Likelihood to Recommend 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.
Read full review Smaato is very well suited for user acquisition and retargeting companies. Their overlap in terms of audiences and publishers with other exchanges is very limited, which makes it a great alternative when you need to scale a campaign and want to maintain your frequency cap. They work very well in branding campaigns as well as performance campaigns.
Read full review Pros Read full review Fill - the ad requests we send to Smaato have seen a great requests-to-impression ration. Revenue - We've seen a lift in overall revenue thanks to the high CPM bids we get from Smaato. Payments are always on time and they have a responsive financial team that is helpful in answering any questions. Customer service - They are very fast to respond to any issues. The set up was streamlined thanks to their professional customer service. Read full review Cons Their support is very slow. Inventory prices can be a bit high. They need better anti-fraud controls. Read full review Inventory can be a bit pricey in competitive markets like the US. Reporting dashboard is limited, needs work. They don't offer a lof of transparency about margins over media cost. Read full review Usability 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.
Read full review Smaato has a UI where you can control your line items on the traffic you want to receive. That is a key unique selling point that other SSPs don't offer. Most of the items that you will need like reporting can be done on a self serve manner and that is a big plus, specifically for changes that need to happen really fast and you don't need to deal with account managers that may take some time to answer emails.
Read full review Support Rating 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
Read full review Smaato's account management team is very professional. They are quite fast in terms of customer support, which is very helpful. One item that stands out is that they are willing to understand what you need for each campaign and what is the best way to move forward. They don't just jump quickly into trying to upsell more of Smaato's products (audiences, data) like other SSPs do.
Read full review Alternatives Considered 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.
Read full review With over 20 demand partners in our stack, Smaato is in the top 5
Read full review Return on Investment It has had a positive impact on my business objectives It has helped me grow exponentially It has provided a way for me to expand my business Read full review Increased overall revenue Strong demand pool Easy reporting Read full review ScreenShots