15 Best Ad Networks For Publishers And Bloggers To Monetize Your Blog
Okay, so you’ve set up your blog and are looking for ways to monetize it.
Or maybe you’re still in the planning stage – you’ve decided to set up a blog and are trying to figure out if ad networks can help you monetize your blog.
Maybe you’re wondering:
Which ad network pays the best?
Which is the best ad network for publishers?
What is the biggest advertising platform?
What are the best free advertising sites?
What are the best ad companies for blogs?
Which are the largest display ad networks and largest video ad networks?
In today’s blog we will cover topics such as mobile ad network comparison, popular ad networks for new bloggers, what are the biggest ad exchanges among premium ad networks, and other ad networks that you may want to join as a blogger or publisher.
Internet ad spending in the US is predicted to rise from 121 billion USD in 2020 to close to 153 billion USD in 2024.
It’s no wonder that the ad tech industry is booming with advertisers and publishers spending more and more on display ads using the top 100 ad networks.
When choosing the best ad network for publishers, it is important that you keep your customers in mind and make sure that you are not hampering their user experience with display ads and shopping ads.
In this article, I will talk about the best ad network examples for publishers and bloggers, how you can choose the best ad platforms for your business, and whether Mediavine is better than Google AdSense when it comes to comparing the most well-known advertising platforms.
We will also check out the traffic requirement of each of these blog advertising networks, their ad providers technology, and how much advertising revenue you can expect from each of them.
Ready to begin? Let’s go.
Disclaimer: If you buy something using the links in this article, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you. Know that I only promote stuff that I use and trust for the sake of my readers and the reputation of this site.
What Is An Ad Network?
An ad network is a sort of marketplace for advertisers and publishers (owners of websites with ad space to rent out).
The ad network searches the internet for ad space that is available and then sells that ad space to advertisers to display their ads.
An ad network acts as a self-serve platform and allows you to set up an ad inventory to maximize your ad revenue.
Watch this video to learn more about advertising technology and how major ad networks work:
An ad network owns ad servers for selling ad impressions to advertisers and monitoring ad revenue.
What is The Difference Between An Ad Network And An Ad Exchange?
An ad network acts as an intermediary by collecting ad inventory from publishers and selling them to advertisers. An ad exchange, on the other hand, is a digital marketplace where the advertiser publisher network can sell their ad inventory directly to advertisers.
How Do I Choose An Advertising Network?
Before we look at the top mobile ad networks ranking, it is important that you understand how publishers and bloggers choose the best advertising network that suits their business model.
Whether it’s mobile ad networks or any other advertising technology, you need to consider the features and benefits of each advertising platform so that you can make the best decision for your business.
There are many factors when it comes to choosing the best ad networks for your business:
- Research the different websites in your niche and see what ad networks run on them. Remember that most ad networks use artificial intelligence to pick what ads to run on sites.
- Take into account whether you want to run ads on a website or mobile app (android or iOS). If you plan to run ads on a mobile app it would make more sense to go with a mobile marketing platform for ads.
- Check the size of the ad inventory of the ad network you are considering. The bigger their ad inventory, the larger the number of websites they can run your ads on.
- Make sure that the ad network is a platform that serves good quality ads. The quality of ads running on your website or mobile app greatly affects the user experience.
- Go with the best ad networks that have more than one ad format to choose from. There are different types of ad formats such as video ad formats, text ads, or pop-under ads. Even if you plan to run only text ads, plan to join an ad network that gives your room to scale to video ad campaigns later on as your business grows.
- Check the traffic requirements of the ad network you plan to join. You need to consider your current website traffic from Google or from social media like Twitter depending on where your customers usually hang out.
- Check the payout offered by each ad network you want to join. Do not join ad networks with a very low payout or ad networks that promise a high payout only if you meet very high traffic requirements.
- Educate yourself on ad fraud and how you can avoid it. Ad fraud is usually committed by domain spoofing, cookie stuffing, or geo masking, so be sure to choose a reputable ad network that is transparent with account managers and publishing partners.
Here is a helpful infographic with more tips on how to choose an vertical ad network for your business:
Is Mediavine Better Than Google AdSense?
