» January 14, 2008 in
If you are interested in PPC check out today's LONG video. My longest video yet at over 9 minutes (I got carried away). If you don't want to watch the full video I'll sum it up for you:
Picking the campaign
There is no rhyme or reason to the way I pick campaigns. I try not to go with something that pays $1 and stay away from credit/loan stuff. That's about it.
Finally I preview the landing page to make sure it's something I would be comfortable buying from, usability is good, form fields work, looks good in multiple browsers, etc.
Getting a domain
After I pick my campaign I choose a keyword rich domain name to redirect my traffic through to the offer. I use this keyword technique for picking my domain names.
Getting the Keywords
Keyword discovery is the best tool I've found for getting a big list of keywords. I grab a huge list of keywords, usually 1-2000, drop them into my keyword scrubber, and then over to an excel spreadsheet.
Formatting the keywords for MSN
I make a unique url for each keyword like so:
domain.com/?keyword=msn1
Where msn1 represents the actual keyword. I don't pass the real keyword I paid for because I prefer to keep it to myself. If I get a sale I go look up the msn1 and it will tell me the keyword that converted.
Setting up the campaign
I drop the keywords/urls into msn that I just created.
To make the ad copy I look at banners or existing creatives and pull copy from them. Not very original but it's an easy way to get good creative.
Watch the stats
Next I sit and wait for 24 hours for clicks to roll in. At the end of 24 hours I had 14 clicks, for a cost of $3.50 with no sales.
Feedback?
Let me know what you think of the process. I can tell it's going to take a long time to get rich using these methods unless I make some modifications.
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TheWebHostingHero () says on January 14, 2008:
Do you split test your ads and landing pages?Also I'd suggest keywordspy.com for keyword research.
45n5 () says on January 14, 2008:
@TheWebHostingHero - thanks for the keyword spy tip, I've never tried it"Do you split test your ads and landing pages?"
I don't have a landing page most of the time, for instance the betty crocker offer I redirected directly to the merchant. However I do split test the ad copy.
$1000 Affiliate Experiment says on January 14, 2008
Wow that video was creepy. Not because your creepy or anything, but because thats almost exactly how I have been doing campaigns, almost to the tee. Unfortunetly though, I get the exact same results as you do. Low Impressions, low number of clicks, zero conversion. Keep up the great videos, they are really enjoyable to watch. --Eric
Jonathan (Trust) says on January 14, 2008
Way too early to make any kind of judgement. Only a few bucks, only 14 clicks, on a Sunday and just MSN? I expect to get more than few sales every hundred clicks, so after a few hundred, I have a pretty good idea if it's going to work or not. Everybody is different. Some have a set dollar amount they'll let it go for before making any kind of decisions. Then it's kind of like fishing. Trying to figure out the best bait, keep casting until you get a bite. The ones that don't work out, drop and move. After some time, you'll find some that work for you. Then just find some more.
Pingo says on January 14, 2008
I aggree with the points listed already.
MSN doesn't drive that much traffic, but give it time to justify how it does.
Then i'd say that this strategy is still helping you to make a campaign that makes you $20 bucks a month. Then do it 50 times.
One of the 50 you pick will be a killing. But hey your still making that 1k a month. As you mentioned in a previous video.
thanks for all the advice. keep the 365 video's coming!
jen says on January 14, 2008
That is exactly what happend to me last year, I tried a TON of campaings with no results. Sometimes using hundreds of keywords and bidding very high $1 - $2 dollars per click and other times bidding low.
The results were almost identical with Google, MSN and Yahoo. Low impressions, low clicks, low convertions. That is why I decided to just work on my SEO and do other stuff to make money.
REC says on January 14, 2008
I think I would wait to get 100 clicks.
Maybe use Google Trends, maybe.
moneyreign () says on January 14, 2008:
I like to try and test offers that aren't too saturated, and pays enough that I have some room to play with the ppc on.If you can find an offer that you are somewhat interested in, you should have a better chance of it performing. Not only will this motivate you to work on it more, but may give you an advantage to ppc terms and keyword wording... as you already know what the product/services relates to.
