Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 88 posts

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#41

Post by Ryan_Jones »

billmalarky wrote: post #36
Ryan_Jones wrote: post #5

so, I realize this might be seen as spam, but I am always trying out adsense alternatives and regularly maintain a list of the ones I'm trying out. http://www.dotcult.com/best-adsense-alternatives/ TLDR: casale, Lijit, technorati are working best for me.

Lijit was the best alternative for me, and I went through a good 5-6 networks. However, their CPM's were significantly less than adsense. Their support is really good though and they do actually have control over their inventory unlike a lot of other ad networks I worked with (many networks claim to be able to block audible/video/popup malicious ads but still allow many to slip through). Technorati is decent I believ…

I still use Lijit for their "backup ads" feature. Basically, I monitor the CPMs I'm getting from other networks, then set my floor CPM in Lijit to that number. That way, I get about 30% fill with Lijit - but it's guaranteed to be at a higher CPM than the other network. Chaining them together works really well - you just need to do it asynchronously so that it doesn't impact load times.

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#42

Post by junto »

Chitika wrote: post #15

Hi, Chitika customer support here! Our ad network is often used by those who cannot get AdSense approval but who still have high-quality sites. You can even test us out alongside AdSense -- we've found most publishers who use Chitika AND AdSense make more money than those who use AdSense alone. We have search-targeted text, display, mobile, in-text, pop-out, and highlight ads available to all of our publishers. Feel…

What is your company's policy on ads that automatically open up iTunes or Google Play if they detect an iOS or Android device.

Because that shady practice is really starting to annoy me.

I've now had to enable parental controls (for myself) and block the iTunes app to prevent these annoying subversive ads from hijacking my browser on my iPad.

I'd like to see a policy of 1 warning then a ban for ad publishers who use these underhanded methods.

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#43

Post by doh »

toddynho wrote: post #16

Todd from @BuySellAds here. An ideal setup is one in which you utilize about a handful of different companies in the "Tier 2" position. Probably no more than a handful though, because after that it gets hard to manage and rather convoluted. Tier 1 is your directly sold ads (stuff you sell on your own directly to an advertiser or through a company like BuySellAds). Tier 2 is where the AdSense's of the world will live.…

Hm, this is what google shows when you type the name of your company (at least in safari)

http://imgur.com/cfdFdvd

There is no link to click on

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#44

Post by junto »

toddynho wrote: post #16

Todd from @BuySellAds here. An ideal setup is one in which you utilize about a handful of different companies in the "Tier 2" position. Probably no more than a handful though, because after that it gets hard to manage and rather convoluted. Tier 1 is your directly sold ads (stuff you sell on your own directly to an advertiser or through a company like BuySellAds). Tier 2 is where the AdSense's of the world will live.…

Hi Todd. I just asked a competitor for his company's policy on App Store browser hijacking [1]. I.e. Ads that automatically open iTunes or Google Play. What is your company's policy regarding this extremely shady underhanded practice?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7675109

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#45

Post by elwell »

antjanus wrote: post #17

Honestly, none of that. Create your own "ad network". Basically, figure out the theme of your blog and what kind of people it attracts and then find affiliate programs for that. For example. Let's say your tutorials are for developers. What do developers need? * development tools * hosting * further courses/learning That will yield a pretty good list of affiliates that will convert well such as: * New Relic * Digital…

The Digital Ocean ad on your site is a faulty link that 404s

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#46

Post by junto »

sandycheeks wrote: post #32
toddynho wrote: post #16

Todd from @BuySellAds here. An ideal setup is one in which you utilize about a handful of different companies in the "Tier 2" position. Probably no more than a handful though, because after that it gets hard to manage and rather convoluted. Tier 1 is your directly sold ads (stuff you sell on your own directly to an advertiser or through a company like BuySellAds). Tier 2 is where the AdSense's of the world will live.…

We've noticed a decrease in tier 1 advertisers over the last 18 months. We get a million+ uniques per month and are very picky about the ads we run. The decrease in tier 1 has been small businesses who have become concerned that their ads may be misconstrued as 'link buying' and will cause them to be penalized in Google's search so all that is left for us are the large brands. Many of the small businesses had been ad…

That's scary. Do Google really penalise companies who buy advertising from other sites other than via Google Adsense?

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#47

Post by Chitika »

junto wrote: post #42
Chitika wrote: post #15

Hi, Chitika customer support here! Our ad network is often used by those who cannot get AdSense approval but who still have high-quality sites. You can even test us out alongside AdSense -- we've found most publishers who use Chitika AND AdSense make more money than those who use AdSense alone. We have search-targeted text, display, mobile, in-text, pop-out, and highlight ads available to all of our publishers. Feel…

What is your company's policy on ads that automatically open up iTunes or Google Play if they detect an iOS or Android device. Because that shady practice is really starting to annoy me. I've now had to enable parental controls (for myself) and block the iTunes app to prevent these annoying subversive ads from hijacking my browser on my iPad. I'd like to see a policy of 1 warning then a ban for ad publishers who use…

An ad should never open up an application on your device for you. It should only direct you to content that you've asked to see (because you made a decision to click on that ad). We hate annoying ads too! If you do see a Chitika ad that does this, let us know ASAP so we can remove it and make sure it's not happening anywhere else.

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#48

Post by u124556 »

antjanus wrote: post #17

Honestly, none of that. Create your own "ad network". Basically, figure out the theme of your blog and what kind of people it attracts and then find affiliate programs for that. For example. Let's say your tutorials are for developers. What do developers need? * development tools * hosting * further courses/learning That will yield a pretty good list of affiliates that will convert well such as: * New Relic * Digital…

Your Digital Ocean link doesn't work, the double // after the domain seems to be the problem.

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#49

Post by josefresco »

antjanus wrote: post #17

Honestly, none of that. Create your own "ad network". Basically, figure out the theme of your blog and what kind of people it attracts and then find affiliate programs for that. For example. Let's say your tutorials are for developers. What do developers need? * development tools * hosting * further courses/learning That will yield a pretty good list of affiliates that will convert well such as: * New Relic * Digital…

Please don't tell me your advocating using affiliates in place of an ad network like AdSense. While on the surface it makes sense, and if you're lucky you'll find great affiliate programs, but there's an equally, some would say much dirtier side to affiliate programs.

Success is the key to how your relationships go. Get too successful and chances are the company you have an affiliate agreement with will get tired of paying out large sums to you (sound familiar?) They will either kill your relationship outright, or replicate your business model first and then kill your relationship once it's taken hold.

Also, other affiliates will do whatever they can to sabotage your efforts.

The best defense to all of these shenanigans is diversification and direct ad sales.

Google may or may not screw you on AdSense, and your affiliate "partner" may or may not to the same. They key is to be ready and have an alternative waiting in the wings for when it happens (and trust me it will if you have success)

Re: Ask HN: AdSense alternatives?

#50

Post by antjanus »

elwell wrote: post #45
antjanus wrote: post #17

Honestly, none of that. Create your own "ad network". Basically, figure out the theme of your blog and what kind of people it attracts and then find affiliate programs for that. For example. Let's say your tutorials are for developers. What do developers need? * development tools * hosting * further courses/learning That will yield a pretty good list of affiliates that will convert well such as: * New Relic * Digital…

The Digital Ocean ad on your site is a faulty link that 404s

Thanks! I just added it, simple typo :)
Post reply on HN