The Most Active and Friendliest
Affiliate Marketing Community Online!

“Adavice”/  “RollerAds”/

Viable business model?

jims45

Member
Hope I am not offending anyone by posting such a direct question but is CPA a viable business model? I have tried promoting CPA offers with 7search and after much effort trying to optimize got 4 conversions for a spend of around $100.
Then moved to 50onRed thinking better quality traffic was the answer, tried all three platforms spending over $200 without one conversion.
I joined the dojo hoping to find a clear strategy to run a profitable campaign likely to make a few dollars, not expecting to make instant mega bucks, a positive ROI of a few dollars would have made me happy.
I read here test, split test, expect to lose money, spend hours trying different offers/advertising platforms....oh and pay for tracking or you don't get anywhere!
Frankly I am disappointed having spent so much time and money on worthless software and training schemes I really hoped I might make a few bucks signing up here.
If the potential rewards where a fabulous income I can see the value in doing all the research and testing....but for a few dollars???
Please set me straight if I am missing something and again no offence intended :confused:
 
Last edited:
This isn't an easy business man.

Most people have to spend at least $500-1,500 to learn how everything works.

That means, spending all of that without getting positive ROI, just to learn and dominate a traffic source and tracking.
And that also means you spend that money on the same traffic source and same type of offers (vertical).

Don't go and spend $100 here, $200 there and another $100 in other traffic source or you won't dominate anything. Also, if you don't have a tracker, you're fried. Get Voluum. It's free...
 
Thanks for the honest reply...unfortunately there is a lot of false info around on the net that implies making a profit is as simple as buying some garbage software or signing up for a "training course".
I am easily at the spent $1500 level right now and desperate to turn the loss making trend around. That is why I posted this thread,. I guess time to stop and think...carry on or cut my losses and call it a day!
Again...thanks for your honesty.
 
:) Yeah. I call that "make easy money" a tendency thanks to the Warrior Forum, LOL.

There are no 1 click solutions... but you can learn and it will take you a few months and some money. But it's worth it if you persist :)

What traffic sources and offers are you promoting?
 
I started out with a weight loss blog and spent a good deal of time researching and writing content but soon realised i needed to hire pro writers to gain a regular audience. I placed a few relevant ads with out success.
Next I moved on to Peerly email submits and 7 search, learned to track with prosper 202 and managed to remove some of the bad traffic. I did see some conversions but not profitable.
More reading forums etc and I think my problem is bad traffic so I move on to 50onRed and try a dating offer (single parent) using all three platforms ending with pops. Spent around $200 without a single conversion showing in Peerfly, however I was not set up correctly for tracking as I could not find a post explaining the method for 50onRed.
My latest attempt was a Peerfly offer for free digital TV that was showing a 50% CTR on Peerfly stats. I targeted free TV domains using pops and again no conversions. The landing page looked great so I did not attempt to create my own, maybe this is my error?
My best success to date was with CJ when promoting a health related offer on Bing I actually broke even.
Thanks for taking an interest and trying to help its appreciated!
 
Sounds like you're not trying enough offers yet :)

Most affiliates try 10-20 offers before finding 1-2 good ones.
Even when they're supper affiliates, they launch 10-30 offers per day to see which one sticks and can be optimized to green.

BTW, you should try offers with low pay rates and with high volume. It's tempting to launch an offer that shows 50% CR, but most of the times it just means the offer has low volume. Either a high EPC or CR is probably abnormal unless you know it's a proven one. Ask you manager for a top offer per volume (not EPC or CR) and test them.

Imagine the top offer is having like 5,000 conversions per day, with an EPC of 0.05 and a CR of 8%.

Now imagine there's another offer having 20 conversions per day, with an EPC of $0.5 and a CR of 40%.

Which would would you launch?
The second one can be tempting, but you there's less volume and you don't even know who is running it. What if the offer is being promoted with banners or contextual search that has a high conversion rate? (e.g. a website receiving 100 visits per day with a targeted keyword).

Or maybe nobody was running the offer, somebody decided to test it and got 5 conversions (from 10 visits) and it didn't work or he couldn't test more. Now the offer shows a 50% CR, but it doesn't mean it's the best for you to start.

So, ask your manager for proven offers and the top list by Volume instead and try them again.
 
That's how it is. I spent about $1.5k before I started seeing good results, even if I was experienced with the tech side and new a few things about marketing already from selling software products.

The key is to be honest with your AM and tell him that you are just starting out and you want to recommend a good converting offer for a beginner, especially when you don't have a high budget. He/she could also help you a lot recommending you angles, ideas about creatives etc for that offer.
 
