Outbrain vs. Outbrain DSP: Which One Performs Best?

Outbrain is a well-known name to affiliate marketers. However, with the introduction of Outbrain DSP, many marketers are left wondering which option is best suited for their needs. In this Outbrain vs. Outbrain DSP blogpost, we highlight the key differences between these two options to help you choose the right one for your campaigns.

What is Outbrain?

Outbrain is a leading native platform with a vast network of publishers including MSN. It operates on a pay-per-click (PPC) model. The primary goal of Outbrain is to drive traffic to your website through engaging recommendations that blend seamlessly with the user experience.

What is Outbrain DSP?

Outbrain DSP is an advanced advertising platform that allows marketers to programmatically buy ad space across various channels. DSP stands for Demand-Side Platform — it’s the main component of programmatic advertising. With Outbrain DSP, advertisers get data-driven insights, target specific audiences more precisely and optimize their campaigns more effectively.

Outbrain vs. Outbrain DSP: Which One Should You Choose?

Here’s the list of main factors to consider when deciding between Outbrain and Outbrain DSP:

Ad Types

  • Outbrain is focused on native advertising. Its ads are designed to look like part of the content, making them less intrusive and more engaging for users. 
  • Outbrain DSP supports various ad formats for a more comprehensive marketing strategy. With Outbrain DSP you can launch native, display and video ads or cross-channel campaigns.

Budget

  • Outbrain typically requires a lower initial investment since it operates on a PPC model. It makes Outbrain campaigns accessible for smaller affiliates or those just starting out.
  • Outbrain DSP may require a larger budget due to its advanced features and capabilities, but it can result in higher returns if you have the resources to invest in programmatic advertising.

Complexity

  • Outbrain is user-friendly and intuitive. It is suitable for beginners or those who prefer a hands-on approach without the complexities of programmatic advertising.
  • Outbrain DSP may require some expertise in programmatic advertising strategies. If you have experience in digital marketing and are comfortable navigating advanced platforms, this option could be highly beneficial.

Optimization

  • Outbrain users can monitor the performance and optimize their campaigns in real-time.
  • Outbrain DSP provides tools for top-quality automated optimization based on performance metrics. Its optimization options include CTR, CPA and more.

Analytics

Both platforms offer great analytics tools; however, Outbrain DSP provides more in-depth insights into campaign performance across multiple channels. If data-driven decision-making is crucial for your strategy, Outbrain DSP may be the better choice.

Campaign Goals

  • Use Outbrain if your primary goal is to drive traffic to blogposts or articles. If you want to enhance brand visibility through native advertising without complex programmatic strategies, Outbrain is your best choice.
  • Use Outbrain DSP if you’re looking for an advanced approach to advertising that includes programmatic buying across multiple channels. If your focus is on precise targeting (including frequent MSN users ) and real-time optimization for various ad formats, then Outbrain DSP is the right option.

To Wrap Up

Both options — Outbrain and Outbrain DSP — provide great opportunities for affiliate marketers looking to drive conversions. The choice between Outbrain and Outbrain DSP depends on your marketing goals, budget and expertise level. For those focused on driving traffic through native ads, Outbrain remains a powerful option. If you’re ready to dive into the world of programmatic advertising with advanced targeting capabilities and cross-channel strategies, then Outbrain DSP can offer significant advantages. Select one that fits your needs or experiment with both options to boost your performance — we’ll provide you with reliable accounts on your way to great results!

No impressions, clicks or conversions: a guide to fixing Facebook ads

Setting up your account, generating creatives and launching your ad are just the beginning of your advertising journey. In this blogpost, we list the most common problems you can have after launching Meta campaigns and how to fix them. Follow this guide to troubleshoot your Facebook or Instagram campaigns and drive revenue!

Fixing Facebook Ads: No Impressions

Sometimes ads have zero impressions. The main reasons for this include the unpublished page, blocked page, restrictions in settings, billing issues, insufficient bid or wrong date. Let’s see how to fix them.

What to do:

  • Check if your Facebook page is active. If you still can see the “Publish page” button, click it.
  • Check the status in the “Business Help Center”. If your page is blocked, file an appeal or start over from another page.
  • Check if there are any country or age restrictions. Go to “Settings”, then to “Audience and Visibility” and click on “Followers and Public Content”. Go to “Who Can Follow Me” and make sure you removed all restrictions.
  • Make sure there are no debts and no spend limit.
  • If you chose the “Cost per result goal” strategy, your bid may be below the competitive level. Increase your bid or select another bidding strategy.
  • Check if you set the right date in the settings. It should be “Today”.

