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Dumb Questions From A Green Affiliate (14)

02-22-2017 12:44 AM #1 rvs318 (Member)
Dumb Questions From A Green Affiliate

Yo,

Before I start..

I am green as fuck.

I feel like a blind man with no arms and no legs trying to climb out of a well.

I suppose that's how most newbies start.

But I guess that's just part of the process...

So I'm gonna enjoy it.

Seeing how my affiliate marketing brain is a blind, armless, legless, untrained little puppy...

Feel free to drop as much knowledge as you want to on me. I'm here to learn, make mistakes and soak it up.

Anyways. Here is the start of a long line of dumb questions, new insights, and lots of mistakes...

I hope you're as excited as I am.

---------

I'm doing some work tonight to take the first steps and setup all of the basics - with the intention of launching a pops traffic campaign by the end of the week.

1. Setting up a CDN (I plan on using Beyond Hosting - as recommended in this thread.
2. Tracking platform ( I plan on using Voluum - also recommended in above thread.)
3. Account on an affiliate network (Probably ZeroPark? I'm just going with the flow. Action as opposed to overanalysis)
4. Learning how to setup network and traffic source on Voluum.
5. "The know how to build/edit + host LP's.

(That whole numbered section was pulled from this thread on pops)

Right now - I'm stuck on #1.

I signed up with my email address, created a project, and put my credit card info in...

I can now access the rest of the site including the "billing", "support", and "services" tabs.

Am I good to move forward?

Am I "all set up"?

For now, I'll just keep it bite sized. It's tuesday night. I want to launch a campaign by Saturday morning. That's my goal.

I'm gonna rip through this shit as best I can - while doing a good job and covering the basics - and start failing forward.

Please feel free to drop any nuggets of knowledge you may have to offer.

Thanks very much - looking forward to getting things started, learning, and hopefully contributing some value as well.

In the meantime I'm going to get started on the other steps.

-RVS3-

02-22-2017 07:34 AM #2 manu_adefy (Veteran Member)

Alternative for #1: https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...-Cost-Way-Ever!

#2: Voluum is good to begin with

#3: ZeroPark is a traffic source, which is fine to begin with, to get a feel for the funnel. You can also try PopAds, quick approvals and low deposit limits (which I recommend you use to begin with, don't deposit too much before you have a profitable campaign). As for affiliate networks, have a look through this section: https://stmforum.com/forum/forumdisp...etworks-Offers The standard ones mentioned for beginners are ClickDealer, F5 Media, MundoMedia, mPire network... The list is just so long; your strategy should be to sign up to 1-2, then leverage that approval to get into as many as possible. I signed up with more networks than I can count, even if I send traffic only to like 5 at most. Also, this might be something interesting for you as a beginner: https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...bitrage-Part-1

#4: There should be individual documentation on your chosen tools and networks, but if not, come back here

This might also save you some time and money: https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...Avoid-(Part-1)

I think that's it for the very beginning; one other thing I'd recommend is starting a follow along here: https://stmforum.com/forum/forumdisp...long-Campaigns Then you will have people giving you advice as you progress through everything, and you have all your learnings in one thread

Cheers!

02-22-2017 08:07 AM #3 miss_bridge (Member)

If you're just starting out with your tracking platform, you may be interested in Adsbridge, as we offer a free trial! (our paid plans are also cheaper than most, and you get an STM discount here!) LEt me know if you have any question regarding a tracker, and I'll be happy to help!
-Zach

02-22-2017 09:11 AM #4 rvs318 (Member)

Cool.

I watched the free videos promoting the 6 Week AMC and they strongly suggested going the afflow arbitrage route.

I think I'll do that.

Just signed up for a monetizer account.

While I'm waiting for approval, I'm setting up a simple business website.

For afflow arbitrage - do I have to use zeropark? I know you mentioned that PopAds is a good, cheap source.

But the tutorial for arbitrage seems to recommend using zeropark specifically bc of integration w Voluum.

