All three models monetise AI bots, but they split cleanly into two philosophies, and that split is the fastest way to understand them. TollBit and Cloudflare pay per crawl put a price on the door: they charge a crawler for the right to reach your content. Content-layer ad injection, the model blankspace uses, leaves the door open and earns from what happens inside, by placing a paid brand fact into the page a Live Search Agent reads. TollBit is a marketplace where publishers set per-request access rates. Cloudflare blocks AI crawlers by default and runs an access marketplace across its network. Ad injection charges nobody for entry and instead runs a real-time auction on the read. Each captures a different slice of AI traffic, which is why most publishers end up using more than one.
The two questions that decide which model fits
Every approach answers one of two questions. Do you want to charge AI companies for access to your content, or do you want to earn from what AI agents do with your content once they read it? Access-charging models (TollBit, Cloudflare pay per crawl) suit training crawlers that identify themselves and will pay for bulk ingestion. Content-layer advertising suits Live Search Agents that fetch a single page anonymously to answer a live user question and are not paying for access. Knowing your traffic mix is what makes the choice obvious.
TollBit
TollBit operates a marketplace that acts as a paywall, or tollbooth, for AI bots. When a crawler tries to reach a publisher page, it is redirected to TollBit and met with a transaction fee the publisher sets. Publishers can price by AI company, content category, and usage type, and TollBit distinguishes a summarisation licence from a full-display licence. The platform records each access and invoices AI companies monthly. TollBit states that publishers keep their full set rate and that it charges AI customers a transaction fee on top, rather than taking a revenue share. It is used by thousands of websites and has been integrated into publishing platforms.
Strengths: clear per-use pricing, granular control by company and content type, and a model that AI companies can transact with cleanly. Limitation: it depends on crawlers being willing to pay for access. Agents that fetch anonymously to answer a user prompt, and do not accept a charge, are not monetised, and the model is access control rather than advertising.
Cloudflare pay per crawl
Cloudflare became the first major infrastructure provider to block AI crawlers by default in 2025, and it introduced pay per crawl as a third option between allowing and blocking. Publishers on Cloudflare can set a price, and AI companies decide whether to pay. A billing event is recorded when a crawler makes an authenticated request with payment intent and receives a successful response, and Cloudflare aggregates the charges and pays publishers. Because Cloudflare sits in front of a large share of the web, the reach is significant, and AI companies can declare whether a crawler is for training, inference, or search.
Strengths: default protection, network-level scale, and no integration beyond being a Cloudflare customer. Limitations: it monetises crawlers that authenticate and accept the price, the intermediary takes a cut estimated by independent analysts at around 30%, and like TollBit it is an access model rather than a model that earns from the read itself.
Content-layer ad injection
Ad injection earns from the content, not the access. Live Search Agents parse text and ignore JavaScript, so the monetisation has to happen in the text the agent reads, server-side, before the agent processes the page. This is the layer blankspace operates in. When a Live Search Agent retrieves an eligible page, blankspace runs a sub-50ms auction at the CDN edge and injects a relevant, accurate brand fact into the content as editorial context. Human readers see nothing different. Advertisers target by IAB content category, market, and the specific prompt clusters users ask, and revenue is attributed the same day. In live accounts the average CPM has benchmarked at around $15.
Strengths: it monetises the anonymous Live Search retrievals the access models miss, it does not require AI companies to agree to a charge, and it pays per high-intent retrieval rather than per generic access. Limitation: it monetises retrieval and reading rather than bulk training ingestion, so it is complementary to, not a replacement for, a licensing or access strategy aimed at training crawlers.
How the three compare
Access models charge AI companies to reach your content and work best on identified training crawlers. Ad injection earns from contextual brand mentions in the content and works best on anonymous Live Search Agents answering live user questions. TollBit and Cloudflare put a price on the door. blankspace earns from what happens inside the room. A publisher can sensibly block low-value scrapers, charge training crawlers through an access marketplace, and monetise Live Search retrievals through content-layer advertising, all at once, because each addresses a different category of bot.
How to choose
Look at your AI traffic by type. If training crawlers from a few named companies dominate, an access marketplace captures more. If Live Search Agents are your largest category, which is increasingly the case, content-layer advertising is the only model that monetises them. The starting point is the same for all three: server-side visibility into who is actually visiting, because client-side analytics cannot see agents that never run JavaScript.
Frequently asked questions
Is TollBit or Cloudflare pay per crawl better?
Neither is universally better. Cloudflare offers default blocking and network scale with no separate integration if you already use it. TollBit offers more granular pricing by company and usage type. Both charge for access and both take or add a fee.
Can I use ad injection and pay per crawl together?
Yes. They monetise different traffic. Pay-per-crawl charges identified training crawlers for access, while ad injection earns from anonymous Live Search retrievals. Using both captures more of your total AI traffic than either alone.
Do access models monetise ChatGPT and Perplexity live searches?
Only partially. When a Live Search Agent fetches a page anonymously to answer a user prompt and does not accept an access charge, the access model earns nothing from that visit. Content-layer advertising is designed to monetise exactly those retrievals.
How much do the intermediaries take?
TollBit states it does not take a revenue share and instead adds a transaction fee for AI customers. Independent analysts have estimated Cloudflare's pay-per-crawl cut at around 30% and some licensing marketplaces at around 15%. blankspace operates a revenue share, with publishers receiving 70%.
Which model requires the least technical work?
Cloudflare pay per crawl requires the least if you already use Cloudflare. Content-layer ad injection requires a single lightweight edge worker on your existing CDN and no CMS changes. Licensing requires a negotiated legal agreement.