Key Points

  • Ad revenue calculators are inaccurate at best and intentionally misleading at worst.
  • The same often goes for revenue projections from monetization platforms throughout the ad space.
  • Publishers control many variables that can increase or decrease ad revenue.

Looking for an ad revenue calculator? You might as well take a wild guess about your future revenue earnings - that would be just about as accurate as even the best online ad revenue calculator, if not more so.

Why is that? Because ad revenue calculators aren't meant to give you a clear, accurate, and unbiased projection of how much money you will make, and even if they were meant to do that, they couldn't possibly pull it off.

Understandably, many publishers are disappointed to find that out. But you can do better than an ad revenue calculator - you can calculate your revenue yourself and take total control of the variables that will drive your revenue higher. Read on to learn more.

You won't need a calculator when you work with Playwire. All you'll need to do is sit back and watch the ad revenue pour in. Find out how Playwire takes ad monetization to the next level for publishers like you. Contact our team.

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The Complete Ad Revenue Resource Center

The Problem with Ad Revenue Calculators

Here's the real problem with ad revenue calculators: They're sales tools. Ad monetization companies put these calculators on their websites to attract attention from publishers who are looking to increase their revenue. You put in your numbers and get shockingly high estimated earnings, and you're excited. Then, the hope is that you'll call the company that owns the "calculator" to inquire about their services.

Even if that particular sales pitch would never work for you, you still won't end up with an accurate number from the online ad revenue calculators. Why? Because they couldn't possibly predict or understand your approach to each of the thousands of variables that can affect your revenue.

For example, are you running premium ad units that command particularly high CPMs for each impression? Are you creating high-value audience segments that drive higher website traffic with a data management platform (DMP)? Do you have relationships with direct buyers who funnel premium brand dollars into your overall monetization strategy?

These are just a few of the variables that could render an ad revenue calculator's estimate totally inaccurate.

Can You Trust Estimates from Ad Monetization Companies?

What about when a monetization platform reaches out to you and provides a "customized" estimate of how much ad revenue you would bring in if you worked with them? Can those be trusted?

Absolutely not. Again, this is a game of giving you the highest possible estimated revenue - hopefully higher than the competitors you've spoken to. That way, you might be tricked into believing that this vendor is the best and can get you the most revenue. 

It's all a sales tactic, and it's not based in reality. For the same reasons that automatic advertising revenue calculators can't be trusted, estimates directly from ad monetization companies often can't be trusted, either. 

They should all try to increase your revenue. The question isn't how much they want you to believe they can bring in - it's how they plan to maximize your revenue. The maximum possible revenue should always be the end goal.

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Read the publishers' guide to ad revenue.

How to Calculate Ad Revenue Yourself

To get a better understanding of your ad revenue potential, it's helpful to understand how to calculate the ad revenue you are currently bringing in. There are two methods that can give you an accurate view of your overall app or website revenue.

Page View CPM

This one is way better than an ad revenue calculator: Page view CPMs are the gold-standard metric by which publishers measure their ad revenue. The page view CPM equation is simple:

Page View CPM

Divide your total ad revenue over a particular time period by the number of page views you received over the same time period. Multiply that by 1,000. The result is your effective page view CPM.

This metric is considered the best and most accurate because it smooths the effect of temporary spikes or dips in page views so you can get a more accurate picture of your CPM.

eCPM

Another common way to calculate ad revenue is through the effective CPM (eCPM). This metric is quite similar to page view CPM, but it accounts for impressions rather than page views. Here's how it goes:

eCPM

Divide your total ad revenue over a particular period of time by the number of impressions you received over the same interval. Multiply that by 1,000. The result is your eCPM.

While this is a commonly used ad revenue calculation method, it is somewhat less useful in measuring ad revenue and comparing your results across different time periods because it doesn't account for the increases in revenue that come simply as a result of visitor growth or growth in total page views.

A Trusted Partner in Ad Monetization 

We're not trying to spoil the fun. In fact, we get it - it's exciting to imagine how much ad revenue you could pull in with your audience and reach. We do that all the time when we talk to publishers, but we don't rely on an ad revenue calculator for it. 

Instead, we use hard data and years of experience to understand how high a publisher's revenue could go, and then we deploy our AI-powered revenue amplification platform, human intelligence-powered yield optimization team, and success-powered global direct sales team to make it a reality.

If that sounds like what you're really looking for, we're ready to tell you more. To understand where your revenue could go and how to get it there, all you have to do is contact Playwire.

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