Question about Time Management (7)
This is my 3rd month grinding AM full-time, and I'm roughly breaking even.
I'm sticking to running iPhone sweeps on POPs on two traffic sources; trying to keep it simple and focused.
I have about 30 campaigns running; I've had this many running for over a month. (Some I've given up on to be replaced by new ones, but I'm averaging about 30 at any one time)
99% of these camps are either breaking even or slightly losing or making pennies per day. Only 1-2 camps make more than $1/day on any given day.
I've recently started to question how I'm spending my time. I'm spending 30 minutes every 2-3 days on each of these campaigns that, in my noob opinion, have almost zero chance of ever making me more than 1-2 bucks a day. (and they might not even be able to make me that much)
My original mindset was: If I find 100 camps making me 1-2 bucks a day, that's 3k-6k a month; awesome! And if I find a big winner, even better!
But lately, part of me is starting to think that abandoning low volume/low earning/low potential-earning campaigns might be the way to go; that they're just a time suck. Instead I could focus on finding camps with much more potential.
So, basically, abandon anything that doesn't have the potential to make me xx/day, for example.
And today I read this part of a great post by Amy in Mr. Payne's follow along:
"Test widely, only pick camps that are so promising that they'll get green with minor optimization, then scale as hard and as fast as you can. Repeat as often as possible so you'll continually find new profitable camps to replace dying ones."
Quote came from this thread: http://stmforum.com/forum/showthread...nd-Sweepstakes
So, my question is, is there a rough guideline I should follow with regards to how much time I should spend trying to make a campaign profitable?
For example, would it be worth it to launch a new campaign, and make, say, three rounds of cuts maximum. And if it's making $1/day, let it run. But after three rounds of cuts, if you're still in the red, dump it and move on instead of putting in more time trying to squeak out pennies.
FWIW, money isn't an issue here; I have a healthy testing budget.
Sorry for the wall of text; this was as much of a vent as it was an ask for help.
Thanks for reading!
This is a very valid concern, and a challenge faced by many affiliates - especially those that are running on pop.
And I think your goal of 3-6k/month is really not difficult to achieve! But I really wouldn't suggest aiming for 100 camps x $1-2/day. You HAVE to raise the bar to something a little more sensible, such as $5+/day/camp to start.
Why? Because 1)juggling 100 camps will leave you exhausted. Spending 5 minutes checking stats for each camp will take you 500 minutes = 8+ hours! (I'd rather get a full-time menial job at a factory - I'd be making more money plus not shoulder any risk or stress myself out!) And 2)where would you ever find the time to test new offers to replace dying camps? Not to mention that 3)given how volatile pop camps perform, a slight drop in performance would completely eliminate your slim profits and dip into the red. Yup - we definitely need to set the bar higher!
So, with $5+/day/camp being the new goal, we can now make new plans that will allow us to get there. Here are some suggestions:
-First of all, make sure you'll get enough traffic volume on a traffic source before running there.
Sure enough, some sources don't have traffic estimators. But for those that do, check the numbers. I can't give you a cut-off value because every situation is different, and as you gain experience you'll become a better judge of how much traffic is enough. For starters, 1-2k impressions a day is not going to get you anywhere.
-Secondly, test lots of stuff and cherry pick the best!
I like to take 2-3 offers from different aff networks, that have similar payouts, that the AM knows to be converting for other affiliates, and use these offers to test every different lander I found on Adplexity. Once I find a winning lander I would test all similar offers I can find on various networks. By casting a wide net I vastly improve my chances of finding a profitable offer+lander. And if you test several geos and/or offer types at a time, you'll get to pick only the best to optimize and scale.
-Thirdly, drill down to major traffic segments to gauge promise!
While you're mass-testing offers, regularly drill down to offer > lander > [major segments], where major traffic segments are traffic subsets that have enough volume to be worth your effort in running it exclusively (i.e. a traffic segment that can net you $5+/day). e.g. A browser you haven't even heard of would not qualify as a major traffic segment, but a major OS such as Android, would.
Basically, when you drill down to offer > lander > [major segments], look for green segments with at least 2 conversions. (1 conversion doesn't count - you never know when the next one will come!) The more green you see, the more promising the camp will be.
