Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 12:28 pm Post subject: Adwords - Overture ?
Hi all,
I heard of affiliates without web sites or even a newsletter.
They simply buy Ad-words or Overture Ads and they set up a redirect
to the merchant with their affiliate links.
I would like to do the same because in my niche keypharses and words are cheap. Top bid around 0,18 $ and the average commission is 16 $ for the products I promote.
My problem is, I don't know about the PPC game , if you know any resource preferably free let me know or if you are good at this please share some information.
Steve.
Last edited by SteveTao on Mon Nov 03, 2003 5:30 pm; edited 1 time in total
Joined: 08 Aug 2003 Posts: 205 Location: Assisi, Italy
Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 5:12 pm Post subject:
Hi Steve,
What you are asking is a numbers game, and to do it well, make sure either the affiliate program in question has tracking, or you use some form of redirect tracking as a starting point, you have to watch your numbers like a hawk!
$16 commission with the PPC game isn't that great - especially at $0.18 per click. Just to break even you need to make a sale for every 88 visitors. Add in a factor of about 10% false clicks (that all PPC engines acquire minimum - we have tested this thoroughly) - so, to be safe you should figure 1 sale for every 80 visitors (just to break even).
Not many sales pages will pull this number directly from a PPC campaign. You would probably lose money here. Add on the factor that "affiliate" will be written on your ad (Overture and Google do this), and things get even grimmer.
Take the same scenario at $0.05 per click and things start to look a lot better. To break even you need to make a sale for every 320 visitors, for a good copywriter, this usually isn't difficult to optain, but the question is, did the merchant use a good copywriter? Few do.
Ask the merchant if they have CR% (conversion rate) stats that they can share with you - this will help you to determine your max. bid (but for goodness sakes, leave some cushion space - the real CR% will probably be worse than what they tell you).
There are several good paid resources for the PPC game - but I don't have the links handy. Money can be made, but it isn't as easy as it seems. Be careful.
Posted: Mon Nov 03, 2003 10:29 pm Post subject: PPC and Google Adwords
Hi Steve!
Tim has given you excellent advice. I would look for programs that pay you $30 or more and look for clicks between $0.05 - $0.10. As Tim stated you MUST track your campaings and results. CTR and your sales copy are also very important. Don't forget, Overture don't let you click directly through a merchants site. And Google only allows sites without PopUps. So it is possible to do it without a website, but you are limited.
Here is one question I've got asked very often:
"Google Cash, an interesting read but ... is it really that easy to succeed? And off we go to dream like results = $1000, $2000, etc, etc.
And just for five or ten minutes work. Can you get me some of that?"
This is possible, but very rare. You should see Google Cash and the Google Adwords campaigns as work. You need to do some research on very good keywords, writing a terrific sales copy and tracking your results constantly. Improve your adcopy and CTR constantly. I'm running some capaigns here in Germany with Google.de and my results are very,very good.
You can make a good amount of money with Google Adwords, but this is not a get rich quick scheme. Remember:
You have to spend money before you can make any money. I recommend that you have a starting budget of $50-$100 minimum.
Can you lose money with it? Absolutely. Can you make money with it? Absolutely. I've done both. I am ahead now that I have "mastered it" as well as I have but it is definitely not a quick fix with no homework involved.
To find the best keywords and spying how much competition there is on Google I use Jeff Alderson's "Adwords Analyzer Tool".
Jeff is now working on a lot more features and I'm very satisfied that I bought it, because it's now a lot easier to find keywords and see instantly how much Google Adwords campaigns are running for a specific keyword. If you live outside the US, you can also use a build in feature to see the results as the US users see them. You don't need a proxy server any more.
Thanks for the advices.
I have a couple of questions.
When do you consider a campaign is a failure ?
What are your rules for money management ?
From what I understand on Overture only the top three bids are displayed on all partner sites. So should I always be a top bidder , is it possible to make it with a less advantageous position ?