Fixing Facebook Ads: No Engagement

Do you have likes, comments or other reactions? If you don’t have any, your audience doesn’t like the ad or the ad is shown to the wrong audience.

What to do:

  • Review your budget settings. A small budget might not be enough for the algorithms to find the right audience.
  • Expand the target by adding related interests and using broader categories if possible.
  • Boost reactions to the ad from other accounts. It is believed that with more reactions Facebook algorithms give you preference in the auction.

Fixing Facebook Ads: No Clicks

If there are no clicks, then the copy or visuals are not catchy enough or your ad lacks a clear call to action. 

What to do:

  • Rewrite your copy to make it more clear and attention-grabbing.
  • Make your visuals stand out from other posts. Bright colors, a focus on the main object and the right format and size are key elements of success.
  • Add a call to action so that users know exactly what to do next. Make sure your CTA is clear for your audience.

Fixing Facebook Ads: No Conversions

High CTR is good, but your real goal is conversions. If there are none, there are several possible reasons: 

  1. The message of the ad and the landing page does not match. For example, promises in your ad contradict what the landing page promises potential customers.
  2. Your target audience is chosen incorrectly and you show the ad to those who aren’t interested in your product or service. 
  3. The user does not understand what the benefit is.
  4. The landing page is overloaded with information or this information is unclear.

What to do:

  • Compare your ad and landing page content. Make sure all you promise in the ad is present on your landing page.
  • Check your targeting settings. If your targeting is too broad, your offer can’t reach the right audience. Specify your audience parameters.
  • If your targeting settings are wrong, you reach an audience that isn’t interested in your offer. Review your targeting settings.
  • Make sure the benefits of your offer are clear to the audience. Rewrite your copy to make them easy to understand.
  • Avoid too much text on your landing page and optimize it to add more clarity. Place the most important things, like CTA, on the first screen of the landing page and make them visible and easy to find.

What’s Next

Congratulations! You fixed some initial issues of your Facebook campaign and are ready to move on. You still have a lot to do, but now you have numbers you can analyze. Use data on your impressions, clicks, engagement and conversions to track the effectiveness and optimize the performance of your campaign.

For more practical advice and industry news, join our Telegram channel. We post a lot of helpful content there. Stay tuned!

If you are just planning your Meta campaign, we can provide you with Facebook agency accounts. Here’s why agency accounts make ad campaigns more effective.

How To Launch Native Ads In DV360

Most ads are designed to stand out and intentionally contrast the content around them. However, native ads are meant to blend in with a social media platform or a site. They match the format and feel of the media content. When done right, native ads don’t annoy users and get higher engagement rates. Native ads in DV360 also show great results.

Native ads in DV360

Display & Video 360 offers programmatic native ads with the widest choice of ad placements you can find. However, launching a DV360 native ad might not seem as straightforward as display campaigns. Here’s our step-by-step guide for creating a native ad in DV360 to improve your experience with this programmatic platform.

5 steps to native ads in DV360

  1. Click on “Creative” in the side menu.
  2. Then click on “Format gallery”.
  3. Select “Native” on the top bar.
  4. Choose the type of native ads and click on “Create”.
  5. Click on “Preview publisher samples” to see how it will look on different websites.

That’s it! Enjoy your native ad in Display & Video 360.

DV360 dashboard

Where to get a DV360 account?

Zmatic provides DV360 agency accounts. Contact our team to get reliable accounts. We will provide you with initial training for DV360 campaigns, help you set up accounts for your campaigns and support you throughout your advertising journey on this platform.

What Is Programmatic Advertising?

Programmatic advertising has become essential in today’s advertising. It appeared as a way for advertisers to automate the ad buying process and optimize campaign performance. In a few words, programmatic ads easily and efficiently connect advertisers and publishers. Let’s shed some light on the inner processes of the complex system behind programmatic advertising. We’ll discuss its main elements, tools and how they work.

What are programmatic ads?

