SHE Media Review: My RPMs and Honest Opinion [2024 Update]

There are few real reviews of the SHE Media ad network out there – based on actual experience with the ad network, I mean – so I’ve decided to right the wrongs, as I’ve been a happy SheMedia Collective publisher for several months now.

In this SHE Media review, I will reveal my earnings with the ad network, the RPMs I am getting, as well as my honest opinion about them. I’m also updating it now in 2024 with fresh data, and new thoughts.

This will make it easier for you to decide whether or not you should give SheMedia a try.

These are the RPMs I’m getting with SHE Media

I’ll get straight to the point, since this is what most people want to see: the actual earnings and RPMs.

The blog I have enrolled with SHE Media Collective is YMYL (health niche) and these niches are usually getting higher RPMs overall. So expect my numbers to be a bit higher than the norm.

As you can see in the screenshot below, my Session RPM with SHE Media is $31.81 so far in November 2023. The best RPM day was $49.15 which is simply mind blowing.

Here are the RPMs I’ve been getting so far:

• August 2023: $17.55 (the month I joined them)
• September 2023: $26.28
• October 2023: $27.46
• November 2023: $31.81

January 2024 update with new RPMs:

• December 2023: $29.29
• January 2024: $19.50

It took their system about one week to reach a higher RPM. My first day with them had an RPM of $3.30, which grew to a bit over $12 the next day and kept going up before stabilizing.

January is generally known for very bad RPM numbers, but I am still very happy with what SheMedia is giving me.

If you prefer to look at the Page views RPM instead, that value was $17.16 in November:

I personally prefer to look at the Sessions RPM, because that is what Mediavine is using, so that’s what I am comparing results against.

Either way you put it, you can see that the RPMs with SHE Media are absolutely amazing – no matter if we’re talking about Q4 numbers (which are usually the highest of the year) or Q1 (which are the lowest).

Based on other reviews that I’ve seen, RPMs for other niches can vary between $10 – $15. I have applied to move two of my other smaller blogs there, so I will be able to confirm or deny this.

But it’s obvious that very high RPMs are achievable and overall you have all the reasons to be extremely happy with this ad networks and the earnings potential.

I sure am.

If you are convinced or want to try it out – here’s the official SHEMedia page (not an affiliate link).

She Media vs AdSense

Before moving my site to SHE Media, I was running AdSense on that website and I was already getting a pretty decent RPM, as you can see in the screenshot below.

Here are the AdSense stats for the same site, for the month of July (before moving):

As I mentioned already, the RPMs were really solid on AdSense as well. You have the screenshot above as a reference (values in Euros), but I did the math to be able to correctly compare revenue.

I looked at Analytics for July and calculated the AdSense RPM for Sessions in USD. That ended up being $17.23.

All in all, I can say that SHE Media makes me 65% more that AdSense did, on average.

You can probably tell from this article – I’m not a native English speaker. However, I’m still earning my living from blogging in English. Don’t let language stand in the way of your success!

SHE Media vs other ad networks

When it comes to comparing SHE Media and other ad networks like Ezoic, Mediavine, Raptive or Monumetric, things get a bit more complicated.

I am not able to compare apples to apples, as the site I have enrolled with SHE Media only ran AdSense ads. BUT I do have other websites on Ezoic and Mediavine, so it’s still better than nothing.

SHE Media vs Ezoic

I think that SheMedia and Ezoic can be considered competitors in the same league. My winner is SHE Media, mainly because the user experience is a LOT better.

I moved the site over to Ezoic for a few days a few years ago and the earnings were under what I was making with AdSense.

It’s true, I didn’t give them a full week to optimize, but even after the first 3 days or so, it was still making less than AdSense, which I found surprising.

While most likely, it would’ve probably ended up earning me more, I switched it off because the Ezoic ads were slowing down my site a lot, the ads were ugly and there was A TON of them, so the user experience was horrible in my opinion.

But overall, I think that in terms of pure RPMs, Ezoic and SHE Media will be very close. However, it’s more than just RPMs to consider, and this is why I prefer the latter.

SHE Media vs Mediavine

I have four blogs with MediaVine, and even though none gets the same RPMs as the blog I have with SHE Media, I still think that MediaVine is the better choice.

When it comes to RPMs, the niche and source of traffic matters A LOT. The blogs I have with Mediavine get the following results:

• Travel niche blog: $13.17 session RPM in November 2023, but with just 35.5% of the traffic coming from US, UK and Canada and almost a quarter coming from a small European country with traditionally low RPMs.
• Entertainment blog #1: $15.39 session RPM
• Entertainment blog #2: $16.35 session RPM

However, when comparing these RPMs with what I was getting from AdSense prior to switching, they are still between 200% – 300% higher.

This makes me believe that I would be getting a higher RPM from Mediavine, but since the blog is unlikely to reach the 50k sessions required by them, I’m more than happy to stick with SHE Media.

If you’re interested in Mediavine, make sure to check out my Trellis theme review.

