You pretty much have it. Ages ago I did develop the site as a network so the heart of it is indeed an ad platform. However a year ago I discovered most of the ad feeds had disappeared or turned completely junk so I migrated it into an 'all in one' earning / rewards site.
The core is ad network but the truth is, as a guy who spent ages on the site, I had to turn it around. There is just no time to market an ad network these days - me on my own = no time to make it, market it AND run it etc. Not to mention the costs - astronomical. It's not like 10 years ago when I had loads of affiliate sites. It's the changing times - sites are so much bigger, so much more to do - it's nuts.
So I setup an offers section, surveys / offerwalls, forum etc - most of it opens up once you join. Not a huge amount of offers but they are independent rather than being ad network based so I have flexibility with offers to join, plus there is no middleman taking an extra cut in commissions.
It's kind of like swagbucks but more search engine based - due to the ad network side of things. I think when people get it, it will work - it's just not as in your face as a rewards site. Also the search engine allows you to look at results abroad (change your location to Germany and see what .de sites are saying about Brexit!) and it allows some interesting research. I noticed Google took this feature away from Chrome when I was making it so I kept it all as a core network and search engine.
It one of those things - two years solid was a labour of love so I was not deleting the search engine! No idea if it will work.....it should as there is decent offers, an affiliate program and quite a few options in there. I can only give it a try.