How to Integrate Ezoic with WordPress (Step by Step Tutorial)

The lion’s share of online content publishers monetizes their blogs and websites by displaying ads. If you’re one of them, you must know about the prominent ad network called AdSense. While it’s one of the most reliable ad-based content monetization options, there are some other players in the market. Ezoic is “one of them” (don’t get me wrong). Today I’ll tell you what is Ezoic and how to integrate Ezoic with WordPress.

You might have heard about Ezoic in the meantime. Or, maybe you’ve seen their ads on the web. Remember? Well, don’t worry. I’m here to demystify the Ezoic story. Just bear with me along the way.

What is Ezoic?

Long story short, Ezoic is an online ad platform that pulls advertisements from hundreds of ad networks based on real-time bidding. It enables the publisher to earn the maximum revenue possible. Ezoic can also integrate with your Google AdSense account and maximize your AdSense income to a great extent!

Ezoic aims to improve your website’s user experience by testing different ad layouts based on the visitor, their location, behavior, the surrounding conditions, and many other factors. The Ezoic platform uses AI and machine learning to know your visitors and display different types of ads in different arrangements. 

The company, Ezoic Inc. was founded in 2010. Besides ad earnings improvements, Ezoic also offers site speed accelerator and UX improvement services. 

Ezoic vs AdSense

I know you would ask this. Although, it’s an Apple to Orange comparison. Google AdSense shows ads mainly from the Google Ads platform. But Ezoic doesn’t have any AdWord-like program. Rather, it displays ads from hundreds of third-party ad networks like AdSense, Infolinks, EMX, etc. 

Learn: AdSense vs Ezoic – Which One is Better?

If you use a specific ad network, say “X”, you are showing ads from the “X” network only. But when you are using the Ezoic platform, your ad space is sold to the highest bidder among hundreds of ad networks. When there are more competitors, there is a greater chance of earning a bigger bid amount in ads. 

Ezoic empowers you to utilize its robust algorithm and generate more revenue from ads shown on your site.

Ezoic is a Google AdSense Certified partner, which means you can integrate Ezoic with your existing Google AdSense account. The Ezoic ad tester then includes ads from your AdSense account in the AI-based ad layout which is expected to result in more revenue in your AdSense account! This process is called “Mediation” in the Ezoic term. We will see more about it later in this article.

How Ezoic Works?

Ezoic works differently than your regular ad network. With traditional ad networks, you would just put some code into your site and they start showing ads. In that case, displaying ads was just a matter of placing some code snippets on your site after getting approval from the ad network. 

But when it comes to Ezoic, you need to do quite a few bunches of tasks. First Sign-up with Ezoic. Then they will review your site whether it meets Ezoic’s requirements. Currently, the platform requires a minimum of 10K visits per month to be eligible for utilizing its technology. 

Once you’re approved, then you need to integrate Ezoic with your site. It works with all CMSs and technologies. If you’re using Cloudflare for your website, you can complete the integration by connecting Ezoic with your Cloudflare account. 

If you are using WordPress, you can use the Ezoic WordPress plugin for the integration process. 

Whatever method you are going to use, you will technically give Ezoic access to pull your site content. Then you will also set up the Ezoic ad tester for your site with multiple ad placeholders. You can also utilize your existing ads for teaching Ezoic’s machine learning system to learn from these ads’ performance. Finally, Ezoic puts ads for your visitors based on all the data it collects. Ezoic, the Google Certified Publishing Partner tests many ad combinations for the highest amount of revenue and the best user experience. 

Is Ezoic Free? How Much Does Ezoic Cost?

So, Ezoic does a lot of works for you. Now you may ask, “is Ezoic free?” The answer is, “Yes”, and “no”! You can have it for free. In the free plan, Ezoic puts an ad underneath your webpages and earns from that ad. If you use a paid plan, you get rid of that additional ad. Also, you get access to premium ad partners, site speed booster, and more. The best part is, you can try a paid plan for 30 days at no cost.

Okay, I’m convinced. So, how do I use Ezoic? How to integrate Ezoic with WordPress?

