Our billing process is straightforward, but it can sometimes confuse customers. This article provides an in-depth explanation of how it works and addresses common questions.
Ad Request
Adserver.Online uses a consumption-based billing model, where the consumption unit is an ad request.
You pay for every incoming ad request regardless of where it comes from in the system: JS code, VAST endpoint, OpenRTB endpoint, or XML/JSON feed.
It is essential to understand that an ad request differs from an impression.
Ad requests may not always result in impressions due to targeting, frequency capping, etc. The number of ad requests may be nearly equal to impressions only when you have a 100% fill rate.
Note that a single webpage may generate multiple ad requests when multiple ad codes are installed. For example, if your website receives 1000 visits daily and you install 5 banner codes on each page, then your website will produce 5000 ad requests daily.
Pricing Plans
We offer three pricing plans: Starter, Premium, and Pro Buyer. You can check them here: https://adserver.online/plans
It is important to understand that plans like "Premium 10M" do not exist.
In this example, the plan is Premium, but 10M is the traffic volume tier, which is not constant, and it's selected dynamically at the moment of monthly billing.
Traffic Volume Tiers
Every plan (e.g., Premium) has multiple traffic volume tiers (e.g., 3M, 5M, 10M, 25M, etc).
Higher tiers are cheaper. Hence, the more ad requests you serve monthly, the less you pay per each 1 Million ad request.
How Billing Works
The billing runs monthly. The exact dates of your billing period can be found in the Billing / Subscription menu.
First, the billing gets the number of ad requests consumed within the reference period. Note the billing works in the UTC timezone.
Next, the billing selects a suitable traffic volume tier based on the number of ad requests and the pricing plan.
Finally, the billing calculates monthly spending according to the selected tier.
After that, the billing creates an invoice and tries to charge your card. If you have deposited funds, they will cover your spending.
Monthly Spend Calculation
Suppose you consumed 6.1M ad requests in a reference period, and your plan is Premium.
First, the billing selects a suitable traffic volume tier.
6.1M is in between 5M and 10M tiers. The lower 5M tier is selected as a suitable one.
On the 5M tier, 1M costs $13.80
Finally, spending is calculated as $13.80 * 6.1M = $84.18
You can click the Pricing Calculator button on the Pricing plans page to check the tiers.
Automatic Charges
Your balance may go negative when you consume more ad requests in the current billing period than are included in your plan, e.g., Premium includes 3 Million.
The system allows your balance to fall as low as minus $50 (on the Premium plan).
If the balance falls below minus $50, the system will try to charge your card automatically to make your balance zero.
If an automated charging attempt fails, the system will create an invoice for manual payment. You will have a few hours to pay the invoice. Otherwise, ad serving will be suspended.
Packages
Package-based pricing means you prepay for a traffic package every month. For example, you can buy a Premium 50M package.
Package cost is calculated based on regular pricing (traffic volume tiers). For example, 50M will cost $484.
The system will charge $484 from your card at the beginning of the billing period.
Exceeding ad requests will be billed using regular pricing. Unconsumed ad requests will not carry over to the next period.
The minimum package size is 25M. Discounts are possible for packages exceeding 500M.
We can provide you with pricing based on packages upon support request.
Spending Control
You should be aware that the system does not have spending limits. For example, upgrading to Premium does not apply a limit of 3M, as you may assume.
The only limit is your balance in the system and the balance of your linked bank card.
This means that ads will continue to be served until your account balance becomes insufficient. After that, the system will try to top up the balance by charging your card and continue serving ads.
To avoid unexpected spending, regularly visit your panel and check the Requests column in the Reports / Statistics menu and the amounts in the Billing / Subscription menu.
We recommend you configure an automated alert that triggers when your monthly number of ad requests exceeds a certain threshold. You can do it by pressing the Alerts button in the Billing / Subscription menu.
To stop ad requests from counting, you can deactivate a website or a zone or a publisher. So, to save costs, you may deactivate websites/zones/publishers if you temporarily don't use them.