Programmatic advertising is an automated process of media buying and selling through multiple ad networks in real time. Programmatic advertising platforms use algorithms to analyze large amounts of user data, connect advertisers with publishers and help them buy or sell ad slots efficiently. Thanks to programmatic platforms, advertisers can run their campaigns globally across multiple channels and devices using many ad formats, with precise targeting and real-time optimization.

To understand how programmatic works, it’s important to get to know the key elements of the programmatic advertising process.

What DSPs, SSPs and DMPs are

Key participants of the programmatic advertising process include advertisers – brands, agencies or individuals – who look for ad slots and publishers – owners of websites or apps – who provide ad slots. They interact via programmatic platforms: Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs) for advertisers and Supply-Side Platforms (SSPs) for publishers.

Demand-side platforms, or DSPs, are platforms used by the buying side – advertisers – to purchase ad slots from multiple sources, launch, manage and optimize programmatic ad campaigns. Supply-side platforms, or SSPs, are platforms that publishers use to manage their ad slots and maximize revenue by offering their available slots to advertisers. DSPs help lower costs, improve efficiency and centralize ad performance data. SSPs automate ad selling. Thanks to SSPs, publishers can connect to ad exchanges and auction their available ad slots. 

Between DSPs and SSPs sit Data Management Platforms (DMPs). DMPs collect and analyze user data to segment audiences for better targeting. A DMP helps you make more informed decisions and better optimize advertising campaigns.

What ad exchanges are

An ad exchange is a digital marketplace where advertisers and publishers meet to buy and sell ad slots in real time. In the programmatic advertising system, ad exchanges sit between DSPs and SSPs. That’s where real-time auctions take place.

Ways to launch programmatic ad campaigns

Programmatic advertising offers 4 ways to launch ad campaigns. 

Real-Time Bidding

RTB, or open auction, is the most commonly used type of programmatic advertising. Due to its popularity it sometimes used as a synonym to programmatic in general. It works on an auction basis and is open to all advertisers and publishers. Demand determines the final cost of the ad slot – the highest bid gets the ad space.

Private Marketplace

A private marketplace (PMP or private auction) is a real-time auction with a limited audience of advertisers selected by a certain publisher. This type of auction allows publishers to offer premium ad slots to exclusive partners.

Programmatic Guaranteed

Programmatic Guaranteed doesn’t follow the bidding process. Advertisers negotiate the price for ad placements directly with publishers, like in traditional media buying. Once they agree on a fixed price, the advertiser has to buy the ad slot. This type is still programmatic because it reduces the amount of manual work.

Preferred Deals

Preferred deals also involve direct negotiations between advertisers and publishers. They also have to agree on a fixed price, yet advertisers don’t have to buy the ad slot they have agreed upon. If the advertiser denies, the publisher can sell it in auctions.

How programmatic ads are bought

To better understand how programmatic works, let’s take a look at the open auction process. Buying ad placements via real-time bidding has five main steps:

  1. A user visits a website.
  2. A DMP collects information about this user and sends it to an ad exchange.
  3. A publisher uses a SSP to send information on available ad spaces to an ad exchange or DSPs.
  4. A DSP bids on available ad slots in real time based on the advertiser’s requirements.
  5. The highest bid gets the ad slot.

Pricing of programmatic ads

The cost of programmatic impressions depends on many different factors, for example, targeting options, devices, time or the year, etc. Typically, programmatic deals are priced on a cost-per-mille basis (cost of an ad per 1,000 ad impressions) and on average cost around $0.50 to $2.

Why programmatic advertising is effective

Programmatic advertising saves time for publishers and advertisers due to automation of the media-buying process, but it’s not the only benefit of programmatic ads. First of all, it provides access to a lot of advertising networks at once and a broader selection of suitable offers. Also, programmatic advertising is a highly data-driven advertising method. Analyzed user data helps deliver highly targeted ads to relevant audience segments and increase revenue. What is more, real-time analytics of programmatic campaigns help advertisers craft ads and optimize them to reach better results. Thanks to these aspects, programmatic often delivers higher ROI than other advertising methods.

Wrap Up

Programmatic advertising is quickly gaining popularity as a convenient and effective way of advertising. Modern programmatic platforms provide user-friendly interfaces to make programmatic advertising available for everyone. We also do our best to help advertisers reveal the benefits of programmatic ads. If you need assistance with choosing and setting up accounts for programmatic campaigns, feel free to contact our team. We have a lot of experience with programmatic platforms and share our expertise through support and training.

