Competitive Intelligence Tools:What's The Use

[Deborah Bamidele]

Since there are tools like
Whatrunswhere
Boxofads
Adbeat
Adultspy
and others...
I wonder why affiliates still test and test. Seriously, I'm confused. According to what I've read about these tools, you get to see the campaigns that are already profiting for other affiliates. You get to see the offers that are converting, the LPs ,banners, and even the traffic source.
So can't I just pull some of these informations, tweak them a bit to make it better and then run in the same traffic sources or similar ones, without having to test and test.
Or I'm I missing something?

 

[T J Tutor]

If only it was that simple. Yes, if you were able to just copy 100% of someones campaign you should in theory get the same results. Not always the case. As you said, change a few things, make it your own, etc. Anytime you make changes to something that works, it won't provide the same results. One can simply change the color of the "Call To Action" box and get dissimilar results. Change a photo, change a font, change whether it has a lead capture or not, etc. All of these can make ot break a result.

What spying does is give you the data to create your own campaigns based on what works, but, you then have to test many variations of your new elements to see which ones provide success and failure. Any alterations, additions, or detractors will change the results of a campaign.

Spying has become essential for many, maybe even most. But it isn't going to eliminate the need to test your own campaigns. Maybe the guy you decide to copy has a private deal with the advertisers for premium, or preferred, placement of his banners or text ads in return for a 90 or 120 day commitment of $10k a day in ads. If you can't compete with that, then you most certainly may not achieve the same results. This is just one of hundreds of features in a campaign that spying won't tell you.

Spy for inspiration and data. Don't spy to simply try to replicate and copy someones elses campaign.

T J

 

[Deborah Bamidele]

Wow! That was really comprehensive. Thanks for taking the time to write all that.
One more thing, If I decide to start promoting incentive offers by offering some freebies, do I still need tracking devices, self hosted servers, and intelligence tools?
As a beginner, getting all those things set up can be really expensive.
Can I just start small if I'm promoting incentive offers?

 

[Deborah Bamidele]

@tjtutor, what do you mean by "Maybe the guy you decide to copy has a private deal with the advertisers for premium, or preferred, placement of his banners or text ads in return for a 90 or 120 day commitment of $10k a day in ads".

 

[T J Tutor]

Wow! That was really comprehensive. Thanks for taking the time to write all that.
One more thing, If I decide to start promoting incentive offers by offering some freebies, do I still need tracking devices, self hosted servers, and intelligence tools?
As a beginner, getting all those things set up can be really expensive.
Can I just start small if I'm promoting incentive offers?

I should have added this in the original post.
You DO need to learn tracking from the beginning. It is very important that you get into tracking from the beginning because there is a great deal to learn about trackers. you don't want to wait to learn tracking. This industry is all about data sets. Collecting and understanding data in various situations is what we all spend a great deal of time on because it is the shortest, quickest, means by which to design and launch winning campaigns, refine losing campaigns into winners, and to develop your intuitions that will drive your predictability assets to create great campaigns.

Get a VPS! It is a small investment, and any business requires at least a modest investment. You will need it to serve up your LP's and WP Sites fast. Speed is essential and when you have 1000's of people hit your pages at the same time, you don't want them to wait 3 or 4 seconds for a page to load. I'll re-phrase,THEY WON'T WAIT! This isn't 1998 when you could sell a million ebooks on "How TO Train Your Bird", or "How To Play Guitar" (Thank You Frank and Eben) in a week. We are in an instance of marketing online that now requires investment (albeit miniscule compared to any other businesses). This industry got busy in the late 1990's and has matured considerably since then. In case you haven't noticed, the networks are screening pretty heavily these days because so many people were joining that had bought the bullshit training ebooks about "How To Make A Million Without Spending A Dime". The networks want to know that you are capable and honest. In addition, you will want to learn at least the basics of managing your server through both your CPanel and your WHM in order to tweak everything for best performance.

