Earning a living from CPA marketing
- Thread starter Rvfamily
- Start date
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
@Judecd23
I am glad you liked it. After reading from Finchsells that he starts EVERY campaign with a customer avatar worksheet and then seeing it in a course I went through from a very successful CPA marketer, I decided that it had to be something that I implemented. I appreciate you checking out the blog. I will have some new content there, the first of next week. Hope you check it out.
As always,
Here's to your success!
You're welcome.
Not for the past couple of weeks.
Frank Kern taught this years ago. He got right down to the nitty-gritty of his ideal target - physical characteristics, family situation/# of kids, how they dressed, what they did for fun, occupations, etc. About the only thing he left out was their sex life. But that probably was dependent on what product he was selling.
Anyway, Frank was very successful and he swore by this technique.
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
I haven't posted here in quite some time, but this has been on my mind lately. Just thought I would share with this great group of people.
I see and talk to so many who are struggling in some area of IM. Hope you all find value.
Everyone who has been working at IM for a while talks about it. It's mentioned frequently as the number one reason newbies struggle and eventually give up.
What is the menace that will stomp on your dreams of earning a living online?
Well, to be honest, I've always believed that stories or examples help make things more relatable. So I've come up with a good analogical example.
Let's say you want to become an engineer. Well, engineering is a broad field. You're going to have to be more specific.
Ok, fine. So you decide you want to become a petroleum engineer (not as popular right now, lol). Well, you get started with basic course elements (math, physics, etc.) that are common and necessary to any field of engineering.
As you progress and have a good working understanding of these foundational principles, you begin to get into the niche specific (petroleum) knowledge and skills that allow you to work, thrive and progress in that field.
Now once you have been through the educational process (a lot of theory) and you get out into the workforce, you begin to acquire practical skills and knowledge that come from actually working in the field.
Now at this point, you begin to command some real dollars in the marketplace.
And because you have had the foundational education in engineering, if you wanted to cross over into another area of engineering (mechanical, let's say), you would have a significant head start to acquiring the new skill set necessary to function in that new niche.
Well, everyone (virtually, I would say) comes into IM thinking of it as a niche in and of itself. It's not.
Think of IM as the field of engineering. With Info Product Creation as Mechanical Engineering, CPA Marketing as Electrical Engineering, YouTube and Video Marketing as Petroleum Engineering and Email list building and marketing as Chemical Engineering.
You can plug any one specific IM niche into the engineering equivalent.
The main idea is that each one niche in IM has it's very own specific niche related knowledge that you must master if you want to rise above the avg IMer in that niche.
What's the difference between the avg IMer in a niche and someone who is truly proficient? I would offer up that it's the difference between earning a little money this year online and earning a quit your job income online this year.
Just as you cannot pursue mechanical, petroleum and chemical engineering at the same time (without tremendous expense of both time and capital resources), you cannot pursue video marketing, list building, webinars and blogging all at once.
Pick a niche you want to master and once you have it down, you will have many of the foundational skills (basic landing page creation, copywriting, how to write a headline that gets action, basic autoresponders, etc.) that will allow you to quickly move into another niche in IM.
So decide (you might remember my post from long ago about the Latin root of decide- to cut off [from] any other possibility) what niche you will pursue and "cut off" all other roads and distractions that keep you from becoming the next all star in the niche you have chosen.
As always,
Here's to your success!
Casey
aka The Nomadic Marketer
I see and talk to so many who are struggling in some area of IM. Hope you all find value.
Everyone who has been working at IM for a while talks about it. It's mentioned frequently as the number one reason newbies struggle and eventually give up.
What is the menace that will stomp on your dreams of earning a living online?
Well, to be honest, I've always believed that stories or examples help make things more relatable. So I've come up with a good analogical example.
Let's say you want to become an engineer. Well, engineering is a broad field. You're going to have to be more specific.
Ok, fine. So you decide you want to become a petroleum engineer (not as popular right now, lol). Well, you get started with basic course elements (math, physics, etc.) that are common and necessary to any field of engineering.
