Goal: Recover Lost Ad Revenue Without Hurting Engagement
Blind’s primary objective was straightforward: recover revenue lost to adblockers.
At the time, Blind was already using Google’s free ad recovery product. It was integrated and required little lift, but it lacked the visibility and optimization flexibility needed to maximize performance.
Blind wanted:
- Clear analytics on blocked impressions
- Customizable engagement messaging
- A/B testing capabilities
- A performance-based pricing model
- Minimal engineering burden
And most importantly, they needed confidence that pushing recovery strategies would not damage user engagement on a community-driven platform.
Challenges: Limited Visibility and Internal Risk Concerns
Blind’s initial setup had several constraints:
- Minimal reporting visibility
- No A/B testing
- Limited customization
- No clear recovery trend tracking
Because Blind is a social platform, internal stakeholders were cautious about introducing aggressive recovery messaging.
Would gating harm engagement? Would bounce rates increase? Would daily active users decline?
With only ~25% of traffic on web (and 75%+ on app), Blind needed to ensure any web monetization effort justified itself quickly.
As Charles Hsieh, Vice President of Sales at Blind, explained:
“If you want money, then we need to unblock more impressions. It’s that simple. I understand you care about user experience—let’s try it. Let the number speak for itself. Let the analytics tell us if engagement has decreased, if bounce rate has increased.”
Solution: Admiral Recover + Data-Driven Optimization
Blind partnered with Admiral to implement Recover using a phased, performance-first strategy.
From the outset, the engagement model was structured as:
- Risk-free, rev-share partnership
- Proof-of-concept deployment
- Gradual optimization approach
- Biweekly strategic reviews
- Fully managed optimization support
Reflecting on the decision, Charles shared:
“The reason why we chose you guys, first and foremost, is that you guys have just a risk-free partnership pricing model that really is kind of hard to say no to. This kind of rev share model to jumpstart—it’s really easy just to say, ‘Hey, let’s get the trial going.’ If it works, it’s really a true win-win situation.”
Admiral provided:
- Real-time adblock analytics
- Customizable recovery messaging
- A/B testing capabilities
- Managed experimentation and iteration
The Turning Point: From Soft Messaging to Step-Function Growth
Blind initially deployed softer recovery messaging. Performance plateaued around the low-30% range.
Through collaborative strategy discussions, Admiral recommended testing stronger gated messaging to unlock additional recovery. Blind evaluated the risk carefully, monitoring:
- DAU
- Bounce rate
- Engagement trends
- Community feedback
There was no meaningful decline in user behavior. Revenue, however, increased significantly.
“We didn’t see a huge decrease during the time that we set up a hard gate,” noted Charles. “The fact is just that we didn’t see a huge drop. So that’s why it was pretty easy to continue the process.”
This shift created a step-function improvement in recovery performance, ultimately pushing Blind toward a ~70% recovery rate.
As Charles described it:
“We hit a plateau—we were at 30-plus percent. That was the turning point. This kind of soft gating message only works and takes so far. We really needed to move to the next step. We needed to have a step function. That was a huge step function that still continued to grow over time.”
A Fully Managed Partnership
Blind operates with a lean team, and they did not want another dashboard to manage.
What differentiated Admiral was the managed approach.
Biweekly optimization calls, proactive experimentation, and ongoing performance tuning allowed Blind to focus on broader revenue strategy while Admiral handled recovery execution.
Charles explained:
“Literally at Admiral, if you ask me, ‘Can you go into the platform and do something?’ I probably knew how to do that six months ago when we started. But now Scott (our Admiral Customer Love manager) just does everything. I have no idea how to use the platform and I don’t need to because I just keep on seeing the percentage go up and up. That’s the kind of partnership I’m looking for.”
Trust was earned through performance.
The Results
Blind’s collaboration with Admiral produced measurable, sustainable impact:
- ~70% pageview recovery rate
- Significant lift from gated optimization
- No material negative impact on DAU or engagement metrics
- Fully managed, hands-off performance growth
Blind now views recovery not as a static solution, but as an ongoing optimization engine.
Looking back on the partnership, Charles summed it up:
“I’m just utterly impressed with our experience so far with you guys. It does not feel like work. It feels more like I just do some great work and I have some fun doing it.”
Top 3 Reasons Blind Chose Admiral
Performance-Based Model
Rev-share pricing made experimentation easy and aligned incentives from day one.
Data-Driven Confidence
Transparent analytics and testing allowed Blind to move aggressively without compromising engagement.
Hands-Off Execution
Admiral operates as a true extension of Blind’s team—driving optimization without dev burden.
As Charles put it:
“You have to lean in with your brand. Your brand is pretty well known in the industry for this particular product. If those brands chose you guys as a solution, why wouldn’t we give you a shot? We didn’t even look elsewhere.”
