AppLovin is a mobile advertising optimization platform from the company of the same name headquartered in California.
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ironSource
Score 8.0 out of 10
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ironSource (or Supersonic before ironSource and Supersonic merged under the ironSource brand) is a mobile app monetization and mobile advertising application. ironSource (the company) is headquartered in Tel Aviv.
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Taboola
Score 8.6 out of 10
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Taboola is a native advertising platform from the company of the same name in New York for publishing "recommended" content in a variety of popularly visited news sites and spaces. Taboola is partnered with many publishers (the Atlantic, Tribune, MailOnline, Business Insider, etc.).
$10
Starting Price Per Day
Pricing
AppLovin Exchange (ALX)
ironSource
Taboola
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Campaigns
$10.00
Starting Price Per Day
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
AppLovin Exchange (ALX)
ironSource
Taboola
Free Trial
No
No
No
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
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More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
AppLovin Exchange (ALX)
ironSource
Taboola
Considered Multiple Products
AppLovin Exchange (ALX)
No answer on this topic
ironSource
Verified User
Director
Chose ironSource
We were wanting to expand our channels, and IS stood out from the others because of their presence in other verticals that suited our target audience. We would not propose utilizing IS to replace any of your existing DSPs, but rather to supplement the DSPs you are already using.
AppLovin is particularly well suited for gaming campaigns where it is really hard to reach users and you need formats like the rewarded video to keep users engaged with your ad. I would not recommend it for branding campaigns as their formats are more performance-focused and the inventory is expensive so unless you are trying to reach the desired CPA, it would not be worth it to pay that much for ad placement.
Very good to scale Android apps in US or MX. I wouldn't use it for scaling iOS Apps in Latin America as they have a very small inventory. The platform is super easy to use and start launching ads. We use it as a complement to Appsflyer.
If you want to have your company advertised on news websites across the United States then Taboola is perfect. If you're looking for clicks and impressions but not so much interested in traffic that is highly engaged and converting often then I'd suggest Taboola as an option to run traffic, too. This is the perfect platform for grey-hat offers and similar ideas. I wouldn't suggest it for running ads on your website due to some strict conditions and the fact that it might not necessarily play nice with traffic coming from Facebook.
AppLovin has been a great partner for us. We have used them through our DSP and gotten great results with them. Their focus is on monetizing publishers' inventory and they could put more resources into their standalone service as an SSP to make sure DSPs can consider them strategic partners for the long term.
It was pretty straightforward getting an account set up and having an account rep assigned. Compared to some other platforms Taboola is actually rather intuitive when it comes to navigating the user interface. Pixel implementation was easy and we didn't have any discrepancies tracking conversions. Also the ability to target LALs was very useful and semi-straightforward to upload.
AppLovin's support team is their weakest point. They are not very responsive and they tend to provide solutions that do not fix the problem. It seems like they will only be proactive if you are a very big client and by doing that they are preventing the rest of the client base from increasing spend on their platform and growing their accounts
We have a point of contact in Taboola and he has been really great in supporting our campaign. He helped us set up the initial campaign, answered our questions related to the campaign and even agreed when I asked for a lower CPC. Also, while he tried to encourage us to spend more, he never pushed us to the point that it gets annoying.
Of all of the competitors above, AppLovin is the one that is more focused on gaming and that has a better pool of users in terms of conversion rate. While PubMatic and Magnate offer better solutions for CTV, AppLovin is better than InMobi and MoPub regarding in-app formats and inventory.
ironSource has more reach in the USA than other players that are focused on smaller geos. I would also say that Google is a big competitor with its DV360 and we use them as well, but ironSource is more focused on branding and Google provides more options for campaigns that have multiple objectives.
Outbrain doesn't charge a fee for automatic credit card billing. Often Outbrain CPC for the same content is cheaper but not always. The Outbrain UX is not as good as Taboola but recent changes had made them better than they used to be. In Outbrain you can not change images or titles once they are submitted. You also can not clone campaigns which you can do with Taboola
Taboola campaigns have had positive effects on top of funnel activities and engagement metrics though the traffic is not always as qualified as one would like. You will need to carefully tailor your campaign to squeeze out the most relevant traffic.
