Turned $1.5K into $21K in 50 days - Hunger Games 2 (29)
I started IM about 7-8 years ago, though it has been on and off. My first attempt was actually a good success. I wrote an ebook and placed some aff links in it and uploaded it to a torrent site. Banked a few $K off it when I was 16 or so and in school, which was a massive amount of money for me at that age. Pity I didn’t stick to that method, I didn’t pursue it after my torrent was removed and spent all the money on useless shit lol.
I’ve tried many different avenues, but AM with paid traffic takes the cake for the most enjoyable. The instant gratification is a huge motivator. Building websites (50+ made) and doing SEO is just too slow and isn’t fun. Well spamming with Xrumer is probably the most fun I had doing SEO and building websites. Sorry forum owners 
AM with paid traffic -> See the results of your work today.
SEO -> See the results of your work weeks to months later, only for your sites to be wiped out by a Google algo update >.<
Anyway, I successfully built some display camps making $100ish per day back in Janurary until about March direct linking offers. Awesome stuff, real fun. I travelled to Japan and worked off my smartphone aha, even made creatives on it from scratch XD no laptop FTL.
I was noobing around for 3 months or so and did some big noobie mistakes that are listed on this forum, such as editing profitable campaigns too drastically and not scaling over multiple traffic sources and targets as quickly as possible. Also, the source I was using suddenly disallowed redirects and I couldn’t get my camps reapproved using aff links. BAM, camps gone and my money was being spent fast from traveling. I ended up coming back to Australia with $0, 4 guitars and credit card debt to my name lol.
Trying to get back into the game, I joined this forum in September. Aside from the tools and goldmine of information this forum has, the raw not too serious kind of mindset was really appealing. Unlike the “I’m a business man in a suit and speak proper” attitude that a lot of IM forums have. The fact that the forum has a fair few AU and NZ members was also a big plus for me.
"I never knew money like this, in the palm of my hand till I met the man with mad hook up and big plan."
In late Oct, early Nov I was invited into F5 Media by Maynzie the mayniac on the dance floor. His attitude was no less than golden and it really rubbed off on me. He helped me see how in reach it is to succeed and that you can expand stupidly quick in AM. Also that successful AMers are ‘regular’ people like you and me of all ages.
Believing that it is possible and achievable is one of the biggest things that helped me, otherwise you will subconsciously self-sabotage yourself into failure or not reaching your full potential. This happens all the time (from my own experience and observation), people are not ready for success, so even if they have everything they need to succeed they still can’t make it.
Maynzie recommended me some sweet offers with very nice payouts in niches that I have experience in and also gave me some tips on how to run them. I started with about $1.5k with a $2k credit card, with that I set up on one traffic source with one offer and started consistently doing mid-high $xxx gross per day in November, unprofitable/break even at first but after optimising the ROI was decent. Talking with Maynzie during this was really inspiring and motivating, he’s a really genuine good dude and helped me see the bigger picture.
After reaching my first $1K grossed day, I was accepted into the Hunger Games 2 for Team ASP Money Tree, man that is when shit just exploded. The competitive element and team mentality combined with the excitement of making serious money with the help, advice and support of Maynzie, Lorenzo and teammates really pushed me to my limits. Lorenzo putting me on 2x a week payments helped my cash flow enormously and allowed me to scale much further.
From Nov until now (Dec 23) I have grossed about $77K through F5 Media, $55.5K being from this month with a record day of $5K grossed. ROI has averaged out to about 25% (125%).
Hunger Games was no spoon feed (teach a man to fish vs. give a man to fish) and I’ve put years of work into building my IM skill set. I had the technical skills (tracking, html etc.) needed before competing in HG2, but was lacking in other skills (I’m still learning everyday) like knowing when to cut targets, split testing effectively, how to scale efficiently, choosing your battles wisely, managing bulk campaigns, running good offers, boosting conversions, keeping quality up and just going for it in confidence without overthinking. Too many things to list aha, but these are much more important than raw technical skills. You need to know what to do with the technical skills and how to get the most out of them.
