What's the right mentality? Aiming for $5/day or $1k/day? (31)
I'm trying to get some opinions on what the right mentality to approach this AM thing after a few years of struggling.. Some super affiliates and life coaches say to think 'big' and big things will come, while others say you should start small, get on base and work for $5-$10 a day campaigns and eventually things will build from there.. Any opinions? thanks
depends on your ambition and your budget I guess, if you're absolutely new to this, take the time to learn and practice small and you'll see from there, as you gather knowledge and experience you'll see when you feel comfortable starting to aim higher.
but don't put any limitations on yourself though, you can be confident that if you want it bad enough, you can get to the 1K$/day, and work towards that! 
mehdi
Think of it like this...
You have a goal- let's say you want to make 1 million in 1 year.
"Wow, that's a big goal!" you may say. And it is! I would like to make this much myself. But, it's hard to look at an entire year's earnings as a single event- a single 'thing' to happen. So let's break it down:
$1,000,000 per year is $83,333 per month.
"Okay. Now that's a smaller number, but it's still pretty big." That's true- considering my current level of income, it's hard to imagine making that much in a month. Let's go further:
$83,333 per month is $2,777 per day (avg. 30 days/month).
"Hey, there are lots of guys on this forum that make $1,000 or more per day! That doesn't sound so bad." If I can get to $1K a day, I see no reason that I can't do $3K a day.
But the thing is, you can't just jump right from $0 to $3,000 per day. You have to make every amount in between before you get there- that's where Critical Path Management comes in. You know that you have to learn to make $50 a day before you can make $500 a day; you have to learn to make $500 a day to make $1000; and so on and so forth. Here's another analogy: let's say you want to get into powerlifting. You want to be able to squat 800lbs, which by the standards of some powerlifting organizations (WestSide for example), is really not that heavy- much like I'm sure that $1m in a year isn't that much compared to some members on here, or for top-end super-affiliates. But that would make you happy- that's your goal. If you get into a squat rack with 800 on the bar on your first day, you will literally die or break something. Well, probably. So what you have to do is work hard to be able to lift every denomination of weight in between. If you follow a solid program with focus and commitment and have a solid diet, you can strengthen your legs to squat 200. Then 250, then 300, until you get to your goal.
You gotta think big to set your long-term goals. But you should also set short term goals that lead to the completion of your long term goals, otherwise you will become frustrated. But if you only set easily attainable short-term goals that aren't part of a 'bigger picture', you will lack direction and ultimately may find less success as you fail to push yourself to a certain place.
Now, this is basically conjecture as there are some people (on this forum, too) who literally start banking $1000/day within their first couple weeks. Then even higher. Some will likely disagree with this methodology. And, of course, maybe you'll jump from a consistent $100/day to $500/day with nothing in between. But the goal setting remains the same - use your end goal as a starting point, and work backwards to set smaller goals that will get you there. That way you'll know you're going the right direction, and you'll always have something to pursue that isn't so far outside of your abilities as to seem unattainable... but will move you further along that path of where you want to be. That's what works for me.
Keep in mind this is pretty simplified because it's easy to break down money in such a way, and maybe your goals (short and long) will change along the way. In fact, they probably will. But you can apply this to everywhere in your life.
... For the record, one of my end-goals is to reach 195lbs and <10% body fat, which is why I find the fitness analogy useful for me. My genetic potential is probably about a maximum of 210lbs of muscle, and I don't plan on doing bodybuilding shows competitively, so I would be happy with this result. Probably ecstatic.
wow.. thanks for your input
boom to the boomachucka, brilliant
What boomachucka said is brilliant! little mini goals leading up to a larger goal! Way it was broken down to me is like this... think of your goals as climbing a stair case. You want to get to the top, but you can only climb one step at a time... You're still thinking big (the top) but concentrating on the next step.
If you break down that 1000/day goal into smaller ones you'll start to formulate your plan, but in doing so you can't really focus on the money parts of it, but rather on what is going to result in the money. Money is the outcome of the process, so focus mainly on the process. Key is to find out what is different about a $50/day process than a $500/1000 day process. That's how I look at it
Tim Ferriss has a really good approach to goal setting. It's pretty congruent with boomachucka's strategy as well.