As I’ve already mentioned, you can use Ezoic on your website, potentially, regardless of the CMS or site-building platform. Ezoic says on its sign-up page: “Ezoic works with all CMS, technologies and monetization partners”. 

How to use Ezoic with WordPress

In this tutorial, I will show how you can add Ezoic to your WordPress site, to be very specific, how to integrate Ezoic with WordPress. It involves the following steps:

• Sign up for Ezoic
• integrate Ezoic with WordPress
• Setup ad testing
• Apply for Google Ad Exchange
• Turn on Ezoic

Without further ado, let’s get started!

Step 1: Sign Up for Ezoic

To integrate Ezoic with WordPress, you need to register with the service first. This step is very straightforward. Simply visit this Ezoic link, click the Get Started or Start Free Trial button, and fill in the sign-up form with appropriate data. 

The Ezoic sign-up page assures you with a big message which reads “Google Certified Publishing Partner”. After carefully filling in the form, click the ‘CREATE EZOIC ACCOUNT’ button.  

Step 2: Integrate Ezoic with WordPress

After successfully opening the Ezoic account, go to your Ezoic dashboard. You will get a section called “Get Started Today” at the top of the page. 

Note: Ezoic’s “Site Speed” is a premium feature, which we’re not going to cover in this tutorial.

As the first task, integrate your WordPress site with Ezoic by following the very first option. 

Once you click the “Integrate Your Site” link, you will get about 4 integration options to integrate Ezoic with WordPress. These are:

1. Nameserver based integration
2. Cloudflare based integration
3. WordPress plugin based integration
4. Code snippet based integration

Ezoic Integration via Nameservers: The nameserver based integration method may take 24 to 48 hours to complete. To integrate Ezoic with WordPress using this method, you would need to change your website hosting nameservers on your domain’s DNS settings. If you follow this method, you may face difficulties while changing your hosting in the future. So I would suggest to skip this method and choose an alternative option.

Ezoic Integration via Cloudflare: The Cloudflare based method to integrate Ezoic with WordPress is really easy and takes only a few minutes. If you’re already using Cloudflare for your site, then you can utilize this Ezoic integration method. You will just need to choose the Cloudflare integration option and authorize Ezoic from your Cloudflare account. 

If you don’t want to give Ezoic access in your Cloudflare account, you have 2 more options in hand! The code snippet method, and the WordPress plugin method.

Ezoic Integration Using a Code Snippet: The code snippet method to integrate Ezoic with WordPress is also easy. You just need to put a code (provided by Ezoic, if you choose to use this method) in the <head> section of your site. It’s similar to inserting Google Analytics or Facebook Pixel code into your site which you can do in several ways. However, I don’t recommend you going with this method, because it may slow down your site. Rather, you can go with the WordPress plugin based Ezoic integration method.

Integrate Ezoic with WordPress Plugin: To integrate Ezoic with WordPress using the official Ezoic plugin, first make sure you are logged in to your Ezoic account. You will see a message to integrate your site. You can also navigate to Settings > Integration > Manage. Scroll down to the WordPress Plugin section. Click the Integrate Now button. 

You will see the official Ezoic WordPress integration plugin. You can download the plugin from there and then manually upload, install, and activate on your WordPress site. Alternatively, you can also login to your WordPress dashboard, go to Plugins section > Add New > Search for “Ezoic Integration”. You will find the plugin developed by Ezoic Inc. Install and activate the plugin from there.

If you don’t have any Ads.txt file for your site, the Ezoic integration is complete upon activating the Ezoic Integration plugin. But, if you do have an Ads.txt file for your site, you need to follow another simple step to complete the workflow to integrate Ezoic with WordPress. 

Visit adstxtmanager.com (an Ezoic service), open an account there. In the meantime, download, install and activate the Ads.txt Manager plugin on your WordPress site. Reload the dashboard. Go to Settings on your WordPress dashboard. You will find the Ads.txt Manager Settings option. Click that, and a new page will arrive. 

There you will find a field to enter your adstxtmanager.com account ID. Login to the adstxtmanager.com account and click the Get Started option. Authorize the ad sellers, import your existing Ads.txt information, and then in the step called “Redirect”, you will see your adstxtmanager.com account ID. Copy that ID and come back to the Ads.txt Manager Settings page on your WordPress site. Enter the adstxtmanager.com account ID. Save the settings. 

