It’s Time for an Ad Manager

So you have a great blog, your traffic is up, and now it’s time to make some money. You have signed up with an ad network, and you’re getting multiple offers from companies interested in purchasing your ad inventory. But how do you manage it all? A few months ago I would have recommended OpenX, a free tool that allows publishers to easily manage and maximize ad inventory on their websites. OpenX, formally known as PHPads, is customizable, has built-in reporting features, is powerful, and fairly easy to use. In fact OpenX is used by over 30,000 publishers, including TheStreet.com, Digg.com, and Last.fm.

The problem with OpenX is that it requires you to download and install the software on your own server. It also requires some basic knowledge of server directories, MYSQL and a server fast enough to serve ads at the rate of your impressions (the higher the traffic the faster the server). With that being said, are you ready to trust your revenue source to OpenX?

For those who aren’t, Google has answered your prayers with the release of Google Ad Manager. Targeted towards, small to medium publishers, Google Ad Manager takes advantage of the same features as OpenX with the stability and reliability of Google. Google Ad Manger requires no setup, no extra server costs, no knowledge of MYSQL, and most importantly it’s free.

Google Ad Manager is out of beta, and if you’re a Google AdSense publisher, you can sign in here . If you’re not an AdSense publisher you must first sign up.

You can see a full list of Ad Manager features here or access their Help Center here.