I won a 50 dollars offer at Overture , I will probably give it a try. Now , you said about a terrific adcopy . This is can be problematic , merchants aren't good at this. If I direct the visitor on an affiliate site with an adcopy , it involve at least two more things , web hosting cost and domain name cost and I guess each product promoted must have it's own mini-site. It's expensive but the mini-sites can have extra-traffic for free by normal submission in search engines. What is the % of your non-ppc traffic or better what the CR of your non-ppc traffic , if I can ask ?
These questions weren't for me, but I answer anyway
SteveTao wrote:
When do you consider a campaign is a failure ?
When you spend more money than you make.
Quote:
What are your rules for money management ?
Don't spend more money than you make (and remember to include all the hidden expenses in your calculations).
Quote:
From what I understand on Overture only the top three bids are displayed on all partner sites. So should I always be a top bidder , is it possible to make it with a less advantageous position ?
There's no reason to go for the top spot at all costs. In a way it actually makes sense to bid for the lowest possible ranking - that's where the best ROI is.
Quote:
Now , you said about a terrific adcopy . This is can be problematic , merchants aren't good at this.
You can say that again. This is one of the main problems for anyone who runs an ads-financed site, email newsletter or other internet based service.
With the current shift of focus from pay-per-sale and back to pay-per-click programs the situation should improve eventually, but it might take a while.
Quote:
If I direct the visitor on an affiliate site with an adcopy ,...
From what I understand, they were talking about the text of the ad itself. There are lots you can do even with the single sentence or so AdSense allows.
Quote:
it involve at least two more things , web hosting cost and domain name cost and I guess each product promoted must have it's own mini-site. It's expensive...
If you shop around a bit, you should be able to get a hosting package complete with domain name for considerably less than 10 dollars a month (I pay 4 for each of my mini-sites and I didn't spend that much time and energy looking for the best offer). Whether that's expensive is hard to say, but if you're talking about 50 dollar bids at Overture and really believe you can write better adcopy, it's certainly worth serious consideration. _________________ Frank Nordberg
http://www.musicaviva.com
The internet center for free sheet music
$16 commission with the PPC game isn't that great - especially at $0.18 per click. Just to break even you need to make a sale for every 88 visitors. Add in a factor of about 10% false clicks (that all PPC engines acquire minimum - we have tested this thoroughly) - so, to be safe you should figure 1 sale for every 80 visitors (just to break even).
Not many sales pages will pull this number directly from a PPC campaign. You would probably lose money here. Add on the factor that "affiliate" will be written on your ad (Overture and Google do this), and things get even grimmer.
One thing that can help increase the odds in your favour, is to create some sort of series of tips or mini course related to the product.
If you use a landing page of your own, you can pop up from this, if using Overture, but will need to use the main page for Adwords (where pop ups are banned).
Basically, you gain a contact address for "helpful news" coupled with reminders for your affiliate link to the product.
Frank wrote:
These questions weren't for me, but I answer anyway
So do I...
SteveTao wrote:
When do you consider a campaign is a failure?
In an ideal world, I like to track all affiliate products as far as the sale. (However, this is often not possible, as many merchants do not play ball their side of the server.)
Often, you find sales being made quite a while later, but which show up as coming from the original tracked PPC ad. Presumably similar things are happening with the untracked cases, though you can't tell.
What I am saying is, that these PPC campaigns can often turn out to be more successful than their initial results might indicate. This is especially true if you use the email collection and follow up method mentioned earlier. It's just very hard to track in most cases.
It basically depends on your relationship with the "subscribers". Also, how much work are you prepared to do?
SteveTao wrote:
From what I understand on Overture only the top three bids are displayed on all partner sites. So should I always be a top bidder , is it possible to make it with a less advantageous position?
What ever you do, you must do the maths, and not fall into the trap of competing with the brand-obsessed, money-wasting big boys.
That said go for #3 if you can afford it. (From my experience, you don't gain anything much from being #1 - just lose money faster.)
Remember that during the last week of every month, many of the big companies (who have used up their monthly ad budget) temporarily withdraw their listings. Thus #5 might end up #3 for the last week of the month, but without paying any more. Keep an eye on your niche, to check how things unfold.
Failing that, #4 down to #10 are all used by other lesser partners, and you will gain some traffic. You need to experiment with different placements, to see what the balance of price and traffic works out. All cases vary.
