So – are you ADDICTED to your stats? (22)
Sometimes, the sheer dopamine rush of checking your stats can be a bit overwhelming – and even distracting.
You know? When you've got that JUICY campaign going and traffic is streamrolling... let's just put it this way; I'm glad I wasn't born a F5 button (or CMD+R, whatever applies to you)
Personally I must admit it can steal too much of my focus at times... instead of leaping forward you're kind of stuck in this "must keep an eye on everything that's going on right now"-mentality. Checking CVR, CTR, spend, etc etc.. and when it's all in the green, you become this kind of mesmerized; just refreshing - waiting for more.
Are you addicted to checking your stats? How often do you do it?
Share your tips&tricks for becoming more systematic in this matter with us!
I am pretty sure almost everyone on this forum has gone through this phase at one time or another.
The are much much worse things in the world to be addicted to than monitoring the metrics of your business.
It is only when it starts seriously interfering with much more important things in life than money (e.g. your family, your relationships with your loved ones, your health, personal growth/progress) that it should be a concern.
Otherwise it is mostly harmless in my view.
At first I wouldn't say that checking stats like this is a bad thing.
Especially when you're just starting out, you just want to know what the ROI is.
And good stats even increase my work ethic so now and then...
But what you can do (I know this can be done in CPVlab) is set-up alarms when stuff hits a set minimum or whatever.
There are times that I'm out of the office and can't touch the F5/refresh button.
And that's fine. Looking at stats per minute or per hour is useless because traffic varies a lot.
At 3PM you may think you need to change something, while at 5PM that 3pm loser has become a winner.
So with those alarms set, you should be fine.
Since a lot of the affiliate networks use Cake as their platform now I installed the Cake APP on my iPhone.
But thanks to the "remember password feature" within the app that you can accidentally disable I'm no longer able to check those stats on my phone.
And it's a relief! Damn, even when I'm with friends or family or do a workout etc. I had the habit to quickly check the stats.
And if they suck I feeled really bad. But when you come home 1 hour later to see the stats have magically fixed them self by a good portion of received traffic you really think if it's all worth it.
It's the same with WhatsApp and carrying your phone with you all the time.
I wish I could just throw my phone away for a few days and start "living" again like it's meant to be.
How great would it be if you talk to someone who actually has to say something you don't know instead of thinking "get lost" I already read that on FB 
(sorry for the off-topic adds)
Yes, and mobile phones make it worse as you can check them anytime anywhere.
My partners and me have RSS feeds in our phones for our whole ad network stats, and splits by each account manager, affiliate, advertiser and country, with today stats, yesterday stats and 7 days ago stats.
That way we can notice any drop in traffic, conversion ratios, etc ad take actions fast.
The bad thing is that every time I have to wait somewhere even for 1 minute, like at the elevator, or in traffic jams, or between series at the Gym, etc I take my phone and start to look at those stats.
Wife has been with me since I was a webmaster/affiliate myself 15 years ago, so she is used to me checking stats all the time, but of course still complains every day
I do it and I hate the fact that I do it so much. I feel like it happens more when you hit the next plateau of earning. For example, if I am at $200/day for the past month then I wont really check it. As soon as i hit $300/day, I'm excited again and checking it every second. Its a retarded habit and small dopamine hits like this throughout the day have been proven to kill creativity.
It used to be like a drug when I was starting out.
After some time unless I was doing something really new I didn't care checking the stats more than once or twice daily.
When the excitement wears out they are just some numbers on a computer screen.
Everytime I check stats and there are not new conversions I do 10 push-ups right away
I'm becoming more fit and also I check stats less often than before
I'm addicted to checking for conversions. So I've automated it and have some software running in the background which checks for conversions at a specific time interval and plays audio of cash falling on the floor when it has registered conversions in that time span.
It often sounds like a Niagara of small change. Other times it sounds like waves of cash washing up against the shore. I find it very comforting but it certainly annoys others when I turn up the volume.
its like christmas every morning
It used to be a lot more like that in the beginning, I couldn't even sleep I was so eager, but over time its dulled down to checking every few hours. Emotional detachment from the campaigns helped me push it even further, have to give time for the data to roll in haha
I try very hard not to check stats too often - whilst it's addictive, it's also not good for the stress / cortisol levels, and can very easily lead to you making decisions too soon.
Having said that, "try very hard to" and "succeed in" are not the same thing.
In the beginning it was huge, I remember right in the beginning. 20 seconds after sex, I said to the girl 'Hmm let me see if I made money during that' I checked my stats and I had!
Now on campaigns I've been running for over a year, there is days when I just dont even check the stats, as its on its own tracking system. But I check stats on my new campaigns/offers constantly and get excited at a $5 profit on new things, but have way more profit that doesn't get me excited one bit anymore.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuXeOs4oOBw
lol wtf i have something like that. I have to watch this movie (i might be living under a rock).
Originally Posted by h0mp
Some guys on here are probably still owed some money
We named F5Media (F5) for a reason
it's common practice to refresh those stats ALLLL day long
It's funny how everything changes but nothing changes. Before the internet or even fax machines, the highlight of the day was running to the mailbox to see how many checks, credit card orders, and money orders were in the mail. Then, when fax was popular, every time the fax machine went off, we'd run to the machine to see if it was an order. It was especially fun to check the fax machine in the morning to see how many orders came in overnight. While I do enjoy refreshing stats (limit myself to twice a day), nothing beats the thrill of getting checks and money orders in the mail, and I still get them. Of course opening the envelopes and processing the orders is a giant pain, and if you hire someone they are prone to stealing the cash and money orders (yes, people still send cash in the mail), but man, the thrill never gets old.
Here's a photo of me, circa 2006, with a "good day at the mailbox"
http://www.womenapproachyou.com/images/Johnchecks1.JPG
Here's the interesting thing for you guys who are product owners: if you have a printable order form option for those who like to mail in checks and money orders, you will get them sent to you on a regular basis. Three days ago, September 18, 2014, I went to my mailbox and found two mailed in orders, for a total of $831 in....money orders. Yes, money orders still do exist in 2014. I love money orders because they go right in the bank with no processing fees.
Here's my printable order form,if you guys want to check it out: http://www.johnalanis.com/ultimate_orderprint.htm
And yep, someone actually took the time to print it out, hand write in all their order information, fold it, put it an envelope, go down to the bank, stand in line to get a money order, put it in the envelope, put a stamp on the envelope, lick it, seal it, and drop in in the mailbox. Some people simply do not like credit cards and prefer to pay with checks, so if you're the product owner, adding a printable order form for the customer to mail in with checks and money orders will earn you additional revenue.
Even more shockingly, I actually get orders sometimes for my DIGITAL download products. Yep, we cash the check, email them the link, and they're happy. One of my best customers who's spent $8,000 with me over the years has never paid with a credit card, only with a mailed in check--he hates credit cards, and I love his checks. So, add a printable order form, and you'll be surprised at what shows up in your mailbox.
Originally Posted by panicore
Some guys on here are probably still owed some money
Originally Posted by johna5150
I started becoming obsessed when the revenue started coming in.
@stackman
About 60% back then, a nice combination of magazine ads and direct mail. I want to get back to that next year since direct mail sold customers are the best...expensive to get, but the best. I'll probably have to drive them to a phone room, offering a free cd plus shipping, with a true closer on the other end to upgrade them to a high dollar product ($300 to $700) to overcome initial cost of customer acquisition. But those guys buy forever once you get them, because you can target recent, direct mail sold buyers and they know what to do when they get an offer from you....
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