I am going to start posting every campaign on here. I have ran 500$ worth of campaigns since I have joined STM. Mostly from Offermobi, and some from mobpartner and EWA. No luck yet, so its time to get some pointers.
Campaign(a)(Splitting offers now):
EWA - $500BestBuyGiftCardEmailSubmit - $1.15(after asking for payout bump)
Link(so you can see tracking parameters used):
http://www.tracklead.net/click.track...ID=681401&SID=JT_CAMPAIGN,JT_OPERATOR,JT_HANDSET,JT_SITE,JT_TIME STAMP,JT_KEYWORD
Images attached to post.
Campaign(b):
Offermobi - 100$BestBuyGiftCardPhone&Survey&extras - $7.50 (haven't asked for payout bump yet)
http://tm.trackmobi.com/aff_c?offer_...&aff_id=16453&aff_sub=JT_CAMPAIGN&aff_sub2=JT_OPERATOR&aff_sub3= IJT_HANDSET&aff_sub4=JT_SITE&aff_sub5=JT_KEYWORD
The images for this campaign are identical except for "Email" and "500$" are replaced with "Phone#" and "100$"
Results = Bad
This was actually the worst campaign I have ran. But I told my self from now on I am posting on here as part of my system. EWA Offer: 196 clicks and 1 conversion. Offermobi 126 clicks and 0 conversions. I am not going to bother showing the data, to me that's a for sure fail!
Plan now:
switch to another offer. Keep implementing all the improvements I have made thus far. Hopefully the next offer converts. I chose this one because it was recommended to me from my AM at EWA, then I just found comparable offers on other networks. My third split test campaign was going to be mobpartners bestbuy gift card.
Semi-Success in the past:
I have ran 9ish campaigns so far. Once I got the skills down I was able to make a campaign in 3 hours. That's without getting info on an offer before hand, just picking them off the shelves sort of speak. Learned a lot though.
For those 6 I never tried any of the offers Angry Russian suggested in his guide. I figured if it was there people have already filled the inventory gaps. But after 6 campaigns of my own selection I decided to give meetmoi a shot. Sure enough that was my closest to a success. However even after optimizing it was a no go. I would optimize to say OPERATOR - SITE ID - AD1 and it would spend $30 and get $20. I kept thinking I could get it over 30$ but after 200$ loss I figure it was time to cut the chord.
Stuff that I have already improved on from my previous attempts which I learned from STM postings:
-For my first 4 campaigns I used Tracking202 with Beyond Hosting VPS but after reading polarbacon, tijn, and AngryRussian say over and over that direct linking works just fine, I switched it up.
-Spend more time on each campaign. Find offers on multiple networks for split test. Give each campaign the best chance possible, High CTR images with High CR AdCopy(your best guess of each). This way you waste less money. For me I work in the oilfield and make fantastic money, but I don't want to see any more disappear then I have to. I think it's almost a bad thing in AM when your not too worried about money.
-Each Jumptap Campaign has 4 copies of the same ad. Gets even impressions across all ads.
-Incorporating as many JT_Parameters as possible, even if I don't think I'll immediately use it. EWA lets you use a lot, so I did.
-There is probably more improvements that I have made in the past month then mentioned here, but I forget, its all moulded into a system.
Suggestions?
I know hitting up Neverblue would be one, but I got denied for now. Once I hit something profitable I'll re-apply. I am getting better at talking to networks and traffic sources. I have gotten bid price reductions and payout bumps.
Other then that, got any pointers? Any offers that you would suggest?
Glad to see you're doing it the right way HappyCanadian.
Here is what I would do if I was you. You need to be more methodical in your testing and test one variable at a time. Pick one offer that you know converts on mobile (ask your am). Don't rotate among networks just yet.
Next create 3 drastically different ads copy images animated the whole lot. Right now you're ads are pretty similar. I would also go to a local phone store play on the phones and see if you can spot some of your competitor ads to get more ideas.