As you progress and have a good working understanding of these foundational principles, you begin to get into the niche specific (petroleum) knowledge and skills that allow you to work, thrive and progress in that field.
Now once you have been through the educational process (a lot of theory) and you get out into the workforce, you begin to acquire practical skills and knowledge that come from actually working in the field.
Now at this point, you begin to command some real dollars in the marketplace.
And because you have had the foundational education in engineering, if you wanted to cross over into another area of engineering (mechanical, let's say), you would have a significant head start to acquiring the new skill set necessary to function in that new niche.
Well, everyone (virtually, I would say) comes into IM thinking of it as a niche in and of itself. It's not.
Think of IM as the field of engineering. With Info Product Creation as Mechanical Engineering, CPA Marketing as Electrical Engineering, YouTube and Video Marketing as Petroleum Engineering and Email list building and marketing as Chemical Engineering.
You can plug any one specific IM niche into the engineering equivalent.
The main idea is that each one niche in IM has it's very own specific niche related knowledge that you must master if you want to rise above the avg IMer in that niche.
What's the difference between the avg IMer in a niche and someone who is truly proficient? I would offer up that it's the difference between earning a little money this year online and earning a quit your job income online this year.
Just as you cannot pursue mechanical, petroleum and chemical engineering at the same time (without tremendous expense of both time and capital resources), you cannot pursue video marketing, list building, webinars and blogging all at once.
Pick a niche you want to master and once you have it down, you will have many of the foundational skills (basic landing page creation, copywriting, how to write a headline that gets action, basic autoresponders, etc.) that will allow you to quickly move into another niche in IM.
So decide (you might remember my post from long ago about the Latin root of decide- to cut off [from] any other possibility) what niche you will pursue and "cut off" all other roads and distractions that keep you from becoming the next all star in the niche you have chosen.
As always,
Here's to your success!
Casey
aka The Nomadic Marketer
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
Woot, he's back!
Great analogies, Casey! Very nicely explained and easy to understand. I think it's a great reminder as well, for any of us who have become scattered with trying all the options and suffering from SOS (shiny object syndrome).
Thanks so much for posting it.
@azgold,
Thanks for taking the time. I must admit, writing here (and on my blog) is a rather cathartic experience for me. My problem has just been time. Hoping to put up my last several campaigns here soon. Hope you are well.
As always,
Here's to your success!
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
Hello Af'ers!
So, here we are in 2017. I trust that everyone had a fantastic start to the new year, and have laid plans for making this year better than last year. It's once again been a while since I have posted here. My intention has been to once again start on a several times a week posting schedule, but as you can clearly see, that has not happened as of yet.
Well, I completed a certification from Hubspot (free, for Content Marketing) and one key takeaway was that I need a content creation schedule to help keep me focused and on task. To that end, here is my first post here in 2017.
Before beginning, I would just like to say that this community has been very kind and helpful to me as I have worked to develop my skills in affiliate marketing. There are so many great people tied into this forum and I have truly appreciated the kind words and insightful direction in improving my skills. Thank you.
Let's dive in....
My Campaigns for the Year
Let's get real, OK? In 2016 I conducted 10 paid campaigns in Bing, 2 paid campaigns in 7 Search, and one paid campaign in Adwords, totally 13 paid traffic campaigns in 2017. My total ad spend for the year was $575.58 and my total profit for the year was $69.12. This leaves me with an ROI of -91.67% for the year. Not a good year.
I made a lot of mistakes during the year, including setting up, and starting one campaign with tracking links going to the wrong destination (ouch) for two days. Setting up multiple campaigns where I ran ad spend of more than 20 times the payout, testing various aspects of the campaign. And finally, not having tracking links in place for a campaign that was just above break even, thus not being able to identify where the converting traffic was coming from (and not allowing for optimization to make it profitable).
Lots of lessons learned (and re-learned) this year. My biggest challenge has been money for ad campaigns and has severely limited my ability to be consistent.