The idea is to set huge, super ambitious long term goals but to set very small, manageable daily goals.
Having the ambitious long term goals gets your brain thinking of ways to achieve them while also serving as a tool for motivation. In the affiliate marketing sense, if you only planned to ever make $50/day, ideas of scaling, moving to higher-budget traffic sources, starting your own business, etc etc etc would probably never even come on the radar. If you had plans of making $10,000/day, you'd probably be thinking about these things.
Having the easy and manageable daily goals does a few things. First, they're intended to ensure consistency of action and minimize potential for burnout. The hope is also that once you finish your goals for the day, the sense of accomplishment you feel and momentum you build keeps you working far longer than you "had" to. Even if you don't get any momentum going though, you've still gotten some work done and you avoid having days where you feel so overwhelmed with stuff you need to do that you end up doing nothing at all.
Lots of motivation in this tread. Lovin' it!
Realistically, I think it depends on your life situation.
If you are in a rough financial position and you have a lot of fixed responsibilities (mortgages, kids, credit card bills), then striving to make small amounts with the maximum ROI possible is the most sensible way forward.
I would never advocate attempting to conjure a $3,000/day out of thin air if it meant compromising your other responsibilities. But if you do have the money to invest, and can afford to take the loss if it all goes tits-up, then by all means set ambitious targets and use them to drive you forward.
One thing I would say about affiliate marketing is that budgeting and financial forecasting is pointless.
It's no good making X/day for a week and then predicting that you're going to be a millionaire by the end of the year. It doesn't work like that. Offers disappear, campaigns tank, and the volatile nature of the industry means that a profit margin in 2012 is unlikely to be the same in 2013.
It's one of my biggest pet peeves. Figures forecasting in affiliate marketing is just not the same as other businesses where you actually have control over the variables.
In my opinion, the best mentality is to forget the money altogether. Ask yourself not "how can I make £1000/day?", but "how can I provide £1000 worth of value every day?"
When you have a business model that provides measurable value, then you can start forecasting figures and growth expectations.
Traditional affiliate marketing in the CPA sense... this is just arbitrage. You have no control.
Yes, you can make incredible money, but the only figures that mean anything are those already cashed and cleared in your bank account.
Originally Posted by Finch
Exactly. I think that's the fundamental mindset that has to be behind any long-term business.
Aside from the JFK reference, setting goals is all well and good, but like Finch said, the real world isn't so predictable.
Success isn't linear. If you divide up your yearly target equally into daily increments, you're setting yourself up for disappointment.
You need to work out what actions you're going to do that actually get you closer to those goals/targets, otherwise you're just a dreamer deluding yourself. The warm & fuzzy self-help feel-good platitudes are not enough.
Originally Posted by Finch
Obviously, all of us without exception, go into AM with money in mind. But I've never found setting financial targets works for me - if anything it stresses me out. I think focusing on the money stops you from the focussing on the process, which is the most important part.
I found I made more money by setting myself targets like: This weekend I need to launch 3 new campaigns OR Today I need to create 200 ads covering 2 different angles. Last time I did the latter of those 2, I had a couple of real winners in all of those 200 ads I tested which must have made me $xxxx's. But creating 200 ads is a much more tangible target than I need to make $xxxx.
Weirdly, I think I've made the most money when not focusing on the cash.
Originally Posted by richardj
Thanks for all your opinions, I think my probems involves not launching enough campaigns instead of obsessing about why this or that offer isnt working, why it stops converting after 1 day, or why I cant optimize it well enough to get a decent profit.. Anyways, priceless opinions guys thanks.
I've crossed the 4 digits per day mark a long time ago.
The secret really is better copywriting and more testing.
Affiliate marketing = Copywriting + Testing
There have been studies conducted that show if even the smallest amount of cognitive ability is needed for a task, then focusing on a reward will hinder your abilities rather than enhance them. So while I think it's important to have a financial goal in mind, that shouldn't be our motivational factor. Like richardj said, focusing on targets like creating x number of campaigns by this time, or getting CTR to this number might be better for our performance. I have problems taking my mind off the money too, but I find if I just see that I'm constantly losing money then that is demotivating. So I am trying to focus more on the process rather than the money.
