Every publisher we speak with wants to know how we drive such high ad performance with our optimization layer. Although we’ve always been completely candid with our publishers in our meetings, we’ve never revealed our trade secrets around our performance in a documented form – until now. The truth is, performing the optimizations we do for Upsight requires some very proprietary technology, so we feel we can comfortably reveal our optimization secrets. To that end, VP Mediation Platform, Darren Keyes, decided to sit down and write ‘The Art & Science of Ad Optimization’. He explains in painful detail all the tricks of our industry-leading trade.

1. The Art &
Scienceof Ad Optimization

2. Upsight Ad Mediation represents the next level of fully-managed ad mediation
and optimization for mobile app publishers. It’s a rigorously vetted and tested
collection of top-performing networks and exchanges all rolled into one
powerful SDK. We use a hybrid system, with many layers of optimization, to
ensure you get the most revenue from every single impression.
On the one hand, it couldn’t be simpler - one SDK, one integration, one check.
On the other, behind the scenes our team and technology eliminate all
the headache and hassle out of manually mediating multiple ad networks.
We offer the only unbiased and neutral ad solution on the market. Well
beyond your basic ad waterfall, our proprietary optimization techniques and
technology maximize your ad revenue in every country, every day.
Upsight Ad Mediation
The Next Generation of Ad Optimization
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.

3. Your Basic Ad Waterfall
Top Skimming Ad Networks
Most home grown solutions use a simple waterfall to rank their ad
partners. Simple, static waterfalls are a good first step, however, they
are far from optimal.
In this simple waterfall example, Network C is going to exhaust all ads
before Network A is called.
What if the top campaign from Network A is better performing
than the third campaign from Network C? In this case, you are not
optimizing beyond your first ad call. Maybe you should frequency cap
Network C, effectively skimming off their top campaigns.
However, now you are giving up depth of fill from Network C. If you
cap all your networks, you probably won’t fill all your ad requests.
This configuration is still sub-optimal.
Ad Network C
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
A
A
B
Ad Network C
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
CAP 2
A
A
B
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 3
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.

4. B/F
B/F
Top Skimming with Backfill
Putting Ties to Work
If you are going to frequency cap, then you need to be able to call
those networks again in your mediation stack to ensure maximum fill
rates.
Your waterfall is more complex now. We are skimming the best
campaigns from Networks C and A, while calling them again at lower
ranks in the mediation stack, so all your ad requests are filled.
When performance is very close across two or more ad partners, you
should rank the networks at the same level so that each gets called
an equal percentage of the time. This way they can compete to keep
the waterfall rank.
The ability to rank ad partners equally is especially useful during
ramp up, when you don’t yet have any data available.
Ad Network C
Ad Network
CAP 2
A
Ad Exchange A
Ad Network C
Ad Network B
Ad Network A
CAP 1
B/F
B/F
Ad Network C
Ad Network
CAP 2
A
Ad Exchange A
Ad Network C
Ad Network B
Ad Network A
CAP 1
Tied
Tied
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 4

5. Leveraging CPM Floors
Managing Multiple CPM Floors
Exchanges are very different from networks. Since they pay out on
CPM, you have the ability to set CPM floors. One strategy is to set a
high CPM floor and put the exchange at the top of your stack.
You are now top skimming your exchange partner as well.
However, while you are top skimming your exchange partner by
setting a high floor, you are losing out on a lot of good campaigns
from the exchange that could fit in nicely at lower ranks in the
waterfall. We should set up more floors!
Now we are top skimming, mid skimming and backfilling in all cases.
This is the complete picture, right? Well, not quite yet.
B/F
B/F
Ad Network C
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
C
A
B
A
A
A
A
A
CAP 2
$20 CPM Floor
$12 CPM Floor
$6 CPM Floor
$2 CPM Floor
CAP 1
Tied
Tied
B/F
B/F
Ad Network
Ad Network
C
B
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
CAP 2
A
A
A
C
CAP 1
$20 CPM Floor
Tied
Tied
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 5

6. Blind Auctions
But what if your app is not resonating with the advertisers and DSPs
on the exchange? You can try running blind auctions, obscuring your
app name from the advertisers. Even if your app is already doing well
with regular auctions, a blind auction at the bottom of your waterfall
can often pick up a lot of remnant traffic as well.
The Art & Science of Optimization | 6
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
Testing with Discovery Mode
What about Ad Network B? They are way down the list because
they don’t perform, right? Or is their performance low because they
are way down the list? We need to “discover” how much better Ad
Network B will perform higher up in the waterfall. So we need to test
by utilizing discovery mode a small percentage of the time.
Discovery mode lets us test a small amount of ads at different ranks
to validate performance without unnecessarily compromising your
overall ad performance. This should be an ongoing process as
individual ad networks always have different campaigns that can
affect their performance.
B/F
B/F
Ad Network C
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
C
B
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
CAP 2
$20 CPM Floor
D/M 4%
$12 CPM Floor
$6 CPM Floor
$2 CPM Floor
Blind
CAP 1
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 6

