On May 13, 2019 at 5pm Eastern, something huge happened here at AdThrive: the code that powers the best ad monetization in the world just got A LOT better.
We launched Nucleus: version 3.0 of our ad code.
And a complete game-changer.
Over the years, we’ve been hyper-focused on delivering AdThrive publishers the highest earnings per pageview with the least number of ads possible, and we’ve made hundreds of changes to our ad code along the way to ensure that. Our approach to advertising technology has always been at the forefront of the industry. But technology is never static, and we knew changes to our existing ad code wouldn’t be enough for where we want to go next.
With flexibility at its core, Nucleus is a completely new version of our ad code, rebuilt from the ground up, and future-proofed for industry changes coming down the road.
What does our ad code do?
Our ad code runs through the AdThrive Ads WordPress plugin or through JavaScript placed directly on your site. When a reader loads a page on your site, the ad code executes and does a lot of things simultaneously:
Inserts ads dynamically
The ad code determines which ad slots should run on the page and dynamically inserts them in the right places.
Gathers data from Marmalade
The ad code gathers data from Marmalade, our proprietary contextual targeting system. Marmalade uses machine learning to give advertisers additional insight about every page, so they place higher bids with confidence about where they’re showing their ads.
Calls Prebid
The ad code calls Prebid, the leading open source header bidding “wrapper”. Prebid calls many of our advertising partners, as well as our unique private marketplace (PMP) deals, and conducts an auction to find the highest bids.
Calls Amazon
The ad code calls Amazon’s wrapper that brings in specialized demand directly from Amazon and other partners.
Calls Google
The ad code calls Google, which has their own advertising partners, their own demand, plus more of our unique deals.
Ultimately, our ad code ensures the highest-paying ad is served to your site visitor. This fine-tuned process happens for every ad impression in every placement on your site!
How does Nucleus help?
We’ve been carefully testing for months to make sure that Nucleus fully supports all the high-touch customization for our premium advertisers, and constant optimization and split-testing that our revenue team does each day.
Our main goal was just to set the stage for great things to come in the rest of 2019, but on day 1 of rolling out Nucleus across all AdThrive sites, we were already seeing exciting RPM gains!
That’s not from any new features — yet! — just shiny new code doing its thing.
Over the next several months, we have a slate of new features lined up that will improve things even more. Nucleus allows our ad code development team to move faster to bring you new offerings, monetization opportunities and behind-the scenes improvements, including:
New ways to improve ad viewability.
Viewability (or how well an ad is seen by human eyeballs) is one of the main criteria that buyers use for choosing where to spend money. Nucleus lets us dive into new projects to increase viewability on every site and increase revenue down the road.
A whole bunch of new ad partners for video.
AdThrive video CPMs are leading the industry right now, but in the coming months we have further video player updates headed your way and we’ll be able to onboard additional video partners thanks to Nucleus!
Preparation for MAJOR industry shifts.
Google is changing its auction system this year, with broad-reaching implications for digital advertising. We’re taking care of everything for you, like updating our systems that optimize floor prices for auctions to drive better revenue in this new world. Nucleus allows us to get those new systems live even faster!
2019 has seen a lot of changes in the advertising ecosystem so far, and the second half of the year will hold its fair share as well. Nucleus has us more excited than ever about what the future holds for AdThrivers!
