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Media Buying, Ask Me Anything (40)

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In Reddit spirit, for the next 48 hours I'll answer any question on Media Buying you guys may have. As long as its not super personal I'll answer honestly and truthfully. Fire Away ..

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What is the most blackhat technique you have used in a media buy campaign?

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Never really bought super black hat, but probably turning on old campaigns that had been paused on networks to be able to run stuff that was no longer getting approved, and then quickly shut it off once it ran a bit. Rinse and repeat, profit (Looking back, not too proud of it, but I promised I'd answer truthfully)

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Noob! Can't believe you don't even you use ninja optimization techniques. Jokes, good on you for not having some dirt!

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whats your favorite adserver and what makes that adserver your favorite?

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I personally was pretty ghetto and only started using adservers about half way through. We signed a deal with zedo to use their adserver. Technology wise it was okay, but contract wise it was a nightmare, I believe they still have 6k of my money in "credit" sitting around somewhere. I love sitescouts adserver. I've known Matt and Paul a long time, their 3 ad format is effective and the pricing is comparable. I'd go with them for sure.

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ya i would agree with you one that, i really hate zedo and have moved to sitescout adserver. now that i have you on the topic of sitescout adserver, im sure you are familiar with "impression recycling" , any tips on the times to set it to recycle, for example, running dating. i have a banner pop up then 30 seconds later goes to another then another. have any tips for me on this?

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As with anything, setting depend on the user and the campaign. Certain audiences behave differently. I'll give a related but somewhat horizontal example that will be easier for everyone to understand. If I'm optimizing a campaign and I'm paying a $1 CPM, my offers CPA is $3. I may only give the banner 10,000 imps before I cut or keep it, but if my campaigns CPA is $40, how do I know if I have a high converting banner with 10k imps. Same thing, how do you know what time to set the recycling to if you don't test multiple ones PER each campaign and see what works best in each situation.

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Not sure if these are personal..but:

Which ad networks did you buy off of?
Which had the highest amount of volume?
Which had the highest amount of international volume?

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List of ad networks goes on and on, but my favorites for direct networks back in the day (I had a ton of success with these networks back then but this may have changed): xa.net (cpmatic), adtegrity, valueclick, cpxinteractive to name a few. Ones I didn't love: harren media, redux media
volume wise: valueclick and cpx have a TON of volume, but again this may have changed
Never bought international (outside of the USA and CA) so I can't answer that.

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1.Biggest amount per day you've made (and how much was the spend)?
2.Longest campaign you've had (and how much it made you total)
3.Most proven vertical since you started media buying
4.Thanks

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Are you still running camps? Whats your favorite vertical?

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I have no clue on 1 or 2. I don't keep track of stats like that, that's an ego thing. All that maters at the end of the day is how much you bring in in net revenue and how stable it is (no I won't say those numbers, they're none of your business, and honestly don't matter anymore). Bragging about how much you made is like bragging about how big your dick is, all for show and ego. I can't remember exact times or numbers, but I know my longest running media buying campaign grossed around 1.2 for that individual campaign.

Vertical wise, ones like diet, biz opp, dating and those kind with mass appeal are all proven. I've had success with all of them, each person is better at different things though. I'm a lot better promoting financial related campaigns than I am at diet campaigns.

@google: I am not, since we launched whatrunswhere.com public around 8 months ago, I haven't bought a scrap of media. It is a conflict of interest to our users, if I gave out advice and was buying I may skew my advice because it would hurt me. This way I can focus my time on building the biz, and not have people worry about me stealing their stuff or anything like that.

Fav vertical is anything financial (except for payday loans, won't touch em).

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Hey Max,

1. Can you name 3 niches you would suggest running on US news type of sites right now?
2. Can you explain any specific angles to go with the above niches

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It's been a while since I bought, so I need a refresher. I'm going to stick to one I'd run and go into a bit more depth as otherwise it'll take all night. I'd run job search for example, or biz opp lead gen.

I'd create my own lead gen page, simple above the fold and just asking for a name and email to see if they qualify, give some pros and cons, I'd then capture that data and send them to a lead gen (found it works better than CPS offer), and then just mail and monetize that data upfront as well. Your target CPA would be low though probably in the $4-5 range, so you'd have to either also ask for a phone number (cell phone) so you could do opt in SMS and call center stuff to help monetize it, and then you'd have to buy remnant inventory on the news site in specific sections as it probably wouldn't back out on a ROS buy. News sites are tough for RON because different people read different things but you should be able to target by section allowing you to pair offers with the content. Like diet offers with health and wellness, job offers with the classifieds and careers, and so forth, make sense?