Thanks for the info guys. Btw you just proved I have not completely wasted my time because all of what you posted makes sense to me!
I have arranged an optimization call from my 50onRed manager and will give things another shot.
Just one question if I may, I currently have a self hosted version of Prosper 202 as my tracking tool which was relatively easy to set up for 7search campaigns using an online guide. Sad to say I could not find a tutorial for setting up with 50onRed, you mentioned Voluum, is this easier to set up?
All in all I feel much more positive, a big thanks for putting me on the right track.:D
 
@ jims45 (I tried to tag you lol) :ninja:

Just wanted to tell you I believe in you. Sometimes you'll have good days & bad days. But don't ever give up because you failed more than succeeded. It's a learning process.

It sounds like you're on the right track. The money is made in the testing, tracking & optimizations. Just imagine the freedom & change this business could do for your life & others.

If you have questions just reach out & get your answers. No one will ever hand you a silver plate. You gotta fail and have the drive to keep going even when you're down or are not getting results desired, because you know you can do it & it's just a matter of time before you crack the game.

It is easier to quit than win. Easier to blame than do. Take action, keep moving forward.

Peace & luck with your campaigns.
 
Starting this thread was clearly the right thing to do, I had reached the point where I was thinking of calling it a day!
There is another Forum that will give you little help but send you non stop emails trying to convince you need this software or this course in order to succeed. I take it I am not the only newbie to fall into this trap:rolleyes:
I am waiting from an optimization call from my 50onRed manager and have emailed Peerfly for suitable offers. When I am good to go I will try another Dojo follow along.
Hope some of you guys can spare the time to comment on my progress.
Thanks again for taking the time to read this thread.
 
Starting this thread was clearly the right thing to do, I had reached the point where I was thinking of calling it a day!
There is another Forum that will give you little help but send you non stop emails trying to convince you need this software or this course in order to succeed. I take it I am not the only newbie to fall into this trap:rolleyes:
I am waiting from an optimization call from my 50onRed manager and have emailed Peerfly for suitable offers. When I am good to go I will try another Dojo follow along.
Hope some of you guys can spare the time to comment on my progress.
Thanks again for taking the time to read this thread.
 
Stay away from shiny objects
Stick to ONE method and don't stop until it works
Sticking to one method will teach you the fundamentals - you may NOT make money but you WILL learn valuable skills
Do something on the side to build up income to fund campaigns (Graphics, Fiverr, night shifts, coffee shop etc)
 
Affiliate marketing is a marathon. It took me years and many failures before I had the skills and experience to build a really successful website. And I'm sure that five years from now, I'll probably look back at my current projects and call myself a "noob" for it.

The beauty with affiliate marketing is that there's more than one way to earn money. When I get burnt out or feel like I'm hitting a wall, I put the project aside and try a new method. Starting over helps refuel my creativity and motivation, which helps me look at marketing with a fresh perspective and more experience. My current top two money sites began as angry side projects that I started after becoming fed up with my "main" methods. They helped me learn and understand what my mistakes were with the old methods and how to avoid them in the future.

CPA isn't going anywhere. If you're at the end of your rope, then take a break, remove yourself from the daily stress and frustrations of it for awhile, and try again with a fresh perspective. Or give one of the dozens of other affiliate marketing methods a shot to see if it's a better fit for you. You can always give CPA another shot later.

Perhaps this isn't the most popular advice, but it's what works for me.
 
I belong to a PPV group on Skype and went there last night after chatting to my 50onRed account manager. Quite by chance I met a very experienced PPV marketer that gave me a lot of valuable advice, the challenge of positive ROI seems a lot closer now;) Guess what..he said stick to one method until you have mastered it and take a break sometimes, pretty much the advice given here!
 
just to add in my personal experience and opinion here.
i started 4 yrs ago in affiliate marketing, burnt almost $xxxxx all in total until i got some luck with dating in pof n fb, making me low $xxxxx month.
and then fb stop working, i switch to mobile, done making $xxxx days in it.
now with google policy tighten, i am back to $xxx days again.
its a rough journey bro, but u gotta learn how to work with it.

as others mentioned, do not chase shiny object, do not jump around too much (of course, certain level of trying with different methods work), but try to master something before you jump around.
and the most important thing is you have to get good tracker as other mentioned as well, if this tracker allow you to change offers and lander easily, that will be great.
try to control your testing budget, do not drain your few hundreds in one shot without looking at the stats, optimise time to time based on what is converting, whats not.

hopefully both of us can excel in our path. all the best
cheers
charles
 
Thanks for your post it seems I am not alone in my experience with CPA :D
I have a campaign running right now that is showing conversions so I am on the right track! I have another project running now that I hope will make me some $$$ while I gain experience, its good to know that money can be made if you persevere;)
 
Jims45, I am just getting started with mobile, but with each interview and blog post I read about those that are the titans of affiliate marketing, they all say the same things got them there:
1 - Relentless time, effort, persistence even when it seems like it would not work.

2 - None of them became successful quickly/overnight, and the road to success took several months to a year to consistent daily profits.

It almost seems like there is an unofficial number of minimal hours/effort count we all have to put in before the affiliate gods reward us with profits. While I'm in the same boat as you, I encourage you to keep chopping wood and eventually, the river of profit will begin to flow to you.
 
MI
Back