Articles: Publishers

CPM - Getting started

You may have noticed that we have been starting to sell ads at CPM (cost per thousand impressions) rates on a handful of BSA Publisher sites. As it turns out, selling ads this way in large blocks of impressions works equally well for advertisers as our standard 30-day rate ads.

Here's how it works:

– you select the “CPM” option from the new Payment Model select menu when adding a new zone – you set your CPM rate (i.e. $0.75 or $2.25) – you set your banners (typically 1), and max banners (typically 10 or any other number that you choose) – then, when an advertiser see’s your listing, they will have the ability to purchase a fixed number of impressions (say, 250 thousand) for a fixed price based on your CPM rate – and, we will serve them those impressions spread out over the 30-day term

We have restricted the size of these CPM based ad zones to 300x250, 728x90, and 160x600. You should be installing these zones as premium inventory; they should be at the top of your page, right below a post title, at the top of your right column, and in general in high click-through locations.

Pricing

The #1 question I'm sure that is on your mind is: how should I price this? Let's assume that you have an AdSense unit installed where you plan to add this unit. So, you would take a look at your AdSense earning history for that unit, and then price it accordingly while taking into account BSA’s commission rate. If you do not currently have an AdSense unit installed, then we’re happy to make some suggestions, please send us an email at support@buysellads.com.

Backfill

Backfill is a very important aspect of this new feature set and the reason why we are now opening this up to more publishers. The biggest barrier to entry for publishers adding premium positions in the past is that they cannot afford to give up existing revenue. With the CPM Backfill feature, you can now serve up your own ads or other ad networks ad (like AdSense) when you do not have a BSA sold impression to serve.

Here's how it works:

– on your publisher dashboard page, for each CPM based zone you will see a link for -CPM Backfill- –. You can specify up to 5 different backfill options – select the percentage to serve each of your backfill options.

The hardest part of this project was getting this to work with AdSense. The good news, is that if you are using the new CPM Backfill feature with AdSense your AdSense code is now asynchronous. I feel the need to repeat that: using AdSense in conjunction with CPM Backfill will now make your AdSense code asynchronous!

Additional notes:

– leaving the default “advertise here” checkbox checked on the install ad code page for these units is a wise decision. We have added new styles for this that blend very well with the units. To see a sample, go here: http://bsarocks.com/test.html – when you have the units setup and installed on your site, there will be a lag in the time from when you install to when they are available for sale on your listing page. This is OK and this is normal. – when you get the units installed, if you ping us via email in support to let us know, you greatly increase your chances of selling some impressions. We have active advertisers who want this inventory and we are feeding it to them as it comes in.

Last, but not least, we truly appreciate your business, and if there is ever anything I can do to help you please do get in touch.

Enjoy, The BSA Team

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