Next thing is you have to be realistic with 1.15 payout assuming a 5% conversion rate you're still looking at .05 to .06 epc. Lets face it shooting for 10% CR is tough so you want to be realistic. In order to get clicks that cheap you need to talk to your AM at the ad network you're working with. Here are just some strategies that can get your CPC that low.
1. Bid on wifi, typically this traffic is less desirable and therefore much cheaper
2. If you're going smart try apps they are cheaper than mobile web
3. Try CPM with a VERY high CTR ad of at least 1 to 2% you can usually buy CPM .50 to 1.50
Remember with a limited budget you want to be testing only a few things at at time. Every time you ad another variable that you're looking at whether its carrier, handset, etc you have to keep doubling your budget to get any kind of significant data. Your first most important thing is your creative and offer once you have a winning combination figuring out OS, app vs web, site ids, carrier, handsets, etc will be much smoother.
Huge thank you Angry, will report back with the next batch of results.
okay!
EWA-BestBuyGiftCard-EmailSubmit-1.15
So, I stayed with the same BestBuy campaign because it was recommended by my AM at EWA(Chad King). I know it didn't work out last time, but Chad did say it was working so maybe when I use Angry's advice it will help. I guess I like to give things a second chance.
Jumptap configuration
-Daily budget = 25$
-Contains adult = No
-On Adult Sites = Yes
-Show all day and hours and evenly paced
-Frequency = 5
-IOS-Iphones only
-US only
-WIFI only
-Bid .03(ask and you shall receive, wonder if they will go lower...)
-Only Apps, No Mobile Sites
I think I get what Angry means now by methodical testing and not having too many variables. Even now I could reduce the variables. I made 5 ads(See Images attached) instead of 3. After I started spying I found so many ideas 3 just didn't cut it. I guess less = more. For my next campaign it will only be 3.
I think my ads have definitely improved. They are much different now. I have read Scientific Advertising(thanks again Angry) which has helped the speed of making ads and, I hope, the effectiveness. I don't always follow all the rules by the book, but I think that's also the point. Test, test, test.
I learned to spy now. I have an HTC hero. I downloaded some free games, and checked out the ads on there. That helped. Sorry if I stole some ads from you guys! I also googled regular web ads and took some elements from them.
Side personal note: Angry suggested I go into cell phone stores to do some spying. I would definitely do this if I didn't work in the oilfield for 30 days at a time. I've included a few pictures of my work environment. Either way, I have an android phone and borrowed my coworkers iphone to spy on that.(See Images attached, Iam indoors 90% of the time monitoring computers, that's when I do AM. But I included an outdoors pic just for fun.)
Day 1
Summary:
-At the beginning of testing I was at 6$ spend and 3.45$ Rev, I was excited! but then conversions slowed right down and ended with 33.03$ spent, 5.75$ received. It went that hi cause I had to do some actual work at work.
Actions taken after testing:
-Emailed Jumptap AM to delete SITE ID's featured in attached Pic (Image: Day1-SITEIDs). AM did this no problem.
-Decided not to eliminate any Ads just yet cause I figured SITE ID's were the thing to blame. Ad3 did the best though. (Image: Day1-AdDataCR)
-Jumptap Data, Definitely the best CTR rates I have had. Obviously spying was the key difference there. (Image: Day1-AdDataCTR)
Day2
Summary:
-315 Clicks(10.32$) and 0 Conversions, guess I just didn't want to give up on this guy. The .03 cents just seems so much cheaper then .06! Do bad days just happen like this?
I didn't adjust anything after this day cause I was going to end this campaign, but gave it another chance the next day. (3 Pics attached for Day 2).
Day3
-I created another campaign around a BeNaughty EWA offer since I was scrapping this campaign anyway, got bored waiting for approval, so ran this one again. 335Clicks(10.05$ spend), 1.15$ received.
I won't post pics cause I think with my setup this offer is not going to convert. I am going to try one more day though and just run Ad3. See what happens.
