Another reason you failure or succeed.

I read again today that the biggest difference between those who make money and those don’t.

Is whether they are tracking and optimizing and how  Accurate and Constant they are at it.

On the internet you can track anything and everything.

Government, institutions and high school students do it all the time.

So, who doesn’t track ?

Most online marketers at the beginning level?

Sometimes is technical. Many times is ignorance and laziness.

There is not one successful advertising company in the world that does not track every possible variable they can.

Some even come up with new ways and add to the field of statistics and analytical research.

If the super big boys are tracking and crunching numbers.

Why aren’t you ?

IMV

FaceBook Slap! We called it first !

While kinda.

If you look in our pages section. We did post about the changes at FB and how now the people have spoken and don’t like the current ads.

The last few days the blogs on AFFBUZZ (we mentioned them  a long time ago) are full of  the new policy’s and I am hearing of the bloodshed.

5 figure incomes shredded.

Well, what did you expect ?

Google did it, AOL online before them. Now, FaceBook!

Sorry guys.

I have said this since my 1st month in PPC.

That we need to look at the past and learn.

Apply the lessons of the Columbia Record club, CAN-SPAM, Infor-mercials.

All the ‘grey’ and ‘black’ hat marketing and lawsuits that have happened from them.

I have read some marketers whining about how FaceBook and Google should NOT dictate policy and that people can make their own choices.

Sorry, industry and government disagree and they are larger then you.

I have always said and will always say.

Get the lawyers, marketers, accountants and consumers all working together.

You don’t need to screw people over to make money and fast money is no good if you leave pissed people you cant go back to.

No one likes to be screwed or conned AND we all love a great deal and getting more then we paid for.

I dont like censorship. I also do not like ‘crap’ and FB and Google are just trying to keep what they think is ‘crap’ by level of complaints ‘off their porch’

I dont like it, but if it was your network. Would you really be any different if a group of advertisers were pissing off your customer base ?

Easy to point fingers when its not your “house” people are “defacing”

Anyway, Lets find out what the consumers want and FTC and traffic sources will allow and make all sides happy.

That’s GOOD business!

IMV

Gone for 7 Days.

I was taking action what were you doing ?

In the last 7 days I have put up 36 campaigns, posted (on another blog…never again)  over 20 helpful messages and 3 complete methods (dont worry. I have more detail here and it was a private blog) and have been 1st run noted in 2 newsletters not once but 2x!

Not bad for 7days.

Oh, and ROI for the week was 31%

So, I am back with alot more to post and I will be posting exclusively here.

I might give a small tip on other forums, but ALL the best will be here free for general information and details in the membership side. Plus, anything I post elsewhere. I will post here to in the proper section.

Which, will be launching before July 4th.

People want their freedom NOW not later and I AGREE!

So, posting and helping others on more advanced forums, as well as, my own testing and running  my own campaigns. Continues to give me unique insight that I dont see posted anywhere else and I will get that information out here as fast as I can.

Sometimes in drips, sometimes in burst. ALL the time real and legit information.

If you have not read all the pages and posts on here.

Do it!

The blog is small but is wont be for long and I am not putting any fluff on here.

If it is on here. I wish someone had told me earlier or someone has told me. They wish they knew this sooner for all the time and money it saves them.

I am, also, not going to be greedy at all.

In the membership side I will be posting actual campaigns you can do.

Why? Because we are always testing and diversify. The pool is massive in size!

There is sooo much money and people and desire and opportunity and traffic and platforms…and..and.. You get the point.

As one of my mentors said, “Its not about getting a slice of the pie and none left for some-one else. The pie just keeps getting bigger and bigger. There IS enough for everyone!”

I havent seen anyone stop having babies !!! (cept china tried to slow down) and we all know children and teens and young adults and parents and grandparents… ALL CONSUME and will continue too.

So, Im back.

Im here ONLY and I think I have abused the word ‘and’ enough, but you get the point.

Look for how things can work NOT how they cant or be fair and do both. Leaning towards the 1st.

IMV

Advertisers and How to work with them

Keep in mind. No matter what they say.

Ad Networks want you to spend money.

They may say they care about ROI.

BUT, anyone who has worked on both sides. Knows there is an endless supply of business’s looking for customers.

You know you are dealing with a typical advertiser when they say “Oh, your campaign isnt converting? Lets add MORE keywords, targets, dollars.”

