A Free Ad Server We Use
Oct 2nd, 2008 | By Kevin | Category: make money
There are a lot of marketers out there using CPanel hosting for the simplified install of open source scripts like Wordpress and Joomla. However, we don’t here about many using other scripts available in Fantastico. sure we may here about some using Drupal or Mambo, but everyone pretty much sticks to blogs and content management systems.
One of the other scripts that we use and recommend is actually an Ad Server presently called OpenX. It used to be called OpenAds and before that PHPAdsNew. The ad server has really evolved over the last even though this is an open source solution, it truly is an enterprise level ad server capable of serving millions of ads each month. It can also be scaled across multiple servers with the right setup.
You may remeber the big launch of Traffic Fusion last month from Mike Filsaime. The basic premise of Traffic Fusion is to be able to show ads on a partners site while monitoring its activity, and having the ability to change the ad without your partner having to update their site. This is achieved very easily with OpenX much like Hyper Java. You should not that Hyper Java does take it to the next level though, with a simplified insertion code on the partners site and a built in affiliate system accepting payments through Paypal.
OpenX also gives you the ability to GeoTarget your ads as well by the visitors IP address. So if your visitor is from Australia, you can target them with floral shops in Australia instead of the US. This important when promoting affiliate programs specific to different countries.
OpenX also allows you to cap and ad run by clicks or impressions also so you can configure your display advertising specific to your customers need and you can create your own ad network.
The latest relase, 2.6 has added single page calls improving the performance by retrieving multiple ads on a page with a single call to the ad server.
When setting up your ads, you can also associate keywords with the different ads and invoke ads based on keywords from the title or meta tags for a page. We haven’t been using this feature yet but plan to start implementing it on my blog so that the ads that apear within a post are targeted based on what the post is about.
We run a few differnt installations, but a single installation could server ads across a network of websites, giving you all of your ad stats in a single place. It can also be used to serve Adsense ads, allowing you to split test Adsense versus banner advertising or supplement your Adsense income with affiliate income or your own products.
I’ll try to add some overview videos of OpenX next week to take you inside the ad server.
Until next time,
Kevin
Originally from Wisconsin, I moved out to Salt Lake City over ten years ago on a six month software development contract. I now have over 15 years in software development, and was introduced to internet marketing back in 2003. During the wild west days, our business focused on content sites for Adsense revenue. As it became harder and harder to keep up with the search engines, our business has evolved, and forced us to focus on building lists and creating products. We now have a list of about 5000 interested in goal setting, and a small internet marketing list of about 500.
Hi Kevin,
Thanks for writing about OpenX and sharing your thoughts. This is a really nice summary of the key features for many publishers like yourself.
cheers,
Oliver George
OpenX Limited
This is a great review of OpenX as Oliver said, before me. I’ve been planning to try it out for a long time but after reading your review here, I guess I might just do it soon. I was especially drawn to the Geo-Targeting feature. I never knew a free platform like OpenX would support such a feature.
Thanks for this. Appreciate it.
Cheers.
Wow, never knew OpenX was such a useful application. I knew it was good but didn’t know it was so good. And got to hand it over to you man, as the other comments said, awesome review. Need to try out OpenX. Thanks for the useful information. Keep up the good stuff.
I’m using Fantastico to upgrade any latest wordpress version available on the net. Of course, installing and upgrading new platform using this service is a lot easier than we upload and run the executable file. I have never utilize the ad function in my site and looking for something that can be used to organize all my ad section. You have suggested a wonderful application that exactly suit my needs. Do you have any ebook or tutorial for this application as I am willing to learn all the possibilities with this new tool.
Great review. I’ve been using OpenX for my blogs for the past few months and it has certainly impressed me. The performance has been up to mark and never had troubles with it yet. Great application. Really good review. Keep up the work. Cheers
Great information. I’m still new to blogging and I was in the lookout for an ad server. Well considering the review and comments it seems my lookout has come to an end. I’m definitely going to try this out tonight. Thanks for the information.
Hey Kevin, This a great review. Even I’m using OpenX an I’m really amused with it’s work. It’s extremely stable and really gets the job done with less hassle. I’ve used few other ad servers previously but this was by far the best I’ve come cross. Your review is simply great. Keep it up. Cheers
Wow,cool. One of my friend who came to your site recommended me to have a look. and its simply awesome. I’ve not used OpenX earlier but looks like I need to give it a try. Thanks for sharing. Great blog by the way.
Awesome review. And yes, OpenX is by fr the best ad server I’ve come across and used. Its features are just great. The latest release boasts many more options. You should check it out. Thanks for sharing the information
Nice work Kevin. been a OpenX fan for sometime now. And interesting to know you guys are using it as well. Nice review.
Stumbled across your page. Actually I’m new to this but I want to know more about OpenX. I’m currently using Wordpress 2.7 and would this version of OpenX support it for me to try it out? Thanks in advance.
I see that OpenX has many evolved features compared to Traffic Fusion. Thats a good news. Hope the feature of associating keywords will be updated asap. Great post Kevin, hope to hear more on OpenX.
I was going to get into OiO Publisher to manage my blog ads but I guess Open X is worth a try after reading your review. I’d very much like to test both of them and do a comparison, but sadly, OiO Publisher is not free. I will see how it goes with Open X I guess.
i agree with Nadeesha. A comparison of OiO and OpenX would be really cool. Just to know what is best. But Open X has it’s edge because its free. Unless your hardcore concerning ad servers Open X would be the ideal server to settle to. Its’ free and it’s effective. What more do you need.
This is great Open X being free sounds great to me , I mean I have been asked by some website to pay a small fee to download and use wordpress and/or drupal so I will give it a try and let you know what i think about it .
OpenX is the best free ad server as I feel. It’s really great and doe the major tasks of a paid adserver. If you dont have a huge site that would be sufficient. openX is the best.
OpenX is hands down the best ad server I have used (free or otherwise). This post covers some of the main points but let me tell you it makes selling and managing ad space very easy.
Interesting discussion. I’m currently using OiO Publisher but now after reading the article and the comments I’m wondering if that’s a good choice. will try out Openx and see. Thanks
Really useful information. Nowadays newbie bloggers have many resources and articles to look into for help. this si one such useful article. I wish I had such help when I started blogging. Anyway, thanks a lot for the information.
Thanks for the information. I recently tried OiO but wasn’t happy about it. Especially after paying a good some for it too. Seems like OpenX is a better choice. I think I will start using OpenX and see. Thanks for the information.Cheers
Great write up, I’m thinking of using OpenX at some stage soon
I just switched from PHPLD to Joomla. I sure will look this up. thanks for Sharing.
Thanks for the very nice review. I agree that OpenX is one of the best ad servers around at the moment. Very easy and intuitive to use with user-friendly features that are great. And the latest release looks like its loaded with even more bells and whistles – looks even better.
Interesting discussion and post. I’ve been using OpenX for quite sometime and it really is a useful and effective ad server. and I have used few other servers earlier as well. so i do have experience about them and I have to tell you, OpenX is the best.
I’ve been using OpenX for sometime now and it really does perform really well. Even more than some of the paid ad servers I’ve used. Plus the service is really awesome. I do recommend this to all my friends and colleagues.
OpenX is a great invention. Thank you!
OpenX is a really useful ad server. We have been using it for many years now.The product is really amazing. Appreciate the article. Cheers
One of my friend who came to your site recommended me to have a look. and its simply awesome. I’ve not used OpenX earlier but looks like I need to give it a try. Thanks for sharing.
Really useful information. Nowadays newbie bloggers have many resources and articles to look into for help. this si one such useful article. I wish I had such help when I started blogging.