First campaign in over 4 years (9)
Hi all,
Thanks for taking an interest in my follow along. I started in AM in 2010 but quit when I ran out of money in 2011. I didn't have much guidance (or persistence, or work ethic) back then so it was like shooting in the dark...blind folded...in a desert..on Mars (although the entire planet is a desert, but I digress).
Since joining STM a week ago I've spent hours poring over STM articles starting with
- What works in 2015
- What's the best overall strategy to succeed in Affiliate Marketing
- What software hardware and memberships I need
- Attila's ultimate spying guide
- When to stop campaigns
- The Mobile cookbook
And countless offshoots from the articles above. A big thank you to the authors for their excellent posts.
Actions taken:
I signed up with 3 networks, got a approved by 1, never heard back from Clickdealer or Neverblue
Signed up for two mobile traffic sources and funded one; Avazu and Decisive
Dusted off my old Prosper platform v1.32 last touched in 2011...
Chose one offer and followed the Mobile Cookbook Appetizer - http://stmforum.com/forum/forumdispl...obile-Cookbook
Created 21 angles using Caurmen's awesome guide - http://stmforum.com/forum/showthread...-Under-An-Hour
Created 2 banners for 2 campaigns, one targeting iOS other targeting Android using images I Googled and MS Paint.
Setup tracking with Prosper, the affiliate network and the mobile dsp - leaving me a bit confused but I just launched it anyways.
Launched 2 Campaigns this morning
Annnd...a few hours later here's the Results:
- Spent $30 in adspend, earned $4.24 in commissions. Lost some money as expected but gained some confidence and some data. Still get that high when you see your first conversion - woohoo!
- The Affiliate Network recorded 4 conversions with 905 unique clicks
- Avazu, the mobile DSP recorded 1544 clicks from 2 campaigns (322 for iOS, 1222 for Android), 0 conversions
- Prosper recorded 1095 clicks, 0 conversions
WTF...so my tracking is effed up big time.
How I setup tracking:
1. Got the Offer URL -
The network running the offer is on DirectTrack. The offer URL looks something like this:
http://sometrkdb.com/nt/x2244354a4t233t224r2s294/
2. Create Campaign in Prosper -
I took this URL and created a campaign in Prosper - Setup -> Aff Campaigns. Under Affiliate Url field I appended the subid1=Campaign1&c2= (c2 is where the subid assigned by Prosper should go)
http://sometrkdb.com/nt/x2244354a4t2...=Campaign1&c2=
3. Get Prosper Campaign link and put it into Avazu -
In Avazu i created a campaign and put in the following into Campaign URL
http://mytrackingdomain.com/tracking202/redirect/dl.php?t202id=62234&t202&c1={campaign_name}&c2={su bid}
4. Put the Postback URL in the Offer:
To record my conversions I put my prosper postback URL in the offer
https://mytrackingdomain.com/trackin...RANSACTION_ID%
Next Steps
My next step is to install STM modded version of Prosper for mobile so I'm not using an antiquated system not designed to track mobile campaigns.
Right now, after this experiment all I know is I had 4 conversions, and I have a conversion rate. But because of problems in my tracking I do not know:
1. Which campaign of the two had the conversions
2. What is the subid of the conversions
3. Why the clicks are so different among Prosper, Avazu and the Network
If anyone sees anything wrong with my tracking or have any tips or pointers in general it'd be much appreciated.
Thank you in advance.
So I've spent the past 3 days researching and setting up a tracking platform. I started with STM Tracker since I have a VPS already and I'm trying to minimize cost. I followed the detailed STM Tracker installation plan by Caurmen. It was originally posted back in 2013 so a few things have changed; namely
1. The required Maxmind GeoIP database is now $100 for the install and $25/month for updates.
2. The Maxmind database format has changed from .DAT to .mmdb. The STM Tracker still works with the new database format, however you have to convert it to its legacy format as noted by Caurmen later in the installation thread.
3. You can download the free GeoIP2 lite databases for country and city, however the Maxmind "organization' database - now called the "ISP" database is not free ($100) and I think you need this for STM Tracker.
Long story short - after taking the cost of Maxmind dbs into consideration I started looking at Thrive and
1. It has a 30 day free trial. Not sure if
2. I want to host my own data first since I already have a VPS.
3. Thrive seems to have great support and Tom Fang, the founder, did a good job making a case for Thrive on some threads.
If you're a new affiliate, just make a choice and move along. Now, I'll be focusing on running offers again, this time with proper tracking.
nice to see you're taking massive action! Your post inspired myself to start a follow along as well.
Dooo it 
If anything, it serves as a log of what you've done to keep yourself accountable. And if you're stuck, some nice people here at STM may help you. Keep moving
Took me a while to post this because I've been caught up on a number of things while absorbing the massive amount of info on STM. Anyways, here's the results of my first campaign launch:
Whatsapp Wallpapers in Chile
I chose this offer b/c it was on the top offer list and the payout was low at around $1.06
- Created 8 campaigns using mini banners. The campaigns are created using a combination of 2 angles and separating them into WIFI/Mobile + APP/SITE combinations
- Angle 1: New Whatsapp Wallpapers, Install Now! (admittedly not very creative)
- Angle 2: Limited time offer - download Whatsapp wallpapers now!