As for the intelligence tools, one must remember that a tracker is one of those tools. As for a spying tools, I DO NOT recommend that any Newbie plunk down that kinda cash to spy on competition until they have cash flow that will allow for it. Then, and only then, should you begin utilizing them.

@tjtutor, what do you mean by "Maybe the guy you decide to copy has a private deal with the advertisers for premium, or preferred, placement of his banners or text ads in return for a 90 or 120 day commitment of $10k a day in ads".

So, there is a great deal about this industry that isn't seen by many. You see, when you get volume up to the top of the heap with networks, several things can happen. For example, your networks can broker private deals on your behalf with the advertisers for better and more frequent payouts as well as the removal of caps. Also, you can sometimes go direct to the advertiser to assemble the same or similar deal to cut out the network, but you have to be big in the vertical and have a very clean history of performance. As well, you could then do the same with your traffic sources for premium placement or preferred placement for your ads over others. You can also start brokering with site owners for ad placement and with enough of a financial commitment you can get preferred times and positions for your ads on those sites.

There is more, but you don't need to learn about these things immediately. You need to learn the basics and find your initial success first. This initial foundation is absolutely necessary and if you don't do it, if you think you can outsmart everyone along the way in order to find success, it will never come. NEVER!

Be good to yourself, learn the basics so they are a second nature intelligence for you. Then you can broaden yourself regularly as long as you never lose sight of the fact that you are always learning, you always are accepting your failures as learning moments while collecting data, you are running a business and you treat it as such, and you establish strong bonds with others in the industry.

T J

 

[Deborah Bamidele]

I should have added this in the original post.
You DO need to learn tracking from the beginning. It is very important that you get into tracking from the beginning because there is a great deal to learn about trackers. you don't want to wait to learn tracking. This industry is all about data sets. Collecting and understanding data in various situations is what we all spend a great deal of time on because it is the shortest, quickest, means by which to design and launch winning campaigns, refine losing campaigns into winners, and to develop your intuitions that will drive your predictability assets to create great campaigns.

Get a VPS! It is a small investment, and any business requires at least a modest investment. You will need it to serve up your LP's and WP Sites fast. Speed is essential and when you have 1000's of people hit your pages at the same time, you don't want them to wait 3 or 4 seconds for a page to load. I'll re-phrase,THEY WON'T WAIT! This isn't 1998 when you could sell a million ebooks on "How TO Train Your Bird", or "How To Play Guitar" (Thank You Frank and Eben) in a week. We are in an instance of marketing online that now requires investment (albeit miniscule compared to any other businesses). This industry got busy in the late 1990's and has matured considerably since then. In case you haven't noticed, the networks are screening pretty heavily these days because so many people were joining that had bought the bullshit training ebooks about "How To Make A Million Without Spending A Dime". The networks want to know that you are capable and honest. In addition, you will want to learn at least the basics of managing your server through both your CPanel and your WHM in order to tweak everything for best performance.

As for the intelligence tools, one must remember that a tracker is one of those tools. As for a spying tools, I DO NOT recommend that any Newbie plunk down that kinda cash to spy on competition until they have cash flow that will allow for it. Then, and only then, should you begin utilizing them.



So, there is a great deal about this industry that isn't seen by many. You see, when you get volume up to the top of the heap with networks, several things can happen. For example, your networks can broker private deals on your behalf with the advertisers for better and more frequent payouts as well as the removal of caps. Also, you can sometimes go direct to the advertiser to assemble the same or similar deal to cut out the network, but you have to be big in the vertical and have a very clean history of performance. As well, you could then do the same with your traffic sources for premium placement or preferred placement for your ads over others. You can also start brokering with site owners for ad placement and with enough of a financial commitment you can get preferred times and positions for your ads on those sites.

There is more, but you don't need to learn about these things immediately. You need to learn the basics and find your initial success first. This initial foundation is absolutely necessary and if you don't do it, if you think you can outsmart everyone along the way in order to find success, it will never come. NEVER!

