Why Join Mediavine

I want to start out by saying that I am not an affiliate for Mediavine. In fact, they do not have affiliate marketing at all because they want all their reviews to be real.

Moving on…

Working with the right ad network is essential to the success of many bloggers. Mediavine is one of the top and arguably the best ad network there is.

I have been with Mediavine since the end of June 2019. When I applied to join them at the end of April I had no idea what Mediavine was like.

All I knew is that they were one of the ad networks, they were well liked by people who were with them, and how to apply. Since then I’ve fallen completely in love with Mediavine for many reasons.

Seriously, I am regularly updating this list with new reasons.

Customer Service

The first thing I noticed was that they had terrific customer service.

The first time I contacted them was a few weeks after applying to join. They apologized that it was taking a little longer than usual and explained that it was due to high application volume. Then I got approved with in days of my contacting them so I think they made sure to stay on top of my application.

The process to get started takes a little time because they want to make sure everything is set up right. However, by the time things started getting moving I was in Upstate New York where I had little service and only my cellphone. So when they asked me to do stuff I couldn’t.

I was annoyed and told them that I couldn’t do what they were asking due to my situation. Instead of telling me that’s my problem they asked if they could do it for me. Pretty much every step I was contacted with (I was Upstate for six weeks) I asked them if they could do it for me and they did except one that only I could do.

Transparency

The thing that shocked me most when I joined Mediavine was their transparency. I could not only see how much I made every day and my RPMs for that day but they broke the revenue down by type ad placement, by ad partner, device used, and how much each video you have on your site earned.

The new dashboard goes in to even more detail. Now you can also see your revenue by country and by page. In addition, you can see everything in a lot of detail including exact numbers, percentages, RPMs per page, revenue, and more.

They don’t hide anything from their publishers.

Ethics

Not all ad networks are ethical with their publishers.

Many just look at publishers as a way form themselves to make money and use publisher revue at their digression.

They also will keep your money if you leave them if the revenue is beneath their minimum payout requirements. These numbers are often very high relative to how little you earn with them.

Then there is the fact that many (including some of the top ad networks) won’t compensate you for losses you had due to bugs in their system. Or at very least you will have to fight with them to get it.

Ad networks may also may not have any respect for your site and make changes to it without informing you or your permission.

With Mediavine they do not see your revenue as their discretionary fund. They always refund you if they caused you a loss in revenue – in fact, this is usually how I find out that I had a loss in the first place.

Their minimum payout within the United States is only $25 and $200 in Europe. However, their RPMs are so high that I made the threshold even by European standards in my first month.

Before working with Mediavine I was with Gourmet Ads. I was making so little that I didn’t meet the $100 threshold without the revenue rolling over for two or three months.

When I left they owed me just under $100 and I asked if they’d pay it out since I wasn’t with them anymore to make the extra few dollars.

Gourmet Ad’s response was no “because if they pay [me] they’d have to pay everyone.”

The Mediavine Guarantee

Unlike some other ad networks, if they don’t get paid for any reason, you lose out on the money despite having earned it. With Mediavine, they eat the cost so you get paid what you are owed.

High RPMs

Mediavine has very good revenue rates. This because they have a minimum that advertisers have to pay for space on you site. This makes sure that your revenue always stays high.

Many ad networks pay very little for your ad space. Anywhere from a number of cents to a few dollars.

After switching to Mediavine my RPMs skyrocketed.

However, it should be noted that revenue does depend on a number of factors.

If you are new it will take some time for you to build up credibility with advertisers so you probably won’t be making much.

Still, when I moved I was shocked to make in my first two days what used to take me weeks to earn with Gourmet Ads.

In addition, your niche, audience, WordPress theme, and host can all make a big difference.

Not to mention, if your readership is American you’ll make a lot more than if you’re audience is from anywhere else.

Then there is the fact that you will make different RPMs based which quarter you are in, what point in the month it is, and what day of the week it is.

The beginning of a quarter is always painful. The beginning of a month will always be a big drop from the month before unless there is a holiday coming up. And Mondays are always a big drop for me.

After switching to Trellis I saw my RPMs jump to what they had been in the last Q4 – which had record breaking RPMs- and I was in Q2 – during Corona when RPMs were way down.

Then, I switched to Agathon from Lyrcal Host I saw my RPMs go up by a lot more.

More Money

When you join Midiavine you get 75% of what ads pay. This is a high percentage compared to many other ad networks.

However, for every year you are with them you get a loyalty bonus of 1% for every year you are with them for the first 5 years.

Also, when you hit 5,000,000 ad impressions – which is a lot easier than it sounds – you start getting 80%.

It doesn’t end there either. When you hit 10,000,000 then you get 85%.

So, by the end of 5 years you can, and likely will, be getting 90% which is unheard of!

Monetizes Jump to Recipe Buttons

In the past you couldn’t have a jump to recipe button with ads. However, there was very high demand from users due to the speculation that it is better for SEO, so Mediavine addressed this.