02-22-2017 10:06 AM #5 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

Originally Posted by rvs318

For afflow arbitrage - do I have to use zeropark? I know you mentioned that PopAds is a good, cheap source.

But the tutorial for arbitrage seems to recommend using zeropark specifically bc of integration w Voluum.

Amy had to choose one source when writing that tutorial, so she chose Zeropark, but that doesn't mean you cannot use a different source. Any source can work with that method, ZP is just the easiest to manage because of the integration. But, this will also mean that most people who are about to try this method based on the tutorial, will start with ZP and that means a lot of competition

02-22-2017 10:14 AM #6 manu_adefy (Veteran Member)

PopAds is not necessarily cheap per impression, but you can deposit low amounts through PayPal, with low or no fees. Most other traffic sources require a certain minimum because of how high the fees are for low amounts.

02-22-2017 10:15 AM #7 caurmen (Administrator)

Lots of good advice here. I'll just add one more piece:

Keep moving forward.

Don't worry if you think you're getting stuff wrong, you don't know enough yet, etc. Just keep taking practical steps forward.

You've started out well with this: keep it up.

You'll learn far faster that way.

02-22-2017 06:58 PM #8 rvs318 (Member)

Originally Posted by matuloo

...True.

Good point, thanks.

02-22-2017 06:59 PM #9 rvs318 (Member)

Awesome advice so far. Thanks everybody. I'll be back with more soon.

02-22-2017 11:31 PM #10 rvs318 (Member)

Ok. Here's my update.

I'm doing afflow arbitrage, using PopAds as a traffic source.

Signed up to Voluum? Check.

Signed up to PopAds? Check.

Signed up to Afflow? Check.

Now I need to figure out how to integrate all 3, and make it all work.

It's funny, because I don't know what "make it all work" looks, hears, feels, or smells like. Guess I'll find out soon.

Like I said, my goal is to launch a campaign by Saturday morning.

Question #1: Are campaigns a thing on afflow since there are apparently no offers, landers, etc?

I guess the next steps are to:

1. Integrate Voluum with PopAds - traffic source with tracking
2. Integrate the 2 of those with Afflow - sending traffic to afflow, andbeing able to track it.
3. Learning how to use afflow to direct traffic to profitable geos.

Question #2: Any comments on the above steps?

I have no idea how to do any of the above. I'm going to rip through the Voluum/ZeroPark Afflow Arbitrage Guide and see what transferable knowledge I can apply to integrating PopAds w/ Voluum. Then I'll move forward with trying to integrate traffic + tracking with Afflow.

Question #3: Am I missing anything obvious?

Thanks

-RVS3-

02-23-2017 10:01 AM #11 caurmen (Administrator)

Looks good to me. Good luck, and looking forward to your first results!

03-02-2017 01:13 AM #12 rvs318 (Member)

damn.

I'm still stuck on the integration phase trying to link up popads, afflow, and Voluum.

I've gone through the tutorials for zeropark + afflow, but am having trouble connecting the dots.

I know it's a learning process. I understand that this struggle is just building AM muscle that will be invaluable for the future.

My 9-5 has definitely gotten in the way. I need to be better about putting time aside for this.

Very little progress so far.

I've set up a subdomain on godaddy, but whenever I test the links i get 403 forbidden error.

In the meantime, I'm going to keep at it.

Maybe I need to read more and do more research.

I appreciate any suggestions you are willing to share.

I'll be back soon with another update.

RVS3

03-07-2017 11:58 PM #13 rvs318 (Member)

When I try to add PopAds as a traffic source on Voluum it says:

"PopAds does not support server to server conversion tracking."

Is this going to be a problem? I'm not really sure what this means.

03-08-2017 12:20 AM #14 rvs318 (Member)

Also, when I test out my afflow link I'm shown a page for Flash Player Install.

I'm assuming this means that the link is working?

Here's a screenshot:

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