Interview: James Avery, Founder and CEO of Adzerk, Explains What the Adzerk adOS Platform Can Do for Publishers, Networks

I came across Adzerk (www.adzerk.com) by accident and stayed on their website by choice, for nearly an hour. The adOS platform, centered around publishers and networks, has some unique offerings on the market and I definitely wanted to hear more. James Avery, Adzerk’s founder and CEO, kindly agreed to clarify some of my questions.

Otilia Otlacan: It’s been two years since Adzerk went out of beta and welcomed its first publishers. Before getting into what’s new at Adzerk, would you mind giving our readers an intro to the company and what it offers?

James Avery: Adzerk’s core mission is to help publishers get the most revenue from the great content and resources they are creating. We do that through the adOS platform which is built to make optimizing both direct sold inventory as well as ad networks and remnant sources like Rubicon and Pubmatic as easy as possible. The adOS platform is at it’s core an ad serving platform that aims to be the fastest, easiest to use, and most flexible platform available on the market.

Otilia Otlacan: I’ve been following the Adzerk blogs (Product Blog, Team Blog, Run of Network Blog) and couldn’t help but notice how fast the platform is expanding. Which of the recent launches and updates are you most proud of?

James Avery: Our new ad code was a long time in the making and is definitely the feature I am most proud of from the last 6 months. It took an incredible amount of development and testing time to launch a completely new version of our ad delivery script – you have to test it in every version of browser and operating system and with our focus on speed we spent a huge amount of time performance testing different variants and making sure it was as fast as possible. The new ad code is not only faster than any other ad code out there – it is also easier to read and use. It’s rare that you have time to go back and do something over – so when we had the chance with our ad code we really made the best of it.

Otilia Otlacan: Not too long ago, the ad servers market was dominated by just a handful of players; it’s a radically different scene nowadays! Where does Adzerk position itself, what is it best at?

James Avery: We want to be the core platform for online publishers and ad networks – not just an ad server. Ad servers have always been viewed as this commodity that just puts ad code on the page, but we believe your ad server is much like your CMS or CRM – it should be the core of your media revenue and have the features to play that role. This is what led us to develop the marketplace to make your ad server more of a hub between your different technologies (and we have some other awesome features coming down the road with the same goal in mind). We feel that we are the best choice for publishers who are doing at least some direct sales and especially for ad networks looking to automate more of their business.

Otilia Otlacan: I see an Adzerk for Networks white label solution in your offering – could you tell us more about it, its availability and pricing?

James Avery: Adzerk was originally started as a solution for the vertical ad networks that I was running so we know what networks need when it comes to management and ad serving. We have a comprehensive solution that includes full white labeling, payment calculation, and an extensive publisher portal for your publishers. We have networks as small as a couple million impressions a month (who can get started for $150/month) to networks serving 100s of millions of impressions (pricing based on volume).

Otilia Otlacan: In my experience, many publishers – particularly the small & medium – sized ones – stick with ad servers such as DFP Small Business or OpenX for the easy monetization of any remnant inventory. What options are available in Adzerk in this regard?

James Avery: Absolutely – I think this is an area where we actually provide more options than DFP or OpenX. Both of those systems lock you into their monetization network (AdSense or OpenX Market), at Adzerk you can choose from the dozens of ad networks and enterprise level SSPs like Rubicon Project or Pubmatic. Normally small publishers don’t get access to tools like Rubicon or Pubmatic – through our app store publishers of any size can use their technology to get the most from their inventory.

Otilia Otlacan: Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?

James Avery: We are always looking to talk to publishers and networks and hear about your current solutions and what you would like to see improved – it helps drive our product forward and it inspires us to hear from people and companies we can help. So reach out to us on twitter at @adzerk or email us at contact @ adzerk.com.