Getting Down To Business

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I’m feeling motivational today.  You might think that motivation is for wimps and losers.  You might think that motivation is cheesy.  You might want to think again.  Affiliate Marketing can be a very isolated industry.  Communication is all done over wires and screens, and it’s every man for himself out there.  You don’t have a manager telling you what to do.  You don’t have anyone setting goals for you.  If you aren’t careful, you can slip into a downward spiral very quickly when things go wrong.

I’m a firm believer in goals.  You have to set them, write them down on paper, and put them somewhere you can see them every day.  I have never missed a goal that I have written down this way.  Try it, you might surprise yourself.

These three videos have been viewed over and over again in my office.  The first one is about getting your mindset right.  The second one is a purely emotional motivating speech that gets me fired up every time.  The third one is inspirational simply because it is so fun to watch someone that has completely mastered his talent and ability.  You can laugh these off, or you can think about the difference that it would make in your paycheck if you take them to heart.  The choice is yours.

What Offers Are Still Working?

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Since the rebill crash there has been a general sense of panic among affiliates.  It’s as if there was only one way to make money in the industry, and now that it’s practically dried up, everyone is scrambling.  Funny thing is, that’s absolutely untrue!  There were affiliate offers long before Acai Berries came on to the scene, and there will continue to be offers that make money.

Conversion Van

Official Vehicle of Affiliate Marketing: The Conversion Van

So what are some of the things that are making money still?  Here’s what I’m seeing do very well right now.

1. Education

As a vertical, EDU has had its ups and downs.  Right now is definitely an up.  Not only has it always been a strong performer on email, but lately social media marketers and PPV guys have been seeing the allure of getting paid $30+ for a lead (no credit card required).  There are many different flavors out there such as Criminal Justice, Nursing, Massage, Video Game Design, and Web Design.  This makes it easy to break down your campaigns and target people that will actually convert.

2. Dating

Dating is one of the oldest verticals there is in all of CPA marketing.  It will never go away.  Why?  Simple: people need companionship.  If you’ve read Ca$hvertising by Drew Eric Whitman, dating and companionship ties directly into one of the “Life Force 8”.  This means that it is hard-wired into our psyche to want it.  You don’t have to sell it to people, they already want it.  You just have to convince them that the site you are promoting is the best way for them to get it.

3. Gaming

Gaming can include a lot of different things such as downloads and Facebook apps.  There’s money in all of them.  The lead gen type offers and Facebook apps are great for social media traffic and PPV, and the download games are great for display and media buy traffic.  These offers have lower payouts, but they convert like crazy, especially the apps.  All the user has to do is press “Allow” and then you get credited.

4. Email and Zip Submits

Yes, they can scrub hard. And yes, the payouts are low.  But these things are still around for a reason: they work.  Ruck from Convert2Media has posted a couple of awesome tips about how to promote these for low bid prices and competition.  You may need to rotate a few to find some that will stay alive for longer, but trust me, they exist.  I’ve seen affiliates do 20,000 leads on one single email submit offer over 3 weeks with no scrub in sight.  For real.

These are just some examples to get you started.  There are many more offers and verticals out there that are alive and well.  Take some time to test out some new things you wouldn’t normally consider, like offers with lower payouts.  They may surprise you.

Don’t Push “Make My Bid Highest”. Ever.

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If you are reading this right now and you are a PPV marketer, we need to come to an agreement on something.  I know when it’s late and you are about to go to bed, it can be tempting to log on to TrafficVance and hit that shiny “Make My Bid Highest” button just to make sure that you are getting all of the traffic.  Too bad.

evil button

Every time you push that button, you are just handing money to TrafficVance or DirectCPV or whatever network you are using.  See, it doesn’t just automatically figure out the least amount that you would need to bid to get the #1 spot, it overbids it.  A lot.  Like 5 times more than you could have been paying.  It only takes $0.001 (that’s a tenth of a cent) to outbid someone.  But when you hit the evil button, it raises your bid by $0.005.  That makes TrafficVance happy, but it makes us pay too much money.

So let’s all just agree right now to take the extra 30 seconds it takes to log on, check the rank for our top keywords and URLs, and add $0.001 instead.  That is all.