How to Warm Up Google Accounts For Blackhat

Launching campaigns on Google Ads isn’t easy, the risk of being banned is very high. However, some know-how, patience and time can keep your accounts running without raising any red flags, even if your campaign is blackhat. A crucial step to a successful launch is to warm up Google accounts. Here’s how to do it right and build trust with Google. 

Important note: these are tips from our practice, they can’t guarantee that your Google account won’t be banned, but they definitely can increase your account longevity.

Keep Low Profile For 7-10 Days

Before you boost your ad budget, take a deep breath and slow down. The first 7-10 business days are critical for your account. Start with a low-spending strategy and keep cloaking disabled. Google keeps an eye on new accounts that start with high budgets, this could mean failure for your campaign. 

Once you’ve submitted your whitehat keywords and white pages for approval, it’s time to play the waiting game. Resist the urge to make any changes — this will lead to disaster! Bans may also happen during this waiting period. If you start making changes to your account too soon, there’s a 99% chance that you will be banned.

Keep It Slow to Win Google’s Trust

When the whitehat part is approved, it’s time to add your cloaked site to those approved whitehat keywords and ad text. Run this setup on a small budget for a few more days. This is your chance to build Google’s trust! 

After gaining some trust, you can gradually raise your daily budget, but not too fast. Rapid budget growth is a red flag for the platform, so take it slow. Over time, Google will trust your account. You’ll notice it by fewer bot views on your ad page — it’s a sure sign that you’re on the right track. Once this has happened you are ready to advertise your real offer. 

Make Changes Wisely

While you’re warming up, always set a maximum CPC bid limit. During this phase, do not make a lot of changes at once in your campaign. Even when running with your blackhat link, keep it on a low budget for 1-2 days. If the account survives this period without suspension, congratulations! Your account is likely to last much longer than expected.

Act Different To Succeed

Remember, Google Ads relies heavily on bots for monitoring, so human moderators are rarely involved in the approvals and checkups. Over time, these bots will learn your specific way of acting and will be able to recognize it in your new accounts. So it makes it essential to avoid repeating the same actions that could trigger bans.

To Wrap Up

Warming up Google accounts may seem difficult, but it’s a crucial step in your long-term success. By taking the time to build trust with the platform, you’ll build a basis for an advertising campaign that drives results. So take it slow, be strategic and your efforts will pay off! 

Check out our Telegram channel for more affiliate tips and news. Stay updated!

Recap: Affiliate World Europe 2024

It’s been a week since we returned from Budapest, energized and full of fresh ideas. We met partners in person and discussed industry developments at Affiliate World Europe. What was this conference like?

About Affiliate World Europe

Affiliate World Europe 2024 took place in the heart of Budapest, one of the most beautiful cities in Europe. The city is known for its rich history and stunning architecture. For many years AWE was based in Barcelona, now Budapest became a new spot and provided a captivating background for this vibrant event.

Affiliate World Budapest in Numbers

AWE was two action-packed days, filled with talks, workshops, discussions and opportunities for growth. The event featured over 350 companies and attracted a record-breaking number of 7,500 attendees. With 220+ booths to offer what shapes the future of affiliate marketing and 40+ speakers to share their insights with the audience, Affiliate World Budapest was a true hub for networking and collaboration!

Conference Highlights

The magic of Affiliate World is in the knowledge shared on stage. The main stage and breakout sessions were packed with cutting-edge talks and experience-based insights from industry experts. This conference had dedicated zones for Nutra, Finance, Crypto, Dating and iGaming verticals. Highlights of AWE also included workshops from Google and TikTok.

AWE 2024 offered limitless networking opportunities. It started with a pre-party on day 0 and continued until the last moments of the closing party Affiliate Oktoberfest. Attending all events was key to network at the fullest. We decided that sleep was less important than new inspiring connections!

What’s Next

Our time in Budapest inspired our team to new challenges. It was our 7th visit at Affiliate World conferences and we aren’t going to stop! We were glad to exchange knowledge with thousands of top affiliate marketers. We look forward to the next inspiring events by Affiliate World that will bring together so many professionals to network, learn and collaborate. But now it’s time for us to follow up on what we discussed during AWE! 

