Game developer Sohomob leverages AdMob mediation to grow revenue by 300%

Founded in 2011, Sohomob is a Hong Kong based company thats well known for its successful mobile board game apps. They take pride in delivering high-quality games to users and focus on making the games beautiful, easy to use and functional. As a result, Sohomobs games have attracted players from all over Asia, with Battle Ludo earning over 10M downloads.

AdMob is the most comprehensive and reliable product in the market - Daniel Ho, co-founder, Sohomob

The problem
To build a sustainable business, Sohomob needed a way to monetize its growing user base without interfering with social gameplay.

The solution
Turning to AdMob because of its reputation for global reach, Sohomob implemented a variety of ad formats including banners, interstitials and videos. To avoid interfering with gameplay, Sohomob showed ads only in between levels and at natural breaks. This helped them engage users without disrupting the gaming experience. Sohomob also leveraged AdMob mediation and ad network optimization to maximize earnings for ad placements. AdMob mediation allowed Sohomob to serve ads from multiple ad networks and ad network optimization enabled Sohomob to serve the highest paying ad from their mediation stack automatically.

The results
Adding AdMob mediation and enabling ad network optimization helped Sohomob increase its total revenue by 3X. After seeing so much success with AdMob, Sohomob decided to implement AdMob house ads and in-app purchase ads, helping them cross promote their apps and introduce in-app purchases to their users.

Sohomob is not stopping there, with the aim to build the largest social board game community in the world. To check out Sohomobs success story, or any other of AdMobs other success stories, visit the AdMob website. Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob

Mobile Ads Garage: Episode 4 - Interstitials

The Mobile Ads Garage is a new series that covers how to use the Mobile Ads SDK to display ads from AdMob and Doubleclick For Publishers. Each episode will cover one aspect of the SDK, break down the feature, and show screencasts of real implementations on both Android and iOS � all in a friendly format.

With two episodes on banner ads on the books, the Mobile Ads Garage now turns its focus to interstitial ads.

Andrew and Gary the Graphics Guy are back this week with a detailed explanation of the interstitial ad lifecycle, how to load ads, and how to display at just the right time. Along the way you'll get screencasts of Android Studio and Xcode, plus links to guides, samples, and other resources.



If you like the video, save the Mobile Ads Garage playlist to your YouTube Playlist collection and you'll never miss an episode.

We�d love to hear which AdMob features you�d like to learn more about. The comment sections for the videos are open, and you're welcome to toss out ideas for new episodes and examples you'd like to see. If you have a technical question relating to something discussed in one of the episodes, you can bring it to our support forum.

 - Andrew Brogdon, Mobile Ads Developer Relations

Ad network optimization support now available for Chartboost and Unity Ads

AdMob Mediation is an easy way for you to manage different ad networks and help maximize revenue, all from a single interface. With AdMob Mediation, you can also take advantage of ad network optimization, a feature that helps you generate the highest CPM from your mediation stack. Ad network optimization does this by obtaining the freshest CPM from each ad network based on historical performance, and dynamically reorders them in the mediation stack, so that the ad network with the highest CPM serves ads to your apps.

Today we�re excited to announce that we�ve enabled ad network optimization support for Chartboost and Unity Ads, with country-level specific CPM support. They will join over twenty of our existing supported ad network optimization ad networks.

Getting started with ad network optimization is easy; simply select the ad network(s) you want to add to mediation, enter your ad network login credentials and AdMob will pull the accurate CPM data for each network.

1. In ad network settings, check �Automatically pull the eCPM value from this ad network� box.

2. Enter your login credentials so AdMob can collect the latest CPMs from your ad networks, and review the checkbox language.

Here�s what developers have to say about AdMob mediation:

�We integrated AdMob sometime last year and it doubled our income, which was really good. Mediation is one of the things we mainly use in AdMob. It supports a lot of different networks, so we don�t need to integrate different SDKs.� 
- Amit Goyal, Co-Founder and CTO, Appkruti

�We�ve seen a 30% to 40% bump in revenue since we started using mediation in AdMob. AdMob offers a simple way to work with multiple ad partners to maximize fill rates and revenue. The way AdMob automatically optimizes across multiple ad networks is fantastic.� 
- Micah Koffron, Founder, Digitalchemy

To learn more about ad network optimization and AdMob Mediation, please visit our help center, and to stay connected on all things AdMob, follow our Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ pages.