The experience gained was phenomenal, only so much can be taught by words, tips and tricks can be taught/shared this way, but the majority needs to be learnt with hands on experience. You can’t learn to fly a plane just by reading the manual or even having the process explained by a pilot and never actually flying yourself.
Hunger Games really pushed me to keep going to find the roof, only to find that there was no roof. It’s like I wanted juice, I had the blender with fruit but no power. I was given a fruit farm and nuclear fission from Maynzie, Green and HG2 + teammates. Everything clicked into place and just worked, years of frustration and failure finally coming to an end and I’m beyond stoked about it.
Here are some tips, a lot learnt from the last few months as well as things picked up over the years. Hopefully it will be useful to some: [CONTINUED BELOW]
Have specific rules about how to cut creatives and targets. Don't piss around on targets that are losing or breaking even. 80/20 rule kind of thing, don't let the squeaky wheel get all the attention. Have a shot at making –ROI and break even targets profitable by further optimisations but focus mainly on making the big winners even more profitable. Make decisions off statistically significant data of course.
Have a set of rules to determine what is statistically significant and when to cut targets etc. Don’t do it on a case by case basis, this makes it easy to quickly cut targets without overthinking it and wasting time.
E.g. In The Angry Russian’s mobile course on this forum, his rule was spend 5x the payout of the offer you are promoting, cut the losers and optimise. I use the same rule, sometimes down to 2-3x depending on how much volume is available.
I also cut sources that have a very bad eCPC, ones that even a very good CR could not save. Cutting really low volume targets may be a good idea too, as it can take too long to get statistically significant data and profits will be almost negligible so it can be a waste of time managing them.
Don’t force things to work, go with what is working and don’t be stubborn about it. The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over expecting a different result.
-----
Choose your battles wisely. Competition can make a huge difference. This goes for traffic sources, targets and offers.
-----
Day parting can really boost your ROI, I recommend using it to cut out unprofitable parts of the day if they exist for your campaign. Don’t be a lazy ass!
-----
“It is too easy”. Many people think “this is too easy” when something works and think it was a one off or they have to improve or change it. If it works, go with it, milk it.
“Everyone must be doing it, it must be saturated, I might as well not try”. Don’t assume something is saturated and you cannot profit because of all the ‘elite’ AMers without giving it a shot.
-----
Don’t split test too much stuff at the same time and split test things that are more significant. E.g. don’t start your initial test split testing different fonts for your LP, do more drastic stuff like pictures, layout, colour theme and headlines then narrow down to the less significant stuff if you want.
-----
Socialise with others in AM, you don’t even have to talk about techniques as there is a wealth of technique shared on STM. Just having friends in the same industry as you makes it feel more real and achievable to succeed.
-----
"Quit while your ahead" - this saying is bullshit, a pussy way to do things and bad for mentality. When you're ahead, analyse how you got ahead and use this to annihi-fucking-late further. Keep pushing while you're ahead to stay ahead. The quit while you’re ahead mentality implies that any success is one off and bound to fail eventually, this isn’t the case.
-----
Aim high, real high. Aim for the moon, even if you only make it halfway you would have made it further than if you aimed for your roof and made it. Get your modest goal and multiply it by 10. It is possible and is possible sooner than you think.
-----
Don’t overthink or plan to far ahead, we have a tendency to overcomplicate shit. You might fuck around for hours trying to make your project the ‘best ever’ before launching but it would have been better to just start it minimalistic then modify it over time. Don’t be a perfectionist or OCD about it.
-----
Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater, or the bong out with the bongwater. When things go wrong, don’t throw everything away, just fix or remove the broken parts. A lot can be salvaged or even revived. If a campaign starts dying, try new landers, banners, move it to another traffic source if you haven’t scaled completely, swap out the offer with another etc. Don’t just chuck out the whole thing out, you probably have a nice amount of valuable data collected on it that shouldn’t go to waste.