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Hi Matt,

what you would suggest to beginners? good word of advice?
a small profit on their pocket gives them confidence and fuel to move on. just like POF is said to be first traffic source for beginners to try, any you would suggest related to media buying.
your perspective would help
thx,
amit

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Duplicate post

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@mattaw

what type of banner ctr were you getting? what was your aim ctr for hitting the sweet spot?

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Did you ever run any gaming offers? Any tips? I've tried quite a few, can always get plenty of clicks, but rarely conversions. Am wondering what the secret is.

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I tried xa.net (it was recommended) and was testing direct linking to credit report offer. Upload 10-15 banners and received 1000+ clicks, but not a single conversion.
Any suggestion on what niche would work on xa.net with their traffic?

Also, best way to arbitrage with media buying if you have unlimited cash for spending? <--- you don't have to answer this, im just trying to make cash without any work

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For begginers, I'd suggest sitescout and adbuyer, there are tutorials I wrote here and on bluehatseo.com about how to get started there.

Banner CTR is irrelevant. All that matters is your CPA on the backout. I've had terrible banners around 0.1% ctr that performed amazingly and banners with a 1% ctr that were terrible. CTR is a nice measure to try and improve but conversions are all that matters.

I've never ran gaming offers so I can't comment on them, sorry.

For an IO, make sure you have a 24-48 hour out clause so you can get out if the buy isn't backing out. Ask for demographic restrictions (example, if you have a free trial that needs a CC, block everyone under 18, as they don't have one to buy with). Daily spend cap is also useful or they may blow your budget fast and if you have an adserver, ask for your tags so you can swap creatives quickly (they take a lil bit to traffic the creatives). Everything is negotiable, doesn't need to be 25k, I'm sure they'd take 10k just as happily.

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Most of the niches will work, you just have to find the right traffic, I almost NEVER direct link when buying though, it isn't ppv or a search ad, the people need to be presold as they're not looking for something your just telling them about it. Also what was your spend there, if you spent $50 and didn't get a lead, this is all pretty irrelevant as you just need more data

In terms of unlimited budget, then I'd just test, test, test and find stuff that works on a direct site basis everywhere, if that makes sense.

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I add $1000 and set my daily to $100. After that I told my AM that he can do whatever he want with the money and test wherever he want, cos it was my first media. So, he spend $300+, there was no conversions and he told me that xa.net is not for me and told me that they will make exception for me if i want refund for the rest of my money there, cos they don't do refunds.
This gesture totally turned me down on my attempts for future media buying.

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Was the reason you quit media buying and started a spy tool becuase you found it hard to profit on rebills after 2010? (I don't blame you - if you an affiliate and promoting rebills on those networks you mentioned, it is quite tough these days). But I don't believe the excuse that you gave saying you got "burnt out", I just think you found it tougher to make money so you decided to create your own rebill. Which was a smart thing to do - props to you.

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a bot offtopic but still important:

Are you aware of the fact that WhatRunsWhere.com gives a blank screen (doesn't display anything) for a query let's say 300x250/728x90 , XtendMedia/Blue Lithium/a few other networks, past 30 days, US, landing page keywords blank ?

That sucks big time. Do you think that is fixable?

Thanks in advance

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Hey Matt, great thread, thanks for sharing your knowledge with us, it's awesome! Few questions here:

- Best networks to go for low-CPM traffic for co-reg paths (and freebies/coupons)? Any tips for that market?
- Dayparting: how important is it for offers like credit reports/loans/your own example?
- Which blind networks you can (could) recommend that do NOT run internal (or at least you're somewhat sure about)
- How much were you able to drop your target CPA after initial optimization (i.e. you got 3x the target CPA from the start and after 1Mil imps you were able to drop it to 0.8xCPA and hence run with 20% profit)

Thanks!!

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Have you tested low payout offers on buys? How have they backed out for you?

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Respect Nefig,

I'm definitely not Matt - Max , but I found out something interesting that may (or may not) answer one of your questions:

First things first. As obvious as it may sound - you can still get 20 cent CPM of questionable quality CPM out there. I've seen people/companies running campaigns paying that much. In a nutshell you find a so-called "full service" ad network, sign an IO, pre-pay for traffic and provide your own ad tag. Then you place as many creative as you want inside the ad tag.

There are many ways to accomplish that. I'd say doubleclick ad tags are universally accepted, SiteScout tags may work out as well. I wouldn't suggest screwing around with OpenX tags. Now the trick is to establish a relationship with a network that is connected to RTB exchanges. I've seen this approach worked with one particular network I don't want to name. I assume this may work out with SiteScout.