7. Now that we have a cohesive strategy for top skimming, backfill,
and discovery, we need to do this uniquely for each country – all 196
countries… every single day! And that’s only with 5 demand partners.
Upsight Ad Mediation has over a dozen premium networks and
multiple exchanges which access 100’s of DSPs and advertisers.
Maintaining floors, caps and multiple ad calls for all these ad
partners, in all these countries, every day, is no easy task and
requires a lot of sophisticated technology, automation and manual
man hours by a very savvy team.
Country Level Optimization
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
B/F
B/F
Ad Network C CAP 2
Ad Exchange A
Ad Exchange A
Ad Network C
Ad Network B
Ad Network A
Tied
Tied
B/F
B/F
Ad Network C
Ad Network
CAP 2
A
Ad Exchange A
Ad Network C
Ad Network B
Ad Network A
CAP 1
Tied
Tied
CANADA
USA
UK
CHINA
B/F Ad Network C
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
C
B
A
A
A
CAP 2
$20 CPM Floor
D/M 4%
$12 CPM Floor
CAP 1
B/F
B/F
Ad Network C
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Network
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
Ad Exchange
C
A
B
A
A
A
A
A
CAP 2
$20 CPM Floor
$12 CPM Floor
$6 CPM Floor
$2 CPM Floor
CAP 1
Tied
Tied
$20 CPM Floor
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 7

8. With a mediation stack this complicated, you need to use automation to help
manage over one million unique waterfalls, which we maintain every day.
The best way to re-rank these ad networks will be with automated algorithms.
But how often should it run? What look-back period is most optimal? How
do we handle lack of significant data for low volumes of traffic in specific
countries? What range of performance should networks be tied at? How do
we get separate data from each of the multiple ad calls we are making to each
demand partner? These are just a few of the questions that your algorithms
needs to address.
What About Automated Optimization?
© 2015 Upsight Powered Inc. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 8

9. Automated Setup
With so many apps to manage, Upsight
Ad Mediation uses APIs and other scripts
to set up apps with our networks and
exchanges automatically. This saves a
ton of time in getting your app set up
and optimized with live ads.
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 9

10. Unified Reporting
Not only do you need to pull all of the reporting from each of your
demand partners into a single place (so your automated algorithms have
data to work with) you need to pull it separately for rewarded vs non-
rewarded, video vs static, front fill vs back fill and for each floor you have
set up in your exchanges. This ensures each position in your waterfalls
can be optimized individually.
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 10

11. Upsight Ad Mediation uses a seven day rolling look-back period. We have
tested look-backs as far back as 28 days, and our testing has indicated that
7 days is the optimal look-back to smooth out weekly aberrations, collect
significant data to analyze, and be responsive to performance changes at the
ad network and exchange level.
Ad partners with performance that are within a small percentage of one
another are automatically tied for rank in order to give each the opportunity
to outperform.
We re-rank our ad demand partners daily, which is actually fairly aggressive,
as you will see on the following page.
Upsight Ad Mediation
Automated Optimization
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 11

12. The First 7 Days Are Key
Each ad network can independently take up to 4 or 5 days to optimize for any given app. With multiple networks
and exchanges being re-ranked daily in every country, Upsight Ad Mediation typically takes 7 days to reach full
optimization, but will often continue to improve performance over a period of 14 to 21 days.
DAY
1
DAY
2
DAY
3
DAY
4
DAY
5
DAY
6
DAY
7
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 12

13. Optimizing for Oscillations
Even with optimizations running daily, we see oscillations which work against optimization, especially from app
install networks.
When a network is promoted to a higher spot in the waterfall, they see an increase in impressions. Since there is a
significant lag in revenue from app install campaigns, we see a portion of the revenue from these campaigns getting
reported one or two days after the impressions were shown. Consequently, as impressions go up, lagging revenue
will push eCPM down for a day or two.
Similarly for networks moving down in rank, they experience a drop in impressions, and we see revenue come in
from impressions over the previous days. This causes eCPM to inflate.
In an automated system, this can cause these networks to oscillate back and forth in your mediation stack. When
optimizing daily, these fluctuations will typically settle out in a day or two, or they can be smoothed out more quickly
with manual optimizations.
If we were to optimize more often, say hourly, these oscillations would be virtually impossible to control, especially
with a lack of significant data in most countries at an hourly level.
Aug 27
$0
$4
$8
$12
$16
$20
$24
Aug 28 Aug 29 Aug 30 Aug 31 Sep 1 Sep 2
Network A Network DNetwork C Network FNetwork B Network E
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
eCPM
$28
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 13

