Guide
Quick Start
for Advertisers
Interstitials
Choose a pricing model
Name your campaign
With time, the number of campaigns will grow, and finding the right campaign can become a real problem. We suggest using a disciplined approach to naming:
At PropellerAds, you can choose from 3 effective pricing models: CPM, SmartCPM and CPA Goal 2.0. Make sure you review your options, as it’s essential for planning your budget and interpreting results.
Paste in the target URL
What webpage or landing page do you want your potential customers to visit? Paste the URL of this page and proceed with other settings.
PropellerAds' internal tracker is usually sufficient for most conversion tracking needs. But i f you prefer professional conversion trackers, you can find the detailed instructions on how to integrate these services with our platform and a comprehensive list of tokens in this article.
OPTIONAL
Geo – Pricing Model – Ad Format – Promo title. For example, US_CPM_Onclick_First Campaign.
Set up your tracker
Decide on frequency
Optimize ad exposure by defining the number of times a day a user would see or click your ad. Read our guide on how to optimize ad frequency.
Upload creatives
Next you need to decide on which template you will use. You can choose from static and animated templates.

Time to upload the creatives (up to 8 sets): a title and image. ​Please read more about the t​echnical requirements and policy rules​.
Step 3.0
4.1
4.2
4.3
4.4
Interstitials
Select traffic options
At PropellerAds, you have the possibility to tailor traffic specifications according to its source.
Set up your geo-targeting and budgeting
Choose the area where you want your potential customers to see the ads. You can select from preset regions, countries, and the cities in these countries.
To achieve the maximum results, we recommend selecting specific countries rather than targeting the whole world. Follow the golden rule: 1 GEO = 1 Campaign. To speed up the process of creating campaigns, you can clone campaigns. ​Read about g​eo-targeting best practices.​
Select the tools for narrow targeting
Besides device targeting, a range of settings is available, including ​connection type​, OS type and versions, mobile ISP (internet service provider), and browser type and language. Here’s a full list of ​targeting options​.

We also suggest reading our article about​ wide and narrow targeting.​
You can determine the zones (i.e., ad placements) you want your campaign to be limited to, or exclude specific zones. In other words, once you have enough data on your campaign's performance, you can use white- and blacklists.

Please read our detailed article on blacklists.
Choose ad zones ​(optional)
Schedule your campaign
At this point, you already know the audience size and the locations where your ads will be shown. Now you can customize your advertising campaign even further by using our smart scheduling tool.

You can decide what days of the week and the time your campaign would be active. Learn more about creating an efficient campaign schedule.
When you are done, click to start the campaign or save it as a draft. Enjoy your advertising!

By the way, it usually takes only 2 minutes and 24 seconds for a campaign to pass the moderation.
Use our Smart Rotator tool to A/B test your creatives or optimize Push campaigns with multiple creatives.​ ​Creatives with a higher CTR will get more traffic.​ Learn more​ about Smart Rotator.​
PRO TIP
Traffic sources
When setting up your campaign, you can select an option to get PropellerAds traffic, broker traffic (3rd party traffic) and traffic from anti-adblock zones. These options are commonly used for scaling campaigns.
Traffic types in Propeller: what is broker, premium, anti-adblock traffic
You can change all the parameters and optimize the performance.
Make your targeting more specific
If you are looking for even more precise targeting, you can take advantage of our city and state targeting features. Choose in which cities/states your ads would be shown to the target audience.

Once you have selected the desired GEOs, proceed with your bid. Learn how to set the right bid for your campaign.
Each time you change the targeting settings, check the expected campaign results (number of impressions, clicks, etc.) on the traffic estimator.
PRO TIP
If you activate auto-optimization (Target CPA), you have to first determine the target action (i.e., what user action is required), and then set the Target CPA. Learn what Target CPA can do for you.
Set device targeting
Start with device targeting to control on what devices your ads are shown to your potential customers. You can also define the type of device: desktop, phone, or tablet.

This setting allows you to efficiently optimize campaign performance and creatives, because users on different devices have different needs and goals, therefore, conversion rates would differ.
If you are promoting an Android app, there is no point in trying to reach iPhone users.
HERE'S AN EXAMPLE
Setting up the targeting —
narrow-wide
12 may 2020
You can change all the parameters and optimize the performance.
All done? Time for budgeting.
First of all, you should estimate the ​total campaign budget​. Do you have the numbers?
Total campaign budget is a crucial parameter for an affiliate. You should define how much you are willing to spend on testing the CPA offer beforehand. The amount shouldn’t be too small; otherwise the test results might be inaccurate: traffic volumes would be insufficient to provide reliable data. As well, the testing budget shouldn’t be too big, as you risk wasting your money without getting any results.
PRO TIP
If the CPC rate is $0.1 and you are planning to buy 1000 clicks (0.1 x 1000), your budget should be $100.
HERE'S AN EXAMPLE
The final step of the campaign setup helps ensure that your ads reach only the desired audience on a budget.
4.1
4.2
4.3
4.4
It’s important to mention that this tool displays general traffic and rate data as of the previous day. It is not guaranteed that you can get all the available traffic because it depends entirely on your bid.

The budget will be defined by your targeting settings: GEOs, devices, user activity groups, etc. — all these aspects will impact the final sum.

The next step is allocating your daily budget. Depending on your campaign goals and the pricing model, the budget may vary. Usually, affiliates calculate the daily budget for test campaigns according to this formula: daily budget = total budget. Make sure to check if the CPA offer has a daily capping. Complete guide to budgeting in advertising.
.
.
.
.