FYI for moderators/super affiliates: I already got a solid reply through private message for another direction. Just so you guys know I've already been helped.
I hit pay dirt.
That's pretty much all I have to say.....but I'll keep going because the only reason I hit pay dirt is this forum. Let's continue this follow along...
Campaign 3
**some network** - **I guess I shouldn't really say certain things anymore??**
Jumptap Configuration
-Daily budget = 25$
-Contains adult = No
-On Adult Sites = Yes
-Show all day and hours and evenly paced
-Frequency = 5
-Android
-US only
-WIFI only
-Bid .05
-Only Apps, No Mobile Web
Day1
Spent 50$, made 4.50
Ad# - CTR - Clicks - Conversions
Ad1 - .7% - 168 -
Ad2 - .9% - 395 - 1
Ad3 - 1.3% - 470 - 1
Comments: The downside of this one is the conversion process is longer. I thought I would give it a shot anyway and it didn't work. The only reason it went up to 50$ is I left it unpaused but waiting for approval, it got approved then it ran like a thief. Lesson learned, pause all campaigns that are waiting for approval. I thought I did do this, so lesson 2, when the jumptap AM emails you to say he reduced the bids like you asked, go back and pause the campaign because he probably left it unpaused.
So that's the bad. The good is those are the best CTRs I have seen. In my next ads I will prep the user for a longer conversion process to increase CR's. I will also test Web instead of APP.
2 days later: The weekend slows alot down, AM's don't get back to you, campaigns don't get approved, etc...I guess its a good thing cause I just realized a nice opportunity. The campaign that I almost had luck with before matches the ads of the previous campaign. I am going to use these wicked new ads and low bid prices to give it another shot.
Campaign 4
**Some Network** - **my first profitable campaign**
Jumptap Configuration
-Daily budget = 25$
-Contains adult = No
-On Adult Sites = Yes
-Show all day and hours and evenly paced
-Frequency = 5
-Android
-US only
-Specific Carriers as per campaign rules
-Mobile Web only
-Bid .05
Day1 = Spent 50$, made 91$
Ad# - CTR - Clicks - Conversions
Ad3 - .7% - 860 - 28
Booyaaa, Web vs. APP and lower bid prices and a better ad made the difference from my previous attempt when bid prices were .11$. At the beginning of the day I set the budget to 25$, but as soon as I saw 10$ spent and 20$ received, I increased it to 50$ for the day. Now keep in mind this is without any optimization whatsover. So I am excited to get the necassary data to cut things like SITEID and OPERATOR. From here, I will follow AngryRussians guide once again. I am going to create an iphone campaign and a feature phone campaign using Ad3. I will also create 3 very different ads in 3 campaigns with the same targeting because I want to get my CTR back up to the 1.3% range. Every other variable will be the same for these campaigns. Time to spy some more. Also, the battle of the day is to stay calm and NOT TOUCH the campaign that is working.
That leads to a question for the gurus. Should I increase the budget of the campaign that is working?? or just copy that campaign over and over until I discover it's limits? or any recommendations please...
**so far today the campaign is still profiting 1:2 ratio, can't wait to optimize this BAMF**
**if anybody is wondering, this is approx my 10th mobile campaign and 20th+ campaign in general. I just didn't start posting until recently**
Under campaign 4, I assume you mean WEB only instead of WAP only considering you already say it's targeting Android?
Those are some sweet CTR's bro.
I would recommend split testing some text ads as well, looks like you've made some good progress so far, keep it up!
Nice pics! I live in Alberta and have some buddies who work at the rigs too!
@emonitized: Thanks. All corrected.
@403flux: Thanks for the tip. Do you have any advice when I test and make mobile text ad copy? or do you know a good mobile app or webpage for spying and getting ideas? Also, have you met up with any affiliates in Alberta? I work as an MWD for a directional company and work 30-60 days at a time(My choice, I ask to be sent to big projects). I usually have a few days in between to visit family and friends. Would be cool to actually meet people doing the same thing!
get a cheap Android phone and download some games!