SHE Media vs Raptive vs Monumetric

I don’t have sites with either Raptive or Monumetric (although I am planning to give both a try in the near future), so I am only offering my best guess here.

Raptive: I believe it would be similar to Mediavine and earnings would be at least a bit higher than She Media.

Monumetric: I believe that earnings would be similar (maybe lower?), but I am turned off by the fact that I have to pay a $99 setup fee to get a smaller traffic site to them.

All in all, when compared to other Ad networks out there, SHE Media Collective is a solid competitor and a perfect solution for publishers who haven’t hit Mediavine or Raptive levels yet, and definitely a much better choice than AdSense alone.

She Media: Ad Setup, Page Speed and other considerations

The process of setting up the ads on your blog, as well as the impact the ads have over your PageSpeed scores is essential nowadays. This is why I love Mediavine and dislike Ezoic.

I really didn’t know what to expect from SHE Media before joining, but my experience was more than pleasant.

Not only that they don’t plaster your site with ads like some other Ad Networks do, but the ads are easy to implement (you just activate the plugin and a rep takes care of everything) and there is no negative impact over PageSpeed scores.

Here is the PageSpeed score of a page running SHE Media ads:

And here is the PageSpeed score of a page on the same blog, but with the SHE Media ads disabled:

As you can see, the ads don’t have a huge impact overall and the scores are pretty much similar to what I’m getting with Mediavine on other blogs.

The best part? My website is passing all the Core Web Vitals and I am extremely pleased with the overall user experience, as ads are not annoying.

I am using GeneratePress Premium on most of my blogs. You can check out my in-depth review of GeneratePress here, but the bottom line is that I LOVE this theme!

Turning off ads on specific pages is as easy as clicking a single button in your WordPress dashboard – the easiest way I’ve seen across all the ad networks I have used.

Personal thoughts about SHE Media

What I really like about this ad network is that they don’t use a gazillion ad formats. I am actually surprised to see that they don’t have Native ads (which might increase earnings a bit), but I won’t complain as I usually disable them anyway.

Here is the ad types I am actually getting from them. Clean, easy and nice:

One of the things I don’t like about SHE Media is the fact that they only show you the top 10 pages in terms of revenue, as seen below:

I love the fact that other ad networks – from AdSense (difficult to setup) to Ezoic and Mediavine give you the chance to see the earnings from either of your blog’s pages (or at least the top 100).

Just 10 is not much as I am a geek who loves to dig into the numbers, see which of my articles are profitable and which are not. So if they would increase this report a bit, things would be much better.

Another interesting thing that I found out is that, once you have a website on She Media, you can apply with any other website, even if it doesn’t meet their original pageview criteria (which is 20k page views per month).

This is a huge advantage, in my opinion, as we finally have a sort-of-an-alternative to Ezoic when it comes to smaller sites. And a better one, in my opinion.

However, I have applied with two of my smaller sites to She Media in late December and I STILL have not received an answer until today, one month later.

I have contacted their support and they said that they’re going to look at them, but they are a bit swamped with requests.

And this is my main problem with She Media: their support is a bit slow compared to other ad networks where you get your answer almost instantly. They are really polite and helpful, but a bit slow.

However, I haven’t signed up with them to chat, but to make money, and for that, I am really happy.

In summary, here is what I like and dislike about SHE Media:

SHE Media pays via PayPal (globally) or ACH in the US. Have in mind that if you want them to pay you via PayPal, you must contact support and tell them so. It’s written on their payment page, but I missed that initially.

NOTE: The platform also offers opportunities for various brand partnerships. I have seen a couple advertised already, but they are for very specific situations and niches I had nothing to do with.

But still nice for those who can qualify and potentially boost their earnings.

These are the requirements to Join SHE Media

While you can find this data (and other FAQs) on the company’s FAQ page, I am listing the requirements to join them below:

• 20k+ page views per month (although they might accept blogs with lower amounts)
• Site should be at least 3 months old and have constant, consistent publishing
• High % of US-based traffic and under 5% invalid traffic
• A good track record with all Google ad products and platforms

Basically, for 90% of English language blogs out there, the most important requirement is reaching 20k page views.

Also, have in mind that you have to sign an exclusivity contract for 12 months (you can break it if you let them know 2 months in advance).

Conclusion

My experience with SHE Media has been great so far. If you’re looking to monetize your blog with ads, they are a really solid option. The best at this level, in my opinion.

While I would still switch over to either Mediavine or Raptive when I meet their requirements, I find SHE Media perfect for medium-sized blogs, and a better option to AdSense or Ezoic.

The onboarding process is smooth and straightforward, so if you’re blog is at around 20k page views per month and you don’t see it reaching either 50k sessions or 100k page views in the next 6 months, I think it’s a good idea to join SHE Media.

I would love to hear your thoughts about this ad network below or any insights you might have if you’re using them.

If you have additional questions, don’t hesitate to ask them down below and I’ll answer ASAP.