When it comes to mobile apps and games, they are a digital way for a business/company to earn money and to provide their service to the client.
When you own a mobile app/game, your expectation from the same is to earn money from it and to get direct traffic to your app.
A single solution for both of the above expectations is Advertisement.
Some Facts and Stats
Sapio Research reported that 77% of brands are planning to invest in in-app advertising; foreseeing an improvement in campaign ROI of 41%.
A February 2019 study from PubMatic found that 56% of media buyers believed in-app advertising delivered better audience targeting than other forms of advertising, with 54% saying they saw better customer engagement.
Image Source: https://www.appypie.com/top-mobile-ad-networks
What is an Advertising SDK?
An Advertisement Software Development Kit (SDK), is a piece of code that will help your app connect with third-party services and technologies. By using the SDK, you can connect to multiple ad networks to run in-app advertisements, and you will get the benefit of earning the most out of your ads. The SDK will make managing multiple ad networks easy and will use the app data and insides to show the right advertisement to the right user.
When you integrate a mobile Advertising SDK with your app, you allow the advertisers to put ads in your app in return for revenue. You will be paid according to these factors:
- Number of impressions that the advertisement makes,
- The type of ad that you allow in your app,
- The clicks that the ad gets.
The video app will earn you more money as compared to a banner ad. However, your app is not just a tool to earn money and thus, you should also take care of the user experience. Ads are important for increasing revenue for your mobile apps or games. However, you should not forget about the user experience of the app, and the more ads you use, the more it will hinder your app experience.
Top 14 Ad Network SDKs for Mobile Games & Apps
Let’s have a look at the 14 best ad networks for Mobile Games & Apps.
1. Admob
The biggest name that comes to mind when we think about advertising is Google, and this is also the case when it comes to mobile app and game advertising SDK. More than half of mobile apps and games use the Admob SDK to enable in-app advertisements.
The Google Advertising SDK serves over 200 billion ad requests a month, and it has over 1 million advertisers. Admob’s helps the users in earning revenue with easy in-app ads, actionable insights, and powerful & easy to use tools that will help your game/app business.
2. Unity Ads SDK
Unity Ads SDK has surpassed Facebook and has become the leader of the gaming trilogy(Unity Ads, AppLovin, ironsource).
Furthermore, Unity Ads SDK offers two types of ads, one is the rewarding ads that the users will have to see till the end and then they will earn an in-game reward for the same, and the other one is the easily skipped interstitial ads. It also offers different formats of ads like banner ads, video ads, and interstitial ads. For hyper-casual, word, puzzle, and arcade games, Unity Ads held the number 1 spot, and number 2 for action, adventure, card, simulation, and sports.
3. Facebook Ads SDK
The most powerful and the most successful social media platform is Facebook. The Facebook SDK allows you to use Facebook’s robust ad system and therefore your app will get the benefit of Facebook’s algorithm for advertisement.
You will be able to run ad campaigns on your app/game with effective targeting based on the location, demographics, behaviour, gender, job, interest, relationship status, age, platform, wifi/mobile connection, etc. It supports different types of ad formats including playable and reward ads for games. The users are less likely to skip these ads and therefore you will get more returns.
4. Amazon Ads
Amazon Ads SDK allows the developers to quickly and easily integrate ads in their mobile app/game and the returns are based on the impressions using a Cost-per-thousand impression (CPM).
The SDK provides ad options in a variety of sizes and formats. The Ad targeting options like location, gender, and floor price allows the developers to target the right ads to the right audience. Being a product of such a huge brand, the Amazon Ads SDK offers multiple benefits and controls to manage your campaigns. The SDK is used by thousands of apps/games, and it runs millions of ads monthly.
5. AppBrain
AppBrain is an Ads SDK that works on the CPI model (Cost Per Install). Rather than paying for the ads shown, the advertisers will pay for the ads when the user installs the app.
Comparatively, the revenue that you earn for each install will also be high. The SDK supports various advertisement formats like banners, videos, playable ads, etc. The huge community of AppBrain makes it a very effective SDK for app monetization. Budget can be set for the promotion services, let’s say $50, and the promoter can even track their spendings and the results in real time.
6. StartApp
With some amazing clients like Disney, EA, Rovio and Yahoo!, StartApp is used by over 100,000 apps for monetization. Smartapp provides next-level smart ad targeting and groundbreaking ad units. StartApp features advertisement targeting and an optimization engine that ensures that the most relevant ad is shown to the users. It provides the users with the most engaging experience. The SDK is well-known for its interstitial advertising in mobile apps.
7. Vungle
Vungle is an SDK solution to supercharge your app and your app revenue. It comes with light SDK and advanced predictive algorithms. It supports multiple mobile app and game development engines and can be integrated within minutes.
Moreover, Vungle also comes with several distinguishing features. It offers only one type of ad – Video ads. The algorithm ensures that the right video is shown to the right user, and the video quality and content of the ads are superior too. Vungle also offers custom targeting options, and they offer various bidding options like CPC, CPA, CPM, and CPI.
8. Smaato
Smaato is a quite popular Advertising SDK for mobile apps and games that is known to provide the highest returns for the advertisements. It aggregates hundreds of global demand partners, and then they offer real-time competition for every impression. This creates visibility and transparency, which allows the apps and games to get the highest return for showcasing ads on their products.