8/12 Launched 4 campaigns with Angle 1 (A1)
A1 WIFI+APP - Spend: $10.51 Revenue: $3.18 ROI -69.7%, Imp 97390, CTR 0.57%, CR: 0.0031%
A1 WIFI+SITE - Spend: $0.23 Revenue: $0 ROI: -100%, Imp 2516 CTR 0.24%, CR 0%
A1 MOB+APP - Spend: $10.73 Revenue: $2.12 ROI -80.2%, Imp: 94541, CTR. 0.60% CR: 0.0022%
A1 MOB+SITE - Spend: $0.20 Revenue: $0 ROI: -100% Imp 2235 CTR 0.31% CR 0%
Each campaign had a daily budget of $10. I ran the campaigns for a few hours and paused them all once the budget was up for 2 of them. As you can see, the numbers looked dismal. What I learned here is
1) apps get way more impressions than sites for this traffic source and
2) CTR on apps is almost double that on sites. Although one may argue that there is limited data for the two campaigns on SITES given the small number of impressions and clicks to conclude the expected CTR over the long run.
8/13 Launched 2 additional campaigns using angle 2 in addition to the 4 from yesterday
A1 WIFI+APP - Spend: $10.89 Revenue: $2.12 ROI -80.1%, Imp 102256, CTR 0.48%, CR: 0.0020%
A1 WIFI+SITE - Spend: $1.22 Revenue: $0 ROI: -100%, Imp 13178 CTR 0.21%, CR 0%
A1 MOB+APP - Spend: $10.74 Revenue: $2.12 ROI -80.2%, Imp: 99011, CTR. 0.50% CR: 0.0020%
A1 MOB+SITE - Spend: $0.95 Revenue: $0 ROI: -100% Imp 10414 CTR 0.17% CR 0%
A2 WIFI+APP - Spend: $10.89 Revenue: $2.12 ROI -80.1%, Imp 102256, CTR 0.64%, CR: 0.0020%
A2 MOB+APP - Spend: $10.05 Revenue: $2.12 ROI -78.9%, Imp: 117063, CTR. 0.63% CR: 0.0017%
So the numbers still suck. At this point I think I have enough data to reach statistical significance. I didn't prune any underperforming sites during 3 to 4 hours the campaign was running so I've decided to run the numbers from the best performing placement from all the campaigns to see if even that could survive the scrutiny.
Conclusions for placement on TubeMate -From the data in the table above, the Min Viable CR (.0092%) is very close to the max expected CR (0.01%) for the placement on Tubemate. I'll need to get over 4x the current CR to reach the Min Viable CR and also the Min Viable CTR (1.32%) is double my current CTR (0.65%)
Conclusions for placement on Dream League Soccer - the Bin Max CR is higher than the Min Viable CR. However the CTR needs to be improved 16x to reach the Min Viable CTR.
At this point, I believe the data is telling me to go pursue other more fruitful endeavours. If I were to stick with this, I could try to
1. Change the angle and optimize the banners to get higher CTR and
2. Run longer hoping to hit some magical conversion hour
I think the ROI on the current offer/traffic source/angle combination is not going to be worth it. However it was a great learning experience for my first campaign and putting some things into practice.
Your experience and logical thinking really shows in the way you've analyzed and laid out all the data and your observations. You have my respect for sure!
The only thing I would suggest is for you to spend more time on the brainstorming and research phase because that can make or break your campaign. Your campaign strategy and stats analysis are solid. It's just that your angles - as you've pointed out yourself - are not that great. And 2 banners x 2 angles = 4 banners is hardly a fair test. If you were able to do -80%ROI with these angles imagine what you COULD be doing with better angles and further campaign optimizations (cutting placements, devices, carriers, etc. etc.).
Also, if you do more research to understand the WHO and WHY people would want to download what you're promoting, it will help a ton in guiding your angle creation. I have zero experience with whatsapp wallpaper offers - but if I wanted to give it a try I would start by reading the user reviews here for example:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...allpaper&hl=en
Reviewer comment #1:
"Too masculine I don't like that the designers only made masculine wallpaper options... I hope they update it with a female in mind."
Potential headlines:
"Feminine Whatsapp wallpapers for girls! Download Now!"
"Masculine Whatsapp wallpaper for guys! Download Now!"
Reviewer comment #2:
"Its cool I liked it. But prefer more cool wallpapers! Add more please."
Potential headline:
"Tons of cool Whatsapp wallpapers available! Download Now!"
Reviewer comment #3:
"Bored I am using this for quiet some time.. And I am really bored using the same wallpapers. Could some more nice wallpapers be added would be good."
Potential headline:
"Old Whatsapp wallpapers boring you? Download New Ones Now!"
Reviewer comment #4:
"Great but could be better As higher resolution phones is more common today it feels weird that none of the wallpapers are very high resolution."
Potential headline:
"High-resolution Whatsapp wallpapers - Download Them Now!"
My headlines aren't very well-written but you get the idea.
Alternatively of course, as you've pointed out, you can seek greener pastures by testing other offers.
Either way - I love your writing style and your analytical approach - will be watching this space for further progress. Have fun and best of luck!
Amy
Thank you Vortex for the invaluable feedback. I see the difference clearly between the approach of a seasoned marketer and the approach of a newbie in your response. It's true that (my) weakness in this campaign came out in the research and creative end and I will work on that. We are in marketing after all
How many angles or banners would you suggest to start testing with at the same time? For example would it be 8 banners for the same angle, 4 banners for 2 angles, or 1 banner per angle for 8 angles?
You're too humble! I'm not much more experienced than you, if at all. Really.
I like to test at least 2-3 banners per angle, and at least 5 angles. When brainstorming I like to come up with lots of angles, then choose 5-10 I think stand the best chance and make 2-3 banners for each. This way I'd be giving the offer my reasonably best shot, so that if it doesn't convert, I can move on from the offer instead of wondering "hmm...what if I had come up with better angles?"
Amy
Thanks for the tip.
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