Finally, if your market is extremely competitive, you might consider aiming at the bottom of the first page of results. I haven't tried this myself, but a famous marketer once recommended this to me. I guess the theory is that people scan the page, and if they don't click the top few, the last ones tend to linger in their mind.
Needless to say, wherever you end up, make sure your listing is designed to draw the targeted click. If your ad is good but general, you risk spending a lot but selling little. If your ad is just poor, you won't spend much, but you'll sell even less!
SteveTao wrote:
If I direct the visitor on an affiliate site with an adcopy , it involve at least two more things , web hosting cost and domain name cost and I guess each product promoted must have it's own mini-site. It's expensive but the mini-sites can have extra-traffic for free by normal submission in search engines.
Yes, they can. But you can still just group a selection of PPC landing pages on one domain if you choose. Remember your MWR is getting the affiliate click, so no need to worry about much other than a larger preselling text ad.
SteveTao wrote:
What is the % of your non-ppc traffic or better what the CR of your non-ppc traffic , if I can ask?
I have a number of small sites, and use both methods (and others) to draw traffic. Each site varies. So can't answer that one.
But the fact remains... certain people make a great deal of money using each approach.
Hope this helps,
Charlie. _________________ "Before I speak, I have something important to say."
- Groucho Marx
(No-pressure, wonderful and informative free eCourse is
on the exit pop on the site if you?d like to check it out)
SteveTao wrote:
Hi all,
I heard of affiliates without web sites or even a newsletter.
They simply buy Ad-words or Overture Ads and they set up a redirect
to the merchant with their affiliate links.
I would like to do the same because in my niche keypharses and words are cheap. Top bid around 0,18 $ and the average commission is 16 $ for the products I promote.
My problem is, I don't know about the PPC game , if you know any resource preferably free let me know or if you are good at this please share some information.
Joined: 08 Aug 2003 Posts: 205 Location: Assisi, Italy
Posted: Tue Nov 04, 2003 5:42 pm Post subject:
Steve,
A lot of good info here helping to give various ideas and directions you could go in.
I have some good news to report with Adsense (as an advertiser). It helped our CR% grow. My partner called me up last night to let me know that one of our sites is going great guns (with Adwords/Adsense), we are directly selling a broad topic service with PPC traffic (I wrote the copy), and it is now pulling almost 3% CR - this is fantastic (and very profitable). Most of the sales are coming from Adsense affiliate sites (not Google's search page) - quite frankly, I am surprised!
We also tried Overture and Findwhat, but they bombed (almost zero sales) - had we just tried Overture, we would have thought that our promotion was a failure, when we have found it is raging!
Maybe in a month or so, we will open up an affiliate program now ... something that affiliates can sink their teeth into.
The unfortunate reality with what you are hoping to do is that most merchants don't even have a clue what their CR% is (as Charlie mentioned) - so, you end up being the Guinea Pig. Or they tell you that they have a CR% that is based on very limited info. Very few merchants take the time and energy to make sure that their sales page pulls before creating an affiliate program. I wrote our sales copy twice before finding the winner here, and we had to try several sources before finding the the best source of traffic (so far). We will tell our affiliates where we have had the best success (the more they succeed, the more we will succeed), and where it didn't work to well for us. Very, very few merchants will walk this extra mile for you - if you find one who does, work with them, often they are worth their weight in gold!
I like to promote stuff that is off the beaten path, even with merchants that don't even have an affiliate program, but this is a whole different topic, and is a bit tricky.
If I like a product, but not the affiliate program - I tell the Merchant, and I tell them what my conditions are to work with them (very gently and graciously). Generally, they are very willing to listen, and sometimes even excited to make modifications. Sometimes they ignore me. If I don't feel good about the affiliate program, and the merchant isn't willing to meet my needs, then I let it go - I have stopped taking it in the teeth. So, don't force anything, use your advertising money cautiously, and do your homework.
There is no such thing as a free lunch. You say you have $50 as a gift for Overture - great! At the very least you will get some valuable experience (at no risk), this can only help.