It's also interesting to find offers that have different landing pages. It's ridiculous how much tiny differences can make in conversions.
moneyreign () says on January 14, 2008:
Just finished the video. I loved the part "this is what you drive when you dont have SUPER in front of your name!"... haha that was hilarious.Anyway, tomorrow I will have a post that will give you a definite edge over the competition. Something brand new.
45n5 () says on January 14, 2008:
thanks all for the feedback and tips and stories.@moneyriegn - look forward to the post and ian enjoyed the car part also ;)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7wPHiInK7s
@rec - I have other campaigns with more than 100 clicks but usually they just run red
@jen - the only thing about seo is it takes time and is so passive, ie, do something then hope it ranks highly
@pingo - thanks, i reckon I could keep the 50 pages on one domain and go for it.
@trust - thanks, I'll keep fishing, maybe try some different bait or move to a more familiar fishing hole.
@$1000 Affiliate Experiment - I'm sure it's most peoples experience, I just happened to video tape it ;)
Mr LongTail says on January 14, 2008
Chanting: Post your script, post your script, post your script. =)
Seems like a few lines of code right? I'm guessing that it dynamically grabs the keyword and enters your own keyword in the subID or is it different ?
45n5 () says on January 14, 2008:
@Mr LongTail - I will post the details tomorrow or the next day. You are the second request ;)"I'm guessing that it dynamically grabs the keyword and enters your own keyword in the subID or is it different ?"
exactly.
you link to the same landing page but a "unique" url for each one like this
domain.com?keyword=mykeyword
then it redirects with the keyword as your subid
Kris Karkoski says on January 14, 2008
Looking forward as well. Will post this on my site tomorrow along with a new post about PPC.
Kris Karkoski says on January 14, 2008
@ moneyreign - looking forward to your post as well.
Mark from Bloglyne says on January 15, 2008
Maaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrk! Howz it going man! :) This vid - great stuff and honest... If this was on one of those "super-affiliate" sites, I think the ending of the vid would have been - Yeah, and I made a gazillion dollars and now you should buy my eBook for $997 - oh wait, that is not how it really works??? *grins*
I'm up and running again at Bloglyne - come by and give me some feedback on the new articles.
Also, remember...PPC if it were easy, everybody would do it!
Kris Karkoski says on January 15, 2008
Mark - I thought of a few observations after I got a chance to watch the entire video.
1) Could you share the index page you use in the video with the keyword redirecting to the merchant
2) What URL do you use as the display URL. I am currently using my .info domain but was wondering since it just redirects to the offer should the display URL be the URL where your offer is?
housetubetv says on January 15, 2008
"Getting a domain
After I pick my campaign I choose a keyword rich domain name to redirect my traffic through to the offer. I use this keyword technique for picking my domain names."
Good domains are hard to come by ....soon, the .com will run out of domain names.
I have 350+ domains and the top 150 are making money just parking at domain parking.
Mark from Bloglyne says on January 15, 2008
@HouseTT - I do not believe that the .com domains will run out... you just have to be creative :)
Scott says on January 16, 2008
Hey, nice blog.
Found you in the comment section at cashtactics.
I used to do a lot of what you did here. But I never could get my head around the keyword tracking. Anyway I consider PPC a big crapshoot. The house (SE) always wins.
I shifted gears after reading Day Job Killer. I just bid on the product name, if they allow it. Last year when Amazon started giving an extra $15 for every cell phone(with service) sold, I promoted a lot of those and did OK. But the prices changed often and it was a pain keeping the ads updated.
Now I just have one unrelated ad running with the product name as the keyword. It makes back roughly twice what I spend in PPC on it. I idea here is that people know the product name and are just looking to buy it, or at least learn more. Look through the APPs and find good paying programs and run the product name through your keyword software of choice and see what it gives you. If it gets a good amount of searches, then give it a try.
Cheers,
Scott
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