So at which point do you decide to pause a camp? I would say that if most of the offer > lander > [major segments] are in loss by 2x payout and you don't see any green, then ditch the camp. As a last check though, drill down into placements to see whether there are big placements that have been zapping large portions of your spend without converting - if so, blacklist them and run some more traffic to see if things will improve.
-Fourthly, try to run in the same geos again and again so you're not starting from zero each time.
What I said in the last paragraph about ditching the campaign - is only one approach. Another approach would be to think more long-term. If you persevere and keep running the camp until you have a winning offer+lander, then cut placements, then you'll be left with a list of good placements - that you can launch future offers on again and again. Since you've already invested in cutting placements once, running in the same geo will give you a good head start! (Just be aware that a placement that converts well for carrier may convert very badly for wifi, so a list of good placements for carrier may not work if you decide to target wifi.)
Ideally of course, you'll want to cut placements for as cheaply as possible. So if you choose to cut placements using an offer+lander that is in loss, you'll need to spend more money than if you had a really good offer+lander that's in profit before you start cutting placements.
It will be hard at first to abandon the $1-2/day camps, but trust me - just start doing it RIGHT NOW! It will free up your time and energy and cashflow (which isn't a problem for you but I'm listing that for the sake of other affiliates reading this) to do a lot more testing to uncover offers/geos/verticals that have more profits potential.
If you want to be making more money, something will need to change. By making this one change in your approach and mindset, you will make progress.
Boy and you thought YOU made a wall of text!
Best of luck! 
Amy
Wow man!
You definitely don't want to run hundreds of $1 campaigns.
What will happen this way is that you will burnout very very fast and lose all your motivation straight away.
Try to rather make a few bigger campaigns, it's not so hard to have 1 single campaign doing at least $xx or $xxx.
With less campaigns you can focus on them better and you will also have much more free time and enjoy the work more
(don't get me wrong you will still need more campaigns to make bigger numbers, but I would rather manage 10 campaigns that are doing $10, then 100 campaigns doing $1).
BTW your idea reminds me my SEO times when I had a site that was making $x-xx and then I thought if I just create 100s of those sites I will have $xxxx, but it never worked like that of course
Thank you both so much for the responses! This is a huge game changer for me! $5/day is now my new benchmark for keeping a campaign running.
Sure enough, some sources don't have traffic estimators. But for those that do, check the numbers. I can't give you a cut-off value because every situation is different, and as you gain experience you'll become a better judge of how much traffic is enough. For starters, 1-2k impressions a day is not going to get you anywhere.
I like to take 2-3 offers from different aff networks, that have similar payouts, that the AM knows to be converting for other affiliates, and use these offers to test every different lander I found on Adplexity. Once I find a winning lander I would test all similar offers I can find on various networks. By casting a wide net I vastly improve my chances of finding a profitable offer+lander. And if you test several geos and/or offer types at a time, you'll get to pick only the best to optimize and scale.
Once you see some stats, such as lander CTR, offer CR, which traffic segments are promising, etc., you will get an idea whether there is enough traffic to produce the $5+/day.
And $5/day is just a start. Pretty soon you'll be abandoning $10/day camps. But $5/day would be a good start.
If you have some stats to show, we can look at each case in detail.
Amy
I know this isn't a follow-along, but I'm gonna post some stats to see if you can help further refine my thought process.
Yesterday I dumped all my campaigns that were breaking even and only kept a handful that I think have the potential to make $5/day without too many rounds of cuts.
Here is a great example of where I was getting mixed up. The following screenshot is conversions by ISP. When I look at these stats, I don't know if I should just cut the worst preforming ISPs and move on, or if I should start a 2nd campaign targeting the worst preforming ones with a lower bid to try and make it work.
My argument for starting a 2nd camp with a lower bid is because the EPV is 0.0005, and the min bid is 0.0003. So, in theory, if I started a 2nd camp and used a min bid, I might be able to squeak out some profit.
Same thing for the browsers:
I could dump Chrome, or I could split it off into a 2nd camp with a lower bid.
I'm quite confident I know what you're going to say, but I need to hear it to have 100% confidence going forward, and perhaps others could benefit from hearing it as well.
After drilling down further, I noticed that it's all coming from two website IDs:
Attachment 13787
Would you run this only on the two IDs that converted, or would you let it run on all IDs since I haven't spent enough on the other IDs to warrant cutting them yet?
Home > The Newbie Zone > Questions and Answers