Be good to yourself, learn the basics so they are a second nature intelligence for you. Then you can broaden yourself regularly as long as you never lose sight of the fact that you are always learning, you always are accepting your failures as learning moments while collecting data, you are running a business and you treat it as such, and you establish strong bonds with others in the industry.

T J

Thanks for the detailed response. I'm sincerely grateful for the time you take in writing all these. From all that you've said, it's so obvious I'm not financially ready for paid advertising. My budget is not large enough and taking a short cut isn't the best.
Now I went through the newbie's guide again and realised that I can start by driving free traffic. Since I'm low on buddget, I think I shld embrace that.
Here's another question:
What do you think of tools like money robot submittr, GSA, and Senuke xcr?
Have you ever used any of these tools to automate seo processes?
Will these tools harm my site.
What other tools do you recommend to drive free traffic?

 

[T J Tutor]

Thanks for the detailed response. I'm sincerely grateful for the time you take in writing all these. From all that you've said, it's so obvious I'm not financially ready for paid advertising. My budget is not large enough and taking a short cut isn't the best.
Now I went through the newbie's guide again and realised that I can start by driving free traffic. Since I'm low on buddget, I think I shld embrace that.
Here's another question:
What do you think of tools like money robot submittr, GSA, and Senuke xcr?
Have you ever used any of these tools to automate seo processes?
Will these tools harm my site.
What other tools do you recommend to drive free traffic?

As for free traffic, I am not an expert at this as it requires far more time than I am willing to spend to make it work. That doesn't mean I don't do back linking and such, but the only places free traffic for CPA works is on established web sites that rank high in the SERPS.

These tools you mention are not for Newbies, they will likely get you banned on Google as a Newbie. They are expensive as well. You say you can't afford to buy traffic, yet you are considering spending a bunch of money for tools you aren't ready for and really don't need. Take that money, go to 7Search, and start to learn about paid traffic (IMO).

In my opinion, based on the questions you have, you need to get down to basics and learn the ropes of the industry before jumping into the use of tools that are expensive, can be difficult to use, and some will put your sites at risk.

I appreciate your enthusiasm and willingness to adopt advanced tools and techniques, but you don't have the rudiments down yet. You seem to want to drive a formula one race car without having ever driven a street car.

You are asking loads of great questions, but in the end, for CPA you need to learn about landing pages and WordPress, tracking and trackers, VPS management, traffic sources, copy, niches, and such. For content and continuity sites, there is all of that and a great deal more.

There is only one way that will give you a strong foundation in this industry, and that is not running around trying a bunch of blackhat stuff that can cause disastrous results for you. You need to learn one traffic source, one vertical, one tracker, get a VPS and learn to manage your CPanel and WHM, learn copy writing for CPA offers and affiliate offers, etc. Once you have mastered these few elements, you will be well armed to push deeper into the industry and advanced tool sets.

I know, and understand, the rush to make it all happen fast, it's largely due to all of these "Guru's" running campaigns about how you can eliminate all of this learning by just investing in their course, or their product. Doesn't happen, NEVER! We've all been there, all of us, everyone of us. It doesn't happen that way. If you really want to make a go of this business, then you must get into learning mode before you get into earning mode. That means learning to master a single traffic source, a single tracker, a single vertical. It only takes a few months to get this done and you will earn along the way. Short cuts in learning generally don't produce good results. Taking the time to master something with sustained repetition produces long term and permanent skill sets.

Please go and read through this thread in the Newbies Forum.
As a Newbie, What Stops You From Getting Started

This thread is full of the initial stumbling blocks and initial misguided Newbie thoughts. Give it a good read. I have responded to all of them with guidance and direction. We are all here to contribute, but you need to establish a starting point for your new business. The requirements of which you will find easier to understand and put into action after you have read this thread.

T J

 

[Deborah Bamidele]

@tjtutor, Thanks. I will do that and come back if I have more questions.