Do I have a shot to make this work? (7)
While doing some spying around for an offer I wanted to run, I stumbled upon the campaign of the top affiliate running it on my network. I found his placements, banners, lander, the whole shabang basically.
So naturally, I decided to give it a shot myself. Like I always do, I proceeded to set it up exactly as he had it to set a benchmark for the numbers I needed to beat in order to be able to outbid this individual.
I set it up and let the traffic run -- very targeted at first, only concentrating on the top placement. I started off in position 3-4 and kept raising bids until I could see myself in the top spot.
After spending 3-4x the offer payout, I paused the campaign without seeing any conversions. I didn't expect to be uber profitable out of the gate, especially when bidding sky high just to take over the top ad placements. But I surely didn't expect for it to tank and not convert at all.
Now, one thing I had not mentioned yet was that the top affiliate happens to be running his own private offer. I know the payout he is getting is quite a bit higher, and knew I'd probably be cutting it very close until I was able to show good quality and volume to be able to get a similar bump. But it's flat out just not converting for me. I may get a rogue conversion here or there, but based off of the data I have and how I see him running it even this very minute, something does not seem right to me when my conversion rate is so much lower than it should be.
So, given that this guy has his own private version of the offer, which seems odd seeing as the landing page is identical and they could have easily just bumped the payout on the same offer I'm running, my inner conspiracy theorist started to think that maybe the reason there are 2 versions of the same offer (or more, possibly for other individual affiliates) is because the one I have access to is getting scrubbed (more) by the advertiser, as the lead quality isn't as good (in general, as everyone runs it).
Is that too much of an extreme conclusion to jump to?
I understand the obvious course of action is to split test the offer with another network, and that's what I'm planning to do next. Just waiting to get approved on another network for it to begin the split test. Although I really like the network I'm running it with now, since they have been great to me thus far. In any case, I need to do what is best for me.
So, anyone have some thoughts on this? When networks give guys their own offers, does that usually mean the other guys are screwed? Am I jumping to conclusions too soon? What would you do?
Thanks.
There can be many things.
If making money was a simple as just copying and pasting what you think others are doing, then everyone would be a gazillionaire.
Originally Posted by cmdeal
While I'm used to competing with guys that are getting much higher payouts, I had yet to go up against one who had his own offer exclusively to his or herself. That's the tidbit that's making me scratch my head, wondering what other advantages they could have aside from a heftier payout. Thought I would ask, as I'm sure many of you here have gotten to the point of having your own offers, and likely been in the same position I'm in of competing with others who had them before you.
Suppose you own your own offer and it is for a virtual good.
Then it really doesn't matter how much you pay for traffic ...as long as your traffic cost is even one penny less than the price of your item, then you will be in profit.
That is a massive cost structure advantage.
Originally Posted by cmdeal
I just wasn't expecting it to pretty much tank, when all the variables seemed to be in order. I even made some tweaks to the original lander, cutting the load speed by ~1 second and my CTR is damn near 100%. So I think I'm doing something right up to this point.
From conversing with my AM, I was told this top offer was converting north of 30%. So payout disparities aside, I'm a bit befuddled as to why I can't seem to even break 10% of that. Which is why I'm thinking that a massive cost structure advantage is not the only thing this individual has over me.
Cost structure aside it is weird if the offer is converting at 30% network wide while you're getting 1/10th of that yet your landers, banners and placements are proven based on your competitor.
Any possibility of bot traffic? Does the traffic look suspicious in any way?
Also, is it feasible that they are cloaking and you have bled through and are seeing a page/offer that isn't actually their main money maker?
Originally Posted by zeno
Also, highly doubt bot traffic is the problem. Landing page CTR is strong and the visitor information seems legit.
They don't seem to be cloaking it either (at least I'm not seeing their uncloaked pages, if they are), as I've checked from multiple locations and some spy tools also confirm my findings. The deal seems to be on the side of the network/advertiser. I've also gone ahead and reached out to the advertiser directly to see if I can get some information from them.
Might turn this into a follow-along depending on the results.
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