-----
Apply for as many credit cards from different banks as possible to help with cash flow if your starting capital is low. Get rewards cards as you will be spending a lot. Applying for lots of credit cards in a 1 month period won’t damage your credit rating, but applying for a new one every month will have a negative effect. This is because it looks like you are constantly looking for credit.
I didn’t have recent payslips, so I photoshopped two old ones and used them to score a $6k credit card from HSBC. Just changed the employer and dates on two old and consecutive slips for a very busy casual period I was working 3-4 years ago lol. Do this at your own risk, just saying that it worked for me during HG2.
Take into account also, that if your local currency is something other than USD you will be getting charged foreign transaction fees on your credit card in one way or another, either as a separate charge or higher conversion rates. Then when you are paid from your CPA network, you may have to pay even more fees to convert the USD back to your local currency, it’s a double fuck.
That’s why I set up a USD bank account specifically for receiving payments and sending wires. This saves me a lot of money on conversion fees, save your coinage. I’m using HSBC currently, but Citibank looks like a good option too.
-----
I haven’t “made it” yet but I can taste it, I will never quit and I’m enjoying the journey.
Don’t be a “I’ll be happy when I ____” person. We always need goals to aim for, when you achieve them, you usually make more goals. If you won’t be happy until you achieve your goals then you will never be happy.
“I’ll be happy when I finish school”, “I’ll be happy when I finish uni”, “I’ll be happy when I get a job”, “I’ll be happy when I get a promotion”, “I’ll be happy when I retire” -> /dead.
-----
Be inspired. Read success stories on this forum, I found Kokofai’s success thread really inspiring.
-----
Remember when you were a kid and nothing was impossible? You could achieve anything you wanted and be anyone you wanted. Before the weight of the world crushed your soul haha! That mentality is what you need. There is no “I can’t”.
You won the first race in your life out of hundreds of millions of sperms, just to be born you won. Don’t waste it not following your dreams. You are good enough to make it and the only thing stopping you is yourself. You need to want success as much as you need to breath, have fun, enjoy it and accept it. Success is yours for the taking.
“If you don’t go for your dreams, someone else will hire you to achieve theirs.”
- Quote from awesome vid Maynzie showed me
Don’t give up, no one else can do this except you. Do you want to be on your death bed with a life of regrets? Imagine making a big difference in your family tree for generations to come, imagine being able to look after your family and make them happy and proud.
Nothing would make me more fulfilled than to take my parents and sister traveling to places they have always wanted to visit but couldn’t afford to, remove financial boundaries, buy them things like a house, car etc. and improve their lives overall. Even to help extended family and friends. This is one of the biggest if not the biggest motivators for me.
My goal is bigger than my own needs (of course my own needs is a huge motivator in itself) and it has really helped me keep pushing. I’ll need to become really wealthy to achieve this, so that’s the goal. If you need extra drive, I recommend aiming for success in order to help your family.
Some say money doesn’t buy happiness, but I’d say they’re full of shit, it indirectly buys a lot of happiness and lack of money buys misery. You need to own money and control it, so that it doesn’t control you and your lifestyle by giving you financial boundaries and forcing you to work a 9-5.
“Most guys are just whimps.. pussies.. cowards, they don’t have it. So they should get a job.”
– Robert Kiyosaki
-----
Josh, Lorenzo, John, Drew, Jim, Johnny and Deon, you guys are awesome and it was a pleasure to battle together in HG2. I really look forward to meeting you guys in person someday!
Special thanks to Josh, seriously dude, I’ll never forget what you’ve done for me and I couldn’t have achieved this without your broship.
Also special thanks to Lorenzo (you led us well), Jordan and Besmir for this awesome forum and hosting the Hunger Games.
Joining STM is hands down the best move in my entire IM career, besides actually starting my IM career.