When has tossing money after a loser every worked ?

In the members forum I give specific money management rules to be used when testing, optimizing and scaling. I also point out the different metrics for different ad platforms. Mobile banners convert differently than txtlinks.  Mobile banners also have a different conversion then say Online.

So, do not let an advertiser tell you to spend more if their network has not shown a conversion on what you know to be converting targets or at least a significant sample of tight targets.

“Keep your powder dry”

IMV

How to Succeed in Banner/CPV/PPV/PPC/TXTLINK/CONTEXTUAL/SOCIAL & MEDIA BUYS

OK,

So, today is the day that the Blog diverges. You will want to start checking the pages for information posted in each section.

Some will come on a daily bases. Others in clumps. It all depends on the current research and information out there.

More detailed information will be in the membership area. Which is growing information right now and when it is of sufficient size. I will open it up to the public.

It will NOT be cheap and it will NOT BE expensive.

It will be DETAIL’S of what works and what doesnt.

The exact names and numbers that I do not post here will be in there.

Why is it paid ?

Simple, I am spending money and time to test what works and then telling you. This is almost invaluable. I am also creating more competition for myself. This helps us all succeed.

I test what works and forge the unknown (what I love to do) and you get to sit back, take what works, avoid what doesn’t and make money.

Not only are you getting what doesnt work. So, you dont waste your money doing something that “sucks cash.”

You will also find out from me and others what does work and exactly how and when it stops !!!

Plus, we will have cutting edge information on all the ways to make money that people are just getting into or are under the radar. I was one of the 1st to do banner ads in 1994 and one of the 1st to explore mobile2mobile CPA offers.

So, the blog here will be daily posts with topic information on pages and links to the members site for the detail.

A win-win for all. You will still get useful information that will make you money and save you money here for FREE and for a little more each month then a coffee a day you will get detailed information on how to make money and not lose money.

That’s better than any other publication out there. What is general is free and what is detailed costs. That’s fair!

I look forward to you stopping by daily for what ever level you want. A birds eye-view or up-close and personal.

Lets make some money

IMV

Money Management & Internet Marketing

I have mentioned it before, but it is worth mentioning again.

I am bringing this up because I was talking to some new ad platforms today that  I am about to run some offers with.

The matter came around to scaling, my ROI and how large of a campaign did I run.

From that we talked about other affiliates and how so many had short careers and how their handling of testing budgets had alot to do with their short career.

It was very interesting to hear a number of ad networks tell me what I have mentioned before.

To many people blow their money with out planning what is resonable testing investment.

Forgetting that if you lose 50% of your money. It takes 100% profit just to get back to break even and then most offers run only a short time.

The ad networks agreed you have to budget for testing, recovery and then profit.

If you are really wise.

You also plan for research.

Few offers stay profitable forever.

Talked about it before and it was interesting to hear ad networks bring this up in our discussions today.

IMV

Diversify or Die!

Happy Fools Day…

NOW DONT BE ONE !!!

If you put all your eggs in one basket. Don’t be surprised if you lose the whole hen house.

It amazes me that people still gamble with fate with their lively hood.

Time and time again I find that  ‘putting all your eggs in one basket’ is not just gambling, but plain stupid!

In the movie “Days of Thunder” Nicole Kidman’s character chastised Tom Cruises character for taking “stupid risk.” Saying, “How arrogant men are to think they can control things that are far beyond their control.” As he lays in the bed broken after a horrific crash.

Hosting, offers, traffic, networks and methods. ALL of them can go down or change and usually WITHOUT NOTICE!

I just lost 2 days, because I gambled on the 100% uptime of a leading Hosting company and they failed and failed again.

Luckily, I have spread my business out over 3 different hosts and at different levels.

But, it just goes to show that paying top dollar and having guarantees does not make up for when things go wrong and money or data or time is lost. The last 2 are hard to get back.

So, before you send everything through that one host, offer, traffic source, etc.

Ask yourself, “What will happen if this goes down” and then have at least 2-3 workable alternatives.

Make research and prevention part of how you run your business. Not hindsight and emergency’s.

IMV

Losing Money in Internet Marketing ? Maybe your Hosting!

Few mentions it, but monitor your CPU, MYsql and MEMORY load. Whenever, you start an offer or have heavy days.