Posted by Henry Wang
Product Marketing, AdMob

Mobile Ads Garage: Episode 3 - Banner Best Practices

Ever wondered about the best ways to monetize with banner ads while maintaining a great user experience? If so, the Mobile Ads Garage is here to help.

In the third episode, Andrew and Gary the Graphics Guy cover how to integrate banner ads into a mobile app's UX, with a little help from Aunt Betty, hairless cats, and discount moose repellent. You'll see detailed breakdowns of things to avoid, plus reliable best practices that you can take back to your own apps. As always, links to guides, samples, and other resources are included.

If you like the video, save the Mobile Ads Garage playlist to your YouTube Playlist collection and you'll never miss an episode.
We�d love to hear which AdMob features you�d like to learn more about. The comment sections for the videos are open, and you're welcome to toss out ideas for new episodes and examples you'd like to see. If you have a technical question relating to something discussed in one of the episodes, you can bring it to our support forum.
 - Andrew Brogdon, Mobile Ads Developer Relations

The Mobile Ads Garage: Episode 2 - Implementing AdMob Banner Ads

The Mobile Ads Garage has returned with its second episode. In this video, you'll see screencasts and detailed breakdowns of how to implement banner ads for both iOS and Android. Plus, you'll get links to guides, samples, and other great resources.

If you like the video, save the Mobile Ads Garage playlist to your YouTube Playlist collection and you'll never miss an episode.

We�d love to hear which AdMob features you�d like to learn more about. The comment sections for the videos are open, and you're welcome to toss out ideas for new episodes and examples you'd like to see. If you have a technical question relating to something discussed in one of the episodes, you can bring it to our support forum.

For more tips on app monetization, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ pages.

 - Andrew Brogdon, Mobile Ads Developer Relations

Mediate rewarded video ads with AdMob Mediation

This week at the Game Developers Conference, we announced that developers can easily monetize apps with rewarded video ads from a number of ad providers in AdMob Mediation. Supported networks and platforms include AdColony, AppLovin, Chartboost, Fyber, Upsight, and Vungle, with more being added all the time. So if you�re a developer monetizing with these providers and using AdMob Mediation to do so, you can easily manage and optimize them through the AdMob interface.

What�s rewarded advertising?
Rewarded advertising has become a popular form of monetization. With rewarded ads, users are given the choice to engage with ads in exchange for in-app rewards. For example, in a gaming app, a user can watch a video to receive a power up after failing a level.

Features to help you optimize
You can already use AdMob Mediation to monetize apps using banner and interstitial ads. Now, you can enjoy the same powerful meditation tools for rewarded ads:

• Ad network optimization - Earn more by automatically generating the highest CPM from your mediation stack. Ad network optimization looks at all the CPMs across the networks you�ve set up in AdMob Mediation and dynamically chooses the highest paying one from which to show an ad.
• Frequency capping - Improve your user experience by setting frequency caps to make sure your users aren�t seeing the same ad again and again.

In addition, we�ve made it easy for you to experiment with rewarded ads with these features:

• Server-Side Settings - We store reward and waterfall settings for each ad unit server-side so you don�t need to change your code to experiment with new configurations.
• Ad Unit Level Configuration - Try different networks, network order or reward settings at different places in your app to optimize performance.
• Reward Unit & Amount - You can use existing third-party settings or input your own values.

When creating a new ad unit, you can choose your reward values and set your frequency cap

Here�s what our developers have to say about rewarded ads in AdMob Mediation:

Rewarded ads in AdMob Mediation has been running very smoothly and effectively since we launched it. On top of a complete management of the reward mechanics within the tool, it offers dynamic allocation of each ad request to the highest paying network.  

- Baptiste Chardon , Monetization Manager @ Ubisoft

So far, I've connected 2 reward networks and AdMob has proved as reliable and stable as it is for standard display formats. A great push for my business! 