Affiliate Summit East 2010 Wrap-Up

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I just got back and all caught up from the trip to New York, so now it’s time for the obligatory wrap-up post.  For those of you that were not able to make it, you should definitely put it on your calendar for next year.  For pure value, contacts gained, and networking, this was the best show of the year for me so far.  Ad-Tech in November would have to be pretty spectacular to beat it.

I flew in on Saturday night, and got to The London at about 10:00 pm.  I scoped out the room for a minute, which was very nice, then headed out to dinner at Maison with some friends.  Then we walked around Midtown looking for a convenience store that was open to get some essentials that we forgot to pack.  I didn’t want to get too beat up the first night, so after that I just went to bed.

The London

The London

My Room at the London

My Room

On Sunday morning I had breakfast with HeavyT and then headed over to the Hilton to pickup our passes.  The ASE Meet Market was the main event for the day, which runs from 12:00 pm to 6:00 pm.  Once it opened, the Meet Market was totally packed.  You could barely walk through the aisles because there were people so packed in between the small tables.  I made the rounds and talked to people until about 4:00, then it was time for the PPV Playbook meetup at the Hilton bar.  It was an excellent little gathering.  There were lots of people excited about PPV and life in general, and it was cool to meet some of the regulars from the forums.  David (the owner) and Corey (from Affportal) couldn’t make it to the show, but they were attending it virtually through webcams on two MacBooks that were set up so they could talk to people.  I thought that was a pretty cool idea.

At 6:00 I headed over to Touch for the NYC Meetup202 group.  There was a huge turnout there as well, and I ended up taking several affiliates out for Steaks with Mike and Laura from GetAds.  After dinner we tried to get into the ShareASale party, because there was nothing else going on.  Unfortunately by the time we got there they had packed out the rooftop of the Empire Hotel so they weren’t letting any more people in until other people left.  And people weren’t leaving.  So we just went back to the London bar and had a couple drinks there.  I didn’t stay up very late since I had to work the GetAds booth at the Exhibit Hall first thing on Monday.

Meetup202 @ Touch

Meetup202 @ Touch

More Meetup202

More Meetup202

Both days of the Exhibit Hall flew bye, which is definitely not the norm when you are working a booth.  I talked to so many affiliates (new and old) that it was really enjoyable for once.  We had a great spot for our booth right at the door for the 2nd floor, so we got a steady stream of traffic on both days.

Our Corner Booth Spot

Our Corner Booth Spot

There were lots of parties on Monday night, so I decided to try the Neverblue Underground Party first.  I thought that would be the best spot but honestly it was kind of lame.  The venue was in the sub sub sub basement of the Hudson Hotel, and there was no open bar.  Seriously?  Both Neverblue and CPX Interactive were listed as sponsors and nobody sprung for the open bar?  What exactly did they pay for?  Fail.  I had acquired a pass to the invite-only AdKnowledge party earlier in the day, which was at Covet Lounge.  I decided to check that out and it was way better.  Open bar, good peeps and awesome atmosphere.  I stayed there the rest of the night until closing time, then took a very roundabout cab ride back to the hotel because the driver didn’t know where the London was (really?).  I eventually just had to pull it up on my iPhone and tell him directions.

Tuesday after the show I was pretty exhausted, and it was time to head home.  Took a cab straight to the airport and jumped on my flight back to Denver.  The flight was terrible and the landing was super rough, but I survived.  PRO TIP: Don’t fly JetBlue if you can avoid it.  They suck.

All in all this was an excellent show, big props to Shawn and Missy for putting on another winner!

Another Bevo Media Post

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In case you haven’t seen all the posts lately (like this one and this one) about Bevo Media, it is now publicly launched and ready for action.  It is a tracking platform for paid traffic, along the lines of Prosper202.  It does have a lot of nifty features that 202 doesn’t have, and they are putting some serious marketing muscle behind this release to make it a major player in the PPC / PPV / Media Buy tracking & analytics field.

