Roku Direct Publisher

[Baradanikto]

I receive the weekly Roku ad report for my channel.  I recently noticed that the totals were initialized back to zero to start the year.  My channel went live part way through last year.  Does that mean you must accumulate 1000 ad views in a calendar year before you see a payout?

[rovidx_media]

From my understanding, the payments aren't sent out unless you have reached a $100 minimum.   From my estimation, this is about 10,000 views before you'd get to the minimum payout.

[37mediagroup]

The reports reset each billing month. It's just the way they're run, but the reporting stops accumulating each month. Payouts are issued quarterly if your share meets the minimum amount for payout which I too believe is $100.


As mentioned elsewhere on the forums, there's a bit of an infinite loop in the delays on payment, so if you didn't receive a payment yet it's related to that. The reports just reset to 0 each month, I think it's just common in the ad sales industry.

[rovidx_media]

"Pasnow" wrote:
The reports reset each billing month. It's just the way they're run, but the reporting stops accumulating each month. 

I think we get different reports depending on when you requested the report.   I talked to a few other channel owners who where some of the first and they get a totally different report than I get.
Mine is the daily report and ran for all of 2017.   Starting January 2 it reset and now only has 2018.

[Baradanikto]

I'm seeing the same report as rovidx. My report came out weekly and had a running total. Then, on January 1st it reset to zero. With these kinds of games, I'll never see any ad revenue.

[37mediagroup]

Interesting. I started getting the reports around March/April of 2017 but every month it reset. I wouldn't worry too much about totals, if nothing else we still have the reports to respond back with if needed for documentation purposes. They should have them stored somewhere as well in addition to being stored on the servers. Does anyone know has ANY  channel received an RAF payout yet?  Or is it a complete blackout so far.

Agreed tired of the excuses, if nothing else I'd like at a minimum a specific dollar amount that I've earned thru Q4. I can wait a few weeks/months for things to get ironed out, would just like to know whats coming to me. I've been ballparking it now & then based on the reports but after 9 months sorta stopped altogether & just awaiting my paypal deposit which hasn't come:/

[Baradanikto]

It may be time to look for an alternative ad platform.  Can anyone recommend a "fair" and "consistent" ad platform that's easy to implement with DP?

[37mediagroup]

"Baradanikto" wrote:
It may be time to look for an alternative ad platform.  Can anyone recommend a "fair" and "consistent" ad platform that's easy to implement with DP?

I wrote some early on, but never heard back. My guess is they don't want to deal with startups, as my channel was brand new. The time & effort put in to getting them setup & answering how-to questions etc it's probably not profitable to some extent. Now that I have a base & good # of installs I could probably try again. I also had a random ad sales rep contact me & still hound me off & on. The problem was it's been alot of back & forth because I don't think they can supply simply an 'Ad Server URL' that DP asks for, so imho we can't work together. But she'll respond with random links to Roku channel creation, ads etc which have no bearing on the subject (I wish she'd just forward me to someone more technical at her company).  Last real response was essentially telling me to switchover to the SDK platform, essentially learning how to code the site myself the full way, which is a stretch of my coding knowledge. Then she follows up with me every 2 weeks asking my thoughts?? To which I hold back not telling her that I am not going to completely revamp my channel altogether just to work with them. I've sent off another reply asking about the ad server URL method and will let you know, also maybe I'll begin look back to other online ad platforms.
Two 3rd party platforms to consider would be Vidillion & Doubleclick Ad Exchange by Google. I don't know for sure either work with Roku DP but could be worth checking into if your leaning in that direction,
I'll let you know if I get anything achieved. I'd hate to give up on Roku and have more dilemna's as to not getting any 2017 revenue and hearing that 'I'm no longer on RAF' blamed for non-payment. Also starting anew & waiting till the end of the following quarter (ie another 6 months) just to start off with 1 Quarter payment or something.

[rovidx_media]

"Baradanikto" wrote:
It may be time to look for an alternative ad platform.  Can anyone recommend a "fair" and "consistent" ad platform that's easy to implement with DP?

That's what got my channels into trouble.   I use a 3rd party (I'll PM it to you) and it was easy to implement.   However the issue....
Roku want's 30% of your inventory and will back-fill any unfilled impressions at the 60/40 split.   In the last 2 quarters the 3rd party delivered around 130,000 impressions while Roku delivered 300,000 impressions.  The money I make from the 3rd party provider basically covers my bandwidth charges and the Roku money was *supposed* to pay my content partners (and maybe a bit for myself if I'm lucky).
But since they are now 47 days late with the payment from Q3, I'm basically skating on thin ice and if it's not covered before the end of the month, my channels will be down.  
Their initial reason was because I used a 3rd party, they keep 100%.    Thankfully I had reports and back-up data to prove that even with 30% of my inventory, they still owed me a lot of money for the back-filled ads.  I'm guessing that's when they realized there was a big problem.   I've talked to guys who said that they were 100% Roku Ad's that haven't been paid for Q1, Q2 and Q3.  Not sure if they had enough views to get the minimum payout, but some communication on the issue would be great.

There is 2 things that differentiate Roku from the other OTT systems.   Ease of use and tonnes of small independent channels that are for niche audiences.   If they can't straighten this out soon, they may lose those channels and that would be sad to see.

[rovidx_media]

"Pasnow" wrote:
I wrote some early on, but never heard back. My guess is they don't want to deal with startups, as my channel was brand new. The time & effort put in to getting them setup & answering how-to questions etc it's probably not profitable to some extent. Now that I have a base & good # of installs I could probably try again. I also had a random ad sales rep contact me & still hound me off & on. The problem was it's been alot of back & forth because I don't think they can supply simply an 'Ad Server URL' that DP asks for, so imho we can't work together. But she'll respond with random links to Roku channel creation, ads etc which have no bearing on the subject (I wish she'd just forward me to someone more technical at her company).  Last real response was essentially telling me to switchover to the SDK platform, essentially learning how to code the site myself the full way, which is a stretch of my coding knowledge. Then she follows up with me every 2 weeks asking my thoughts?? To which I hold back not telling her that I am not going to completely revamp my channel altogether just to work with them. I've sent off another reply asking about the ad server URL method and will let you know, also maybe I'll begin look back to other online ad platforms.
Two 3rd party platforms to consider would be Vidillion & Doubleclick Ad Exchange by Google. I don't know for sure either work with Roku DP but could be worth checking into if your leaning in that direction,
I'll let you know if I get anything achieved. I'd hate to give up on Roku and have more dilemna's as to not getting any 2017 revenue and hearing that 'I'm no longer on RAF' blamed for non-payment. Also starting anew & waiting till the end of the following quarter (ie another 6 months) just to start off with 1 Quarter payment or something.

I think I know exactly the company you are talking about.   They tried the same thing with me for one of my SDK channels.  I pointed them to the documents that state RAF needs to be used for ads on Roku and they said they would look into it and never got back to me.

The 3rd party I'm working with is really good, sends you a VAST tag (Ad server url) and then fills about 30-50% of my inventory most months.   It's not the greatest solution but they pay on time every month and if they can get their available inventory up to 50-70% (which seems to be happening as the months go by) it may be a good solution.   I can PM you the details if you want.