Several CPV sources compared...

[marketerLevi]

Hello guys I hope the thread title to not be misleading. I am more posting this in hopes for others to chime in on the differences between a few of the top CPV traffic sources. Namely:

Zeropark Vs. DNTX:
From what I gather from my research, ZP has better traffic quality and quantity, while DNTX is a little smaller and lower quality, with stricter rules such as no casino or download offers.

Also according to at least one member, Zeropark was said to have had a lot of low quality clicks - which I gather was from a traffic bot, and could have been from an untargeted RON campaign. However I did read that this is solvable with optimization. What's your take @MinionBanana? Also would anyone say that DNTX has this same problem?

Popads Vs. Popcash:
From my experience with Popads, the conversions (for mobile/PC optimized CPA landers anyway) were far greater with PC/unknown devices than with mobile. Also is it generally true that Popcash is a better source for mobile conversions?

 

[marketerLevi]

Also would anybody mind to shed a little insight into the necessity (or not) to use prelanders with CPV marketing? When I did pops with TrafficVance for 2-3 years I earned a lot and always linked directly to the landing pages, and no results when I used home-created landers. But now several reports are pointing to the need for them.

But especially what about for CPI download apps, such as the ones that take you right to the G.play / iTunes install page - is it advisable to use a lander for these?

And if so, would just a large banner on in the middle of a blank webpage suffice?

 

[servandosilva]

Zeropark has more volume than DNTX, but as far as quality concerns, redirect traffic is always better than pop traffic on both sources.
DNTX started having pop traffic since last year. They don't quite have the same volume but I don't know about it's quality.

As for Popcash vs. PopAds. They're pretty similar, but most people prefer PopAds because of its targeting system which is one of the best I've seen.

Finally. Yes, it's like 99% necessary to use landers in PPV traffic. It can work with direct link but you'll end up with less ROI normally. Just think about it. You're browsing a website and suddenly you get a pop and it opens an app int he play store. Why the hell would you download and install it? You've got no reason or interest so they'll press the back button or close the browser.

 

[marketerLevi]

Hello, yeah when choosing landers for CPV traffic especially I always make sure it's one that's catchy, well designed, colorful and with a clear call to action - so it basically sells itself. It seems at least sometimes a direct page would work if the lander is done right. But I see what you mean on app installs - as a pop it wouldn't exactly sell itself... unless it was promoted in another way, say, as a banner which would sell it a bit better, right?

 

[servandosilva]

Hello, yeah when choosing landers for CPV traffic especially I always make sure it's one that's catchy, well designed, colorful and with a clear call to action - so it basically sells itself. It seems at least sometimes a direct page would work if the lander is done right. But I see what you mean on app installs - as a pop it wouldn't exactly sell itself... unless it was promoted in another way, say, as a banner which would sell it a bit better, right?

Right. Clicked traffic is very different to CPV traffic.

 

[MinionBanana]

hi marketerLevi,

My take is that ZP is definitely worth a try but you need to monitor closely and just pause non converting targets.
If you can achieve breakeven in ZP, usually it can be profitable elsewhere.

 

[marketerLevi]

Or if I can break even on ZP, I can optimize it and earn a profit from ZP alone I'm sure

 

[Yassine Boui]

how can i get accepted in ZP

 

[marketerLevi]

Hello guys I think I really need some advice. I've been having such abhorrent results lately that it's really taking a lot of will-power to profess all this to you guys, but here it goes...

6 days ago I got started with ZeroPark. I have run test campaigns there touching many major verticals including: biz-opp (2x; one offer in two ad types), dating (4x in multi-geos and milti ad types), insurance, Italian sports pin submit, and casino (4x in multi-geos and milti ad types). Out of all these, I usually received very low traffic although my bids were mostly in the top two spots and with many keywords - and for conversions - I usually took a loss, broke even about twice, and had only one successful campaign - of which stopped converting 3-4 days ago!