Bevo Media was designed by Ryan Bukevicz and a team of programmers, and the finished product is definitely quite polished.  The interface is quite visually striking.  But looks aside, there are several things that set it apart from 202 and other competitors.  First of all, it has built-in support for the top CPA affiliate networks.  You just enter your login details and it will automatically pull the stats for you.  This is a massive time saver!  It also has built-in API support for the big 3 PPC engines.  This means that it will pull your click costs automatically as well.  That means no more logging in to your networks and search engines 10 times a day.  Bevo Media becomes your hub for everything.

Another cool feature that I’ve never seen before in a tracking system is the Classroom.  It has different articles, videos, and tools to help the newbie affiliate get their feet wet and make some money.  If you are already a successful affiliate, there’s probably nothing in here that will be new to you.  But if you are just starting out it’s definitely worth a look.

They have both an online hosted version (like Tracking202.com), and they also have an open source self-hosted version (like Prosper202).  They both look the same, and if you opt for the self-hosted version they have a very nifty tool that will automatically install and configure it on a Rackspace Cloud server for you.  For people that have never installed anything on web server before, this is a godsend.

So is Bevo Media better than Prosper202?  Ultimately that decision is going to be up to you.  202 has a lot of diehard fans, and it’s become the industry standard over the last couple of years.  That being said, I think for people running PPC traffic from the big 3 search engines, this is going to give them a huge advantage over the standard Prosper202 installation.  It’s more on par with Tracking 202 Pro, only it’s free.  Definitely give it a shot if you’ve got some time to test it out, and let me know what you think of it in the comments!

Instantly Increase Your ROI By 2%

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I know what you are thinking.  A measly 2% increase?  What’s the point?  Ask anybody that is making six figures a month with Affiliate Marketing if they’d like an extra 2%.  Of course they would!  That’s an extra $2,000 in their pocket every month.  Sometimes in life it’s the little things that add up.

Possibly the most annoying post image ever

This trick only works with PPV.  And it only works with a couple of networks: Lead Impact and Media Traffic.  All you need to do is go to the Billing/Funding page in your account and switch on Automatic Funding.  This means that when your balance drops below a certain threshold, they will automatically charge a set amount to your credit card to refill your account.  For doing this, they will give you a free 2% bonus on the amount you deposited.

It’s free money, sweet and simple.  If you are worried about your card getting charged unexpectedly, just pause all your campaigns when you are getting near the threshold.  You can keep them on pause indefinitely until you are ready to run again.

PRO TIP: If you use a credit card that gives you cash back, you can get another 1% back for free on all of your traffic purchases on any network.

Demand Media Banks It Hard

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If you’ve ever searched Google for the answer to a practical question (and who doesn’t?), you have probably seen the website eHow.com.  It seems to appear on the first page of results for literally thousands of unique terms.  What you may not know is that the company behind eHow.com, Demand Media, has created a cash machine so big that Wall Street and even Google itself has taken notice.

Demand Media Banks It Hard

Essentially, Demand Media is a massive content creation company.  But instead of using employees to do the work, they outsource it all to freelancers.  Authors get paid a set price per article, and they are encourage to crank out several at a time with strict deadlines.  If you like writing but don’t have the time to create your own blog, this actually could be a nice way for you to make a little extra cash on the side.

I can’t help but be impressed by Demand Media and what they’ve done.  They took a simple concept that’s been around for ages, Article Marketing, and scaled it to an unimaginable degree.  The company is rumored to be worth around $1.5 Billion.  It will most likely be acquired by a major public company or have an IPO of its own in the near future.

The reason I felt this was worth a post is to remind all of us of the power of the internet and the opportunity that we have each and every day to get a piece of it.  Don’t get discouraged because you got in the game too late, there is so much money to be made out there.  The world hasn’t even begun to realize the changes that the internet has brought into our daily lives, and the more it gets integrated, the more opportunity there is for us to make money.

You don’t have to create something completely unique and original to make millions of dollars.  Just ask Google.  They certainly didn’t create the search engine, they just built a better one.  All you have to do is keep your eyes and ears open, and when you see something that could be done better or bigger or more profitable, do it!

