What NOT to do!

[mystickcal]

Hey guys, so I was sitting here today working and I was thinking to myself that so many times people say what you should do when your doing affiliate marketing and I started thinking to myself...

A lot of times when I coach people in affiliate marketing they do everything correct, everything to the point. They break up their keywords into relevant ad groups with relevant ads, they split test everything, their landing page is great, etc, etc.

However, I start coaching them and I end up finding that they are doing one thing that is hurting their business. This one little thing that most people in a million years would never even think mattered that much is killing their business and stopping them from making a profit in whatever niche they are doing.

So, I thought it would be a good idea and fun to list things that you have found out that don't work. Something you were doing that was really hurting your business. Don't just say a one or two line thing, explain what happened and why what you did hurt you.

So, of course to start I'll say one that I just noticed during this current week while working. One little thing that increased my ROI by double and also increased the amount of traffic I was receiving for my keywords by 4 times!!!

[mystickcal]

So, what was I doing wrong?

Well, as most of you know and have read from alot of other blogs there are alot of little tricks you can do to help increase the CTR for your ads, especially when first starting a new campaign.

Well, I ran across one a while ago where on a blog I always read, I won't mention it, as most of the times this guy is dead on with his info.

Anyways, while reading this blog he suggested adding a character to the start and end of an ad to increase CTR dramatically.

Now, the problem here is with Yahoo, we all know, or at least you should, cause good affiliates read the terms of service for the people they do business with :P

Anyways, let me start at the beginning...

I started a new campaign in a new niche. A niche I have never done anything in before. I setup everything just like I normally do and just like I tell you all to in this forum.

I do my ads and decide to try this trick I learned and put this symbol Ø at the start and end of my heading title tag for my ads.

Now I started my campaign and my CTR was actually quite nice just like the guy said it would be. I was spending about 300 dollars a day and was making about 600 dollars a day. $300 profit a day. Not bad.

So naturally I started working at increasing the amount of traffic I was receiving and also on getting my ROI higher. However, no matter what i seemed to do I couldn't get it to budge. Nothing seemed to work.

Now, of course everyone knows when Yahoo catches you doing something in your ad that they don't allow in their tos they decline or remove the ad, so I would check the editorial status every night and if they deleted an ad I would fix it resubmit it.

However, what I didn't realize was that for invalid characters in an ad, they don't actually always remove them or decline them. Alot of times they just sit in a pending state forever until you fix them!

So alot of my ads I didn't even notice weren't running because the way yahoo's system is they didn't really jump out at you.

Anyways, so needless to say I fixed all the ads and re uploaded the campaign and I'm now spending about 1000 dollars a day and making about 2500 a day. That was the only thing I changed in my account. I didn't touch a single thing other than that.

So sometimes when your losing money or can't seem to expand your campaign its because of one stupid little thing you did whether you meant to or not that is stopping you.

So again, if everyone can share some of their experiences I'm sure we can all learn from them and you can help others not make the same mistake.

[Sakuragi]

Why won't you want to share which blog you were reading?

[Tom]

Which niche?

[keliix06]

Why won't you want to share which blog you were reading?

I'll make a guess and say it's http://www.bluehatseo.com/

[Sakuragi]

I'll make a guess and say it's http://www.bluehatseo.com/

lØl that makes perfect sense. :D

[mystickcal]

Why won't you want to share which blog you were reading?

Well because as I said the blog is really really good and I don't want people to start being afraid to try things on the blog because of one little mistake made. As it may of been something that worked before and quit working, but yes you guys got it right anyways, it was bluehatseo

[mystickcal]

Which niche?

Insurance. All different kinds, auto, health, etc, etc.

[dan1st]

Insurance. All different kinds, auto, health, etc, etc.

That's very inspiring mystickcal. Mind sharing some tips on promoting these offers? I'd be happy to make even $50/day on insurance.

Are you using offers from azoogle?
Also, are you promoting them all using 1 same landing page (like the one that was released this mth)? or separate landing pages.

[SiNeX]

My favorite has always been ¤ æ ø § the double s I am not sure what it means but it a eye catching symbols :)

[mystickcal]

That's very inspiring mystickcal. Mind sharing some tips on promoting these offers? I'd be happy to make even $50/day on insurance.

Are you using offers from azoogle?
Also, are you promoting them all using 1 same landing page (like the one that was released this mth)? or separate landing pages.

In my opinion one of the best things you can do is do them all, if you try insurance don't stick to only one type unless your a complete newbie ( I don't mean newbie in a bad way :P ) when it comes to affiliate marketing. I use 1 landing site, not page, for my insurance stuff and have found that works best for one important reason. I get alot of people that end up getting multiple quotes as alot of people for example even myself have auto and home insurance through the same company, so if you do all types people will combine and you get credit if they do that!

EDIT: What I mean by landing site is simply take the landing pages we release and add to them. Articles, etc. The landing pages we release should be used as a template for the site, not a single page site.

[slbusiness]

great advice mystickal

Do you suggest having all your insurance offers on 1 page or seperate pages (like seperate page for health, auto etc)?

[mystickcal]

great advice mystickal

Do you suggest having all your insurance offers on 1 page or seperate pages (like seperate page for health, auto etc)?

I have a main landing page which lists them all then I have articles and links going to specific types and then kinda have a bunch of mini sites for each type. But I send all traffic to the main landing page which lists them all.

[dan1st]

An example of your setup (URL?) would be great. :)
But that's probably out of the question.

[mystickcal]

An example of your setup (URL?) would be great. :)
But that's probably out of the question.

Yeah sorry, I really wish I could but as most of you know, there just are some people out there that would rip off all your hard work. And I only have one insurance site and I have alot and I mean alot of work put into it. I can't afford for someone to steal my landing page, my articles, etc. I trust about 99% of you here :D its that dang 1% :P