In the waning months of the year, I did begin to set up small funnels (with a series of 1 to 3 pages) for my campaigns, and I believe this will be an important piece of the puzzle going forward.
For example, I conducted a campaign for a financial offer and used this landing page as the front end of the funnel (single page with three micro-commitment steps). These did seem to generate higher conversion rates, and I'll have some data for you in another post.
With a few exceptions, I think my days of direct linking are pretty much over. When beginning to test an offer in a new vertical, I will probably still direct link to see what the conversion rate on the offer is before spending the time to build out a micro funnel for the offer. This was another lesson learned during the year. On one campaign, I spent a very significant amount of time building out a funnel for an offer that converted very poorly. Just not cost or time effective.
I did do a little bit of ad spend in Facebook, but it was mostly for creating and increasing the audience to some niche specific facebook pages, and really was not for any CPA campaigns. Facebook's TOS severely limit what you can spend money on when it comes to CPA campaigns, but you can spend money to build an audience without fear of account cancellation. On the downside, I did see a severe restriction of the number of people who saw my posts within the facebook pages where I linked out to an offer. This is something I will continue to test and report on here. If you want to use a link cloaker that is very effective in your Facebook posts, I highly recommend the cloaker available within @LukePeerFly tool called FPTraffic. I'll not put in a link so as not to seem spammy, but it's a great tool (hard to beat for about ten bucks a month for what it does). If you want to use my link, just send me a message and I'll provide it.
The Way Forward
I still have not spent the $300 I have sitting in my two mobile ad accounts, so there is some additional opportunity there. More on this to come.
During the course of the last year, I was introduced to some affiliate SEO (building on my first YouTube video SEO campaign) techniques and at least part of my focus going forward will be in SEO. It is not a fast approach to traffic, like PPC, but it is an important additional arrow in the quiver to becoming a successful marketer, in my humble opinion.
I do believe that PPC and SEO are completely different skill sets. But I believe they can be used together to make a more comprehensive strategy for job replacement income. To have and be able to utilize both skills will provide additional opportunities for income.
I have spent a tremendous amount of time and energy learning this new skill set and believe I am now ready to begin making money with it. I have contracted with one local person and am in negotiations with a second for SEO and Social Media Marketing services. To be able to do local client SEO is just the other side of affiliate SEO.
I plan on doing the local client work to fund and fuel my additional work on the affiliate side.
Well, to keep this from being so long it won't get read, I'll wrap it up here. I will provide specifics (to the best of my ability) on the campaigns I conduct going forward.
I do want to add that I am working with a developer/coder who is creating a WordPress plugin tracking solution for me. It is still in the development, but I think when it's finished, it will be a unique solution for those who use Wordpress as the CMS for thier websites, and who don't want or can't afford to use a monthly service like Clickmagick, Voluum or Thrive. It will not be meant to do the heavy work that one of these kinds of services will do. However, for those trying to get started with as little expense as possible, and who are learning to use trackers and setting up campaigns I think it will be very useful.
As always,
Here's to your success!
Casey
aka, The Nomadic Marketer
So, here we are in 2017. I trust that everyone had a fantastic start to the new year, and have laid plans for making this year better than last year. It's once again been a while since I have posted here. My intention has been to once again start on a several times a week posting schedule, but as you can clearly see, that has not happened as of yet.
Well, I completed a certification from Hubspot (free, for Content Marketing) and one key takeaway was that I need a content creation schedule to help keep me focused and on task. To that end, here is my first post here in 2017.
Before beginning, I would just like to say that this community has been very kind and helpful to me as I have worked to develop my skills in affiliate marketing. There are so many great people tied into this forum and I have truly appreciated the kind words and insightful direction in improving my skills. Thank you.
Let's dive in....
