STM Community -
I for one am one of the newest on the forum, and I know there many others out there that I've both spoke to and seen around. The amount of information on this forum pays for the one month membership in less than a full thread read.
That being said - there is SO much information on this forum, and on the industry in general, that as a newbie its hard not to feel a bit overwhelmed as you start your first campaigns and being to feel like your running in place. That being said I wanted to ask the veterans their opinions on maximizing time so that self reliance level in AM and ultimately $xx-$xxxx days of profit can be met.
When it is common knowledge to stick to one geo, one vertical, one traffic source, etc. its hard to wonder if you're going too far astray or focusing as you should. In addition the downtime that comes with traffic source approvals, affiliate manager approvals, etc. leaves some time open that should be maximized if someone wants to really achieve their ultimate goal of being a "super affiliate". Ultimately to maximize chances of large success.
ASSUMPTIONS: The newbie has learned the basics of tracking, running a campaign (has run campaigns), getting landers set up, ripping landers, speaking to AMs, and running different offers, looking at data, etc. The newbie can rip landers, change href codes in landers, and set up tracking, but is no coding or tech wizard by any means.
SCENARIO/QUESTION How does a newbie's early days look. Should they be focusing extremely, extremely niche in terms of vertical (AV Pin Submits, in a single GEO, dual geos... AV Pin Submits/Sweeps/Pin Instals, single GEO, dual geos) to maximize chances of success. How far should they stray from their initial focus? In downtime from one campaign may it be day-parting, trying to find more offers, how should one maximize their time to keep moving forward?
I'm sure a lot of this information is scattered throughout the forum but thought it might be helpful is some of the experts here weighed in on how they would maximize their time in the early days if they did it again.
Hi tpm767!
First of all, I'd say not to focus in a specific target to start. Instead, you should test some segments to see which ones are more profitable for you. At the beginning, you wanna run a RON campaign for some (not too competitive) GEOS and countries with a low payout and a high traffic volume. You should do this so that you can gather a good amount of data in a short period of time, enabling you to start optimizing without having to spend a ton of money. In terms of segmenting OS: I suggest you start with Android. Why? Because - for most of the GEOS - you’ll get more traffic and better conversion rates than iOS, for instance.
Here are some suggestions of segments you can try:
Adult:
UY - Movistar
CO - Claro
KE - Safaricom
Mainstream:
UAE - du
UAE - Etisalat
PY - Personal
After gaining some experience, you can try different spots and more challenging GEOS. Of course it’s important to always keep yourself up to date, knowing the best offers available. How to do this? Always keep in touch with your affiliate network's account manager. They'll surely give you some great tips on what to go for!
Moreover, depending on your budget, you can try 2 to 3 ad-networks and segments to test and figure out which one works better for you and leads to bigger profits.
Good luck on your journey!
Got more questions? Feel free to PM me!
Cheers!
In the early days I was EXTREMELY laser focused. I worked with one traffic source, and just uploaded new campaigns day and night. The niches and angles I tried varied but I got a piece of useful information from every campaign that lead me one step closer to profitland.
I think these days people get to obsessed with exact metrics on when to cut a campaign, how many ads to upload etc. If you are really working hard uploading campaigns, tracking everything you do, then you will quickly learn what works better than others.
In short: Keep your head down and launch campaigns. I promise you will make the most traction that way.
Hey, @tpm767 Some tips to be added:
- Testing - small changes make a big difference. Change the color of your call-to-action button on your landing page could bring in a huge amount of additional click-throughs to your offer. The opposite of that would be to change the whole landing page altogether, which may bring in less click-throughs and therefore be a bad change. If you set up everything right in your tracker, then all the statistics, earnings, costs of traffic will be displayed in one place and show the final profitability.
- Some campaigns will perform better on different traffic sources. Until you test them, however, all you will never know the results. You can carry your campaign onto multiple sources in order to see which, if any will back out to being positive.
- Keep active, read, ask and research on the forum!
Good luck!