets what they want ("first impression") because the CPM bid is so high that the auction usually can't match this number while the publisher gets what they want because the higher paying advertiser CPM puts price pressure at auction and hopefully induces the networks to bid higher and make the auction more competitive.

It's a good strategy for publishers who are working with a small handful of direct advertisers, and can lead to very strong revenue growth when implemented and managed properly.

Welcome & First Post

This is my first post on the Publisher Optimization Central blog. My goal is to provide online publishers who use display advertising as a monetization and revenue generation strategy with the tools, tips, tricks and resources to ensure they are getting the most bang for their buck with their content. Check back soon for some additional updates and some more information as time goes by.

Thanks,
Raj