My Campaigns for the Year
Let's get real, OK? In 2016 I conducted 10 paid campaigns in Bing, 2 paid campaigns in 7 Search, and one paid campaign in Adwords, totally 13 paid traffic campaigns in 2017. My total ad spend for the year was $575.58 and my total profit for the year was $69.12. This leaves me with an ROI of -91.67% for the year. Not a good year
. I made a lot of mistakes during the year, including setting up, and starting one campaign with tracking links going to the wrong destination (ouch) for two days. Setting up multiple campaigns where I ran ad spend of more than 20 times the payout, testing various aspects of the campaign. And finally, not having tracking links in place for a campaign that was just above break even, thus not being able to identify where the converting traffic was coming from (and not allowing for optimization to make it profitable).
Lots of lessons learned (and re-learned) this year. My biggest challenge has been money for ad campaigns and has severely limited my ability to be consistent.
In the waning months of the year, I did begin to set up small funnels (with a series of 1 to 3 pages) for my campaigns, and I believe this will be an important piece of the puzzle going forward.
For example, I conducted a campaign for a financial offer and used this landing page as the front end of the funnel (single page with three micro-commitment steps). These did seem to generate higher conversion rates, and I'll have some data for you in another post.
With a few exceptions, I think my days of direct linking are pretty much over. When beginning to test an offer in a new vertical, I will probably still direct link to see what the conversion rate on the offer is before spending the time to build out a micro funnel for the offer. This was another lesson learned during the year. On one campaign, I spent a very significant amount of time building out a funnel for an offer that converted very poorly. Just not cost or time effective.
I did do a little bit of ad spend in Facebook, but it was mostly for creating and increasing the audience to some niche specific facebook pages, and really was not for any CPA campaigns. Facebook's TOS severely limit what you can spend money on when it comes to CPA campaigns, but you can spend money to build an audience without fear of account cancellation. On the downside, I did see a severe restriction of the number of people who saw my posts within the facebook pages where I linked out to an offer. This is something I will continue to test and report on here. If you want to use a link cloaker that is very effective in your Facebook posts, I highly recommend the cloaker available within @LukePeerFly tool called FPTraffic. I'll not put in a link so as not to seem spammy, but it's a great tool (hard to beat for about ten bucks a month for what it does). If you want to use my link, just send me a message and I'll provide it.
The Way Forward
I still have not spent the $300 I have sitting in my two mobile ad accounts, so there is some additional opportunity there. More on this to come.
During the course of the last year, I was introduced to some affiliate SEO (building on my first YouTube video SEO campaign) techniques and at least part of my focus going forward will be in SEO. It is not a fast approach to traffic, like PPC, but it is an important additional arrow in the quiver to becoming a successful marketer, in my humble opinion.
I do believe that PPC and SEO are completely different skill sets. But I believe they can be used together to make a more comprehensive strategy for job replacement income. To have and be able to utilize both skills will provide additional opportunities for income.
I have spent a tremendous amount of time and energy learning this new skill set and believe I am now ready to begin making money with it. I have contracted with one local person and am in negotiations with a second for SEO and Social Media Marketing services. To be able to do local client SEO is just the other side of affiliate SEO.
I plan on doing the local client work to fund and fuel my additional work on the affiliate side.
Well, to keep this from being so long it won't get read, I'll wrap it up here. I will provide specifics (to the best of my ability) on the campaigns I conduct going forward.
I do want to add that I am working with a developer/coder who is creating a WordPress plugin tracking solution for me. It is still in the development, but I think when it's finished, it will be a unique solution for those who use Wordpress as the CMS for thier websites, and who don't want or can't afford to use a monthly service like Clickmagick, Voluum or Thrive. It will not be meant to do the heavy work that one of these kinds of services will do. However, for those trying to get started with as little expense as possible, and who are learning to use trackers and setting up campaigns I think it will be very useful.
As always,
Here's to your success!
Casey
aka, The Nomadic Marketer
Judecd23
Active Member
Thank you for the update Casey.
"I do want to add that I am working with a developer/coder who is creating a WordPress plugin tracking solution for me. It is still in the development, but I think when it's finished, it will be a unique solution for those who use Wordpress as the CMS for thier websites, and who don't want or can't afford to use a monthly service like Clickmagick, Voluum or Thrive."