- Nicolas Sorel, Co-Founder and CEO of Magma Mobile (France)

Not mediating yet? It�s easy to set up and takes very little time to manage. With AdMob, you can focus on building great apps while we do the hard work for you. Here�s how you can get started.

For more about AdMob Mediation, visit our help center, and to stay connected on all things AdMob, follow our Twitter and Google+ pages.

Posted by Arun Balaraman
Group Product Manager, AdMob

New ad formats and targeting to find, keep and monetize high-quality gamers

When mobile users are looking for entertainment they often turn to gaming apps. In 2015, an estimated 41% of all apps downloaded were games (1). However, while a user may be excited about downloading an app, it can soon be forgotten; studies have shown that 1 in 4 installed apps are never used.

For game developers, building a successful business has often depended on an approach of acquiring as many users as possible, then trying to keep them engaged in the game as their interest wanes. While volume is important, it�s more important to find the right kind of user, who�ll open the app and keep on playing. That�s why today, at the Game Developers Conference (GDC), we announced a host of new features in AdWords and AdMob that make it simpler for developers to reach the right users at scale.

SGN�s Search Trial Run Ad for Panda Pop

Let users try your app before downloading from Google Search
We recently introduced Trial Run Ads on the Google Display Network which let users stream your game from a display ad for your app before they download. In the next few weeks, we�ll extend these ads to search results on Google as a beta for selected U.S. advertisers. With Search Trial Run Ads, when a user searches for a game on Google, they can click �Try Now� from within a search ad and try the app before installing it, similar to streaming apps from organic results. These ads will appear to smartphone users on WiFi, and the user can play for up to 10 minutes, then download the app in full if they choose. This format drives highly-qualified users who are more likely to stay engaged with the app after install. Contact your Google representative to learn more about using this new format.

Showcase your game with portrait videos
More than 80% of video ad views in mobile apps on the Google Display Network are from devices held vertically, but often, the videos are created for landscape viewing. Over the next few weeks we�re launching Portrait Video Ads so users have a full-screen, immersive portrait video experience without having to re-orient their device. We�ve seen significant improvement in both click-through and conversion rates from game developers using Portrait Video, resulting in much lower cost per install and a larger number of downloads.

In AdWords, you�ll be able to give us a portrait video and we�ll display it full screen to the user. 

Promote your app to game-lovers
Advertisers have long been able to control who sees their AdWords ads, and in the coming weeks we�ll be launching even finer options to reach high-quality users with Active User Targeting for Games. This new type of targeting for Android apps can show ads to users who have spent more than 30 minutes playing games, or who have played a Google Play Games integrated game in the last 30 days. Game developers can show their ads to game lovers, and combined with other types of targeting, such as a particular game category (e.g., Adventure), they can reach a very precise audience.

Earn money from rewarded ads with AdMob Mediation
AdMob helps app developers around the world earn through in-app advertising with best-in-class formats and smart tools to maximize revenue. Increasingly, rewarded advertising is becoming a popular form of game monetization: users are given the choice to engage with ads in exchange for in-app rewards. Today, we�re introducing a way for developers to easily monetize apps with rewarded video ads from a number of ad providers in AdMob Mediation. Supported networks and platforms include AdColony, AppLovin, Chartboost, Fyber, Upsight, and Vungle, with more being added all the time. So if you�re a developer monetizing with these providers, you can easily manage and optimize them through the AdMob interface. It�s part of our ongoing commitment to provide app developers with a first-class mediation solution, and follows our recent launch enabling SDK-less mediation.

We�re working closely with developers to innovate our ad solutions and help them build strong businesses. If you�re a game developer, come and meet with our ads teams at GDC at the Google booth between Wednesday and Friday, to discuss developing great games, growing your user base and earning more money. We�ll have a series of great talks in our booth mini-theater each day, and on Thursday morning we�ll be part of the main GDC sessions, with a discussion on user acquisition and monetization.

Posted by Sissie Hsiao, Product Management Director of Mobile Display Ads

(1) App Annie, Mobile App Forecast, Feb 2016

SDK-less Mediation: An easier way to mediate

Publishers have long used mediation to maximize revenue by showing ads sourced from diverse ad networks. However adding new networks required integrating and testing new SDKs - which often led to wasted development resources, app updates, bugs and bloated code. With SDK-less mediation it is now possible to simply add new networks server side without updating their apps.

