RTB (Real-Time Bidding) is the process of multiple advertisers bidding for impressions in mobile inventory using sophisticated software in real-time. The process of selling and buying impressions takes place in Ad Exchanges. The buyer’s side is presented by agencies, advertisers and networks, and these are connected to ad exchanges via Demand Side Platforms.
The seller’s side is presented by publishers and networks and these are plugged into ad exchanges via SSP (Supply Side Platforms).
Smaato’s real-time bidding platform example
Source: Smaato
Real-time bidding platforms benefits
In the world of programmatic advertising, real-time bidding platforms help to support mobile publishers and their inventories by selling their space through an ad exchange. DSPs, (Demand Side Platforms) find the best ad inventory and the highest bidder wins that space – this could be on a website or inside a mobile app.
Real-time bidding allows advertisers to focus on the mobile inventory that is most important to them; by doing so, this increases their ROI and eCPMs. For example, inside a mobile game where the player is taken to watch an ad between moving to the next level of the game — in real-time, advertisers can bid for that space. The highest bidder then wins this inventory, and the gamer sees the ad in real-time.
Real-time bidding platform benefits include:
- Publishers can connect to a wide variety of different mobile advertisers.
- Ad impressions can be sold for the highest price possible.
- Mobile publishers can set their prices and have more control over their ad space.
Below we’ve listed the best real-time bidding platforms so you can get up and running without fuss.
List of real time bidding ad platforms
| Founded | Employees | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | 51-200 |
Zoomd is dedicated to helping advertisers and publishers achieve their key performance indicators (KPIs) through a patented, performance-based advertising platform. The Company’s User Acquisition platform unifies more than 600 media sources under one dashboard including Google, TikTok, Samsung premium inventory and much more.
- Business Models – Choose your preferred business model CPC/CPI/CPO/CPE/CPA
- Fraud – Detection as part of the platform, adding you an extra layer of safety
- Measurement – integrated to all major 3rd party mobile measurement solutions
- Cost-efficiency – Save countless resources by managing all campaigns under one screen
- Data Play – Enjoy machine decisions based on more than 500Million data points a day
| Founded | Employees | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | 101 - 200 |
Start.io is a mobile advertising company. It provides a self-serve platform for advertisers to quickly build and launch ad campaigns, controlling audience, creatives and budget aspects of their campaigns. Among features that sets it aside from other ad networks are uniquely designed animated and interactive ads, data-enhanced targeting, using data derived from over 300,000 mobile apps and native ad units.
- Mobile platforms: Android, iOS
- Campaign types: CPA, CPC, CPI, CPM
- Ad formats supported: App Icon, Full Page Ads, InApp Ads, Interstitial, Video
- Targeting: App, Carrier, Competitors, Connection Type, Device, Gender, Geo, OS
- Key Markets: Global
| Founded | Employees | Social | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 100-125 | 12k+ |
Stack is an end-to-end SaaS-based solution (by the team behind Appodeal’s award winning ad monetization platform) that scales mobile app business growth and drive profit by synthesizing User Acquisition, Ad Monetization and Business Intelligence.
Stack is an independent ad tech market player that strives to clear the way for publishers and advertisers to collaborate directly. In an industry known for being opaque, Stack aims to increase transparency and empower mobile app businesses with the technology and data they need to thrive in a highly competitive landscape.
Learn more about Stack
| Founded | Employees | Social | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | 11-50 | 2k+ |
Spotad is a performance-based Demand-Side-Marketing-
Key Features
- Performance driven
- Mobile experts
- Utilize data for better targeting and optimization
- Using self-developed ML model
- Full control of the creative assets for a better user engagement. From the Ad Design to the Ad Serving
Splicky is the new Demand Side Platform (DSP) for the mobile channel using proprietary Real-Time Advertising (RTA) technology. Their technology makes it simple to buy mobile ad impressions and clicks within mobile sites and apps – in real-time. Using just one platform, you have immediate access to all global mobile inventory which uses Real-Time Bidding (RTB) technology. Within a matter of minutes, your mobile ad campaigns can be displayed on a Cost Per Impression (CPM) and Cost Per Click (CPC) basis. Our platform allows you to target on individual Mobile Sites and Apps, giving you total control at campaign management-level. Our detailed analysis gives you full insights on campaign performance enabling you to maximize your ROI.
- Easy to use interface with a self-serve platform and real-time analytics
- Worldwide reach across a transparent publisher set
- Wide range of targeting options including Geo+hyper location and support for mobile retargeting
- Range of formats supported including banners, interstitials, rich media & video
Sovrn is an advertising technology company that provides Meridian solution – an ad server for publishers. The company’s mission is to help publishers to increase their revenue, get insights for their audience and comprehensive reporting on their ad campaigns, as well as acquire more knowledge about effective monetization. Meridian ad server provides a suite of advertising tools for display, mobile and video advertising.
- Key Features: header bidding, VPAID and VAST video support, OnScroll InView ads, integration with all major advertising buyer worldwide
- Tagline: Insights, audience access and advertising solutions that publishers can profit from.
- Platforms: iOS, Android, Web
SmartyAds DSP is a programmatic-buying platform for advertisers who search for safe, supreme-quality push traffic that converts in higher ROI, instant user engagement and retention.
Pricing & Features:
- Push traffic for all screen types & sizes that translates in 200-400% higher ROI & conversions.
- Easy to segment and personalize push creatives.