Interesting and looking forward
"I do want to add that I am working with a developer/coder who is creating a WordPress plugin tracking solution for me. It is still in the development, but I think when it's finished, it will be a unique solution for those who use Wordpress as the CMS for thier websites, and who don't want or can't afford to use a monthly service like Clickmagick, Voluum or Thrive."
Interesting and looking forward
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
Thank you for the update Casey.
"I do want to add that I am working with a developer/coder who is creating a WordPress plugin tracking solution for me. It is still in the development, but I think when it's finished, it will be a unique solution for those who use Wordpress as the CMS for thier websites, and who don't want or can't afford to use a monthly service like Clickmagick, Voluum or Thrive."
Interesting and looking forward
@Judecd23
Thanks for taking the time to read. I'm really excited about the project. It's something I have been thinking about for a long time and after looking at a number of tracking solutions (I still use P202 for some and started using tracking desk as well), I think this can be a fine product to fill this gap (both functional and monetary).
As always,
Here's to your success!
Casey, so nice to see you back again!
I don't think 2016 was a bad year for you. My god, you learned SO much! It sounds like it armed you for a terrific 2017.
This link goes to a login page, not your lander. Maybe a screenshot instead?
Yes, Luke built a great tool. You can put your link in, as long as you identify it as your referral link and also put the non-referral link. Then people can choose which one to use.
You are setting yourself up with multiple streams of income, which is fantastic. I think you'll do well going forward and I can't wait to read of your progress.
Wishing you much luck!
I don't think 2016 was a bad year for you. My god, you learned SO much! It sounds like it armed you for a terrific 2017.
This link goes to a login page, not your lander. Maybe a screenshot instead?
Yes, Luke built a great tool. You can put your link in, as long as you identify it as your referral link and also put the non-referral link. Then people can choose which one to use.
You are setting yourself up with multiple streams of income, which is fantastic. I think you'll do well going forward and I can't wait to read of your progress.
Wishing you much luck!
Rvfamily
Well-Known Member
@azgold
Thank you for always being so supportive and for taking the time to read my posts.
Sorry about the lander. Here is a screen shot of the lander
As you click the buttons at the top, you make a series of micro-commitments until you click the third time and it takes you to the advertisers landing page. When using this page, I could see exactly what step respondents were getting to in the process. For example, if they were pushing the button the second time, but not the third, then I knew I needed to work on the copy for the second button, etc. Reducing the friction in the process is always important.
I have some cool things I've learned to share here about using various free resources and tools to help rank sites for medium and long term keywords, but I want to wait until I have some definitive data to share with everyone rather than just conceptual ideas.
Hope you have a fantastic day.
As always,
Here's to your success!
PS. Azgold, how was your 2016? Can you share some things you learned or how things went for you last year?
Holy cow, how'd I miss this?! Sorry, Casey.
Cool! You'll know exactly where to optimize.
Awesome, looking forward to your posts! You always lay things out in detail.
Thank-you, you too.
I didn't do very much CPA last year, I'm afraid.
I learned that my eyeballs can fry in their sockets if I stare at a computer screen too long.
The point that sometimes, what visitors find appealing enough to click, is least appealing in my eyes, was driven home. It was something I already knew but I still find it a little curious sometimes.
I rediscovered that even though people like your ad enough to click through, they don't like your offer enough to convert.
You know, the basics.
Hope 2017 is an amazing year for us all!
Cool! You'll know exactly where to optimize.
Awesome, looking forward to your posts! You always lay things out in detail.
Thank-you, you too.
I didn't do very much CPA last year, I'm afraid.
I learned that my eyeballs can fry in their sockets if I stare at a computer screen too long.
The point that sometimes, what visitors find appealing enough to click, is least appealing in my eyes, was driven home. It was something I already knew but I still find it a little curious sometimes.
I rediscovered that even though people like your ad enough to click through, they don't like your offer enough to convert.
You know, the basics.
Hope 2017 is an amazing year for us all!
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