Posted: Fri Nov 07, 2003 6:20 pm Post subject: DISCOURAGING OVERTURE BIDDERS
There is something I don't understand.
If the minimun bid at Overture is 10 cent.
Why the 'Overture Bids tool' show bids as low as 5 cent ?
and what do you think of the technique below , its from the Trafficology Newsletter.
DISCOURAGING OVERTURE BIDDERS
Here's an interesting little item. I don't know how practical
it is, but I think it's worth a look.
There are several people who constantly pour over their
Overture bids, optimizing here, experimenting there, and
maximizing ROI whenever possible.
But most of us - those who have lives - usually just wait for
the monthly activity report from Overture to analyze our bids,
and to re-think our strategy. It's usually at this point when
I make the decision to raise or lower a bid, and it's that
tendency that inspired this idea...
The submitter of this idea first suggests doing research to
find out when the Overture monthly report data is compiled.
To do this, he begins changing his bids on various keywords
(every 8 hours) a few days before the Overture monthly report
is due. He makes a notation of the time and date of each bid
change.
When the monthly report finally arrives, he checks the
information in the report to see which bids are identified in
the report, and uses this data to find out exactly (well,
within 8 hours) of when the data was compiled.
Now that he knows this, he can raise his maximum bids to a
very high level JUST BEFORE the next monthly report is
compiled. Whatever clicks he gets will cost him more, but he
only has to do this until the report data is collected, which
he knows within an 8-hour window. After that point, he can
return his bids to normal.
What's the point of all this?
Okay, let's say he and I are bidding on the same keyword.
I'm bidding $0.25 a click and he's bidding $0.26 a click.
He's #1 and I'm #2. Since I know that the #1 position on
Overture gets a lot more clicks, I might be tempted to bid
$0.27 to be in the top position. But then, he'd bid $0.28,
thus starting a bidding war. Before you know it, we'd both
be paying A LOT MORE MONEY per click, yet we'd have the same
relative position we had before.
But what if, when my monthly activity report arrives in my
inbox, I see that I'm #2 at $0.25 but the #1 bidder has a
maximum bid of $3.50?? I don't even have the slightest
temptation to adjust my bid at this point because I'd have
to bid $3.51 per click! So I would leave my bid right where
it is.
And of course, as soon as the monthly reports are sent out,
he goes to Overture and reduces his bid back to $0.26.
As I said, it's an interesting concept, and one that may
even prove to be practical with high-price-per-click
keywords.
About GoogleCash - is it worth the purchase? I wouldn't want to purchase yet another eBook, especially a short one like that unless it has something incremental to offer.
GoogleCash does seem, on the face of it to be for real, but then again, so do so many of them. It does seem more real than most though. The big question is using a system like GoogleCash, how much money do you have to lose before you can make a profit?
Also, with the trend swinging back to pay per click once more thanks to Adsense, is pay per sale really where to start looking right now?
Posted: Tue Nov 18, 2003 12:15 am Post subject: Google Adwords ebooks....
Hi!
I have read nearly every ebook and report about Google Adwords and there is quite a difference in the material. While the Googlecash ebook is very basic it is also a good starting point. Chris has now included an excellent bonus which is a teleseminar with Jonathan Mizel and Perry Marshall (Adwords Guru). So the package together is really worth the money. But my highest recommendation gets now Google Profit, which is the far best ebook / Membership site about Google Adwords. Very detailed information for beginners and the more advanced users of Google Adwords.
Joined: 06 Oct 2003 Posts: 17 Location: California
Posted: Tue Nov 18, 2003 6:09 am Post subject:
Hello dk,
I clicked on the last line in your signature:
http://www.googleprofit.com/?hop=ebooks242
Looked over the site and signed up for the newsletter. With my pop-up blocker on, when I clicked the button for the free newsletter one window after another started opening on my computer until about 20 were open. While trying to shut the windows down I caught a glimpse of what appeared to we a download that was coming in.
To stop the process I had to hit the off button on the computer. I don?t know what you or the site owners are trying to accomplish. From now on anything that says Google Profit or dk goes to the trash. Any comments?
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