Clicks but no Conversions

[cliffordbrown01]

For the last 25 days or so, I bought a few banner placements on BuySellAds. I put up offers from one Aff. Network and here's what I got.

Clicks ~ 500
Conversions - 3

These were on several different sites with hugely varying CTRs,

This was blowing my mind, I couldn't believe my conversions were so low. I also promoted a clickbank product.

Hops - 90
Order Form Impressions - 1

Because my clickbank order form impressions were so low I figured that maybe I wasn't being shaved by the Aff Network. I'm switching all of my ads to some different networks to see what happens. I'm kind of hoping now that my first network WAS shaving my earnings, because there's an easy remedy to that problem.

I'm brand new - any and all advice is greatly appreciated.

Richard

 

[java]

I found that i was getting shaved when i was using p202,
ever since bevo came out with fingerprint tracking, It really helped me see where i was getting shaved.

But you will need to be able put JS code onto the thank you page/conversion page.
you may need to contact your AM to get them to insert it for ya, or contact the owner of the offer.

 

[david15923]

How much did you pay for the ad placements and how much did you earn (conversions and CB product)?

 

[Randize]

Hey guys, how do you find out that your earnings are being shaved?

 

[cliffordbrown01]

I paid about $200, which I thought wasn't to bad for 500 clicks. I made about $4 from the three conversions. The clickbank product didn't sell at all. I still have some time left to get more clicks under the current payment, so I'm just desperately trying to find something that converts.

 

[Randize]

Could it be that the traffic you are sending doesn't match your offers?

 

[david15923]

The offer isn't converting well, but that isn't the problem. Problem is that with an offer that pays 1.30$, for you to get profitable you would have to get 155 conversions. To get that many conversions in 500 clicks it would mean that your offer would have to have a +30% conversion rate. CR's usually vary between 5% to 15%, it's very rare to go above that, probably only with a fully optimized campaign and very good traffic.

Next time try to look at your offer payout and at the cost of advertising. If that offer paid 10$ it wouldn't be bad because you would only need a 5% CR to be profitable. Take a look at K's case study, you will see that he is paying ~$14.50 a week for almost 100 clicks daily, so he got 700 clicks for 15$, you got 500 for 200$.

Doesn't matter, at least you learned your lesson, the advertiser took advantage of you for sure, no one would be selling clicks at 0.40$ in (what seems) a not so competetive niche.

 

[cliffordbrown01]

David -

Thanks for response.

I bought several different spots on different websites and was experimenting on how to get clicks and conversions. I got clicks but not conversions, obviously.

Can you give me more info on how to get clicks for a better price? What resources are out there besides juiceads?

Thanks for taking the time out to help a newbie.

Richard

 

[david15923]

You do small direct media buys (read this) but, if you have at least 500$ I think you would be better off using adscout. A lot of people recommend it and it's better because you can controll your ad spend, target countrys, etc. so it is up to you. Also, I'm no expert, so take everything I say with a grain of salt because I'm a newbie myself, I've read a lot of info on forums and websites but taken little action due to lack of budget. I've 200$, next month I'll make it bigger and bigger until I can have at least 500$ I think.

Good luck

 

[adforbest]

Hey guys, how do you find out that your earnings are being shaved?

Try place 3rd party tracking code on the offer you promot, (if ur aff network support 3rd party tracking), then u could check any different between ur report and aff network report.

 

[cliffordbrown01]

What services can I use for 3rd party tracking?

 

[Randize]

The best free tracking tool that I know are Bevo and Prosper202.

I'm still learning prosper, but heard that Bevo is much better.

 

[cliffordbrown01]

UPDATE -

I followed some of the tips from K's case study as mentioned above - I'm starting to see better results.

I think my biggest problem was that I cast way to wide of a net - I was promoting multiple offers on multiple websites. I think I need to do one at a time so that I can track everything and make improvements, and get that one offer off the ground before moving on. I thought the idea was to cast a wide net and see where the action was but it looks like that was the wrong approach.

It's ok, sometimes I make (expensive) mistakes. Thanks everyone in the thread. I'll give another update in a few days to let you know how it's going.

 

[Randize]

UPDATE -

I followed some of the tips from K's case study as mentioned above - I'm starting to see better results.

I think my biggest problem was that I cast way to wide of a net - I was promoting multiple offers on multiple websites. I think I need to do one at a time so that I can track everything and make improvements, and get that one offer off the ground before moving on. I thought the idea was to cast a wide net and see where the action was but it looks like that was the wrong approach.

It's ok, sometimes I make (expensive) mistakes. Thanks everyone in the thread. I'll give another update in a few days to let you know how it's going.

Glad to hear that man.

 

[Vitico]

Good to hear that man. Keep it up and you will start stacking that cash soon enough.

 

[K]

UPDATE -

I followed some of the tips from K's case study as mentioned above - I'm starting to see better results.

I think my biggest problem was that I cast way to wide of a net - I was promoting multiple offers on multiple websites. I think I need to do one at a time so that I can track everything and make improvements, and get that one offer off the ground before moving on. I thought the idea was to cast a wide net and see where the action was but it looks like that was the wrong approach.

It's ok, sometimes I make (expensive) mistakes. Thanks everyone in the thread. I'll give another update in a few days to let you know how it's going.

Well done man, any more stats?

 

[cliffordbrown01]

So here's an update. I'm not sure whether to post it here or to edit my original post.

I bought a bunch of banner spots on juicyads, was getting tons of clicks, but realized that a ton of my clicks were coming from places outside of the US and were being directed to different offers. Another mistake, another lesson learned.

Now I purchased one banner on one site. Here are the stats.

Price - 13.96 / week
Average - 13 clicks/day
Conversions - 0

Because I did my research, almost all of my clicks are coming from the US. Two or three are from without.

I still don't know how to get that conversion, though. I really have to learn how to make that happen.

This week I'm going to experiment with different banners to test the CTR. I'm just going to focus on that for now and see what happens. I probably won't make any money this week.

Next week, after I've tested some different banners, I'm going to focus on conversions, probably experimenting with landing pages.

I don't feel that I could really make a landing page that is any better than the one provided by the offer, but I'll have to think of what to do. Anyone know of good resources to study landing pages and increasing conversions?

Thanks
Richard

 

[Randize]

It could also probably mean that the creative doesn't connect the dot to the offer well enough. One thing that I have learn about dot connecting is the expectation that you have set for your creatives/landers, that's the "dot".

I'm still working to improve this myself so do correct me if I'm wrong, but let me give an example of how a bad "dot" fails to connect to the offer. e.g. When the creative says 'hey you can get free ipads here', interested people thought like 'oh, cool free ipads, I'ma grab that'. The click thru happens but as soon as they arrived, 'oh, I COULD win an ipad here, thought I can get one for free' And so the conversion didn't happen. They have a higher expectation to that offer, because of how we position the creative. Of course not everyone thinks like this, but my main point is, I believe majorly will be affected by what our creatives are telling them, be it subliminal or direct copy communication.

Landers have the basic of this principle, there are a few types of landing page, reviews, quiz, editorial, blog... each of this have different purposes. Either to make them taking micro commitments or increasing the credibility, it all depends on what we think about our creative or the offer is lacking of.