For over 20 years, wikiHow's mission has been to create the world's most helpful and reliable instructions for any task imaginable. As a result of those efforts, they've become one of the most beloved sites on the internet and their award-winning how-to content is trusted by millions around the world. Their guides are meticulously researched and verified by subject matter experts, ensuring that anyone can learn to do anything with confidence.
Products
Cloud Wrapper, Prebid Server, Video, Insights
Category
Information
Publisher
wikiHow
The Challenge
For nearly two decades, wikiHow has thrived with a lean team and a deeply ingrained do-it-yourself culture. This scrappy approach served them well as they built and maintained their entire ad stack internally, managing their own Prebid integration, Google Ad Manager, AdSense, and direct SSP relationships.
But as the programmatic advertising landscape grew increasingly complex, it became clear that their ad stack could be further optimized with additional expertise.
Attempts to find a partner with traditional ad ops companies revealed fundamental mismatches though:
Pricing Models: Standard 20%+ revenue shares felt excessive relative to the incremental value actually being offered by these services.
Relationship Management: Most vendors also required taking over wikiHow's SSP relationships and absorbing wikiHow into their own GAM network, but wikiHow recognized the benefits of maintaining these direct relationships.
Rigidity: Most other services had predefined rigid frameworks that couldn’t accommodate wikiHow’s specific needs.
Support: Other companies typically rely on non-technical account managers as a single point-of-contact, creating an intermediary that caused communication bottlenecks that weren't conducive to wikiHow’s fast-paced workflow.
wikiHow realized it could benefit from an ad partner if they were the right fit: one that could match their technical sophistication, work at their pace, and provide genuine value without requiring ownership of their relationships or charging high fees.
The Approach
wikiHow's leadership took a characteristically thorough approach to optimizing their ad stack. Over the course of a year, wikiHow talked to trusted peers and partners to narrow the field to the best possible matches.
Three key differentiators drove the decision to partner with Aditude:
Cost Structure That Made Sense: Aditude’s transparent, impression-based pricing aligned with wikiHow’s internal costs of managing their ad stack. Unlike traditional rev shares, it felt proportionate and reasonable.
A True SaaS Partnership: wikiHow retained its SSP seats, maintained transparency, and remained in control of its monetization strategy. Aditude acted as an extension of the team, not a replacement.
Collaborative, Fast-Paced Support: Aditude matched wikiHow’s preferred working style—quick Slack responses, direct access to engineers, and zero “we’re not set up for that” attitudes.
“We liked having our own SSP seats and GAM setup. Other companies pitched consolidated payments as a benefit, but for us, that’s risk concentration. We felt like there were important benefits to keeping direct relationships with our SSPs”
- Justin Brown, COO, wikiHow
wikiHow approached the transition with characteristic caution, starting with tests before committing to a full rollout. What they discovered was an implementation process that felt more like collaboration than vendor onboarding.
Speed Without Sacrifice – Rather than weeks of complex integration work, Aditude provided placements for wikiHow's existing ad unit structure within days. The team simply explained their naming conventions, page layouts, and requirements, and Aditude delivered a working solution that matched their specifications exactly.
Custom Solutions, Not Rigid Templates – Aditude embraced wikiHow’s custom needs and requests:
CMP Integration: Other providers wanted to change wikiHow's CMP to their own preferred partners (often with added costs); Aditude simply worked with wikiHow’s existing, preferred partner.
Outstream Video Player: Deploying new ad formats like outstream video went from multiple weeks of internal development today with Aditude's support.
Prebid Server Demand Setup: When wikiHow was looking to supplement their existing Prebid client demand, Aditude helped quickly implement Prebid server demand in just days without requiring wikiHow to set up and maintain its own infrastructure to support Prebid server-side demand.
“[Aditude] just kind of got it. We handed over our existing structure, and with very little hand-holding or back-and-forth, everything was set up and working in days”
- Justin Brown, COO, wikiHow
The Results
Today, wikiHow's ad operations look fundamentally different—not in complexity, but in efficiency and capability.
Operational Improvements:
Fill Rates: Immediate and sustained improvements in fill rates provided both performance gains and revenue optimization.
Setup Acceleration: New ad unit creation and SSP onboarding, previously multi-week processes, now happen in days or hours.
Data-Driven Insights: Rather than conducting lengthy investigations into performance fluctuations, wikiHow can now get immediate expert analysis from Aditude's team, complete with specific diagnoses and recommendations.
Strategic Capabilities:
Informed Decision-Making: wikiHow now has a trusted advisor for evaluating new SSPs, cookie-less identity solutions, and industry trends, eliminating guesswork and reducing risk.
Custom Problem-Solving: Complex challenges become collaborative projects with Aditude developing novel solutions based on wikiHow’s needs.
Resource Liberation:
Executive Focus: wikiHow can spend more time concentrating on strategic responsibilities rather than daily ad ops troubleshooting.
Engineering Efficiency: Development resources previously tied up in ad tech maintenance are now available for core product innovation.
Responsive Support: Same-day answers to technical questions eliminate the bottlenecks.
“I've never brought Aditude an idea and been told no. Even if it's something they've never done, they'll figure it out. That’s how we try to work as a company, so it’s valuable to have a partner that mirrors that.”
- Justin Brown, COO, wikiHow
Conclusion
Today, wikiHow's ad operations look fundamentally different—not in complexity, but in efficiency and capability.
Operational Improvements:
Fill Rates: Immediate and sustained improvements in fill rates provided both performance gains and revenue optimization.
Setup Acceleration: New ad unit creation and SSP onboarding, previously multi-week processes, now happen in days or hours.
Data-Driven Insights: Rather than conducting lengthy investigations into performance fluctuations, wikiHow can now get immediate expert analysis from Aditude's team, complete with specific diagnoses and recommendations.
Strategic Capabilities:
Informed Decision-Making: wikiHow now has a trusted advisor for evaluating new SSPs, cookie-less identity solutions, and industry trends, eliminating guesswork and reducing risk.
Custom Problem-Solving: Complex challenges become collaborative projects with Aditude developing novel solutions based on wikiHow’s needs.
Resource Liberation:
Executive Focus: wikiHow can spend more time concentrating on strategic responsibilities rather than daily ad ops troubleshooting.
Engineering Efficiency: Development resources previously tied up in ad tech maintenance are now available for core product innovation.
Responsive Support: Same-day answers to technical questions eliminate the bottlenecks.
“I've never brought Aditude an idea and been told no. Even if it's something they've never done, they'll figure it out. That’s how we try to work as a company, so it’s valuable to have a partner that mirrors that.”
- Justin Brown, COO, wikiHow
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