Well at least know we know what you've been up to Cap, heh, best of luck mate.
Cheers.
Good to see you here kind sir!
Diary of The Worlds Lowest Earning Full Time Affiliate Marketer
- Thread starter captain47
- Start date
Good to see you here kind sir!
Phew! It has been a rough couple of weeks at the sea!
Now that the ship is docked for the weekend an update is inevitable.
First off, that day happened, from Voluum (blessed be the guys who made it!):
I had a great week running campaigns, and even had my first 10$ a day in profit consistently for a few days. That would have stayed around for a while if only the offer I was running wasn't paused.
I tried to scale at breakeven and tested everything I could. For the first time, I wasn't losing money, even though I wasn't making much. I made just about 40$ in profit from that campaign. Roughly the same amount as I made from my first job as a freelance WordPress developer back in 2008. I hope history repeats in itself.
Here are the things I have learned in March so far:
Bid Strategy.
I read on Charles NGO's blog that bid strategy is the secret sauce that makes or breaks campaigns. I never really understood it until I had my first campaign that was converting very well and was giving me enough data to play with.
The actual strategy will depend on the campaign and the conversion rate, but I normally start high enough to blow my first test budget in a few hours.
Split Testing Offers.
A very special man told me, "Most offers suck" and somehow his words stuck in my head. I remember reading about the shiny object syndrome once and stuck with my offers for a great while. As you can see here and here.
But there are multiple things to consider why its not working for you.
- The offer might suck. Picking proven offers from the Top offers list that your affiliate networks send you will help to prevent this to some extend.
- The offer plus traffic source might be a bad fit. Not all traffic sources have access to the same kind of audience. So unless you know the traffic source and the geo where the offer is working for 'that guy', it may or may not work for you.
So I finally figured the importance of split testing offers.
- Split test similar offers with the same targeting.
- Split test same offer from multiple affiliate networks. (One offer I tested gave 3x conversions on a second aff-net as compared to the first for the same traffic.)
The Faster You Fail, The Faster Your Learn
One of the things that had been bothering me over the past few months was the speed at which I was launching campaigns. I was so slow that I couldn't launch more than a few campaigns a week.
But working closely with my aff-mans and traffic sources, now I know the best times to get offers approved and campaigns are ready to go as soon as I am ready.
- Of the 63 campaigns I have tested, 30 of them launched in March. Since March 5th.
- Of all the money I spent testing campaigns, I have spent 40% of it since March 5th.
- Of the 93 offers that I have tested so far, I tested 74 of them since March 5th!!
And as a result I have made the most progress this month too.
Best of all, a friend of mine whom I work with closely is also making solid progress this month with his offers and campaigns. We could notice the difference. Now we talk about scaling campaigns and maintaining cash flows and stuff like that instead of finding new offers or bitching about Decisive.
The bottom line is, the more you test, the more you learn.
If you are new, first get your basics right and spend as much as time you need to do that. Basics like:
- Tracking. Use Voluum if you are looking for the best.
- Finding a few affiliate networks that you are comfy with.
- Finding a traffic source that works for you.
- Collect templates and create basic processes on how you launch and test campaigns.
I am talking as if I have made 100$ consistently for a month. No, that's still a goal I am chasing. But I know I will get there.
After 7 months of grinding without seeing land, it finally feels like this ship is going somewhere.
I leave you with these:
And One More Thing..
I figured why affiliates run campaigns even when most of the campaigns are going to be a failure. Its for that one campaign that wins that's going to change everything.
ROI can go both ways, but, no matter how much you loose, you will never go beyond -100% ROI. There is no such thing as -200% ROI.
However, there is no such limit for +ve ROI. It can be +10%, or +100% or even +1000% and beyond. That's why we do this shit.
*Captain winks*
Now that the ship is docked for the weekend an update is inevitable.
First off, that day happened, from Voluum (blessed be the guys who made it!):
I had a great week running campaigns, and even had my first 10$ a day in profit consistently for a few days. That would have stayed around for a while if only the offer I was running wasn't paused.
I tried to scale at breakeven and tested everything I could. For the first time, I wasn't losing money, even though I wasn't making much. I made just about 40$ in profit from that campaign. Roughly the same amount as I made from my first job as a freelance WordPress developer back in 2008. I hope history repeats in itself.
Here are the things I have learned in March so far:
Bid Strategy.
I read on Charles NGO's blog that bid strategy is the secret sauce that makes or breaks campaigns. I never really understood it until I had my first campaign that was converting very well and was giving me enough data to play with.
The actual strategy will depend on the campaign and the conversion rate, but I normally start high enough to blow my first test budget in a few hours.
Split Testing Offers.