Many publishers have this question, so here is my review of the two most popular advertising companies.
Google AdSense – Best For Beginners
Google AdSense acts as the middleman for your ads and has one of the simplest ways of adding ads to your site.
Just copy and paste a snippet of code on your site, and Google finds the relevant ads to display.
How much do Google ads cost?
Nothing – it’s free.
Google AdSense does not have a minimum traffic requirement for publishers to display ads on their site, so almost all first-time bloggers get started with them. You can check within your blogger network for the best ad networks to join.
Mediavine – Premium Ad network For Seasoned Bloggers/ Publishers
However, Mediavine is a different story.
Mediavine earns publishers a much higher revenue and also has a high barrier for entry ().
However, it can be interesting to know that Mediavine partners directly with Google to serve ads on your site.
Mediavine’s ad inventory comes from Google’s AdExchange, which is a bigger and more premium version of Google AdSense. AdExchange offers a higher revenue with bigger ad buys and more advanced targeting.
Mediavine is a Google Certified Publishing Partner meaning most of their products and services are integrated with Google products, allowing them to optimize the publisher’s revenue for maximum earnings.
In short, both ad networks are excellent in their own ways.
Mediavine is just the high-end version of Google AdSense.
Best Ad Networks For Small Publishers And Bloggers In The US
1. Google AdSense
Google AdSense is one of the most popular ad networks available for publishers and advertisers with over 2 million users.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimum traffic requirement
Features:
- High-quality ads
- Customization of ads
- Automated ads that scan the site and place ads where they can convert more
- Ad size optimization
- Easy signup and setup
2. Mediavine
Mediavine is a full-service ad network that offers ad management services for businesses. They claim to deliver high-quality ads that increase revenue and create a better user experience.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: 50,000 sessions in the previous 30 days (per Google Analytics)
Features:
- High-quality traffic
- Programmatic advertising
- Influencer marketing
- Simple, clean, and beautiful ad placement
- SEO– focused
- Better site speed
- Unparalleled customer service
3. Adclickmedia
Adclickmedia helps publishers optimize their ad revenue by identifying the most relevant keywords on the site and getting the best matching ads from the highest bidders. It allows you to customize ad codes to match the design and layout of your site.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: No minimum traffic
Features:
- Text ads
- Banner ads
- Text + image ads
- Quick and easy signup
- Customizable ad codes to match your site design
- Get instant offers to promote
- Get paid for PPC & CPA offers
- Competitive payout for PPC & CPA offers
- Advanced tracking and reporting
- Personal account manager
4. AdAction
AdAction is a global mobile ad network (earn money) that allows advertisers and publishers/ bloggers to choose from different advertising campaigns.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimum traffic requirement is mentioned on their site.
Features:
- Cost per install
- Cost per engagement
- Cost per acquisition
- Reward platform
- Social influencer
- Email ads
5. Adblade
Adblade is a content-style ad platform that offers content-style native advertising. The company promises targeted, qualified traffic with their proprietary Newbullets Ad Format to over 300 million users in the US.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimum traffic required
Features:
- Strong sales controls to protect your ad inventory
- Robust reporting
- Seamless ad integration with any design leading to a better user experience
- Industry-leading CPM
- Standard and advanced ad units
6. AdMaven
AdMaven is another mobile ad network (earn money) that offers publishers and bloggers highly performing ads that increase their ad revenue. It is one of the best pop-under web advertising networks for publishers.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimum traffic required
Features:
- Supports every ad format
- High-quality direct traffic globally
- Campaign optimization for higher revenues
- 24/7 support team
- Easy to set up
- Admin panel and dedicated account managers to help you
- Flexible payment plans
- Filters out inappropriate creatives and malware
- High CPM
7. Media.net
Media.net is one of the biggest ad networks in the world. They help publishers and bloggers maximize their monetization through ads.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimum requirement
Features:
- Contextual ads
- Display ads
- Native ads
- Dynamic ad optimization
- Additional controls to enhance the ad optimization process
- Page-level precision targeting
- Dedicated account managers
- Programmatic platform
8. PropellerAds
