Published by Jeremy. Last Updated on August 13, 2022.
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When it comes to premium ad networks for blogging, there are no shortage of options out there.
Some, like AdSense, accept blogs of all shapes and sizes and pay out accordingly (read: low RPMs- revenue per 1,000 views). Others have higher barriers for entry be it on page views/sessions, audience demographics, and more and often can give you higher RPMs proportional to how strict their barrier for entry is.
When my wine blog, The Grape Pursuit, hit 10,000 page views per month, I was able to ditch AdSense and make the leap to Monumetric– a premium ad network with one of the lowest entry requirements out there.
After my first month on this one, I thought I'd share a bit of a review of what the network is like, pros and cons, and of course my earnings outright!
What is Monumetric?
Monumetric is a premium ad network that taps into various advertising exchanges to help bloggers with a minimum amount of traffic monetize their sites. Through their proprietary tools and accepting sites with minimum traffic targets (10,000 page views per month), they are able to boast higher RPMs than services like AdSense which are known for notoriously low rates.
As such, Monumetric is often a preferred ad network for those in the 10,000 to 50,000-page view range before qualifying for higher-tier advertising networks, like Mediavine.
What Are The Requirements to Get on Monumetric?
Monumetric is pretty straightforward with its application requirements. You are required to have 10,000 page views per month on your site to enter their base “Propel” level program. Your site must be hosted on WordPress or Blogger CMS, your sidebar has to be 300 pixels wide, you must have a minimum of six ad slots on both mobile and desktop, and 50% of your traffic must be from English-speaking countries (USA, UK, Canada, Australia).
From there, your site must be approved by their major ad providers (so if you've been kicked out of AdSense or other similar services in the past for nefarious reasons, odds are good you may not get approved- most ad networks follow this rule) and you have to pay a one-time $99 fee to cover their developer time to turn ads on your site. Sites with over 80,000 monthly page views can enter their “Ascend” level program which waives this fee.
Cancelation on Monumetric is pretty straightforward as well, as you simply have to give 30 days' notice as the contract terms are on a month-to-month basis. Whereas other ad networks may lock you in for upwards of a year, this one is pretty forgiving.
Finally, Monumetric pays out on NET-60 terms after the completion of the month. There is no minimum payout threshold as far as I can tell- you simply just have to wait until that month's income is ready to go. Much like other terms mentioned above, this is a common concern amongst ad networks.
Setup on Monumetric Was a Breeze
As with joining any new advertising network, I always worry about the onboarding process. Monumetric's application page said that due to high demand it could take one to two months to get started, but I was fortunate enough to have a representative reach out just a few days after I applied (it sounds like I got lucky with my email showing up in the queue at the right minute).
Once you are in contact, you'll likely jump on a 15-30 minute video call to talk about what Monumetric is about, have them learn your needs, strengths, and weaknesses, and it is off to the races. As my wine blog was my third site on a premium ad network, I had very few questions, and this call was a getting-to-know-you formality more than anything (I appreciated this). I then had to have my host update my Ads.txt file to include Monumetric code and supply one of their team members admin access to my site, and they really handled the rest.
At this point, I was told it would be a few days if not just over a week before everything was installed on my site, but just a few days later I opened my blog to see ads displaying without prior notification.
If there is one complaint I had about the entire process, it would simply be that Monumetric turned on every ad type on my site by default. Leaderboard ads, interstitial ads, above-the-fold sidebar ads, top and bottom adhesion ads on mobile, and the like. To me, this was a bit too much at the start and was a bit unexpected. That being said, I sent off a couple quick emails and all of the ads I did not like were removed within an hour or two.
I should've mentioned the ad styles I do not like in my onboarding call, so this one was partly on me for not thinking of it. Once ads are live be sure to look through your site in a fair bit of detail on both desktop and mobile once ads are live to see what can be turned off. Keep in mind that those in the lower Propel program must keep a minimum of six ads on both mobile and desktop, so they may or may not be able to accommodate every request. I was pleasantly surprised by all of my changes being accepted without question, and the changes were reflected on my site pretty quickly.
Finally, it does not appear that you can manually place in-content ad locations either, so you really are at the mercy at where the algorithm places them when using Monumetric.
Monumetric Had No Speed Impact on My Site
One of my biggest concerns about joining a new ad network is the impact on my site speed and performance metrics on things like Google's PageSpeed Insights (PSI).
We all know that ads can put a burden on your site and that some ad networks are notoriously bad at this.
Prior to joining Monumetric, my wine blog was regularly loading in 0.7 to 0.9 seconds, and would regularly achieve 100/100 PSI scores (even with AdSense, although part of that was me optimizing placements using an advanced setup with Ad Inserter Pro's lazy load function). After optimizing ads in Monumetric, I was pleased to see that my site was still loading within 0.7 to 0.9 seconds and with 100/100 PSI scores- thanks in part to Monumetric's lazy loading of all ads.
