Hello DPers...I chose a very lucrative or should i say what i thought was a worthwhile rewarding CJ program that on most sales the commssion is $100..after reading the T @ C of that particular program i saw that using adwords and just dropping your affiliate link in there was OK. so I figured i would bid to get about 80-90 clicks a day using adwords. what the heck?! i thought if 1 out of 100 converts then I'm in like flynt, NOT!! here it is 7 days later, almost 600 clicks and not 1 freaking sale any general advice? should i give it more time? what's the general rule of thumb? users see then come back? PS. No sense in telling the niche, cause alot here are doing it already and if not, not wise to create more competition..Duhhh
Yeah.. i've tried the same thing with some $50 and $75 payouts.. nothing but money down the toilet.. I've read that you have to be willing to spend a LOT to make any $$ with Adwords.. of course the landing page and the offer itself have a lot to do with it too.. If it was that easy, we'd all be rich..
600 clicks and no sale means that there is something very wrong there. The 600 clicks is on AdWords stats? Due CJ shows wrong stats for it (they count also some bot visits). I would review the keywords that you are using, check if you are using the correct landing URL (or check if CJ stats shows also at least 600 clicks), also check the advertiser that you are using if it has a good EPC, maybe the problem is the advertiser. What advertiser are you using? This no sales means no transaction or you had at least reversed sales?
What merchant was this - or at least, what type of product? If it's web hosting, that wouldnt surprise me. The market is so crowded & conversions are generally poor on generic "web hosting" targeted search campaigns.
hi, I was wondering if you could post the a bit of the TCs' that relates to this. I was wondering how they worded it. Its just so i know what im looking for, for future referance. cheers
Click the Keyword Link on the program description page - that usually contains the policy about how you can use search marketing with the affiliate program.
well first of all, you need to be bidding on "buying keywords". So many people will bid on stuff like "car" when they are trying to sell a "blue 2007 vw rabbit". See what i'm saying? Something that would benefit you would be to create a landing page and some content so that you can actually get a quality score. That way you aren't paying so much for clicks.
two thing you are surely missing 1) bidding on good keywords, you should look on also misspell or long keywords 2) your simple page, where you are saying ( click that, sign up there and thats it ) maybe you should provide also strong article regarding that products.
"almost 600 clicks and not 1 freaking sale... any general advice? should i give it more time? what's the general rule of thumb? users see then come back?" Impossible to say what happened but here are some ideas. 1) $100 commission? The higher the retail cost TYPICALLY the longer the sales cycle. So especially if it was a computer or something people can shop and compare for a long time. If that's the case and they have nice long cookies you could still make some sales. 2) Did you check for leaks? Are there big 800 phone numbers on the site or Adsense or other leaks? 3) Some merchants just have crappy conversions 4) If it's a super lucrative offer - it could be targeted by parasites 5) Really could be your keywords as others have mentioned. There are buy keywords and there are also many times word you need to be sure to exclude. 6) Does the merchant batch process sales? If so you could have made some they just have not been loaded yet. Lots of other options but those are some things to consider...
You can make money using adwords and cj. You have to look at several factors before choosing which program to promote. Linda from 5 star gave some excellent advice. You need to visit the adwords forum and read about creating quality landing pages and pre-selling. Also learn about writing good ad copy. Just pointing to the affiliates page has never worked for me. Here are two excellent threads on adwords: My Case Study in Mortgage Refinancing using Adwords and LendingTree: http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=351210 How to build a quality landing page: http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=360032 32 Useful AdWords Tips for Intermediate to Experienced Users: http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=328164 For Commission junction, the very first thing I do when screening potential merchants is look at their three month earnings and if they have 5 green bars. Look at the first one rfp.org They have a huge $952 3 month EPC, but they are only 1 green bar for network earnings. My interpretation of that is that probably one affiliate is kicking butt there, but the average affiliate is having a hard time converting it. Look at lendingtree.com They have a large $343 3 month EPC, and they have 5 gree bars for network earnings. That tells me that it converts well and many affiliates are doing well with it also. I then look at some of the things that Linda from 5 star mentioned, like "leaks". I also consider what they are selling and my personal learning curve and available syndicated and plr content I can use to build a site that would be "quality" to lower my adwords ppc cost. For example, I know very little about insurance, but do have some experience in mortgage lending. So I would pick lendingtree over insurance.com Finally, I look at the individual links. I like content links and advanced links. Advanced links are usually interactive and have drop down boxes. They are easy to integrate and make you site look more like the source than a landing page. Content links provide quality information so you don't have to look for articles or write anything up yourself. Hope that helps some of you.
FYI, 5-bar advertisers are in the top 5%. Don't ignore 4-bar advertisers either, advertisers can pay $50k+ in commissions each month and not hit 5-bar status.
One thing to also keep in mind is to consider the shopping habits/browsing habits of the average consumer. How often do you window shop? To a lot of people the paid search results on google and the regular ones mean nothing to them because it's not costing them a dime so they click it regularly and then close the browser just as casually as any other page. They only standout to webmasters because they know someone is paying specifically for their click. That can be said for almost any product, but you certainly need to assume the success rate is MUCH lower for higher priced items. Cookie duration is very important in higher priced goods, especially when you are trying to link it up with adwords. Also with all of the vouchers floating around these days people are inflating bid prices to absurd amounts, because they are only paying pennies on a dollar for them. I know what I am saying is fairly generic and I'd hope obvious to the average webmaster, but I figured I would say it anyway for the people who don't know. Personally I'm more about the long term, and building links to be on the first page of search engine results for those phrases/keywords. The only problem with that is that a lot of people who do go for the high end items like to change their niche/market every couple of weeks/months/whatever based on whatever is hot/in, and it wouldn't be nearly as worthwhile/easy to do the link building process every month. Good luck with working it out, hopefully you find a method that works for you.