The SDK offers increased targeting capabilities and hence it targets the best audience for the ads, which in-turn increases the impressions of the ads. The reporting feature of the SDK helps the app owner in taking advertising decisions for the app.
9. AdColony
AdColony has around 1.5 billion users across the globe and is packed with proven technology, premium advertisers, and better fill rates. The SDK is able to showcase HD videos in the ads that have rich content. It is backed with instant play HD technology and therefore it delivers a quality experience.
AdColony’s core features include demographic targeting, instant play video technology, Aurora HD interactive videos, etc. The monetization technology and mobile video integration strategies makes AdColony one of the best picks for Advertising SDK.
10. Chartboost
Chartbooster provides a tailor-made ad experience for mobile games. It is a direct marketplace with no broker costs. The SDK offers playable ads so that the user can stay engaged while watching the ad. It also allows the developers to cross-promote their app/game for free on their other app/game.
Chartboost works as a platform that allows the developers to sell their advertising space by setting their own terms and prices. You can run CPI and CPC campaigns here.
11. AppLovin
Founded in 2012, AppLovin allows various ad formats like interstitial ads, banner ads, mobile app install ads, and video ads, so that you can explore and find the best advertising format to maximize your returns. AppLovin’s main focus is on finding high quality users for their ad campaigns. They support CPI and CPC based campaigns. The key feature of the SDK is recording the actions of the consumers so that you can analyze the same and adopt new strategies.
12. inMobi
inMobi is an Advertising SDK that offers HD videos and native ads to keep your game users entertained while the ad runs. The SDK offers various types of advertisement formats like interstitial ads, banner ads, playable ads, reward ads, etc for mobile game. inMobi’s marketing cloud helps the brands understand, identify, engage, and acquire connected customers by creating a new path. The huge community on the inMobi platform allows you to get the best returns for all the advertisements that you run on your mobile game.
13. Mopub
Mopub is an open-source advertising SDK that allows the developers to choose monetizing between direct ads, ad network, or real-time bidding system. This delivers unmatched transparency and provides you with an opportunity to get the best returns. The SDK also offers substantial analytics and control to monitor the campaigns and to maximize the returns.
Mopub SDK supports a variety of Ad formats like static image, full HTML5, video, rich media, etc. The platform also offers analytics and controls to allow you to manage your real-time campaign to get the maximum revenue.
14. Ironsource
Ironsource is a game-centric Advertising SDK that has an extensive list of mobile games that uses this SDK to monetize their game. The SDK allows various advertisement formats like video, overfalls, interstitial ads, etc.
The SDK offers the best retention scores for music, sports, adventure, arcade, and simulation games genres. The retention score of the Ironsource SDK is yet another reason to choose this SDK for your mobile game or app. This SDK helps you in maximizing your game revenue by various features analysis, device lifecycle engagement, etc.
Benefits of Advertising SDK for Mobile Games & Apps
Here are the benefits of using Ad network SDK for mobile apps & games.
1. Monetization of the app
The Advertising SDK helps you in enabling in-app advertisements in your app. The advertisements will help you in earning revenue from your app/game. The advertisements will be shown based on the data of the users, and the advertising SDK will use the data to find the right advertisement for the right user. You can also choose the type of app and the preferences.
2. Manage Multiple Ad Networks in one place
Managing multiple ad networks can be difficult and as you add more and more Ad networks, this becomes a nightmare. Moreover, many times, the owner of the app is not able to get the right money for the in-app advertisements. The Advertising SDK is a centralized place for multiple Ad networks and therefore you will be able to manage them effectively in one place.
3. Better control of app monetization
With the Advertising SDK, you can effortlessly choose the type of the app, the duration of the advertisement allowed, when to allow the user to skip the app, and so on in most cases. You will have better and centralized control of the advertisements that are shown, and as the ads will be shown based on the user data, the ads will get more clicks and engagement, which will in turn improve your revenue.
4. Higher eCPM Rates
One of the best benefits of Advertising SDK is the higher eCPM rates. The higher rate is due to the fact that the Advertising SDK will connect your app to multiple ad networks, and this will in turn improve your app’s demand. This demand will create competition for your impressions among the ad networks, and therefore you will get higher eCPM rates.
Need help?
If you are not sure which SDK will be the best for your mobile app or game, and if you want a consultation for the same, you can contact Capermint Technologies. Also if you are looking for a company to integrate SDK with your existing/next mobile game or app, you can reach us at hello@capermint.com.
Capermint Technologies is among the best mobile game and app solution providers. Our team of expert developers is well-versed with all the latest technologies and their applications. Our programmers will integrate the best Advertising SDK based on the genre of your app/game and thus will transform your app into your highest revenue earning source.
Conclusion
In-app advertising works wonders, and there is no doubt about the same. If you are an app owner, and if you want to transform your app into an earning one, integrating an Advertising SDK is the best move.
There are multiple Advertising SDKs out there, and finding the right one for apps or games can be a challenging task, and therefore we have curated the top 14 advertising SDKs. Review the Advertising SDKs mentioned above and choose the right one for mobile games or apps.
If you think we have not mentioned a deserving SDK in our list, do let us know in the comment section.