A very special man told me, "Most offers suck" and somehow his words stuck in my head. I remember reading about the shiny object syndrome once and stuck with my offers for a great while. As you can see here and here.
But there are multiple things to consider why its not working for you.
- The offer might suck. Picking proven offers from the Top offers list that your affiliate networks send you will help to prevent this to some extend.
- The offer plus traffic source might be a bad fit. Not all traffic sources have access to the same kind of audience. So unless you know the traffic source and the geo where the offer is working for 'that guy', it may or may not work for you.
So I finally figured the importance of split testing offers.
- Split test similar offers with the same targeting.
- Split test same offer from multiple affiliate networks. (One offer I tested gave 3x conversions on a second aff-net as compared to the first for the same traffic.)
The Faster You Fail, The Faster Your Learn
One of the things that had been bothering me over the past few months was the speed at which I was launching campaigns. I was so slow that I couldn't launch more than a few campaigns a week.
But working closely with my aff-mans and traffic sources, now I know the best times to get offers approved and campaigns are ready to go as soon as I am ready.
- Of the 63 campaigns I have tested, 30 of them launched in March. Since March 5th.
- Of all the money I spent testing campaigns, I have spent 40% of it since March 5th.
- Of the 93 offers that I have tested so far, I tested 74 of them since March 5th!!
And as a result I have made the most progress this month too.
Best of all, a friend of mine whom I work with closely is also making solid progress this month with his offers and campaigns. We could notice the difference. Now we talk about scaling campaigns and maintaining cash flows and stuff like that instead of finding new offers or bitching about Decisive.
The bottom line is, the more you test, the more you learn.
If you are new, first get your basics right and spend as much as time you need to do that. Basics like:
- Tracking. Use Voluum if you are looking for the best.
- Finding a few affiliate networks that you are comfy with.
- Finding a traffic source that works for you.
- Collect templates and create basic processes on how you launch and test campaigns.
I am talking as if I have made 100$ consistently for a month. No, that's still a goal I am chasing. But I know I will get there.
After 7 months of grinding without seeing land, it finally feels like this ship is going somewhere.
I leave you with these:
And One More Thing..
I figured why affiliates run campaigns even when most of the campaigns are going to be a failure. Its for that one campaign that wins that's going to change everything.
ROI can go both ways, but, no matter how much you loose, you will never go beyond -100% ROI. There is no such thing as -200% ROI.
However, there is no such limit for +ve ROI. It can be +10%, or +100% or even +1000% and beyond. That's why we do this shit.
*Captain winks*
Yea, it is correct. Using the newbie plan with Voluum, you only have their tracking domain and can't have your custom ones.
In the Voluum FAQ, they say that using their tracking domain could make you lose clicks because Antivirus/Security programs detect it has spam/virus.
As @koalahood said, we will be using their tracking domain.
I think it will affect your placements more than your CR I think.
Check these out:
Why should I use a custom domain? – Customer Feedback & Support
Voluum - Setting up a Custom Domain Name - CharlesNgo.com
It happens on your domain server. It will be very fast, in the milliseconds range.
ironbull
Active Member
Great thread man! I have read it all and you are so determined to success that you are going to make it.
One question...are you launching campaigns just with banners and direct linking or are you using landing pages? For me the landing page design/coding is the part of the process where I spend more time.
30 campaigns launched in a month is a good number!
One question...are you launching campaigns just with banners and direct linking or are you using landing pages? For me the landing page design/coding is the part of the process where I spend more time.
30 campaigns launched in a month is a good number!
Here is something that I clearly understand now. Most offers suck. Invest the least amount of time+testing money+efforts into launching a campaign.
Of course, you are not going to be profitable right away. But if an offer doesn't even give one conversion after 2400 people landing on the offer landing page, then its not going to convert no matter what creative you use.
If you have to use a landing page, stick to a basic template for all the offers in the first test. That's what I think will help you launch faster. The faster you launch, the faster you can fail and the faster you can learn..
Thanks for your kind words. We both have a looong way to go
djcrunk
Active Member
Perhaps you should stop listening to that guy, after all, he even thinks Katy Perry is freaking hot
Now time to raid some fucking treasure chest... I mean traffic source... pirate style
.To your success bro, and a bottle of rum!
Cheers!!
internalsoul
Well-Known Member
Whats up Cap, no update for a long time. Haven't heard from you for a long time. everything fine?
Still working towards my goals man. Everything is great, things are picking up slowly but surely
Thanks for checking in mister. Hope things are green at your end too!
internalsoul
Well-Known Member
Went to grey when i was away for a while. Now back to fulltime with some good campaigns in new verticals. Glad to hear you are doing good.
Went to grey when i was away for a while. Now back to fulltime with some good campaigns in new verticals. Glad to hear you are doing good.
Welcome back to the game man!
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