I'm not exactly rolling in the mobile monies yet so I'm not sure if I'm the best one to give advice on it but from my own experience, I always split test text ads and banners and in some cases text ads outperform banner ads and in other cases vice versa, there is no rhyme or reason why, as far as I can tell. You'll just never know unless you test it out.
With text ads you have a lot less characters to work with so keep it concise and always have a call-to-action (CTA) and create some urgency if you have room. I write all my own ads and I just make sure they're radically different from one another - Read Cashvertising if you need help with writing ads but don't over think it too much just get something up and try it out. I'm not too sure where to go to spy on text ads specifically, I've seen them randomly pop-up on some of the apps I have on my phone though.
Yeah I agree it would be really nice if we could organize a meetup of some sort, I know there are a few Albertans in this forum. I haven't networked with anyone locally just cause I don't think I'd have much to offer by way of advice and I don't want to be THAT guy who just sponges info.
That's solid 403flux, sounds like were in the same stage of the game. That's probably the best time to meetup. I'll put it on my to do list, for my days off, to come visit. After working 80 days straight a to-do list is massive! I have family in Edmonton and Calgary and used to work at a skydiving center in innisfail. So I visit people all over....this should actually be in a pm....pming now...
Also, thanks for the info. and ya nobody want's to be that guy. I am glad I finally got something working so I can at least say I am an "Internet Marketer". Although I don't tell to many people that I know won't give a shit, especially in the oilfield!!
- Jan 18th 2012 -
Feature, Iphone, and all tested ads fail!!
Ad#&Target - CTR - Clicks - Conversions
Ad3feature - 1.7% - 97 - 0
Ad3Iphone - .1% - 24 - 0
Ad4Android - .4% - 84 - 0
Ad5Android - .2% - 13 - 0
Ad6Android - .2% - 5 - 0
The CTR's were just too low. The whole point was to find a higher CTR ad. Feature phones had crazy CTR but no Conversions.
My next plan of action is to copy the campaign that works now and see how high I can push till it reaches 20% return.
I have requested my AM to copy the campaign twice, he did it instantly. I then kept the new 2 to 25$ a day for a total of 100$ spend.
- Jan 19th 2012 -
The total spend yesterday including testing budget was 115$ and I received 120$. Not including testing budget I spent 100$. So just on instanct I am going to keep this campaign spending 50$ a day and not push it anymore. Plan of action now is to eliminate bad SITEID's and operators. Besides adjusting my Jumptap campaign I will follow the advice I received via PM - scale to other networks. (Also, remind me to test different bid prices and eventually get a different working ad that I can rotate)
@deedsmedia I was considering doing that the first day, but wasn't sure if it's the right decision. I did increase it to 100$ by copying the campaign and that didn't work out too well(Day2). I think I might just increase the budget instead of copy. Newb mistakes all around? I think so.
- Jan 20th 2012 -
To summerize:
Day 1, spent 50$ received 91$
Day 2, spent 100$ received 120$
Day 3, spent 50$ received 68$
Day 4, today
1st question for the gurus: What can I do to prevent conversions from decreasing in these early days of a successful campaign? Ways I know already
Ad Crop Rotation, Pause for a week, and that's all that comes to mind right now).
Maybe I should just grow a pair and increase the budget to say 500$? I think for today I will increase a bit to 100$.
Addition:
I am going to eliminate Verizon(Image attached)
2nd question for the gurus: I targeted AllTel and AT&T but get no clicks from them. Does that just mean Jumptap has 0 traffic from those carriers?
I see this from a other perspective:
If you are in the green and haven't done any optimization you can give it a go and collect data as fast as possible and make decisions much faster. Even if you loose 10 or 20 dollars you are still in the green overall with this campaign. Just raise the budget of the first campaign and see what happens.
@deeds: Will give this a shot.
What can I do to prevent conversions dropping?
This wonderful campaign that I had has dwindled to a non profitable campaign. I still need to optimize, but for future reference, why does this happen?