- The broadest network of premium push traffic publishers and SSP partners (MoPub, MobFox, PubNative) with tested and localized landings across all geos and verticals.
- In-app traffic from more than 1000 top-rated apps with push traffic for iOS & Android.
- 30+ targeting options for geomarketing push campaigns Including geo-targeting, GPS, language, etc.)
- Frequency capping, dayparting and sparring to fine-tune push advertising experience.
- Comprehensive, easy-to-grasp statistics with an in-deep performance overview.
- Third-party impression analytics tags support, API.
- Rapid and easy campaign set up and creative approval.
- Flexible CPM pricing model.
| Founded | Employees | Revenues | Social | Traffic |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| - | - | - | - | - |
Smaato’s digital ad tech platform is a completely omnichannel, self-serve monetization solution and free ad server all in one. Smaato gives publishers unparalleled controls to make monetization simple. Publishers can bring their first-party data and manage all inventory in one place. Marketers get access to the highest-quality inventory so they can reach audiences around the world and on any device. Headquartered in San Francisco, Smaato is part of Verve Group, a Media and Games Invest (MGI) company, with additional offices in Hamburg, New York, Beijing, and Singapore.
- Mobile platforms: Android, IOS, Mobile, Windows Phone
- Campaign types: CPC
- Ad formats supported: Banners
- Targeting: country, publisher, app, ad format, device, connection type, GPS data, device ID
- Key Markets: Germany, global
PubMatic delivers superior revenue to publishers by being an SSP of choice for agencies and advertisers. With our leading programmatic mobile advertising platform, publishers and app developers can leverage the open exchange as well as advanced deal models to maximize their monetization and gain access to brand budgets.
- Mobile platforms: Android, IOS
- Campaign types: CPA, CPC, CPI, CPL, CPM
- Ad formats supported: Banners, In-App, Interstitial, Native, Rewarded Video, Rich Media, Video
- Targeting: Publisher, Geo, Audience Segment, Ad Format, Platform, Domain / App, Viewability
- Key markets: Global
| Founded | Employees | Revenues | Social | Traffic |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 11-50 | - | 5k | - |
| Founded | Employees | Revenues | Social | Traffic |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | 51-200 | - | - | - |
Jampp unlocks programmatic advertising to drive incremental performance. A demand-side platform (DSP) at heart, Jampp leverages unique contextual and behavioral signals to deliver customers and in-app purchases through programmatic user acquisition and retargeting. We simplify programmatic growth for some of the biggest names in mobile.
- Services: User Acquisition, App retargeting, Lift measurement, Geolocated ads, Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO), Dynamic Product Ads, Predictive Bidding
- Tagline: Unlock new growth
Learn more about Jampp
| Founded | Employees | Revenues | Social | Traffic |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 10-50 | - | - | - |
Hitapps focuses on your success as a whole. Perhaps you can manage a small-scale campaign but, if you want to develop an impactful ads campaign, it’s better to let us take over.
- Performance based marketing
- RTB solution
- Apps development and publishing
HilltopAds
One of the best CPM ad networks for publishers and advertisers from all over the world.
| Founded | Employees | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | 10-50 |
HilltopAds is one of the best CPM ad networks for publishers and advertisers from all over the world. HilltopAds is a UK-based CPC/CPM advertising network launched in 2013. The unique feature of HilltopAds is traffic segmentation by QUALITY and ACTIVITY of users.
Learn more about HilltopAds
Doubleclick Bid Manager is part of Google’s Display & Video 360 advertising solution. It is a Demand Side Platform for agencies, trading desks and advertisers to get access to ad exchanges with a wide range of exclusive video, display and mobile inventory from Google. Its targeting capabilities are defined by more than 100 ad exchanges and approximately 1 billion websites, opportunity to run ads across, desktop, mobile and tablet, multiple bidding strategies support and more.
- Highlights: connects to 100+ ad exchanges, allows to run ads across mobile, desktop and tablet, allows to buy brand-safe inventory for YouTube and TV ads programmatically through Google Partner Select, DBM’s premium video marketplace
- AppsFlyer Performance Index: Performance: Global, iOS & Android: All Categories: Power Ranking #2 (2019)
Entravision
Entravision is the leading Performance One-Stop-Shop Digital Marketing Company
| Founded | Employees | Revenues | Social | Traffic |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | - | - | 20k | - |
Entravision is the leading Performance One-Stop-Shop Digital Marketing Company. We set the beat of digital advertisement.
Get the scale and global footprint you are looking for. Our team is here to boost your campaigns and help you reach the consumers most likely to engage with your brand.
Key Features
- Performance and strategy focus toward UA in mobile devices.
- Mobile-first
- Proprietary tech
- API Integrations
- Partnerships with industry key players
- Renowned Growth Squad
Doble Via Latam was born in 2004, with VAS services and in 2011 thinking about advertisers needs, we started with mobile advertising business. Positioned at an international level we have vast experience in mobile and video advertising business.
Learn more about Doble Via Latam
Digital Turbine is a mobile app advertising platform for app delivery and discovery. The company is double down on a mobile native format to allow advertisers cut through the noice and reach out their target audience. Digital Turbine bypasses app stores and partners with major global telecom companies to introduce apps to mobile users with sponsored recommendations and native preloads.
- Mobile platforms: iOS, Android, Mobile Web
- Campaign types: CPC, CPI
- Ad formats supported: Banners, Interstitial, Native, Offer Wall
- Targeting: Geo, OS
- Key Markets: Asia, Europe, USA