Troubleshooting banner delivery

I’m having problems getting all my banners to display on my website. Can you help?

There could be numerous reasons that no banner is displayed. Please go through this list for some tips on finding the cause:

  • If you are using an Image invocation tag, make sure that only image banners are being used. For other types of banners, including SWF banners, you should use any other type of invocation tag – IMG tags can only display image banners.
  • Even if not using an Image tag, try using a different invocation method. XML-RPC and Local Mode tags require advanced knowledge and you might be using the tags incorrectly. For simplicity and versatility, try using Javascript or iFrame tags.
  • Have you waited? There is a delivery cache for active servers. The default is 20 minutes – it can take time before new inventory or updated Limitation/Capping settings are added into rotation.
  • Try placing the invocation tag on a plain/empty HTML page rather than on your website. Your website might have CSS or HTML which is interfering.
  • Check the zone’s probability tab to see what banners are expected to be used and how often. This page will also tell you if the banner has any Delivery Limitations or Capping. If all banners have limitations or capping, this can prevent delivery.
  • You can clear your browser cookies to restart your session and allow yourself more impressions if the banner/campaign has session based capping.
  • If the probabilities of the banners in a zone simply don’t add up to a 100%, this could be caused by using Contract campaigns without having any Remnant campaigns linked to the zone. A Contract Campaign will limit impressions across a time frame and might currently have a very low probability. Linking a banner from a Remnant campaign with no capping or limitations will guarantee that a banner is always displayed.
  • Can your browser correctly render the banner being used when not using Revive Adserver? Open the Revive Adserver admin page and check the banner’s properties – there should be a banner preview above the main options. If it isn’t displayed here, it means that the actual banner has an issue rather than Revive Adserver’s rendering of it. You can also test by opening the browser in a test HTML page without using the Revive Adserverinvocation tag.
  • Is any ad-blocking or internet security software being used? Try using a different browser, or even a different computer (obviously not the computer of a co-worker who has the exact same ad blocking software being used!).
  • If a Flash banner is being used, make sure that your browser has the correct Flash plugin version for displaying the version. You should make sure that the banner only requires a Flash version that is common among users – when generating the SWF the producer has a choice of what Flash version to require. For example: If they require version 9 of the flash player, you might have only version 8 and therefore can’t display the SWF.

Still having issues? Take a look at some of the other troubleshooting guides in the Revive Adserver documentation.