We post regular updates on our Telegram channel. Join it to receive news on the spot!

Why Agency Ad Accounts Are Essential for Success in All Verticals

In the highly competitive world of affiliate marketing, the choice of ad accounts can make a significant difference in your campaign’s success. At Zmatic, we provide more than just access to agency ad accounts — we offer a complete media buying infrastructure that ensures your campaigns are effective, secure and scalable.

Benefits of Agency Ad Accounts in Affiliate Marketing

1. Wide Coverage Across All Verticals

Our portfolio includes over 140+ agency accounts across major platforms like Facebook, Google, Taboola, Bing, DV360. Whether you’re running campaigns in allowed verticals such as travel, e-commerce, nutra, search arbitrage and dating, or tackling restricted niches like crypto, gambling or adult content, our agency accounts are tailored to meet your specific needs.

2. Lower Risk with Proxy and Anti-Detect Browser

Navigating high-risk verticals requires strong measures. Our proxies and anti-detect browsers help your operations remain anonymous and reduce the risk of bans. This is especially crucial for platforms with intense account inspection.

3. Smooth Financial Management

Managing advertising budgets can be complex, but we simplify the process by handling all account top-ups and refunds. We ensure your campaigns run smoothly without financial interruptions. You just prepay your advertising budget and we take care of the rest!

4. Unlimited Account Supply for Risk Distribution

In certain verticals, ad account bans are a common risk. That’s why we offer an unlimited supply of warmed-up pre-vetted agency ad accounts to distribute your campaigns across multiple accounts. This approach minimizes the impact of any potential ban and your campaign can run without interruption.

5. Personalized Support

With an agency ad account, you get personalized support to resolve any issue as soon as possible. Our team is committed to providing the guidance and assistance you need to achieve your affiliate goals.

6. Empowering You Through Learning

We believe in empowering our clients with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed. That’s why we offer detailed tutorials and introductions on how to use each platform in the most effective way. Our educational resources can maximize your advertising efforts, whether you’re new to affiliate marketing or an experienced professional.

Why Choose Zmatic?

At Zmatic, we’re not just providing agency ad accounts — we deliver a complete affiliate media buying infrastructure designed to help you succeed in any vertical. From secure, compliant ad accounts to ongoing support and education, we provide everything you need to run successful, profitable campaigns.

Ready to Scale Your Affiliate Marketing Campaigns?

Don’t settle for less when you can have the best. Contact us to discover how our agency ad accounts and complete media buying infrastructure can improve your campaigns and drive your success across any vertical, whether mainstream or restricted.

Meet Zmatic at Affiliate World Europe

There’s a great chance to meet our team in Budapest. Zmatic is going to Affiliate World Budapest on September 5-6. Here’s who will be there from Zmatic to answer your questions on agency accounts and more.

Blagoy Nikushev, Chief Executive Officer

Blagoy is the founder of Zmatic. He turned his successful marketing agency into the largest provider of agency accounts and infrastructure for affiliates. Discuss the power of agency ad accounts and their potential for your business!

Telegram: @zebrabg

Vanina Davcheva, Chief Marketing Officer

Vanina is a driving force through her expertise in marketing and brand management. She can organize your promotional collaboration with Zmatic. Brainstorm potential opportunities with Vanina!

Telegram: @VaninaDavcheva

Slavi Kukov, Supply Team Lead

Slavi expands the DSP and SSP partnerships of Zmatic. He is responsible for developing and maintaining our network of digital agencies. If you think of becoming a part of the Zmatic network, discuss it with Slavi.

Telegram: @ZmaticTeam173

Mihael Hristov, Account Manager

Mihael is awesome at keeping our customers happy. He has an in-depth knowledge of the set-up processes for all 140+ accounts Zmatic offers. Find the best-matching account for your campaign with Mihael!

Telegram: @mihaelhristov

Don’t miss out on this great event for business insights and networking for affiliate marketers. Meet Zmatic at booth C39.

Additionally, be sure to check out our previous publication on why attending affiliate marketing conferences can be beneficial for your business growth and networking opportunities. We can’t wait to see you in Budapest at the Affiliate World Conference!

Mostly Asian Platform for a US Campaign? Bigo Ads Case

There’s an interesting case when Bigo Ads was used to get a lot of new US customers. We think it’s worth your attention. 

