Kevel vs. Skai

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Kevel
Score 8.2 out of 10
Enterprise companies (1,001+ employees)
Kevel's (formerly Adzerk) APIs is designed to make it easy for engineers and PMs to build their own server-side, fully-customized ad server. E-retailers and user communities can use Kevel to build ad servers to promote anything from native ads to internal content to sponsored listings (where vendors and sellers pay for their organic listing to be promoted in search and browsing results). According to the vendor, engineers reliably see a significant reduction in dev time using Kevel’s APIs…N/A
Skai
Score 8.8 out of 10
N/A
Skai (formerly Kenshoo) is a cross-channel advertising solution for search marketing, social media and online advertising. The product aims to give advertisers and agencies the control and automation needed to make better investment decisions across search marketing and online advertising.
$10,000
Starting Price
Pricing
KevelSkai
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Kenshoo
$10,000
Starting Price
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
KevelSkai
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeRequired
Additional DetailsPricing is customized based on feature needs, support needs, and monthly request volume.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
KevelSkai
Considered Both Products
Kevel
Chose Kevel
Kevel was an easier initial implementation for header bidding with prebid. The team worked alongside us to make sure everything was operating as intended. We ultimately switched to Ads Manager to access AdX demand and other features that were not possible with Kevel (for …
Skai
Chose Skai
I think Skai beats the competitors with its advanced bidding management system, this is a unique feature of them that if you implement properly, your accounts will surely benefit from this, especially if you have tons of data that the algo can learn from and optimize …
Chose Skai
I personally like Kenshoo better than Marin for a few reasons. When it comes to Ecomm Search, Kenshoo is far better in terms of available features, algorithmic bidding which is more focused on ROAS, and reporting especially for eCommerce. Marin is a good platform, especially …
Chose Skai
Google marketing suite - Good for Google but nothing else
Marin - Was very problematic and lacked easy of use & features
Chose Skai
We selected Kenshoo in 2017 due to its market presence and its notoriety. We learned about Kenshoo's integrations with internal data warehouses, and the bid management aspects were touted as first class. In practice, our unique marketing needs did not align with the limitations …
Chose Skai
Kenshoo's integration with sales and social platforms as well as search made it the only choice when it came to managing campaigns. Other interfaces may be simpler and quicker but Kenshoo's range of external integrations makes it more flexible for certain campaigns and the …
Chose Skai
I definitely prefer Marin for paid search only accounts. I select Kenshoo when my client also purchases Google shopping media, since their proprietary tools there are best in class.
Chose Skai
Some features of Kenshoo outshine other solutions we've evaluated. Kenshoo Infinity Suite is a great product for multi-channel management but overall is less favorable especially from a pricing perspective. We've transitioned several client accounts from Kenshoo to DoubleClick …
Chose Skai
An advantage that Nanigans has over Kenshoo is that their version of 'portfolios' didn't have any budget or flight length requirements and was extremely easy to use. They also offered 'affinity' segments. These are studies they would run on certain audiences that would result …
Chose Skai
Kenshoo is the best in class. With "time" being the most precious resource we have, Kenshoo allows us to get more done in the same amount of time as comparable products.
Chose Skai
I have not explored other platforms.
Chose Skai
While DoubleClick does not fully budget pace accounts I think it overall provides more accurate changes than Kenshoo. When our company selected Kenshoo we were told it would be able to manage hundreds of small accounts with small budgets. It is more designed for accounts that …
Chose Skai
Kenshoo Search offers keyword bid policies based off of sophisticated algorithms rather than simple bid rules. Also, the Kenshoo Desktop Editor allows for extremely easy bulk optimizations. Marin Software doesn't have bid algorithms or an easy-to-use desktop tool. These are …
Chose Skai
Very different tool that Hootsuite - which is a good tool for monitoring, but not for ad management. Kenshoo social was easily implemented since we use Kenshoo Search for paid program. When comparing tools, this one seemed to be the most robust and solved many issues we had - …
Chose Skai
Kenshoo is a more effective and user friendly platform than most competitors. Their tool is more expensive and like I said before, tailored to larger marketing budgets. They set them self apart with the ease of use, the Kenshoo editor, and cross channel functionality. However, …
Features
KevelSkai
Ad Network Integration
Comparison of Ad Network Integration features of Product A and Product B
Kevel
10.0
Ratings
30% above category average
Skai
7.1
Ratings
4% below category average
DSP integration10.00 Ratings5.70 Ratings
Data Transfer00 Ratings8.50 Ratings
Ad Campaigns
Comparison of Ad Campaigns features of Product A and Product B
Kevel
10.0
Ratings
25% above category average
Skai
6.1
Ratings
24% below category average
Ad campaign creation10.00 Ratings7.60 Ratings
Ad deployment10.00 Ratings7.60 Ratings
Display advertising10.00 Ratings4.30 Ratings
Ad display and retargeting segmentation10.00 Ratings4.80 Ratings
Sequence targeting00 Ratings6.30 Ratings
Ad Reporting & Analytics