Today, we�re excited to announce that we�re adding SDK-less mediation to the AdMob and DoubleClick for Publishers platforms. SDK-less mediation is a feature that lets developers add new ad networks without having to integrate additional SDKs or adapters. This is great for developers who are concerned with SDK size or who simply do not want to deal with the hassle of adding and updating new ad network SDKs. With SDK-less mediation, developers can conveniently add new ad networks to their mediation stack.

"AdMob SDK-less allows us to test new networks without updating binaries. It means we can get more expensive traffic from new networks and increase our overall eCPM (and overall income) just by adding new networks and finding most optimal mediation settings (and all these don't require any programming!)." - Victor Negrutsa, CEO, 1C Wireless

As with AdMob�s existing SDK-based mediation, SDK-less mediation will support all existing mediation features including ad network optimization, Live CPM, and country-specific CPM values. Developers using SDK-less will still be able to leverage SDK-based integrations and the two can be combined in the same mediation waterfall. SDK-less networks will have the �SDK-less� suffix on the AdMob interface.

To launch SDK-less, we�re happy to announce our first round of partners: Aarki, Drawbridge, MdotM and Smaato with more coming in the near future.

For more information on technical integration for SDK-less mediation check out our help center. Not mediating yet? It�s easy to set up and takes very little time to manage. With AdMob, you can focus on building great apps while we do the hard work for you. Here�s how you can get started.

For more about AdMob Mediation, visit our help center, and to stay connected on all things AdMob, follow our Twitter and Google+ pages.

Posted by Arun Balaraman,
Group Product Manager

New partners added to the AdMob Mediation platform

Showing ads from multiple ad networks increases competition in your app and can help you earn more revenue. AdMob Mediation offers you a way to manage many different networks to maximize your fill rate, all from a single interface. We�ve been adding new features to our mediation solution, such as ad network optimization, which dynamically generates the highest CPM for each ad from the ad networks in your mediation stack. And we�ve been continually adding ad networks, giving you more choice when selecting ad networks.
Today, we�re excited to announce that we�ve added Vungle and Vpon as our newest mediation partners, with Vungle also supporting ad network optimization.

Here�s what developers have to say about AdMob mediation:

After integrating AdMob mediation and opting into ad network optimization, Bangkok-based company Sinoze saw its AdMob revenue grow by nearly 70% and overall revenue by 175%. To learn more about Sinoze�s big revenue uplift with their popular music app Thapster, check out their case study here.

�AdMob delivers extremely high fill rates � up to 99% in some cases, which other platforms simply cannot match and the built-in mediation feature makes it convenient and effective to manage ads from several demand sources to maximize yield. What is more, the ads are varied, and the formats are high quality so the ads that our players see are perfectly in keeping with the premium feel of the app.�
- Chishima Shigeru, Manager, Sinoze

Digitalchemy went global with its popular calculator apps, enabling them to grow from a team of two part-time developers to a full-time app business with a staff of seven. To learn more, check out their growth story here.

�We�ve seen a 30% to 40% bump in revenue since we started using mediation in AdMob. AdMob offers a simple way to work with multiple ad partners to maximize fill rates and revenue. The way AdMob automatically optimizes across multiple ad networks is fantastic.� 
- Micah Koffron, Founder, Digitalchemy

Not mediating yet? It�s easy to set up and takes very little time to manage. With AdMob, you can focus on building great apps while we do the hard work for you. Here�s how you can get started.

For more about AdMob Mediation, visit our help center, and to stay connected on all things AdMob, follow our Twitter and Google+ pages.

Posted by Henry Wang
Product Marketing, AdMob

Lowdown: How to Optimize Mediation for your App Part 2

Lowdown is a weekly series that brings you tips and tricks on how to best use AdMob to grow your app business, directly from members of the Google AdMob team.

