Finch Sells | Affiliate Marketing Blog

I’m An Affiliate Marketer, Get Me Out Of Here

Feb 10 2010

How many of you have seen The Wire?

There’s a character called Stringer Bell who fronts a Baltimore drugs gang (Ask Cakes for details), and slowly becomes disillusioned with the shady shit he has to deal with on a day to day basis. In a bid to escape the wrong side of the law, he uses the gang’s drug money to invest in property and real estate. Ultimately it all goes wrong and he gets shotgunned down for his sins.

If you’re wondering what the hell I’m talking about – or why – it’s because I’m feeling the strong urge to pull a Stringer Bell, leap out of this shady industry and throw my money at something that doesn’t make me blush when I explain the mechanics of how it produces profit.

Affiliate marketing is full of so much bullshit and unnecessary drama. You can do everything in your power to avoid the drama, but when networking is such an integral part of your business, the drama becomes a lurking fixture of your day. Staring in awe at a cyber shitstorm over nothing in particular. None of the time management tools in the world can fully isolate you from an industry which regurgitates endless shit like no other.

I’ve been thinking about how I can limit the negative aspects of affiliate marketing. How can I cut down on the bullshit and learn to see through the lies without wasting any more of my time than I need to?

It’s a very shady space to work in. Some of the things I see affiliates doing – some of the things I engage in myself – would certainly rank low on the list of “topics to discuss with the grandparents over Sunday roast”. You can say that it’s a dog eat dog world. But one look at WickedFire and I’d change that to “dog eats dog while cheered on by pack of starving wolves”.

You people love drama. And as a guy who blogs to the exact crowd that love it most, I would be a colossal hypocrite to sit here raising a white flag and begging for mercy.

Instead I’m thinking about how I can adapt a business model that allows me to sleep easier at night. Most of us who’ve been doing this for any length of time appreciate that there’s a system in place. I haven’t promoted rebills for so long that I’ve convinced myself they’ve gone out of fashion. But even working with dating, gaming and a bunch of other CPA offers – I’m still riddled with the guilt that making money shouldn’t be this easy. So much of marketing is about creating false positives and selling a user what deep down you know they don’t really need.

I’ve made a personal effort to promote reputable offers and steer well clear of the continuity market. But it still bothers me that my working day involves tapping in to consumer weaknesses and surrounding myself in these negative energies. Negative energies? Yeah, I had a curry for dinner. I’m pretty fucking full of negative energies right now.

At the moment, it’s fine.

Affiliate marketing is an addictive circle to be working in. It can be so incredibly lucrative. I speak to guys who are millionaires in their early 20s and it’s all thanks to an industry that anybody can excel in if they have their fucking nuts screwed on.

But are you planning on doing this forever? Or do you have an exit strategy?

Last week, Nickycakes took a backlash from some of the WickedFire community for releasing a product that allegedly clashed with some of the rants he’d written in the past. I noticed a few posts mentioning how he obviously couldn’t be making as much money as he once did if he was willing to release a relatively low margin product in comparison.

This is such bullshit, I can barely believe I’m even writing about it. I’m not leaping to Cakes’ defense by any means. I’ve never met the guy and I’ve never tried his product. But are all affiliate marketers expected to live and die by the arbitrage game for the rest of their careers?

Whether Nick’s product blows or not, it’s pretty irrelevant. Escaping the “buy traffic to sell traffic” trap is something that I think any affiliate would be a mug to ignore. I don’t see how all of us can possibly get away with exploiting something that is this lucrative forever. Especially if affiliate marketing continues to grow at the same rapid rate.

I’ve been mulling over my own options and thinking about what I want to do. How can I use affiliate marketing as a launch pad to a stable long term business that reaches beyond basic CPA arbitrage? Well, I’ve been posting recently about building long term assets, and there’s a lot more to come there.

For me personally, I don’t plan on sticking in this industry for long. I’ve seen enough of affiliate marketing to know that while I’m enjoying it now as a 22 year old with no family of my own to support – I don’t want to be riding this horse for any longer than I need to be. I have my eye on property investment as an exit plan.

Make enough money as an affiliate to finance the kind of investments that would go beyond what the average 22 year old is capable of laying down. Every day is a constant drive to increase profits and give myself that flexibility sooner rather than later.