~ Genji
Congrats! Just believing that you can achieve something is the hardest step to take. This whole process gets a lot easier once cashflows are sorted out!
Wow ! Speechless !!!
Awesome! Congrats man.
Nice work Genji! You're a monster dude. I'm actually in Japan right now as part of the Osaka P-Town Clique brah. Definitely meet up when I'm back in Perth, I don't meet too many IMers back there!
Best success story I have read 
Loved it!!! Wishing you all the best, and keep up the great work!
I'm so glad of you Genji! Glad that my story helps! And now it will be yours to help others! congratulations on your success and now it's the time to make it even bigger!
STM is not an ordinary forum that just feed you information, instead, it is a place for you to change your life. If you are still here reading without doing anything, I strongly advise you start taking actions right now and you'll succeed if you don't quit!
The story of Genji proves it once again.
Ask yourself guys, Do you want to be the next thread started under this [Success Stories] Section? My answer was yes, and so did Genji's I believe! Again congratulations to you Genji! Keep it up and hit the 6 figures point!
Yep......that was the best inspirational post I've ever read! Congrats man!
Yeah big times, working with Genji has been nothing but a goood time! He listens to every tip I've said and expands on it in even ways I hadn't thought of yet, I got no doubt in my mind his paving his way into a real player in this industry.
Hats off to you bro, extremely well done and thank you so much for committing to the projects.
Wow i didn't read most of that but yeah.. that's the spirit brother! Keep pushin!
Thanks for the kind words everyone, I really appreciate it
Originally Posted by lavish
If you haven't been already, you should def go skiing/snowboarding in Hokkaido its possible, the season has just started. It's like 1080 Snowboarding on the N64 aha, pure awesome. So many aussies up there too.
Yeah for sure, def meet up when you're back in Perth. Give us the heads up when you're back and we'll hit the export ahaha!
Originally Posted by kokofai
Originally Posted by maynzie
I wouldn't be where I am today without your help and support! Thanks dude, words can't describe how grateful I am *brohug*
“If you don’t go for your dreams, someone else will hire you to achieve theirs.”
Great quote^, perspective, tips and write-up. Well done Genji!
Awesome post! Thanks for motivation and tips from HG2. Hope you have even more success in 2013!
Wow!! Thats Really Inspiring!! Maynzie is actually partly responsible for my $500/day goal too !!
Thanx Kyuss for inspiration, and yessss!! Congratulations!! May you reach much higher heights than what you aimed for!!
Thanks dudes and happy new year! Hope you all stack copious amounts of money in 2013!
Originally Posted by sean3
Nicccee, yeah Maynzie is a top bloke ay!!
Great post, very inspirational... I can relate as I only recently started seeing this type of success w/ IM. I feel the same way as you, def not ready to settle here and looking for that next big step.
Originally Posted by thomasbhm
Amazing post, words of wisdom... going to read it again later!
some really strong motivation thanks the post!
INSPIR-FUCKING-RATIONAL!!! Awesome man, love it!
Shit can't believe I missed this one kyuss. Awesome write up man!
Very inspiring thread!!! I'm really happy for your success and for a lot more success in the future.
You are one of a few people who figure out what life is all about.
Cheers!
Great thread, super inspiring. I wanna have a thread up here too. Time to make some fresh accs
Masterful thread, damn Masterminds are a super productive way to get shit done.
I put together a small 3 man adult group about 2 weeks ago, and already there has been $xxxx made days, one of the major reasons being how open and transparent every member has been. From day 1 they were super friendly, even though it was a blind introduction they were sharing all their knowledge they had learned and their results have been phenomenal so far!
Synergy 2+2=5
There are real gems hidden in 2 year old posts. Very inspiring! I wonder where in the sky must Genji be after 2 years!
Awesome story, where abouts in Australia are you from?
awesome man! I hope your still around here. Impressive you were able to create creatives on your phone. One great thing about the industry is the ability to be MOBILE.
Home > Success, Wins, Achievements > Success Stories