Developing blogs or websites with content means you probably are involved in affiliate marketing, banner ads sales or you use an ad network to generate part if not all of your income from your website. I personally monetize my websites using any one of a number of plugins built for ad management and I am always on “the hunt” to learn more about ad management with respect to websites. Depending on what you are looking for there are most chances an ad management solution to suite your needs.
I want to show you 6 of the best plugins, in my opinion, for ad management that are out there today if you are running your website using WordPress. They are all a little different and some have specific niches that they target with their solution and I will highlight some of the reasons why you want these plugins and also some of the reasons to stay away from certain plugins.
Ad Squares
by PrimoThemes
The Ad Squares widget plugin allows you to setup banners and this is great if you are doing affiliate marketing using banners on your site or selling ad space. This is definitely a good plugin for someone wanting to setup a simple plugin that is going to allow them to manage ads on their blog and its easy to install it and use it.
Advantages
- Supports AdSense®, XHTML, PHP, IFrames and JavaScript
- Allows you randomly shuffle the position of the banners
- Allows you to set the number of ad sqaures you want
Disadvantages
- No way to customize the banner size through the user interface which is currently 125 by 125 px
- Only a maximum of 8 banners available to setup
Max Banner Ads
by MaxBlogPress
This is a good option for people looking for a solid plugin to manage your website not only in the sidebar but also the top of the page and setting custom zones on your website. That functionality mixed with the fact that you aren’t restricted by banner size makes this plugin a winner.
Advantages
- The plugin works with zones on the web page (Within The Post, Sidebar Widget, Top of First Post, Bottom of Last Post)
- You can set a number of types of ads including banner, text link, JavaScript and other types
- The ability to make links follow and nofollow which will help you with your website’s SEO
Disadvantages
- May require more setup and coding depending on how you want to use it
WP125
Its a good ad management tool but it doesn’t have a lot of special features or functionality. Perhaps its a plugin that would be better suited to someone looking for very light ad management needs or someone just starting out with a website looking for an easy to use ad management plugin.
Advantages
- The ability to set an expiry date on ads you are running
- Allow you to set the target URL and the ad image URL
- Tracks the number of times that an ad was clicked
Disadvantages
- No way to customize the banner size through the user interface which is currently 125 by 125 px
- Only a maximum of 6 ad positions available to setup
Smart Ads
by John Kolbert
Smart Ads is a great ad management plugin developed by John Kolbert and if you looking for a solution that can help you control ads appearing in your posts and pages on your WordPress site then this is one worth looking at.
Advantages
- Lots of customization about where and how ads will appear and under what settings that they won’t appear
- In post ad creation to show the ad at the top or bottom of a post or creating a custom ad to appear using the [smartad] shortcode
Disadvantages
- No ability to control ads in other parts of the site (sidebar, outside of the posts, etc.)
- No built in tracking for ads
AdRotate
AdRotate is a solid Ad Management plugin which has a lot of great attributes to it including the restrictions you can set at the role level in WordPress and the amount and types of statistics and controls that you can set on your ads.
Advantages
- Gives you the ability to restrict and set access as to who can do what with respect to deleting ads groups and blocks and who can view which reports based on the roles available in WordPress
- Setup clicktracking on ads and statistics on ads
- The ability to disable ads after a maximum number of clicks or impressions
Disadvantages
- If you are a beginner looking for an Ad Management plugin this one may be a little confusing as it assumes you have a higher level of understanding about ad management in general and therefore you may not understand how to use all the functionality this plugin provides
All in One Adsense and YPN
by Linewbie
The All-In-One Adsense and YPN plugin gives you the ability to interface with Adsense, YPN or other ad networks from inside WordPress. This solution allows gives you the control over how these ads are rendered on your website and how many of them appear at any one time.
Advantages
- Gives you a way to ad Adsense and YPN ads to your blog or website and manage what types of ads can run on your website
- Allows you to control positioning and the number of ads that can be displayed on pages and posts separately
- Allows you to access the adsense, YPN or a random ad network in the WordPress user interface when you set it up
Disadvantages
- This plugin is specifically designed for someone that runs ads through adsense or YPN on their website so if you are looking a solution that allows you to setup banner ads or text link ads this is not going to help you
About Luc Arnold
Thanks Luc, great post.