Comparison of Ad Reporting & Analytics features of Product A and Product B
Kevel
9.2
Ratings
18% above category average
Skai
7.3
Ratings
6% below category average
Ad dashboards9.00 Ratings7.60 Ratings
Ad performance reports9.00 Ratings9.80 Ratings
Ad conversion tracking10.00 Ratings6.70 Ratings
Ad attribution reporting9.00 Ratings7.60 Ratings
Cross-channel ad management9.00 Ratings5.90 Ratings
Ad forecasting and optimization00 Ratings6.20 Ratings
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User Ratings
KevelSkai
Likelihood to Recommend
10.0
(0 ratings)
9.2
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
7.8
(0 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
9.6
(0 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
3.6
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.6
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
KevelSkai
Likelihood to Recommend
For ad serving, implementing client-side header bidding with prebid was actually easier with Kevel than it is with Google Ad Manager in most cases, particularly for display advertising. I found though that with more complex integrations (like video), there were more solutions and code snippets available with other larger ad servers (Google).
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Kenshoo Search may not be appropriate if you don't spend much on search engine marketing. It also may not be appropriate if you don't care about tracking conversions and are only concerned with increasing awareness. Or, if you care about tracking conversions but don't expect to capture many, Kenshoo Search may not be necessary.
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Pros
  • More personable team that can address customizations needed to the product.
  • Easy to use interface.
  • Frequent product updates with notifications via email.
  • Well documented API.
Read full review
  • Customized reporting. There are many features that users can't report out on in power editor. Kenshoo makes it incredibly easy to get everything you need for a raw data dump.
  • Automation. Whether it's automated rules, portfolios or refreshing CRM uploads, Kenshoo helps cut some of the manual tasks out of the process making me more efficient.
  • Staying up to date with Facebook product updates. I can appreciate that Kenshoo does an exceptional job and ensuring new capabilities in Facebook are ready for use in the Kenshoo platform as well.
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Cons
  • User interface could be faster to load.
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  • Syncing - I have had many issues where syncs would time out, or not show that changes were posted to Facebook.
  • Library - if there was a library for targeting settings that could be saved and easily accessed and input into new campaigns, that would be very helpful.
  • Updates - seemingly basic tools that a social management platform should have often taken a long time to be released.
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Likelihood to Renew
No answers on this topic
It's great to have a product like Kenshoo Social. It has a lot of data and is a great tool to use. Honestly, I think we would have looked somewhere else if we didn't have some much data and time invested into the platform. We had used it across search and social, so we invested a lot of time to get it running smoothly. It is very expensive and we think we could have gone elsewhere to get the same results over time. Once they have your data and the system is running smoothly, it's very difficult to go elsewhere
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Usability
No answers on this topic
Set-up like other marketing platforms. If you know Google Ads, you know Kenshoo
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Support Rating
No answers on this topic
Very responsive and bring fast answers for problems
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Alternatives Considered
Kevel was an easier initial implementation for header bidding with prebid. The team worked alongside us to make sure everything was operating as intended. We ultimately switched to Ads Manager to access AdX demand and other features that were not possible with Kevel (for instance, EBDA). There are benefits to both but I appreciated the attention we got from Kevel support when we were first working through the implementation. We are still using Kevel for many things, just not as our primary display advertising ad server.
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While DoubleClick does not fully budget pace accounts I think it overall provides more accurate changes than Kenshoo. When our company selected Kenshoo we were told it would be able to manage hundreds of small accounts with small budgets. It is more designed for accounts that would be spending minimally thousands of dollars a month. We had extreme issues with Kenshoo budget pacing and increasing our bids. Overall it did not meet our needs, and we will be switching vendors at end of contract
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Return on Investment
  • Kevel enabled us to get up and running with client side header bidding when our team was still small and the technology was still new. This improved our ability to monetize our inventory.
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  • ROI is harder to track due to reporting/column & time frame default tech in my humble opinion but generally better results when compared to other products
  • Since the interface is difficult to navigate and paid search is a reactive medium, can produce barriers to change.
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ScreenShots

Kevel Screenshots

Screenshot of Adzerk homepageScreenshot of Decision API JSON exampleScreenshot of Management API example