Do you have your own exit plan? You might be making money now, but how are you going to keep making money if the tap ever runs dry?

Taking Your Christmas Bonus Next Week?

Feb 09 2010

Since I posted about potential Valentines Day campaigns, I’ve spoken to a few marketers and the consensus seems to be that although it would be nice to profit well on a Valentines Day campaign, it isn’t a long term recipe for success. So a lot of marketers don’t bother.

I think a couple of the people I spoke to were trying to schmooze me over having read the previous posts about focusing long term. There’s a difference between focusing all your profits on the short term, and understanding the consumer cycles that exist to be exploited.

“Why should I bother with a Valentines Day campaign when I can only get two weeks of profit out of it?”

It’s a fair question. But let’s say you DO make the effort to put together a profitable Valentines campaign. You may only get two weeks of hard profit from it now, but you’re also safe in the knowledge that you’ll have a campaign to roll out next year, and the year after…and so on. It’s a short term campaign that delivers long term results.

As affiliate marketers, we aren’t blessed with working for large companies that can hand out Christmas bonuses when December rolls around. We have to make our own bonuses.

If you were the manager of a high street store, would you neglect Christmas festivities on the basis that it’ll be January soon? No, you come up with a marketing strategy and you use it to take advantage of the current consumer mindset.

When people talk to me about building long term campaigns that can profit all year round, I don’t see that as a bad thing. I just see it as an opportunity lost. Valentines Day isn’t going to disappear from the calendar anytime soon.

Neither will Halloween, Christmas, Thanksgiving Day, New Years Day, Guy Fawkes Night…

You can choose to ignore every single one of these events on the principle that you’re happy with your stable campaigns and don’t want to rock the boat. Okay, but are you simply turning down the equivalent to your Christmas bonus?

If you were to turn each of those events above in to a profitable seasonal campaign – and they can be extremely profitable – you will have done a lot to boost long term profits. Why? Because we know that they’re going to roll around in 2011, 2012…there’s no expiry date in sight. High street shops and online retailers know this. They adapt to whatever current event is being pushed on the consumer and they increase their sales accordingly.

I’m not only talking about seasonal campaigns. Most of us have had a profitable short term cash cow on Facebook at some point. You know? The kind’ve campaign that delivers three straight days of super high profits and then nosedives in to a loss. Is this sort of campaign worth ignoring?

I don’t think so personally. I like these campaigns because I can slam the Pause button, leave it for a month, then cream another couple of days of profit. It might be a short term coup. But it’s a long term option to have. The more of these campaigns you can have at your disposal, the larger your reach becomes and the more flexible you are.

I’ve made a big song and dance about focusing your efforts on the long term, and I don’t back down from that at all. But it genuinely surprises me how many marketers are happy to neglect seasonal opportunities. Tapping in to the current consumer mindset is vital. Just as it’s important to be able to produce consistent stable profits, it’s also important to predict those consumer cycles. You don’t think an actual marketing agency would let you ignore them, do you?

I remember reading a post recently about focusing efforts in to one niche and adopting tunnel vision to stick with it until it succeeds. While this can work, I don’t see it as a sensible decision unless you’re getting closer to owning a product, or at least having a long term asset in that niche. If you’re simply doing CPA lead generation, you NEED to be aware of what’s happening around you. Especially if you’re working at the volatile end of the market where products can disappear overnight.

My job is made easy when I’m selling what a consumer is actively looking to buy. If there’s one thing that definitely isn’t a short term gamble, it’s that Valentines Day will be just as culturally significant in 2011 as it is 2010.

So are you going to adjust to the seasons? Or carry the same message all year round?

Affiliate And Love Advice For Valentines Day

Feb 03 2010

Valentines Day is on the horizon, as I’m sure those of you with girlfriends have been made painfully aware. And even for the singletons amongst us, it’s pretty hard to escape. I’ve always said that Valentines Day is “off season” for me in dating terms. For three years running now, I’ve found girlfriends in March and then broken up with them before the Christmas season. I’m beginning to wonder whether this is a coincidence or whether I’m subconsciously month-parting my affections for maximum ease of stress.