This, combined with what you see above DOUBLED with Popads - that is to say I'm running pretty much the same volume and same results with Popads - which means double the failure I've been facing every day, averaging around 95% loss each day!!! Take yesterday's classic case example: 10,356 clicks/visits and $62 spent, and only... FIFTY CENTS earned!!! (And I'll call this one out as I have nothing to loose on this one: "Flirchi" doesn't convert worth dick!) That's between 20 campaigns on 3 networks yesterday (including evil Adwords... make no mistake they are a merciless villain!) Of these, my portfolio of offers are amazingly diverse ranging from casino to biz-opp, dating, solar, occasional adult, foreign-language targeted, and even a breast enlargement campaign (via exact keywords)! I've even just transitioned into tracking all my campaigns with Voluum in the past 6 days, and I've been waking up every day to see dozens of rows of red, red, RED from loss after loss after loss on around 95% of the campaigns I've tried.

As a result I've been getting depressed and on edge - spending at least 16 hours / day every day for at least the past 10 days scouting out new campaigns / angles to try and creating new campaigns left & right, often relying on caffeine, and recently I've been becoming a bit compulsive - I just set up about 6 new campaigns in the past few hours (mostly varied angles of dating offers), and it's already 1am but I'm still making sure I finish setting up new campaigns before I sleep (multiple new solar and biz-opp offers of various angles, geos and ad on several ad agencies).

I'm really getting disturbed with all this and am at the end of my unemployment with no savings at all and have a condition that makes it challenging to maintain a 9-5 job - all this is why I'm pushing so hard for success on this affiliate marketing jig before my time is essentially over.

Not only has PopAds, ZeroPark and Adwords have been giving me low conversions, but I've also failed quite miserably with Admoda, Millennial Media Bing Ads in this past month since I've gotten back into the aff. marketing game, and I'll tell ya - I am quite confident I have set up quite some brilliant campaigns! Every lander I have chosen was one that looks catchy, colorful & professional with a distinct call-to-action. All my keywords/targets have been aptly targeted (with the exception of some broad categories on Popads), my bids have been within the top spots, my geo's have all been laser targeted, and the offers are top industries and often are the ones showing a high EPC in the aff. network. I have been optimizing my campaigns every day and even occasionally using custom banners / landers, but I'll tell you there's not much to optimize with basically no conversions, so I generally just stop the campaign after I've spent more/less 20% of the CPA rate on advertising. If it doesn't convert at all, better to cut my losses and try something new.

I have been brainstorming night & day under this semi-emergency of mine for success in the affiliate biz and I honestly have dozens of phenomenal ideas for future campaigns / angles & even new ad agencies (and I do have notes of my ideas). In all, I am actually not saying that PopAds and ZeroPark are bad traffic sources. In fact I actually do see potential with them, as I have actually been getting at least some conversions from them leading me to believe their traffic is genuine - and can be effective with the right formula. I just feel that either I've been doing something massively wrong lately or maybe it's just another case of over-saturated markets where there's already too many others promoting offers similar to mine.

In any case, I've traveled almost to the very end of the road and I really don't want to give up on the affiliate scene - but I just may have to unless I have a major windfall... FAST! So I'm really hoping for some genuine advice. @MinionBanana @servandosilva @cashmoneyaffiliate and others that would be so helpful if you would chime in. Thanks guys!

 

[MinionBanana]

1. Focus on one traffic source
2. 20% of the CPA rate for testing budget is really less. Depends on which stage the testing is, initial probably 1-2x the CPA rate for the campaign. If it is an offer which is converting, sometimes I set 1-1.5x the CPA rate for each KW/target
3. No other choice but to test test and test.

 

[marketerLevi]

@MinionBanana thanks for the response. What I meant by 20% of the CPA rate is the rate +/- 20%, so for a $4 offer I'd pay no more than $6 in ad costs. Yup, I'm still continuing to test new things.

And what if I want to take a plunge into the incent scene - incent offers with incent ad agency - is this more/less a solid chance at a profit?

 

[servandosilva]

I can see there are several problems here.
1. You're testing several traffic sources with very low budget at the same time. Instead of spending $20 on each traffic, source, spend $200 in one and make sure you understand it.