Optimizing your mediation setup will help you get the highest CPMs from the ad placements in your app. Last week, I covered how to use dynamic, real time competition (the Live CPM feature) to increase your chances of higher CPMs. If you haven�t done so, make sure to read through that article for a clear explanation of what mediation is and how to enable Live CPM. This week I�ll go over two more strategies that will further enhance your competitive setup.

Regularly Update Your CPM Assignments

Make sure to update the CPM you assign for each of the ad networks in your mediation stack once every 10-14 days. Advertising network CPMs fluctuate over time. You want to be certain that the CPM you assigned for each network isn�t inaccurately high, causing you to settle for lower CPMs. Also, plan for your 10-14 day cycles to land on the first of every month, when advertiser�s usually reset their budgets.

Segment Your Assigned CPM Values

To further intensify competition, segment your assigned CPM values based on geography. Impressions from different geographic locations can differ in value. Many developers will calculate a unique value for their most profitable regions and do a separate calculation for their Rest of World (ROW) inventory.

To better understand how to segment by geography and increase the accuracy of your competitive setup, let�s use a real world app example. Imagine you�ve developed an app that�s very popular in Japan and in the US. When analyzing your mediation stack, it might be interesting to segment Japan and the US from the rest of the world and calculate the average CPM for each bucket. After doing so, you realized that one of your 3rd party advertising networks delivers $2 CPMs on average, but US and Japanese CPMs average $2.50 while the Rest of World CPM is $1.50. Instead of using the world average of $2.00, where AdMob would only need to beat $2.00 to serve a US and Japan impression, AdMob must now beat $2.50 to serve. Segmentation by geography brought precision to your competition, yielding potentially higher earnings.

For more detailed instruction on mediation in AdMob, be sure to visit our Help Center. In the next edition of Lowdown, we�ll be looking at how you can begin to calculate the value of each user using Google Analytics. Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Google+ page.

Posted by Adam Wolf
AdMob Account Strategist

Lowdown: How to Optimize Mediation for your App Part 1

Lowdown is a weekly series that brings you tips and tricks on how to best use AdMob to grow your app business, directly from members of the Google AdMob team.

A key goal for many app developers is to maximize revenue. If you monetize with multiple ad networks, you'll know that some have fluctuating CPMs and fill rates. AdMob mediation can help you determine the most valuable ad to serve in your app, and AdMob can help you determine which ads to serve.

Today, we�re going to dive deeper into how our mediation platform works and introduce an optimization strategy that may increase your app�s revenue�enabling a feature called Live CPM. The best way to understand this feature is to first understand how basic mediation works.

Mediation

AdMob is a robust mobile ads platform that includes mediation�allowing you to serve ad impressions from multiple 3rd party networks, your own house ads, and Google�s advertising inventory. With basic mediation, you�re required to rank all of the ad networks you use, assigning a predicted CPM for each one. When it�s time to serve an ad, the mediation platform will first make a request to the network you�ve ranked as number 1. If that network doesn�t serve an ad, it will make a request to your second-ranked network. It will continue down your list until an ad is served. Although helpful, this setup is unsophisticated. It doesn�t matter if network 2 or 3 is able to pay you a higher CPM, you�ve already committed yourself to the fixed ranking, and there�s a better way to increase revenue.

Mediation with Live CPM

In contrast, when the Live CPM feature is enabled, you increase your chances of higher CPMs with real time, dynamic competition. When it�s time to serve an ad in your app, Google�s advertising demand will provide its most valuable CPM, and compare this to the CPM you�ve assigned for your first-ranked network. Whichever network has a higher CPM will get the impression.

If your first-ranked network wins, but is unable to fill the impression, the process will repeat with the next-ranked network in your chain. This all happens in real time.

When enabling Live CPM, the initial results can be startling. Without it, you�re much more likely to miss your next network�s top tier demand. With it, your set-up is dynamic and top tier impressions from both AdMob and your other networks can be served. If you�d like to learn more, check out our case study on how Thapster, a smartphone music game app, succeeded with Live CPM and visit our Help Center to get more in-depth instructions on how to implement it.

In the next edition of Lowdown we�ll be looking at how you can further optimize Live CPM. Be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Google+ page.







Posted by Adam Wolf
AdMob Account Strategist