Day 1, spent 50$ received 91$
Day 2, spent 100$ received 120$
Day 3, spent 50$ received 68$
Day 4, spent 100$ received 60$
Day 5, I paused the campaign and tested .03 bid, this is converting for me now and is profitable.
Maybe I should just rotate campaigns every 3 days with different bid prices exposing the ad to different inventory?
ps. I did try jacking up the campaign to 200$ but when I did there was only 1 conversion and 50$ worth of spending instantly. Maybe I should start it at the beginning of the day, but my experience so far tells me I shouldn't jack it up anymore and just optimize over time. Thoughts?
So I stopped posting in my follow along cause I figured I would just do my own thing. Conversions dropped and I was like wtf? What do I do now? I messaged a fellow STMer and he encouraged me to just keep posting. So here I am
He also gave me some great insight for things to look into. His key piece of advice is when conversions suddenly drop, email your AM if there is issues out of your control Also he said it may just be some bad few days. He gave me a bunch of other things to look into such as:
Advertiser scrub?
How are the CTRs on your banners?
Have their been billing changes to the carriers?
What's your average cpc?
What kind of optimization have you done so far?
Significant Mobile AM milestones:
- I finally got on with Neverblue after I directly reached out to Marty Borotsik.(Thanks Angry)
- I am close to my 2nd profitable campaign and that one is an offer from Neverblue running on Airpush. I started expanding a bit and Airpush seems to be working out for me. I also registerd with BuzzCity and Mojiva.
More on the first profitable campaign:
- Every time I tried to increase the budget it would perform worse. I would increase it to 70$ a day from 50$ and CR's dropped hard, even after optimization. Shouldn't it go up in CR's after I optimize even if I increase the budget? In retrospect I think this was just a case of bad days coupled with bad timing.
- I have tested a few more creatives to get CTRs up but nothing was better then my first winner.
- I have deleted 7 SITE ID's and 2 carriers(started with 4). Today is actually looking pretty good for profitability, so maybe these will be the good days..
- I think the lesson here is I can't rush things until I know how to rush things. There probably is more that I can do here. But every time I try to increase the budget the conversions go down. I'll just keep optimizing slowly and that way I am at least making 50$ a day or more. A good start I figure, and hell my other campaigns might just take off!
For now I am going to implement the advice I have so far, and will post when I run into my next hurdle.
Keep posting man this is great for a lot of n00bs.
I want to leave you with some food for thought. When I ran rebills although I was pushing around 5k a day on average, I was NOT profitable every day! A lot of affiliates think just because we work with numbers that this marketing is like science... its not its an art, the numbers are there to help us make a decision.
People are still the ones buying or signing up for your shit and simple things like elections, holidays, or even shitty weather can all impact your CRs not to mention the little variances that we don't even notice. All our data shows is us is where opportunities lay and what we can expect in the long run.
I know its hard when you're starting out but its paramount not to let yourself get "trigger happy" and have some patience.
Good luck 
^^ I don't even touch mobile, but clicked on this thread cause I figured you'd drop some knowledge like the post you just gave!
@happycanadian: Are you running all the different ad sizes in your campaign or just 1 ad size?
@The Angry Russian: Do you recommend adding all ad sizes when starting out, or have you found it best to just test multiple different images in 1 ad size to find the ad with the highest CTR? If multiple ad sizes...would you put all the ad sizes in the same "Jumptap ad" or would you put each ad size in a separate ad even if all the images are the same?
different sizes = different phones = VASTLY different results
Agree with Deonup... 300x50 and 320x50 typically smart phones... everything below those more feature.
@mwhiz: Every campaign that I test I make 3 extremely different ads and make one campaign per ad(4 copies of the same ad in one campaign). I only make 300X50 and 216X36 and test with that. I haven't explored different sizes yet. I like this system because after I choose an offer I can make the campaign in under 2 hours.
@Angry: Always more motivated when you chime in. I'll try to drop some nOOB knowledge in my next post after I implement some expert knowledge received so far.