Now go back to adstxtmanager.com. We were in the middle of the “Redirect” stage. Return there, click Next and finish the setup on that page. You will see 2 green thumbs-up signs to confirm that the Ads.txt file integration is complete. 

It may take some time. If you see that the integration is not showing complete, first download your site’s old Ads.txt file as a backup, then remove that file from the server (probably it can be found on the site’s root directory). Now you should see the integration complete. So far, we’ve completed the core steps to integrate Ezoic with WordPress.

However, if you use the Nameserver or Cloudflare integration method, you won’t need to do the Ads.txt integration step even if you have an existing/old Ads.txt file on your site. So now you know how to integrate Ezoic with WordPress.

Step 3: Apply for Google Ad Exchange

What’s next to integrate Ezoic with WordPress? Here you go.

Google Ad Exchange, aka Google AdX, aka Google Ad Manager, is a platform by Google which enables you to sell your website’s ad space to hundreds of thousands (if not millions) advertisers based on real-time bidding. It’s more advanced, more complex, and offers more revenue potentials. But, the catch is, to get direct access to Google Ad Exchange (officially called Google Ad Manager), a website must have a minimum of 5 million monthly pageviews along with other criteria. Also, it needs extensive ad management skills to leverage the power of AdX. 

The good news is, you can utilize Google AdX via a Google Certified Publishing Partner like Ezoic. It enables you to boost your website ad revenue by a significant amount.

To join AdX, Google’s premium ad exchange with hundreds of high-quality ad networks. Login to your Ezoic account. From the Getting Started section on the top of the page/or in the Monetization section, click Apply for Google Ad Exchange. Input a Gmail address. You will receive an email. Fill out the form sent to your email.

Step 4: Link AdSense with Ezoic

Although having an AdSense account is not compulsory to integrate Ezoic with WordPress, if you do have an AdSense account, you can link that with Ezoic. This will allow Ezoic’s ad partners to compete with your existing AdSense account to generate the most profit from every ad impression through Ezoic’s Mediation technology. An Ezoic representative said to me, linking AdSense with all of the Ezoic ad partners will help improve publisher revenue by 15%-20%. 

To do this: Go to Ezoic Account > Settings > Link AdSense > Input your AdSense email address > Fill out the form sent to your email from AdSense.

Step 5: Wrap Existing Ads

After you integrate Ezoic with WordPress successfully, this step allows the Ezoic system to detect your existing ad units and use them in the testing process. To wrap an ad, you need to create an ad placeholder in the Monetization section found on the Ezoic dashboard. Then add some additional codes from these placeholders to your existing ads codes on your site. See more details on this here. If you use Google Auto Ads, Ezoic will handle them automatically. 

Step 6: Set Up Additional Ad Placeholders 

Ezoic assigns a dedicated account management executive for each Ezoic customer (like you). They are experts at setting up and testing ad placeholders on websites based on data. They will help you with this. But if you’re interested, you can try adding them yourself with Ezoic’s chrome extension or manually by creating placeholders. Check this full guideline here. 

Step 7: Setup Your Payment Method

Ezoic sends the payout after the 26th of each month for the previous month. Currently, Ezoic supports the following payout options:

• PayPal
• Bank transfer or prepaid card transfer via Payoneer
• Check (the USA and Canada only)

You can set them up from your user account settings section found via the top-right dropdown. You will also need to fill a tax information form.

Step 8: Turn On Ezoic

After getting Google AdX approval and linking AdSense (if applicable), hopefully, now you are ready to jump into the Ezoic’s world of layout testing & revenue optimization. In your Ezoic dashboard’s Getting Started section, the last part is “Turn On Ezoic”. Turn that ON, and Ezoic’s AI & machine learning will start their ad tester on your site. It will test several ad layouts and ad combinations based on visitors to maximize your ad revenue. So now you know how to integrate Ezoic with WordPress.

Conclusion

I hope you’ve found this tutorial extremely helpful to get up and running with Ezoic on WordPress. Please follow our blog on social media and subscribe to our newsletters for more useful content regularly. Also, do let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.