So it’s been a few days since my latest app release that employs iAds.  And in short, the earnings on it are absolutely abysmal.  Since the release on Thursday, I’ve only seen about 50 cents.  I’m fairly disappointed, to say the least.

During the first couple of weeks that Apple’s iAd network was running, there were discussions around how certain individuals were racking up the cash on their iAd apps.  I’m becoming more and more convinced that this was only due to the novelty that the iAds were and that as time goes on, those dollar signs will decrease (as I have seen first hand).

I took a look at my analytic reports closely and cannot see how iAds would be at all lucrative.  The number of ad impressions that an app shows is a fraction of the number of times that the app sends a request for an ad.  In my case it works out to a single ad impression every 5 times someone opens the app.  Apple is referring to this as fill rate and I think it is so low only because at the current time only the US and UK are displaying ads.  So take this low fill rate (something well under 25%) and then multiply that by an even lower click through rate (something around 10% probably) and that is the probability that someone will click through an ad in your app.  And that sucks.

To determine how many ad requests my app would need in order to see earnings of $1 (yes – a buck), I worked out the forumula

Fortunately eCPM is pretty good for the most part.  Suppose an eCPM of $25, which is 4 to 5 times higher than my daily average, but is a number that I’ve seen.  That means that for every 1000 ad impressions, Apple is estimating that based on the current click through rate and per click bid amount from advertisers, I should get roughly $25.

Using the formula, in order to see a single dollar in iAd revenue, 222 requests would be required!  To see $10 then, 2220 people would need to run the app.  And so on. To make $10 with a 99 cent app you’d only need roughly 15 people to download it.

Now let’s fast forward a couple of years and assume that Apple has a much larger advertiser base and more countries showing ads, resulting in nearly a 100% fill rate.  How many requests would be necessary to see $1 from iAds?  Well, with that high $25 eCPM, that would equate to 1000/25 = 40.  It still sucks.  It would take 40 requests for me to see just a dollar. Assuming that the eCPM will remain high and that you had a 100% fill rate and you were able to get 5000 people to open your app on a daily basis, you could see a daily earnings of $125.

And in a nutshell, I think for the most part, that blows.

Here’s to the crazy ones.
The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes.

The ones who see things differently.

They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo.

You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them.

About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them.

Because they change things.
They push the human race forward.

And while some may see them as the crazy ones,
we see genius.

Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world,

are the ones who do.

- Apple Ad Copy

I first read this quote as being attributed to Jack Kerouac, from On the Road. And actually all over the Internet he’s attributed to writing it. While he did say something vaguely similar in his book, the quote is actually ad copy from Apple’s Think Different ad campaign.

The full, lengthy version of the quote goes as follows:

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes.

The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them.

About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.

How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art? Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written? Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?

We make tools for these kinds of people.

While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Personally, I’m a little more fond of the shorter version – it’s a more concise and to the point.

Of course, there’s also the television commercial version too that combines the great quote with video imagery, featuring the likes of a bunch of famous people from the 20th century.