2. You're doing the same for verticals. Setting up dating, solar, apps and biz op campaigns? What are you trying to achieve? Shooting things randomly at the wall isn't the best way to learn unless you're rich. Why don't you focus on one vertical and learn what works instead of launching dozens of campaigns without following up?

3. spending 20% above the CPA payout? That's pretty much nothing to get data. You WON'T be able to optimize pop traffic by spending 1.2x the payout. A minimum I would recommend is 10x. If an offer pays $4, spend $40 before pausing anything. In fact, I like to spend 50-200x to analyze the data and see some potential. Many times optimizing campaigns will take days or weeks before profit. Spending 1.2x the payout is like throwing away your money and your data.

4. Your ideas and angles ARE NOT GREAT or BRILLIANT as you may think. Data says everything. If your idea is good, it will convert with the right traffic as long as your offer is good. Even a very simple and shitty lander can be a great idea that converts like fire, but the lander you took 4 hours to design and make beautiful can be a very bad idea if it doesn't convert.
Data will tell you if your angles are great or brilliant. You don't get to decide that yourself alone just because you think it is great.

5. You're being impatient and running from one thing to another. You mentioned you launched 20 campaigns over 3 traffic sources, which isn't bad but still very far from profit at the beginning. Also I can see you have used more traffic sources apart from those 3.
Launching 20 campaigns and using Voluum for 6 days before getting depressed and feeling over the edge about to quit Affiliate Marketing sounds very weird considering most of the people that are successful in this business took months or years of learning and many people spend thousands of dollars before finding their first great campaign. Caffeine is not going to solve this so don't over do it.

Sorry for being a bit harsh but it sounds like you need a reality check because the expectations you've got are quite similar from banking hard online super fast with 3 simple steps which we know aren't real.

Don't give up that easy You're just starting. It's like giving up college after the first couple months on your fresh year.

 

[Urs Stettler]

This is probably coming accross totally wrong, because I am new to this forum, but I hear your desparate tone and understand. I had not made any income with ppv until I started to learn how to do PPV the right way. Unless you know what you're doing there is really no way you can become profitable. The learning curve is pretty steep and it has nothing to do with just getting the keywords or URLs right or the lander right. It is really much more involved than that. I did not know until I signed up to a particular forum. Since then (about a year ago, I have been able to grow my income to a regular few k monthly (with PPV).

Now, I am totally new to this forum, so I don't want to break any rules. Am I allowed to place a link (yes an affiliate link) here? And do you want to know about this chest of know how about PPV?

 

[marketerLevi]

Great, thanks. Go ahead and post the link. If it doesn't allow you, then please send it to me directly.
- Levi

 

[marketerLevi]

I can see there are several problems here.
1. You're testing several traffic sources with very low budget at the same time. Instead of spending $20 on each traffic, source, spend $200 in one and make sure you understand it.

2. You're doing the same for verticals. Setting up dating, solar, apps and biz op campaigns? What are you trying to achieve? Shooting things randomly at the wall isn't the best way to learn unless you're rich. Why don't you focus on one vertical and learn what works instead of launching dozens of campaigns without following up?

3. spending 20% above the CPA payout? That's pretty much nothing to get data. You WON'T be able to optimize pop traffic by spending 1.2x the payout. A minimum I would recommend is 10x. If an offer pays $4, spend $40 before pausing anything. In fact, I like to spend 50-200x to analyze the data and see some potential. Many times optimizing campaigns will take days or weeks before profit. Spending 1.2x the payout is like throwing away your money and your data.

4. Your ideas and angles ARE NOT GREAT or BRILLIANT as you may think. Data says everything. If your idea is good, it will convert with the right traffic as long as your offer is good. Even a very simple and shitty lander can be a great idea that converts like fire, but the lander you took 4 hours to design and make beautiful can be a very bad idea if it doesn't convert.
Data will tell you if your angles are great or brilliant. You don't get to decide that yourself alone just because you think it is great.