If, your hosting can not handle the tracking and the serving of pages. You are losing money.

Your CPU load should  be below.5 and Memory usage below 10% a majority of the time.

Ask you hosting company what is optimum for CPU and MEMORY for what you are running and your most active times.

If, your tracking is showing one number the network another and your traffic a 3rd. That maybe the sign of an overworked server and you are missing visitors and you are paying for the traffic. A double waste!

Make sure they are seeing you ads!!!

If you can get a load balanced server and if you are doing enough bandwidth/traffic consider a CLOUD server. They are not only faster, but can be cheaper to run.

Their are add-ons in Firefox that allow you to use Amazon S3 easily. Search of Add-ons will show the most current.

I suggest having tracking on one server. Hosting your pages on another and Any program like LPGen on a 3rd.

Hosting can usually be done with a VPS.

NEVER GO SHARED! The cheap price is not worth the headaches.

Not if you are serious or if you do. Make sure you can painlessly move everything to a VPS and then a dedicated.

Tracking, serving of your ads and accuracy of your data are paramount to quick success and on going success.

“IF YOU CAN NOT TRACK ACCURATLEY. DONT DO IT”

IMV

The #1 Reason people fail in Internet Marketing

Touchy subject and it is something that I need to address, again.

I realized this morning while reading over more emails on some system or blueprint that someone has made to make money off those who dont know how to. A fundamental flaw that gets just about everyone.

In trading  it is called, “Keeping your powder dry”

This is part of the “not-mentioning-how-much-money-you-need-for-testing” that I find most leave out of all their materials or just gloss over.

The problem is that if you look closely and map out many of the programs and courses out there. They are assuming unlimited capital or do not talk about the “drawdown” and “recoup” phases of Marketing.

That is INSANE !!!

In business and any decent start-up you map out estimated costs and time frames for break-even and hopefully profit.

But, from what I am seeing are the same generalities of, “Just go test x amount and once you test enough you will make money” or even worse, ” Just follow my system and you will make money!”

Thats not real!

When you invest wisely or even gamble (and this is more of a gamble) You determine:

How much you have, how much you are willing to risk, how much you will scale if you win, when you will walk away if you are losing and when to walk away when you still have enough to come back and play again.

None of this risk management, money management, business planning & financial management and just plan common sense do I see being mentioned in 99% of the  free and paid course out there in detail that will actually save a persdon from their own financial self-destuction and if they do they gloss over it.

This is not rolling the dice with unlimited capital and I am afraid many people “elling the dream” are ignoring this piece or just dont think about it and it is very important.

You need to be realistic about what you are spending, how much you are willing to lose and what really are the ratio’s of return. I almost always go off of standard direct marketing statistics and love it when the results are better then expected and learn from it when worse.

.1%-3% are great base numbers for everything from CTR to CONV. If you cant get those at least. WTF ? and most would want a much higher CTR and CONV.

For impressions .1%-.3%. If one in thousand are not buying. I hope you have a really low cost media buying campaign. Otherwise you are bleeding cash.

I always look for higher numbers. But, if you cant get these at least. You got to stop and look.  Granted you need enough samples for measurement that means anything and again you need to figure the cost of that into you overall money management plan or you are flying blind and hoping on a dream and a pray.

And as J.F.K. said…

“HOPE IS NOT A STRATEGY! WE NEED STRATEGIES THAT WORK NOT WISHFUL THINKING THAT MAKES US FEEL GOOD”

Good Day,

IMV

Tracking Your Tracking

OK, so enough of the “I told you so”

Until some new level of idiocy occurs we are going to get into the pieces that make the difference.

One of those is tracking your tracking.

OK, you say. I have head of tracking, but tracking your tracking? What do you mean?

What I mean is noting when you start a campaign and add new ads or keywords/targets is just as important as the ROI.

I recommend using an excel spread sheet to note: start date, day of the week, traffic source, country, cost, aff network, offer and payout. Then going laterally add new dates when ever you add keywords or make a change.

I would also recommend a Project Management Software. Use MS-Project only because I was an MS trainer and used to it and their GANNT charts etc.

However you want to. Keep track of when you start and change your campaigns and this timeline of your offers will reveal some interesting patterns over time. More about that later on optimization and making money.

Thats all today. Enjoy!

IMV