After becoming a little bored with using Admob, coupled with the fact I have been getting some poor fill rates and eCPM values lately, I decided to look around for an alternative. After looking at Tapjoy and a few others, I settled on Leadbolt.
Once I followed the easy steps of integrating the SDK and getting it working, all I had to do was head over to their website, and choose an ad type and the settings I wanted on it. I decided for this trail, I would leave the Admob banner ads in the app itself, but add a Leadbolt content blocker offer wall on entering the application. The default setting was to force the user to click an offer before it would let them continue.
Not wanting to push it too far though, I gave them the option of closing the offers without choosing any of them. Then I sat back and watching the impressions rise, the clicks start coming in, but the revenue remain on zero. I figured these must be clicks on offers, but the user didn’t carry through to a point where they triggered revenue. A quick email to my Leadbolt account manager confirmed this. And the prompt friendly reply was also very welcome.
The main thing I was pleased about in the first couple of days, was even though there was no money being made, that the new ad format in my app didn’t generate any negative comments. Im sure if I had forced them to click an offer it would have been a different story. Lets have a look at the stats for the last 5 days.
So after a few days of getting 10 clicks a day and not seeing anything for it, I had some success. 7 clicks brought in $12.60. So even though with so little views, I may only get the odd pay day from Leadbolt, the higher eCPM has made me decide to keep it. Especially considering I made about a third of what I make monthly from Admob in a single day.
Click here to check out the Leadbolt website, its well worth a look.
6 comments
David Webb says:
September 30, 2011 at 6:57 am (UTC 0)
Thanks for the review. I’m also in the process of trying out LeadBolt after being contacted by one of their reps. It’s good to hear another persons’ experience with the site. If the eCPM stays that high it will be a great way to monetize.
arpreb says:
October 3, 2011 at 1:37 am (UTC 0)
I would love if they did stay that high. I expect it to come back quite a bit, but will still be higher than Admob. Will know for sure in about a month. Cant wait to hear about your experience with them aswell.
Dev says:
November 2, 2011 at 12:25 am (UTC 0)
Hello,
Do you have any explanation, official response from Leadbolt why there was no revenue for the first 40 or so clicks? That sounds a little fishy and I don’t like a company taking all the money from advertisers and not paying the developers for that. Are they paying based on Clicks or does the user need to subscribe to something on the landing page for you to get paid?
When do they pay out , how many days and do they use paypal?
arpreb says:
November 7, 2011 at 5:06 am (UTC 0)
Yes I did. I was a little concerned at first aswell. So I emailed my account manager and she informed me the they serve a mixture of both Cost per Click and Cost per Action ads. They have since included this information in the FAQ. In terms of contacting them, it was great. Very friendly and prompt. I haven’t requested a payment yet so I cant comment on the pay outs etc.
Slaven says:
November 23, 2011 at 7:36 pm (UTC 0)
Hello,
I was searching for alternatives to adMob too, and found mobclix. Must admit i just started to using it, and my app isn’t getting downloads as i am hoping but i am suggesting to check it out. The eCPM is pretty high on leadbolt, is it still this high or did it fell down, (maybe go up) ?
arpreb says:
November 24, 2011 at 2:31 am (UTC 0)
For me, it continued to go down. Im sure for some people Leadbolt works great, but I have found it very inconsistent unless you generate large numbers of requests per day. Check back soon as I will be posting a full wrap up of my Leadbolt experiment.