5. You're being impatient and running from one thing to another. You mentioned you launched 20 campaigns over 3 traffic sources, which isn't bad but still very far from profit at the beginning. Also I can see you have used more traffic sources apart from those 3.
Launching 20 campaigns and using Voluum for 6 days before getting depressed and feeling over the edge about to quit Affiliate Marketing sounds very weird considering most of the people that are successful in this business took months or years of learning and many people spend thousands of dollars before finding their first great campaign. Caffeine is not going to solve this so don't over do it.

Sorry for being a bit harsh but it sounds like you need a reality check because the expectations you've got are quite similar from banking hard online super fast with 3 simple steps which we know aren't real.

Don't give up that easy You're just starting. It's like giving up college after the first couple months on your fresh year.

Hi Servando, just getting the chance to get back. It's been 10 days since my big status post / rant above, and since then a few things have changed. I found an offer that has been successful - moderately so; earning a plus overall though some days are zero. The offer was one from the same four categories mentioned above. It's not necessarily wasteful to keep trying the same four categories, as the way I had done it: testing numerous offers / landers / ad formats / keywords & targets until I find a winning angle.

In regards to your advice of spending 50-200X the payout for optimization, there are really two sides to this coin:
One one side, if the offer shows absolutely no sign of conversions within the first 1.2x investment, to me it would seem very risky to spend more, as if it would never convert no matter how much money I throw at it. On the other side, spending those kinds of amounts requires substantial funding. For me, I'm on a 'shoestring' budget, so investing 20x the payout on an offer that hasn't earned yet - while there may be potential for optimization - would in the short run bankrupt me. Your idea of spending much more on testing does sound interesting, but I would have to be rich to afford that kind of testing, and even then, the prospect of being able to optimize a campaign that didn't initially convert well enough for a steady profit seems like a 'fantasy'. But are you really saying that sort of fantasy can be real?

Yeah thoughts of quitting crossed my mind, but only in passing. I think it's normal for everyone to think of quitting something if it's not working out, but at least we don't always give up early.

 

[marketerLevi]

This is probably coming accross totally wrong, because I am new to this forum, but I hear your desparate tone and understand. I had not made any income with ppv until I started to learn how to do PPV the right way. Unless you know what you're doing there is really no way you can become profitable. The learning curve is pretty steep and it has nothing to do with just getting the keywords or URLs right or the lander right. It is really much more involved than that. I did not know until I signed up to a particular forum. Since then (about a year ago, I have been able to grow my income to a regular few k monthly (with PPV).

Now, I am totally new to this forum, so I don't want to break any rules. Am I allowed to place a link (yes an affiliate link) here? And do you want to know about this chest of know how about PPV?

Hello Stettler, while what you're saying about "no way to become profitable" without knowing what you're doing can be true, I would say that's usually true but not always - save for the random chance that somebody happens to chance on a lucky ad target / offer combination. But moreover for me, I know very truly what I'm doing on CPV. I have a solid 30 months experience with CPV marketing, and I had been earning steadily for about two years steadily in the green from CPV marketing on another ad agency around 2008... well enough to literally take me to live in 8 countries overseas for 14 months - and up to $1,000 / days at my peak. So for me, I know what I'm doing.

I know a lot about many industries quite well, how to choose keywords / targets, offers & landers, seasons to promote, bidding, optimizing, etc. Granted I haven't been faring the best lately, and that some of my ideas were not as good as I thought. But next about your statement that success in CPV marketing "has nothing to do with just getting the keywords or URLs right or the lander right". I would pretty much say this can't be true - or not the way you put it anyway - think about it - you're saying that the landing page has no effect on the success of a CPV campaign - however everybody with experience in CPV marketing knows that the lander is EVERYTHING. Because for CPV marketing, the initial lander is the one and only thing they have on your ad, which is truly the determining factor if they proceed or not.

