4 ms·

These revenue numbers strike me as a bit odd, even for US market with it’s relatively high CPMs: $2.5 billion / 365 days / 120 mil daily users * 20 ad impressi

These revenue numbers strike me as a bit odd, even for US market with it’s relatively high CPMs: $2.5 billion / 365 days / 120 mil daily users * 20 ad impressions (assumption on my part) * 1000 impressions (to account for CPM pricing) = $2.85 CPM That’s not bad avg. CPM even for US/EU market assuming mostly display/native display ad units and the relatively lower value of mobile dominant audiences. However, average of 20 ad impressions per user is fairly high. If they somehow have a lot of video ads, it changes the calculations somewhat, but still seems oddly high. Does anyone have any insight into how believable that $2.5 billion number is?

geocar 9y ago
The way the app works is that as you scroll you see more ads interspersed between headlines/topics. You click on one and you can comment and then go back to scrolling. Or maybe you're done with that topic group and you switch to another. More scrolling. 20 sounds fine to me. If it helps, think of the way people sit on hacker news or reddit waiting for the next story to come out, navigating down to comment, and then back to the next story. There are a lot of people who only do 1-2 impressions and a lot of people to do 100. And if you're still unconvinced: 10 ads only double your CPM estimate; A popular four-lettered sports site charges between $1-3 CPM for "un-targeted" display advertising, and $3-5 CPM for demo/interest targeted.
- sologoub 9y ago
  But is that popular four-letter sports site in US or China? Typically, ad CPMs follow income levels/disposable incomes in the country/area the user is from. The quality of data the advertiser has about the specific user is also important. For example, since a lot of the tracking is illegal in Germany, even though incomes are similar to US, the CPMs are lower because US has more highly cookied/tracked users with higher CPMs. I’m not familiar with the Chinese ad market, so asking if anyone has concrete experience there and thinks such CPMs are plausible.
  - csa 9y ago
    Generally speaking, you should assume that there is a portion of the Chinese economy that is approximately the same size as the US with about the same amount of disposable income. This is very much an apples to oranges comparison, but a large part of China is effectively "rich" by international standards. Note that there is also a very much not-rich part of China that brings down the avergages. The averages don't matter so much when analyzing a polarized population.
    - sologoub 9y ago
      You can make that statement about any country - some people are wealthy, while others are not. Chinese consumer economy is not the same size as US in nominal terms, so the ad spending can't be the same either. Which led me to question the revenue numbers in the first place. I suspect that some combination of real revenues and inflationary/artificial cash flows from investments being poured in their customers are the underlying reason. Similar to the feeding frenzy with bike share companies that were profiled in the news a few weeks ago.
  - geocar 9y ago
    So I did some googling and here's their price sheet: http://toutiao.toproi.cn/kanli/kanli.html http://toutiao.toproi.cn/kanli/kanli.html They charge 4-6RMB for the "precision auction" and 0.15-0.3RMB per click, which are only a little lower. These ads are small and only at the tops of certain sections. This suggests a price about half of western prices. They have "guaranteed delivery" at 160RMB CPM (about $18 CPM). Oh, and btw: I know more than one person who uses 300+ frequency in Germany, so while yes, tracking helps a marketing manager justify spend in the US, the lack of tracking also helps marketing managers justify spend in Germany.
    - sologoub 9y ago
      Thanks!

geocar 9y ago

The way the app works is that as you scroll you see more ads interspersed between headlines/topics. You click on one and you can comment and then go back to scrolling. Or maybe you're done with that topic group and you switch to another. More scrolling. 20 sounds fine to me. If it helps, think of the way people sit on hacker news or reddit waiting for the next story to come out, navigating down to comment, and then back to the next story. There are a lot of people who only do 1-2 impressions and a lot of people to do 100. And if you're still unconvinced: 10 ads only double your CPM estimate; A popular four-lettered sports site charges between $1-3 CPM for "un-targeted" display advertising, and $3-5 CPM for demo/interest targeted.

sologoub 9y ago
But is that popular four-letter sports site in US or China? Typically, ad CPMs follow income levels/disposable incomes in the country/area the user is from. The quality of data the advertiser has about the specific user is also important. For example, since a lot of the tracking is illegal in Germany, even though incomes are similar to US, the CPMs are lower because US has more highly cookied/tracked users with higher CPMs. I’m not familiar with the Chinese ad market, so asking if anyone has concrete experience there and thinks such CPMs are plausible.
- csa 9y ago
  Generally speaking, you should assume that there is a portion of the Chinese economy that is approximately the same size as the US with about the same amount of disposable income. This is very much an apples to oranges comparison, but a large part of China is effectively "rich" by international standards. Note that there is also a very much not-rich part of China that brings down the avergages. The averages don't matter so much when analyzing a polarized population.
  - sologoub 9y ago
    You can make that statement about any country - some people are wealthy, while others are not. Chinese consumer economy is not the same size as US in nominal terms, so the ad spending can't be the same either. Which led me to question the revenue numbers in the first place. I suspect that some combination of real revenues and inflationary/artificial cash flows from investments being poured in their customers are the underlying reason. Similar to the feeding frenzy with bike share companies that were profiled in the news a few weeks ago.
- geocar 9y ago
  So I did some googling and here's their price sheet: http://toutiao.toproi.cn/kanli/kanli.html http://toutiao.toproi.cn/kanli/kanli.html They charge 4-6RMB for the "precision auction" and 0.15-0.3RMB per click, which are only a little lower. These ads are small and only at the tops of certain sections. This suggests a price about half of western prices. They have "guaranteed delivery" at 160RMB CPM (about $18 CPM). Oh, and btw: I know more than one person who uses 300+ frequency in Germany, so while yes, tracking helps a marketing manager justify spend in the US, the lack of tracking also helps marketing managers justify spend in Germany.
  - sologoub 9y ago
    Thanks!