Cool FAC Happycanadian, btw are you optimizing first by cutting bad sites, are you following a certain sequence?
@kfeng113 So far optimize by cutting OBVIOUSLY bad ads. Then same with sites and operators simultaneously. I've added more into the process and will update soon with results.
I thought of waiting a little longer but I think I have learned a few key things so I'll update now.
What I have done:
- I took the original profiting campaign and followed 403Flux's advice: I copied my .03$ bid and .05$ bid versions and only targeted site's that have converted more then once. The first day of testing this brought up my CTR to 1.1%(from .6%) and it didn't change the CR's to much. Very Nice! Excited to see what happens tomorrow.
- I am testing app traffic. It didn't convert as well but it still might be profitable after optimization. It had a 1.1% CTR as well. I havn't tested WIFI yet because everytime I do on other campaigns it seems to tank.
- A day that started with bad news and ended with good: On webnesday conversions tanked. I was going to email my AM but he beat me to it and told me my traffic quality is good. The advertiser wanted to give me a payout bump and it was solid! like 33% payout bump. I should have asked earlier for that. Lesson learned. So all the stuff I did before this for optimization just became that much more profitable.
- I am optimizing 2 other campaigns right now and am on the verge of profitability. One bad thing happened in that process. I asked my AM at jumptap to reduce a campaign but he forgot. I ended up testing a campaign at .11$ instead of my .03$ that I wanted. Ouch. It was only one day, but I'll be watching that. I am working nights right now at my job so I email my AM in the morning to optimize. I went to bed, he started the campaign and forgot to optimize. Otherwise if I was on days I would of caught it.
Summary so far:
- The first day it converted 50$ spend and 91$ rev. It went down as time went on. over two weeks I have deleted Site Id's and Operators, tested different ads(original was still better), copied .03 and .05 versions using only good Site Id's. and now testing apps.
- Tomorrow could be a very good day since I may have 3 profitable campaigns. Here's hoping!
Quick Edit:
I think I may slowly change my ways to the prevailing conclusion in this thread.
http://stmforum.com/forum/showthread...igns-do-manage
It will be easier once I leave the oilfield. Don't worry when I make the move I'll have enouch money. Hell I already have more then enough, but just want to get to a certain daily profit before I do.
escapingtheoilfield.com It's not that good right now, the RSS feed doesn't even work. But after I actually succeeded in the original task it will be better. Will be living in a surf location that's for damn sure.
This thread is full of gold nuggets, just getting my start in mobile!
Keep us updated! Awesome progress man!
Nice bump! Don't be afraid to rotate in other offers or the same offer from a different network, 1.1% CTR is boss!
By the way, your jumptap rep is a fucking douche! Hope they reimbursed you for their mistake! If it happens again email them back and cc their boss in the email, their job is to help you make their platform work for YOU, don't feel like you have to be buddies with them. Keep track of all future email correspondence, ad networks are always pulling shady bullshit like this. "Oops we forgot to change your bid," is not a good enough fucking excuse!
Wow, this is a very good way to drive a very good point home. Double thanks to both of you.
@illya If I had different ads in the same campaign they would receive drastically different impressions. I don't know why this is, but to solve it, you can just copy the same ad 4 times in one campaign and name that campaign Offer-Ad4-Web. You can even go further and only put 300-50 size images into one campaign and name it Offer-Ad4-300-50-Web. I am now incorporating that cause different ad sizes get different placements. I didn't do this before now, will report on how it fairs. Edit(What nefig said)
I recieved this via PM from mwhiz, thought I would share the answer.
Happycanadian: you can (and you should) hardcode the ad name into the subid, so you can optimize by creative as well (i.e. in Airpush);
And no, Airpush doesn't support publisher filtering as far as I know. Just devices and carriers.. So test devices and ads.
Just to let everyone know I am still giving it my all. I have being busy, there's being a lot of "reorganizing". I will have a great post coming up in probably a week.