That being said, during the initial setup Monumetric enabled ads above the fold, which appeared to cause CLS events and possibly interfered with my LCP scores within Google's PSI metrics. After requesting to have no ads displayed here, Monumetric turned off the leaderboard ad and pushed my first sidebar ad down below the fold and everything worked out wonderfully.
As of now, I really cannot even see any impact of their ads on my site, and I am grateful for this. They truly have worked out the speed elements nicely insofar as anything above the fold is turned off.
The Dashboard is Good, But Not Great
Once you have access to the back-end system on Monumetric, which for me took a few days after ads were already showing on my site, you get access to a number of reporting features to check out your site performance over time. This includes metrics (on a daily basis) of total earnings, ad impressions, site page views, site sessions, page view RPM, session RPM, page views per session, and impressions per session to name a few.
They offer basic graphs showing breakouts of your revenue by ad type, device, and traffic source, but admittedly could go into far more detail for those who like to get granular into data analysis. For example, as far as I can tell I cannot see a breakout of data on an individual article level, which is always something I like to get into when planning future content.
Perhaps the worst part about the dashboard is that you do not have many tools to adjust things like ad display settings or restricted categories. At most, the only things I have access to are excluding ads on select pages by URL, a video opt-in tool, turning on and off interstitial ads, enabling CLS optimizations, and that is about it. Monumetric does disable sensitive topic ads by default, but there is seemingly no control over this within the dashboard itself. Any changes you need outside of these require an email to your assigned developer, which so far has always been handled so quickly that this one honestly doesn't bother me as much as it could.
That being said, while there are some things I would look for that are lacking (possibly because I'm only in the base Propel program), I am not terribly upset by this. I can see my RPM and earnings on any given day, and that is good enough for me to start. It just could be a whole lot more in-depth for my liking.
There is also a quirk about Monumetric's reporting- data does not update at fixed times every day (although it is supposed to). Within your dashboard, you can see a column marked “Pending Reports” which shows how many outstanding ad exchanges still have to send in data. While these are supposed to be updated at set times daily, I've seen reports listed as pending for several days. Whenever one of these reports comes in, my income and RPM data changes, and pending on the time of day they can change so much that it is different upon each refresh.
Thankfully, earnings always seem to go up, but other details like Session RPM may go down. Weird? Yes. Could be better? Certainly. A deal-breaker? Not at all- it is just another quirk to get used to. At the end of the day, I just want to get paid, and I joined this network because I want more money- and that is exactly what I got.
How Much Can You Earn on Monumetric?
Finally, let's talk cold hard cash. It is the question everyone has about premium ad networks and is the hardest one to answer.
To be able to put a hard figure on what you can earn on any given ad network is difficult because there are many factors that go into things. Site niche, audience location, other audience demographics (like primary language), and more may impact what ads are being bid on your site at any given time. Enabled ad types, density settings, and content length also impact how much you can earn as more ads typically mean more revenue.
As such, it is impossible to compare two sites as an untold number of variables go into this equation. However, I can share my figures for our wine blog, The Grape Pursuit, all the same (keep in mind this site is niche alcohol-oriented and that is a sensitive topic that could impact ad rates positively or negatively).
Shortly after turning ads on, at the start of Q3 in 2022, my site was earning upwards of $8.50 RPM on a page view basis. So at around 400 page views per day, this equated to around $3 daily. After letting the ads optimize for my site over the first month, the normal optimization time for most ad networks, I was averaging upwards of $10 RPM- or about $4.00 per day. So at roughly 10,000 page views per month, I was making $100. The daily RPM fluctuated anywhere between $6.50 and $22.
- It is important to note that the start of Q3 often sees a 30%+ reduction in rates each year, so I intend to update this article as more data comes in to highlight seasonal variation in earnings. I expect ad rates to rise significantly in Q4, but drop from these figures in Q1 and perhaps even Q2. As such, I would not be surprised if my wine blog's page view RPMs fluctuate between $7 and $25 over a 12-month period when it is all said and done. This should only be treated as an estimate until more data comes in.
While we compare AdSense vs Monumetric in a separate article, this was an increase of approximately 300% from what I was earning on AdSense before making the switch (~$3.50 RPM there- albeit the daily earnings were all over the place whereas Monumetric's is much more consistent). Of course, this is a far cry from the $30-$50 RPMs we enjoy on other blogs on Mediavine, but a healthy increase all the same- which is exactly what I wanted.
Monumetric feels like a solid ad network for those in the 10,000 to 50,000-page view traffic range who want to ditch AdSense. My RPMs are a much bigger improvement of AdSense, the on-boarding process was a breeze, and the ads had no discernable impact on my site performance after turning off above-the-fold displays. Will they be able to compete with earnings from even more prestigious ad networks like Mediavine and AdThrive as we grow? We'll find out when that time comes (although compared to my other sites, I have to admit I would be shocked).
For now, I'll take my RPM increase over AdSense and am quite happy to make the switch as it is putting more money in my pocket than I had before. Now, what bottle of wine should I buy when the first month's payment hits my account?
To join Monumetric on your own blog, click here. We are Monumetric affiliates and may receive a commission from your referral. As always, all opinions are our own.
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