Either way, the dating CPA market holds obvious appeal as we charge towards the big day. You can guarantee that even the most hardened bachelors are going to be thinking twice about those “Want A Girlfriend?” ads. It’s all down to the social messages being put out there by commercials on television, banners in high street shops – and affiliates with dollars for eyeballs.

While the most obvious campaigns to be considering are dating offers, I’m going to suggest that they’re not actually the best example of opportunity in the current season. Take a look at the market. You have various ways of approaching the Valentines Day hoo har.

I’ll break out four stereotypes:

Person A – The die hard romanticist. He or she is deeply attached and wants to go that extra mile to make their partner feel special. Depending on the wealth demographic, you could be looking at targeting special Valentines weekend getaways. Round up a list of the hot spots. I can’t speak for America because I don’t know shit for what you guys do on Valentines Day. But over here, Paris and Venice are both popular getaways for the more affluent couples. Look in to flight and hotel packages with specific Valentines Day themes. Some couples are happy to go for a meal and then on to the theater. See what you can find.

PPC is going to be a hard nut to crack but PPV has HUGE potential and is relatively untapped (from what I’ve seen). PPV advertising has really taken off in the last year or so and with a one-off theme like Valentines Day, it’s a total wet dream for effective targeting.

Person B – The reluctant love atrocity. Think Martin Clunes from Men Behaving Badly. There are some guys who mean well but simply don’t have a scooby what to do for Valentines Day. These people are a stone wall match for the various gift dedicated stores that specialize in spelling out what your girlfriend – along with 4 million other girlfriends with the exact same taste – want to receive for Valentines Day.

Honestly guys, “My Last Rolo”? I think I might fucking blush.

Whatever though, these people are generally straight thinking types in an overpowering buying mindset. The Valentines Day pressure is so huge that if the gift looks even remotely like it might put a smile on her face, the purchase is already signed and sealed. Anything to put it to bed for another year.

Unfortunately when you’re working with the various gift stores, you aren’t going to be seeing a huge commission. It’ll be a small percentage. For that reason it’s important to build out gift specific keyword lists and find a store that allows direct linking through to the product pages. You don’t want to be wasting clicks on users who can’t locate the damn page they were interested in.

Person C – The dreamer. Have you seen the commissions on those “Name a Star”, “Give Your Sweetheart an Acre of the Moon” certification packs? If you’re Finch, you’re targeting these as a matter of routine – Valentines Day or no Valentines Day – because they’re such an untapped market (and probably won’t be for much longer after this post). Well, there are many guys and girls who absolutely love these dreamy smeghead tokens of love. Competition is low, targeting is extremely easy, and the commission is generally very good because the products are such an absolute waste of money in the first place.

“Here you go, darling. I bought you a portion of the moon from the International Space Acai Center. It’s just a piece of paper and a bunch of coordinates. But I’m such a dreamboat. Blowjob?”

I guarantee she’ll be impressed at your sheer bollocks for making such a lovesick puppy gesture.

Person D – The sympathizer. Oh come on, we’ve all felt the embarrassing attention of the Valentines Day Sympathizer. This is the eccentric motherfucker who doesn’t have a girlfriend, but still wants to celebrate the big day. Imagine your granny leaving a giant red envelope at your work station. Eager eyes watch as you tear in to the card only to see that – shit – it’s from your own kin. The entire office cackles at your sympathetic “It’s okay, really, somebody loves ya Jonny” card while you nonchalantly try to explain that you’ve had a new postbox fitted back home to deal with the excess mail.

The Valentines Day Sympathizer doesn’t necessarily want to spend money. But he or she WILL spend time browsing the eternally familiar Valentines Day e-cards and electronic gifts. It’s actually surprisingly lucrative to tap in to this “novelty” end of the market. You want to be targeting social media whores who already have a thousand applications added on Facebook. I’m pretty sure Farmville would do the trick.

Anyway, that’s a brief rundown of some different approaches you can take to milking the fat ass Valentines Day cow. I hope everybody gets what they wanted. If you’re a guy, that basically translates to have a good shag and don’t wind up in the spare bedroom.

Oh and I should also point out that if Valentines Day fails to tickle your interest, all is not lost. March 14th is International Steak & Blowjob Day. I’m pretty sure Tesco has an affiliate program. Sign up and get some links on the sirloins.