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@Mattaw

Thanks, the matching offers to newspaper sections is a pretty cool concept, i imagine it would dramatically change the base CPM

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Evasive - Why would I lie about why I stopped buying media. I burnt out, plain and simple. Affiliate marketing isn't a long term business where you build value over time. You create a campaign, run it and you're left with a pile of cash after, not assets, not something you can show other people. Firstly you asked a question then put words in my mouth and made up some fake answer to this question. I stopped profitable campaigns and was still doing well at the time we launched WRW publicly. The reason is we're building a long term company based on providing a great service to our users. I bought media for a lot more than rebills, and did quite well with a lot of lead gen as well. There comes a point though when you're been doing something for years on end, and seeing stuff start and die, when you want something more stable that you can build and nurse into something real and longterm. That's the "burnout" I'm talking about. Hope that answers your question.

kvakzz - We don't allow most of the display networks to be searched like that for speed and database reasons, there are too many results. This is why it shows up blank, hope that answers your question.

nefig - I would by on direct sites for super low payout offers and build off small niche sites to start, get a base there and create my own "network of sites". Over time small numbers of imps add up. EVERY network runs internal, it's part of their biz model, the smart ones don't steal stuff though as it would be biting the hand that feeds you. The drop after initial optimization really depends. Depends on who your acc manager is, how many creatives you test, and how good your placement is. There's no set answer there.

google - I have, they're fine, it all depends on the traffic and where you're buying it from...

stackman - it does, but as you and I both know, high cpms aren't necessarily a bad thing if the traffic backs out better.

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mattaw that is terrible, man. But thank you for explaining.

Now, how do I search for, let's say, all 300x250 run in the UK with Tribal Fusion which I need to do for the purpose of research?

What is it you guys allow? Seriously, as a member I'd love to know

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Kvakzzz - you'd rather the database crashes and brings down the service for everyone temporarily because we load too much data? That seems pretty silly if you ask me.
For that search you'd select your parameters, and hit search, but, I'd set the date range closer to today. If nothing is showing up, pm me and I'll get get tech to find some kind of work around for you.
To clarify, the filter has to do with the number of results being returned, if its under a certain threshold they will show up.

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Any reason why you guys don't feature Engage:BDR placements as they are a major network in most of the countries you serve?

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I don't mean to argue or piss you off. I am trying to figure out is it me who does something wrong or is it the system.

You see, I am a paid subscriber of WhatRunsWhere. But, whenever I sit down to do a 2-3 hour research I usually cannot get much off the WhatRunsWhere. I just tried to search for 300x250 banners in the US for the past 10 (ten) days and I still get blank screen.

So, the $229/month question is - what am I doing wrong?! What kind of "parameters" besides 'landing page keywords' would you suggest I enter in order to see all 728x90 that were run with Burst Media in the past 20 days?

As for the database crashes -- come one! I beleieve people are using cache servers. And, even, cache servers for cache servers... As for the badwidth... well... No offence - but your competitor allows to see image and text ads that were run on a specific network for a specific time period. Yes, I am a paid suscriber for both services

EDITED:

Here are the screenshots. Please enlighten me - what in the wrold am I doing wrong

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Ok, I've sent those images to tech, can't answer until I hear back.

If you search for banners in the past 10 days in the states, we'll return millions of results, this will majorly screw something up so as stated before, we can't do it.

If you'd like to jump on a call about this, PM me and I'll give you my # (I'll loop our CTO and my co-founder in as well) and we'll get anything sorted asap.

This is pulling the thread off topic, so if we can keep this in PM or email I think that'd be best (or you could create another thread if you really wanted).

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Just tried to send you the PM but I can't because I only have 8 posts. I'd be able to send PMs after my 10th post :-\ So I gotta write someting

Sorry about posting here. It is good to know that you are for real...

Yeah - me not being able to see ads has been happening for some time.

I realize we are talking about millions upon millions of banners if you monitor 20+ ad networks. Realistically speaking there are about 10,000 banners (give or take) submitted to the RealMedia Exchance. That's approximately 300K banners per months that go through just the RMX. I'm not even touchning DoubleClick or other exchanges. All I'm after is seeing what's happenin' out there.

Anyways, thank you for taking care of issue. I really appreciate that. As for having a call I really don't know what to say I'll be here at the forum. Let me know if you need more screenshots.

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You said that you wouldn't do payday vertical. Just curious what the reason for that was. I was looking into Payday.

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Which Verticals Work Better on Media Buying ?

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Media buying is dead bro.

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joking?

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