PropellerAds is an advertising platform for marketers and affiliates or publishers. It is a full and self-service advertising network that provides comprehensive and industry-leading ad-serving and optimization for marketers and publishers.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimum traffic requirement
Features:
- Push notifications
- On-click ads
- In-page push
- Interstitials
- Smart links
- Global coverage
- Clean ads only
- AdSense compatible
- Easy setup and payout
- Ad optimization technology
- Multilingual dashboard
9. Skimlinks
Skimlinks allows publishers and affiliate marketers to automate the monetization of commerce links or affiliate links. It is a sustainable source of revenue diversification, helping publishers monetize good content.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: No minimum requirement
Features:
- Access to 48,500 affiliate programs globally
- Editor toolbar
- Link generator
- All-in-one analytics suite helps easy reporting
- Automated affiliate links
- Free and easy to use
10. Infolinks
Infolinks is an ad network that targets ads specifically to what users want, when they want them, and where they are most visible. It displays real-time ads that reflect customer intent, improving context and conversions.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: No minimum requirements
Features:
- Intent targeting using keywords
- High viewability to increase ad performance
- Infold leverages the power of search and display
- Intop – exclusive to smart phones and remains in view as the user scrolls through content
- Inarticle – serves top brand ads as the user engages with the content
- Inframe – provides a solution for unused real estate on wide screens
- Inscreen – functions as an ‘ad intermission’ between page views
- Intext – scans through your content and matches ads with keywords
11. Popads
PopAds is an ad network specializing in popunders. They claim to be the best paying popunder ad network on the internet.
Minimum Traffic Requirement: No minimal traffic requirements
Features:
- Dynamic ad market lets you choose your prices
- Fastest customer support team
- Fast, secure, and easy payments
- Real-time reports and charts
- High rates
- International coverage for over 40 countries
12. Popcash
Popcash is a popunder ad network that helps publishers and bloggers maximize their ad revenue easily. They claim to be flexible and able to adapt to any project regardless of the scale of the project.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: No minimum requirements
Features:
- Fast approval within one hour on business days
- Exclusive advertisers with direct campaigns and high rates with 80% revenue share
- Ads moderated with internal and third-party tools
- 10% referral program for publishers
- Daily payments
- Reports updated every ten minutes
- Easy to set up and implement
- Live support
13. EPOM Ad Server
EPOM Ad Server is a complete ad management platform for publishers and advertisers. This ad server offers a tailored experience, unlimited scalability, and best-in-class analytics.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: No minimum requirements
Features:
- Cross-screen advertising
- Responsive and high-performing ad formats such as display ads, mobile ads, in app advertising, video ads
- Multi-level analytics with custom reports and timely updates
- Automated CPM automation
- White label DSP (demand-side platform) for programmatic businesses
- Free 14-day trial
14. Monumetric
Monumetric offers data-driven website ad management with a high payout and a positive user experience. They focus on filling all of your ad spaces with the highest rates so that you get the best value for your page views.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: 10,000 monthly pageviews
Features:
- Direct marketplace,
- Content dynamic mobile advertising
- Granular reporting platform
- In-image and in-line ads
- Pre-bid enabled video ads
15. ConsoliAds
ConsoliAds helps publishers monetize mobile apps and grow their businesses through online advertising. Publishers can connect their mobile apps to multiple ad networks (any popular ad network) within a single platform.
Minimum Traffic Requirements: NA
Features:
- Access to leading mobile ad networks
- SDK integration for powerful monetization
- Icon ads
- Native ads
- App open ads
- Banner ads
- Rewarded video ads
- Immersive ads
Conclusion
Choosing the right ad network boils down to what your requirements are as a publisher or blogger.
Is advertising one of the primary monetization methods of your site?
Are you just stepping foot in the blogging world or do you have a ready audience to display ads to?
Consider your options and see which company suits your business the best.
In my opinion, Google AdSense is great for beginners. But if you have an established audience that you would like to monetize, you can move on to the bigger giants like Mediavine.
Is advertising your primary method of monetization? Have you tried any of the ad companies on this list?
Leave your thoughts in the comment section below! 🙂