This video does a great job explaining what motivates us: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc
Originally Posted by philme
I think I read that in Daniel Kahneman´s book Thinking fast and slow
Fall in love with the process. It should be an obsession that you think about all the time (as long as it makes you happy and not depressed). I've made big numbers, got comfortable and lost it like most have done. Just humble yourself, focus on ONE traffic source and make it happen. Big numbers means nothing if you aren't consistent or don't understand WHY the campaign worked to begin with. The copy cats are just shooting themselves in the foot and won't last in the long run. Eventually, you will be able to eyeball a campaign and tell if it has potential, if you can scale it, etc.
Become excited when your campaigns are approved
Get excited when you make SOME conversions.
Hell, when a campaign bombs it's not a failure. You successfully found a way that doesn't work.
ANGLES, ANGLES, ANGLES Damnit. If you keep approaching campaigns like the average newb, you will get the same result. If you want to approach a campaign taking the OBVIOUS angle, you will most likely compete with people who are getting way more per lead.
Most importantly, don't think you are king SHIT when you make your first couple x,xxx per day campaign and start getting comfortable. Push harder. It's possible.
thanks agitated, I literally had 1 profitable $30/day campaign out of last 2 years so I'm having trouble identifying WHY that campaign worked and also that merchant ended up scrubbing on their backend so every network I ran with had same CR.. that offer 'my pc backup' was converting so hot the first week at ewa, but I could never get my conversion rate back up after that 1rst week. This was my first campaign taking an ANGLE opposed to going with just targeting related urls on ppv. I guess it was just the right combination of good traffic volume, right angle and right offer.. this is very hard to duplicate because there are no other offers in this niche besides Just Cloud, which never converted for me.. thanks so much guys for all your feedback!
Lot's of good stuff here but Richard's comment below really seemed to hit home for me. Since I've started AM I've been big on setting goals and I really feel a sense of accomplishment when I achieve them. But, after reading this it occurred to me that all of my goals have been based around how much money I make. I am going to try to implement this mindset in my own work and start setting goals for creating new campaigns, coming up with new angles, or testing new ads/landers etc.
Originally Posted by richardj
Originally Posted by doppelganger
this thread is golden... thank you to everyone that posted
Originally Posted by jeffs8914
this thread is killah!
$1k day lol
Go Big or Go Home!
Definitely the best mindset for me has always been incremental. If you are skinny and want to get big and ripped, you can't just make that your only goal. You have to have tons of mini goals along the way or else you'll lose faith and motivation.
GO BIG OR GO HOME.
I set my goals high and I've hit them all. I've gone higher than I could have ever expected, and now I just keep trying to push the limits.
I would say setting a goal for one million a year is just fine and realistic. Just do realistic things to get there. Running dating ads on POF probably isn't as of 2012 from what it seems. A nice offer you negotiate and push yourself with close attention to detail.
now thats ++
(edit, if it matters, I'm just *starting* to make some real money) Good luck
don't set yourself a fixed monetary goal like that in my opinion. Just focus to be in a constant state of testing and learning. You could go from $100 / day to $1k a day literally overnight just by something clicking. You could stumble across some trick or exploit on a traffic source (i.e., how the guys who figured out how to get tons of extra free clicks on mobile, etc). People focus too much on monetary goals and little details, but it's really the cumulative effect of testing and learning every day. You may hit your first huge campaign after a month, or it may not be for a year. You can spend days and days building tons of little micro niche campaigns or you could focus big on something that has huge scalability. Both are a lot of work to effectuate, but a lot of people think they're only capable of making $100 / day, they fall victim to the thought process of "I could never make 1k / day". Don't sell yourself short is the most important thing. You can go from $0 - 1k / day as fast as you can go from 1k / day back to $0 so always stay learning and the combination of all the skills you develop will pay off. Even the best guides can't include the internal learning that goes on from running campaigns day in an day out. Cheers, and good luck!
Haha very true scott I read it with a JFK accent as well
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