eToolkit Inc

In 2012, long time web developer Dmitry Koltsov decided to pivot to building apps. "I founded the company eToolkit Inc with the idea of creating photo album apps to help people organize and process lots of photos from a trip," he recalls. But after starting to develop some apps, Dmitry pivoted again. "The photo organizer apps were hard for people to understand," he says, "so instead we built a photo editing tool to help people make collages from their photos." And these apps found immediate success; the team's most popular app, Love Collage, now has over 70 million downloads.

To earn their revenue, Dmitry and his team turned to ad monetization and partnered with AdMob. "We decided to work with AdMob because it performed the best for us," he says. "We have a really global audience - users from over 200 countries visit our apps - and only AdMob has been able to supply really good CPMs in every country." Though eToolkit offers paid options for those who want them, "the cost of a subscription can be really high depending on the country people are in. So we use rewarded ads as a way to help people who can't afford to pay the subscription still access premium features."

Maintaining free access to features also allows eToolkit to reach a wider audience. "If we didn't have ad revenue," Dmitry says, "we'd have to use a 100% subscription or paid model, which is a lose-lose for everyone – we'd only be able to support people who can pay, which limits our audience to that subset." And being able to support his entire audience is a core part of why he loves his job. "People really love these apps," he says. "They submit lots of reviews and say we've been able to really help them express their love for friends, family, and partners or make their photo look perfect. It's so motivating to know that we're helping people and they get enjoyment out of something we've built."