BlackBerry Advertising Service

[malch]

Considering the very low fillrates in combination with RIMs 40% share of all ad revenue generated I am asking myself where the advantage of the blackberry ad service is compared to pure mobclix or admob. Sure they might have an even lower fill rate on BlackBerry and are "harder" to implement but after all i still get 100% of the ad revenue payed.

Coming from iOS /Android environment it wonder whether or not generating revenue through ads is a viable strategy on BlackBerry? Reading in the forums gives me the impression that it certainly does not pay off for the developer.

Any thoughts on this / do you earn real money with the ad service?

[lagunex]

Hi.

I've been using BBAS since December so I'm stil learning the best strategy for advertising.

My fill rate is 88.9%. Is it low?

What I don't like that much is that they only offer me 3 AdNetworks to choose from, when back in January there were five and they even claim to have more.

The advantage for begginers is that it is really easy to use. Three lines of code and you got yourself a Banner to place which automatically changes every minute.

Options like Smaato, for instance, need a little bit of work to get the same effect. But I do not know if they generate more revenue for the same statistics.

I though all AdNetwork solutions share the dividends in a similar way. iOS is also 60/40, don't know for Android's default. Also, this 60/40 doesn't mean that what you see on BBAS reports have to be multiply by .60. It is like a modern word processor, a WYSIWYG tool, i.e., you'll receive exactly the amount shown there.

I hope it helps.

Cheers.

[malch]

Hi lagunex,

thx for your response (at least one :-)

Your fill rate seems to be quite ok, that´s reassuring. On iOS/Android we usually see fill rates around 98% (with adMob) but 88% is not too far off.

What i heave read is that others are having some trouble getting their fill rate or ecpm up (e.g.: http://supportforums.blackberry.com/t5/BlackBerry-Advertising-Service/Unusually-low-revenue/td-p/124... Is this due to recent reporting erros in the AdService or are eCPM really quite low?

Concerning the revenue share, i quote from the AdService Terms (https://adservices.blackberry.com/terms):

---

[...]pay to Publisher fees equal to sixty percent (60%) of the Ad Supplier Revenue[...]

1.4 “Ad Supplier Revenue” means, in respect of particular Ad Content, all revenue received by an Ad Supplier (excluding, for greater certainty, taxes and other applicable deductions) attributable to the distribution and serving of the Ad Content.

---

"though all AdNetwork solutions share the dividends in a similar way. iOS is also 60/40, don't know for Android's default."

I usually don´t care how much AdMob or iAd take as a share from the final advertiser because I am calculating with the actual value they pay to me. Here is an example of how I am interpreting the AdService terms:

1. Let´s say an advertiser pays $100 to AdMob for Ads.
2. AdMob then takes a 40% share of that and pays out $60 to the developer (me).
3. Now with the BB AdService BalckBerry again takes 40% of that $60 and pays me the resulting amount of $36.

That´s a 40% share I pay to BB just for the convenience of using their "easy to implement" AdService? Maybe I am getting this all wrong but I really don´t see the benefit in using the AdService when I loose about 40% of my income.

On Andoird/IOs it takes me about 2 hours to implement a new Ad SDK (e.g. moblix). Compared to that the BB-AdService (as I understand it) does not look very good.

[lagunex]

As I understand the agreement, 60% of Ad Supplier Revenue is paid to the Publisher, i.e., the developer.

So it is like this: From every 100$ on Ad Supplier Revenue, you get 60$. Why did you multiply again by 40%?

It is just like the AdMob example you used.

"all revenue received by an Ad Supplier" (advertiser pays $100 to BBAS)

"pay to Publisher fees equal to sixty percent (60%)" (BBAS pays the developer 60$)

As I said before, I haven't used other solutions so I can't compare different revenues for the same statistics but regarding the agreement, it seems fine to me.

[malch]

The first 40% is AdMobs share of the $100 and the second 40% is RIMs Share of the 60% left by AdMob. To my understanding "Ad Supplier Revenue" equals the amount which is payed by AdMob ($100-40%).

So unless RIM is not taking any share at all (which would be good news) i presume that of the remaining 60% RIM takes 40% to cover their "AdService" costs leaving me with $36 of potentially $60.

With your example: on pure AdMob i would received $100 not $60.

But you are right, as long as the ecpm and revenue is high enough for the developer we shouldn´t care about how many ad companies take their share inbetween but I can´t resist making the comparison to a highly possible alternative like pure "AdMob".

Thx anyhow for your input :-)
I hope it pays off for you.

[lagunex]

I understand your point. 

I'm assuming RIM is giving us 60% and they are dealing with the remaining 40% and the different AdNetworks. Can't say for sure. I hope someone from RIM could make this clear for both of us.

Do you have any active BB application with AdMob or any other solution? Would you mind sharing with me your statistics to compare revenue? I'm open to change framework as I don't have any problem on working with a harder tool.

I do have a lot of impressions but really few clicks (so CTR is really low) and I'm trying to find out the best ad strategy (place, frequency, etc.). I only have one app published so far. I've realized that more clicks boost a lot eCPM (much more than just more impressions).

Cheers.

[malch]

We only have one paid App in the BlackBerry Appworld and are currently trying to find out whether or not porting some of our Android and iOS Freemium (or Ad based) Apps will pay off.

As far as ecpms are concerned I can give you some numbers from AdMob on iOS and Android.

ecpm on Android vary between $0.04 and $0.35
ecpm on iOS vary between $0.76 and $1.86

As far as I can tell ecpms are quite different for each App depending on how well you can advertise und what advertiser you use. E.g.: changing from AdMob to moblix gave us some improvements on one app but none on the other.

Hope this is helpful :-)