14. When extending your optimization to include country level rankings, the
amount of data is often too small to optimize effectively in many countries,
even with a seven day lookback period. Upsight Ad Mediation’s algorithms
automatically expand countries with insignificant data to include country
tier data. If still too sparse, Upsight Ad Mediation will look at general
performance across our network for apps in the same category as your app,
for that same country and then, that same tier, until we have enough data to
effectively optimize.
Lack of Significant Data
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 14

15. Dialing for Dollars
In addition to all our automated and
manual optimizations by our team, it is
still vital to get on the phone with each
of our network partners to see what
campaigns are coming up that could
fit our publishers’ traffic and negotiate
guarantees for first look in the waterfalls.
The Upsight Ad Mediation team has
weekly conference calls with all our
major partners, feeding data back to
them on where they are losing out on
opportunities to drive more revenue for
their business and yours.
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 15

16. Managing Multiple Blacklists
on Your Behalf
Who wants to set up their blacklists with every ad network and ensure
they are adhered to? Upsight Ad Mediation does this for you! Blacklisting
similar apps from advertising in your app can affect your eCPM quite a
bit. You need to be careful that you are only blocking those apps that
are truly a threat to your business. You can seriously impact your own
revenue by being overprotective. Our team works closely with each
publisher to evaluate opportunities and develop and implement a
blacklisting plan.
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 16

17. Video ads are a major component of Upsight Ad Mediation, filling
approximately 90% of our publishers’ traffic. Video ad performance goes up
dramatically when videos are watched to completion. We give our publishers
the choice and will set up your traffic to suit. Non-skippable or rewarded
video will perform better than videos that can be skipped. However, even
setting the skip offset to 5 seconds versus being immediately skippable can
drive significantly higher performance.
A Word About Skip vs Non-Skip,
Rewarded vs Non-Rewarded
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 17

18. Segmentation
What if you don’t want all your users to
see ads? Upsight Ad Mediation has the
most sophisticated real-time mobile
segmentation engine on the market.
You can choose to segment and target
ads to your users with a virtually
limitless list of behavioral criteria,
including custom calls to create your
own criteria.
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 18

19. Revenue Reconciliation
At the end of it all, you need to ensure your revenue is correct. You need
to reconcile the revenue reported from each of your ad partners and
ensure payment is received. With Upsight Ad Mediation, we take care of
this for you and write you a single check at the end of the month. As we
like to say: one SDK, one integration, one check.
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 19

20. Clearly, mediating and optimizing your ads is more than a full time job. You
need access to sophisticated technology including automated algorithmic
optimization, unified reporting, country-specific waterfalls, user-level
frequency capping, and the ability to make multiple calls in a mediation
stack, along with a talented team to run it… like Upsight Ad Mediation. By
choosing Upsight Ad Mediation, you can maximize ad revenue and offload
all the hard work of ad optimization, setup, blacklisting, aggregating reports
and revenue reconciliation from your team. Don’t just take our word for it…
Putting Upsight Ad Mediation
to Work for You!
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
Upsight (Formerly Fuse) has been a key partner of Unity Ads for three years.
Their team has a deep understanding of the mobile advertising space, and they
are constantly communicating with us on behalf of their publishers, keeping us
informed on upcoming updates and features. Upsight excels at pairing proprietary
optimization bringing the notion of ‘partnership’ to every relationship they build
with publishers and ad networks alike.
Mickey Maher, Senior Director BD, Unity Technologies
The Art & Science of Ad Optimization | 20

21. Upsight Ad Mediation Boosts
Ad ARPDAU 46%
• Hutch integrated Upsight Ad Mediation
as a single source ad monetization
solution, after using conventional ad
mediation for their rewarded and non-
rewarded placements in MMX Racing
• Upsight Ad Mediation ad ARPDAU
delivered an increase of 46%, from
an average of 1.81¢ to 2.64¢, and
continuing to climb above 3¢ - all with
Upsight Ad Mediation while maintaining
IAP ARPDAU
• All gains were achieved by optimizing
the same ad networks within Upsight
Ad Mediation and adhering to a strict
campaign blacklist, managed by the
Upsight team
• By completing the single Upsight Ad
Mediation SDK integration, Hutch was
able to free up development resources
while simultaneously offloading ad
optimization to the Upsight team and
increasing ad revenue
With Upsight Ad Mediation, I get higher ad revenue without
the hassle of trying to manage individual ad networks so my
team can focus on what they do best - making great games!
Shaun Rutland, Founder, Hutch
© 2016 Upsight. All Rights Reserved.
$0.035
Upsight Ad Mediation Ad ARPDAU
$0.015
$0.025
$0.005
$0.030
$0.010
$0.020
$-
1 137 194 1610 22 262 14
(Days)
(AdARPDAU)
8 205 1711 23 273 159 21 256 1812 24 28
Pre Upsight
Ad Mediation
1.81¢ ARPDAU
Post Upsight Ad
Mediation Fully
Optimized 2.64¢
ARPDAU

22. Connect with us:
@GetUpsight
www.upsight.com