Mediavine first did this by optimizing ads in the recipe card for publishers using Mediavine’s plugin create. Then they optimized this for publishers who were using other recipe cards by not lazy loading the ads.

While this doesn’t make as much money as not having a jump to recipe button, its pretty close.

For the record, I don’t have a jump to recipe button. If I’m taking the time to write something, my readers are going to have to scroll through it and see if there is anything helpful to them.

Built For Speed

Mediavine is obsessed with web speed. They are always tweaking and making changes to make the ads load lighter so you site is faster.

They also lazy load their ads so you site loads as fast as it can without the ads interfering. To my knowledge Mediavine is the only ad network that does this and Google even mentioned them in one of their SEO articles for doing this.

They also make sure they have the best tech and build the best programs for you user experience.

They are Good for Your SEO

Mediavine actually started as an SEO company and the CEO Eric Hochberger is an SEO expert. Because of this they make sure not to harm your SEO like other ad networks might.

The truth is Eric is actually kind of obsessed about good SEO and page speed for Mediavine Publishers.

Mediavine has many articles and tips to help publishers improve their SEO and other useful topics. The good news is you don’t even have to be with Mediavine to access them.

For these articles check out the Mediavine Blog or the Mediavine Youtube channel. There is so much great content would highly recommend reading as much of it as you can.

Eric also has an Youtube series called SEO like a CEO to help publishers understand and improve their SEO. It is without a doubt the clearest and most through explanation and breakdown I’ve ever heard from an expert.

Then there is the Theory of Content podcast is co-hosted by Amber Bracegirdle Co-founder of Mediavine. While the podcast was created to focus on content creation, naturally it speaks about a lot of SEO as well.

In fact, it is generally known as an SEO podcast rather than a content creation podcast.

If you want to know more about SEO for blogging check out my article on SEO for Blog Posts.

They care about user experience

Mediavine always puts an emphasis on user experience. In fact, Mediavine’s SEO Eric Hochberger once said “write your content for your users not the ads.”

For me this is super important because I want someone who cares about me and my users. I am a very user oriented blogger and always have been.

They Let you Choose

Mediavine understands how important it is to creators to make sure that their readers have the best user experience. They also understand how important it is to their creators to make as much money as they can.

As a result, they have a bunch of settings that you can change based on your needs. This freedom and flexibility is pretty much unheard of in the ad world.

They know what its like to be a publisher

Mediavine is created by publishers. One of their founding partners is the is the creator of the Blue Bonnet Baker.

They have they have two of their own sites the The Hollywood Gossip and Food Fanatic. In fact, it was due to ad revenue issues with these blogs that they decided to create their own ad network.

Not to mention, many if not most of the people who work for them have their own sites as well. Many of them actually started out as Mediavine publishers before working for them.

This makes a big difference because know what its like to be in your shoes. They use the same plugins you use, they use the same platforms you use, and they have the same struggles you do.

In fact, they created the Mediavine ad network in response to the ads on their site dropping in revenue and their ad network not being willing to do anything about it.

As a result, they did it themselves, then publishers who worked with them on asked if they’d do it for them too, and within a few short years they became one of the top and most sought after ad networks.

They Eat Their Own Dog Food

This is a programmer term about using your own product. In this case, since Mediavine has their own sites and the people who work for them are publishers with their own sites, they use Mediavine ads.

What does this mean for you? It means they need Mediavine to be as best as it can be so they can make money just like you.

Community

Mediavine has a large community of publishers within their network. They have a Facebook group to help everyone connect and answer each others questions and give advice.

They are invested in you

Mediavine knows that if you do well, they do well. For that reason they do everything they can to help you succeed.

Mediavine provides many informative posts on SEO and other things on your blog. They also share interviews with successful bloggers and others on their Facebook page and Youtube channel.

Not to mention, they have great customer service and tech support that does their best to answer your questions and solve your problems in a timely fashion.

They care about their Publishers

This may sound crazy but they actually do. In fact, they care about the blogging industry as a whole.

They put a ton of free content out there for anyone to access to improve their own site and themselves as bloggers. Mediavine also make their plugins free for everyone so everyone can have a better experience and better SEO.

Believe it or not, they originally were planning on putting their WordPress frame work for free. When they realized that wasn’t sustainable due to the cost of running it, they decided they would make it as cheap as they could manage it.

Google Publishing Partner

Being a Google Publishing Partner means that Mediavine works with Google to make sure their ads follow Googles requirements. It also means that they provide publishers with innovative solutions and services.

They’ve also received two awards from Google: the 2019 Customer Satisfaction Award for its “commitment to understanding the customer” and the 2019 Highest Health Score Award for a perfect health score of 100.

The Highest Health Score Award is presented based on Google’s internal metrics of partner performance. This includes revenue, growth, quality of inventory and adoption of industry standards.