I think we can all agree that landers are the most important thing of a CPV campaign. But if you meant it in another way, that the landers / keywords are not the *only* thing that matters, then for this I would agree. Of course it also has to be a hot market, in a demographic that people want it in, and that has traffic. And another super important factor is oversaturation. Even if your offer & lander are the #1 best converter in that adspace and niche, you still may not earn much/anything if there are already too many other advertisers promoting the same thing to the same customers... that's an over-saturated market - but unfortunately for me anyway, it seems a guessing game to determine whether or not this may be the case.

Anyway is there anything major I'm missing out on in my formula, or have I pretty much covered everything that's important in a successful CPV campaign?

 

[servandosilva]

Hi Servando, just getting the chance to get back. It's been 10 days since my big status post / rant above, and since then a few things have changed. I found an offer that has been successful - moderately so; earning a plus overall though some days are zero. The offer was one from the same four categories mentioned above. It's not necessarily wasteful to keep trying the same four categories, as the way I had done it: testing numerous offers / landers / ad formats / keywords & targets until I find a winning angle.

In regards to your advice of spending 50-200X the payout for optimization, there are really two sides to this coin:
One one side, if the offer shows absolutely no sign of conversions within the first 1.2x investment, to me it would seem very risky to spend more, as if it would never convert no matter how much money I throw at it. On the other side, spending those kinds of amounts requires substantial funding. For me, I'm on a 'shoestring' budget, so investing 20x the payout on an offer that hasn't earned yet - while there may be potential for optimization - would in the short run bankrupt me. Your idea of spending much more on testing does sound interesting, but I would have to be rich to afford that kind of testing, and even then, the prospect of being able to optimize a campaign that didn't initially convert well enough for a steady profit seems like a 'fantasy'. But are you really saying that sort of fantasy can be real?

Yeah thoughts of quitting crossed my mind, but only in passing. I think it's normal for everyone to think of quitting something if it's not working out, but at least we don't always give up early.

Spending 1.2x and expecting an offer to convert with PPV traffic is pretty crazy.
Sometimes you get traffic from 100 different websites, if not more. How would you know if they convert when your 1.x is just like 1% of the payout divided by those websites?

Optimising campaigns from non profit to profit is key in this business. There's nothing "fantastic" about it. If you're just looking for profitable campaigns right away you're going to leave a lot of money in the table. I think you can easily get 20-50x more profitable campaigns by optimizing them than by just spending 1.2x and see if they convert being profitable.

Not even the big guys launch all of their campaigns being profitable. That just doesn't happen, especially with this kind of traffic.

 

[Urs Stettler]

Hey Levi. Agreed for "the random chance". There is always the odd combo that converts and puts you in the green.

You mention you know what you're doing... I did not mean to imply otherwise, but I did get the impression that what you're doing currently does not make you happy but produces a rather unsatisfying level of losses. In other words you went from a thousand dollars per day to losses and don't know why. Right?

I think I know why. PPV has changed - or rather the way some uccessful people work with PPV has changed (I know that sounds arrogant, sorry about that). While landers and URLs and keywords of course still are important, they are not the only determining factors anymore (hence my wording: "nothing to do with JUST getting landers ... right...". There are different strategies and methods - some white hat and some not so white - that people apply to make ppv work that really go far beyond. Again, I apologize that this sounds so hyped-up. But unless you play along armed with this level of knowledge, you are just fishing in the murky pond using your bare hands.

You probably agree, there must be a reason why you went from successful to losses. Anyway, I am trying to send you the link. Have a look and let me know what you think.

 

[Urs Stettler]

sorry, don't appear to be able to place a link, or pm??

 

[marketerLevi]

Well guys, I've been in profit for like 7 days straight. I suspected ZeroPark added new traffic partners, and they confirmed that is true. Are any of you others also receiving increased traffic and conversions from them in recent days? Now I'm faced with the oddest dilemma that I'm having to find creative ways to fund all my traffic in order to keep earning - credit cards and hopefully a faster payment back from the aff. network. Anyone also ever "earned more than you could afford"?

Just counting it, I've tried at least 75 campaigns with them in the last 3 weeks, so it's sure fitting that at least one is paying off, OMG!