It’s tough being an online content publisher these days.
While the flow of advertising dollars into digital continues to increase—online advertising spending is expected to grow 20% to $31.3 billion in 2011 in the U.S. alone, according to eMarketer—it has not resulted in higher CPMs for publishers.
Rather, the increase in spending is spread thin across a crowded field of technology middlemen (i.e. ad networks, exchanges, data providers, DSPs, etc.).
And it is largely following increased audience usage of digital media as opposed to resulting in larger payouts per page view for content creators.