Avoid Affiliate Hyperactive Disorder

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One of the strengths of Affiliate Marketers is that they can move quickly.  When Michael Jackson died last year, it only took a matter of hours before affiliates were targeting people searching for news on the subject.  This ability to move quickly is what sets affiliates apart from big advertising agencies and old-school marketing firms.  However, it can also lead to a paralyzing condition that I like to call Affiliate Hyperactive Disorder.

Monkey set up offers. Monkey not make money.

Monkey set up offers. Monkey not make money.

Affiliate Hyperactive Disorder (AffHD for short) is when you have so many campaigns to test that you end up throwing them all up against the wall to see what sticks.  Unfortunately, what often happens is that none of them stick.  Then you are left thinking that you have exhausted all of your resources and have nothing to show for it.  You might think that, but you are wrong.

What actually happened is that you became a campaign creation robot.  When AffHD kicks in, your creativity center in the brain turns off.  You become a monkey copying and pasting links from one place into the other, and when all is said and done you really haven’t added to much value to the process.  No wonder those campaigns aren’t converting, there was no real effort put into their creation!

New affiliates are particularly susceptible to AffHD.  After they have received a couple of conversions the first thing they want to do is go set up 10 or 20 more campaigns.  If it worked once why not just duplicate it on a large scale?  The problem is, they don’t understand why the first campaign worked.  They haven’t taken the time to split test targets, keywords, landing pages, and creatives until they know beyond a shadow of a doubt why that campaign worked.  If they don’t do that, they are leaving money on the table.  If they don’t do that, they haven’t squeezed every last drop of ROI out of the campaign that they already have running.  This must be done before you move on to start something new.

You should be spending 70% of your time working on scaling your successful campaigns and only 30% of your time testing out new niches.  Think about any other business you could be in.  If you made all of your money selling blue widgets, you wouldn’t suddenly focus all of your attention on trying to push green widgets, would you?  Of course not!  You would spend most of your time trying to sell as many blue widgets as possible.  Then when you have a spare hour or two, you could figure out if people want green widgets.  Does that make sense?

The key to avoiding Affiliate Hyperactive Disorder is simple: focus.

Get Their Attention In 4 Seconds or Less

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Another way to look at PPV marketing is interruption marketing.  That’s essentially what you are doing is interrupting them in the middle of their web surfing session and popping an ad in front of them.  What you have to say had better get your point across, and do it quickly.  Let me introduce you to the Golden Rule of PPV Marketing…

Get Their Attention In 4 Seconds or less.

That’s right, only 4 seconds.  That is the average amount of time it takes a user to mouse up and close the pop-up window or click “skip” on your interstitial ad.  Doesn’t sound like very much time?  It’s not.  That’s why you have to do everything in your power to keep them on the page and engage them before habit takes over, which is to close the window.  How do you get their attention?  Here are a few ways.

1. Audio

You can only use audio on your landing pages on two of the major PPV networks: Traffic Vance and Lead Impact.  Traffic Vance doesn’t have too many restrictions on audio, they are quite lenient.  However, Lead Impact requires that there be clearly visible controls to pause or stop the audio.  This is simple to do if you have the right software on your landing page.  The audio player I see being used the most often is Nifty Player.  It is lightweight, fast-loading, and you can have the controls on the page or keep them invisible if you choose.

2. Flashing Graphics

Take some cues from the animated flashing .gif banners that you see used on many of the blogs in this industry (like this one!).  It is super easy to make a 2-5 frame flashing .gif banner using Photoshop, but that’s a topic for another post.  There’s a great tutorial you can read here.  You can use this tactic to make flashing headers, blinking call to action buttons, and moving arrows to get the attention of the user quickly.

3. Use Opposing Colors

One way to catch the eye is to use opposing colors.  Using this color wheel you can easily pick colors on the opposite end of the spectrum, which makes pages much more eye-catching.  You probably don’t want to do anything too abrasive, like use one color for the background and then another for the text, that would just be annoying.  What you can do is use them for different buttons, arrows, or calls to action on the page.  Or when you make your animated .gif files you can use opposite colors and flash between them for maximum effect.

Using one or all of these tactics is a great way to get the user’s attention in 4 seconds or less.  Try these out, and you will definitely see a difference in your conversions.  Just put yourself in the mind of your user and ask yourself, “Would I close this window in 4 seconds?”