So I have been really focused on finding spots that aren't super saturated with competition. I find that I can get some of these smaller spots profitable (ie $10-20/day), but then Im kind of stuck.
Once you move away from the Pornhubs and Redtubes, volume seems to become a problem, especially when working in smaller GEOs (Im working mainly in DE right now, not a small geo, but still smaller than US etc)
Is it just a matter of testing more traffic sources?
I feel like with bid prices on these large sites being so high, I can't really compete there and be profitable.
So am I just stuck running all these small campaigns?
Or am I just doing something wrong? lol
Any advice would be appreciated. 
Matuloo will most probably chime in later - he's the master of adult traffic. But have you tried Exoclick RON?
Be sure you're using a solid-performing offer plus your best creatives, and be sure to cut sites aggressively. I talked about that approach in an old post, but it should still be valid today:
https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...l=1#post200678
Best of luck!
Amy
Hello jabong,
there is a ton of volume for DE, exoclick has lots of it : you don't need to go RON, take a look at the premium spots and test them, there are some very good ones. But there also gems to be found in RON, try to run it for a while and create a whitelist - their RON is too big for smaller budgets, so proceed with caution.
You can also test not-pure-adult traffic, there is a good video streaming spot on ero-advertising for DE traffic... I wont tell you the domain directly, its an .EU ltd, find it 
Exo also has some torrent/streaming sites, test them too.