There’s a successful campaign on Bigo Ads to gain a US audience. What’s so special about it? The main geographies of Bigo Ads are in Asia, the Middle East and Russia. However, Bigo Ads were used to increase a US audience and it turned out to be very effective. What also makes this case interesting is how effective sweepstakes were for getting new leads. Here we’ll tell the main details.

The task was to promote a pre-landing page through graphic banners and videos and increase the number of registrations. The target audience was people from the USA aged 25 to 55 years. And the solution was to offer a lottery with a 1000-dollar cash coupon for registration!

It might be surprising, but sweepstakes are still popular in advertising. These are various lotteries where users can win a prize. In the meantime, organizers get a lot of potential customers or their data that can be used in the future to develop marketing strategies. 

For this lottery, Bigo Ads was chosen as an advertising platform. It’s an advertising platform for reaching users of Likee and Imo. Imo is an instant messaging application. It claims to have over 200 million users and over 50 million messages sent per day. Likee is a short video app where users can create and share short videos with special effects. It is similar to TikTok and has over 150 million monthly active users per month.

Creatives and numbers for the Bigo case

The creatives for this campaign were super simple, but they proved to be effective.

What has come out of it?

The campaign results are as follows:

CPA – 2.8 USD per lead

CPC – 0.05 USD per click

Check out the screenshot above for more numbers. Anyway, these results look impressive.

This case shows that with Bigo Ads, one can reach great results without much effort. Even if you think of launching a campaign in a non-typical geo. Feel free to experiment with video ads on Likee or banners on Imo.

Don’t forget that until July 26 we can refund your set-up fee for Bigo accounts if you aren’t happy with your results. Can you think of a better moment for experiments? Contact us to get a Bigo account.

Join our Telegram channel to get timely updates on our promos.

Why Attend an Affiliate Marketing Conference?

We have attended dozens of conferences and are still excited about any conference we plan to visit. Conferences aren’t just about lectures and learning more about the industry. Our team is sure it’s a great way to invest your time and effort. In this blogpost, we spill some reasons to attend an affiliate marketing conference. 

It’s not so obvious how such events can have a lot of weight in an industry that operates online. All lifehacks and the latest news can be found on the internet. Many experts in affiliate marketing daily share their valuable experience and know-how online. So why does an online industry need offline events and what’s new to find offline?

Networking

Any affiliate conference is a big event and every single person there wants to connect. A conference brings together advertisers, publishers, affiliates, etc. It’s a great way to meet thousands of like-minded people in a couple of days and turn these connections into a valuable network. 

New business partners

Your potential partners are also attending conferences. They are looking for new partnerships to gain more profit together. It’s easy to communicate with hundreds of them in these 2-3 days.  Are there companies and teams you dreamt of collaborating with? Probably they’ve already announced their participation in a conference — schedule a meeting in advance to discuss mutual business opportunities!

Old partners

It’s also a quick and easy way to remind your existing partners how cool you are. While you are trying to attract potential new partners, those you already work with might also see you there. Give them another confirmation that they made a great decision when choosing you once. Such meetings can even lead to a new unexpected project. Don’t miss out on this part of the audience!

Better deals

Discussing business opportunities face-to-face can build more trust and result in better offers. What is more, many participants prepare special offers and hotter conditions for these conferences. If you have a potential collaboration in mind, make sure to discuss it during a conference — it might bring you better deals. And think in advance of special conditions you can offer to those who would like to collaborate with you. 

New Ideas

Such events are buzzing with new ideas. It’s inevitable when leading experts from different countries are brought together to discuss things they like. You never know which piece of advice will be game-changing for you – from an expert speech on the line-up or a small talk at an afterparty. So be an attentive listener!

Catching up with the industry news

It might be difficult to stay updated during your day-to-day affiliate routine. Such events are made for catching up on the news you might miss. Learn about what’s happening in our industry and get a hint of upcoming changes!

To sum up, attending an affiliate marketing conference can be very beneficial. For our team, it’s always a source of energy for new achievements. Many of our deals and partnerships began from an inspiring chat at a conference. This always makes us look forward to the next conference. 

Do you want an inspiring chat with us, too? Meet us at Affiliate Marketing Europe in Budapest on September 5-6, 2024. Our booth is C39.