The Super Affiliate’s Guide to Dating PPC Marketing

The overall response and viral marketing of my “Super Affiliate’s Guide to ppc Marketing” has been amazing. The post itself has almost 100 comments, which blows away any other post on this blog. Not to mention my RSS feed is hovering around the 1000 mark. I knew the market was hungry for some new information to get ideas and activity flowing and I’m honored to have heard back from so many of you that have been inspired. Thank you to all who have linked back to the guide and I look forward to hearing back from many more of you. Some might think I’m insane for providing advice and direct campaign information on what I’m working on, but honestly, I’m here to help YOU out and as saturated as a market is, there is always money to be made. And with that, I now bring you the next installment in “The Super Affiliate Guide”, which will focus on promoting dating offers through PPC Marketing. (UPDATE: Promote your ppc campaigns through MSN AdCenter & Receive $75 in Free Clicks. Click here for my latest chapter in the Super Affiliate’s Guide to PPC Marketing.)

Now that I have shown you how to setup a new campaign and promote your offers through Google Adwords, let’s see if we can get some started. I’m not a master in the ppc dating field, but with minimal testing and time, I have been able to pull profit margins around 50-70% on a few offers. Once again, we will focus on using NeverBlueAds since the original guide did the same, not to mention NeverBlueAds now has over 30 different “dating” related offers to test with.

General Dating Campaigns
You can login to NeverBlueAds and grab a nice well known dating offer such as American Singles, Mate1 or True. All three of these campaigns are high “Network Earnings” offers and all pay a decent amount per signup. This simply means they are performing well across the board for all affiliates. I like to refer to these three campaigns as “General Traffic”. They are all industry leaders in the dating market, but still winners for affiliates on making money. You can do a lot of PPC testing with these campaigns because they are broad and appeal to all audiences. Try testing a lot of keywords with low ppc amounts and track your traffic and conversions, weed out bad terms for conversions and traffic.

Targeted Dating Campaigns
The “General Dating” campaigns will most likely be the most saturated, not only because they have been around the longest, but also because they can usually afford to pay more per signup and they have a lot of in-house promotions across the web. If you are already focusing on the general campaigns or have done some testing, you may want to start some targeted campaigns which are less saturated and will likely convert MUCH HIGHER than others. Three examples of “Targeted Dating” campaigns are BlackSingles, ChristianMingle and BBW Personals Plus. All of these campaigns are also high earners and paying well per signup. Just by looking at their names you can tell what they are targeted to.

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Now that we have taken a look at the different types of dating campaigns available to promote, let’s figure out how to make the most out of our search campaigns and ad dollars. As you already know, the dating market is incredibly competitive and just as saturated as almost any other niche. Here’s a closer look at just how competitive “general dating keywords” are.

The chart above (based of Google Adwords Search), shows the most searched (average) for keywords relating to “DATING“. While “dating” isn’t maxed out to the full bar for “search volume”, it’s “Advertiser Competition” is. Every one of the top seven keywords relating to “DATING” is maxed out on “Advertiser Competition”. The majority of these advertisers are the big media companies, the dating network themselves and the Super Super Affiliates who have managed to tweak their margins enough to make it to the top.

As much fun as competition is, not all of us have the ad dollars or time to try and compete for these big terms. The best part of it is, WE DON’T HAVE TO! The chart below is another report I pulled, but this time it’s based on the “Targeted Dating” campaigns that I mentioned above. I did a general search for “big beautiful women dating” to promote BBW Personals Plus, a search on “christian dating” to promote ChristianMingle and finally “african american dating” for BlackSingles.

Let’s go even a step further and see what type of rates and click volume estimates the high paying “general keywords” advertisers are getting.

With a maximum click of $10.00 per click to show all figures, averages for these “generic” dating keyword range from $1.74 to $2.40 per click for a TOP 3 position. You don’t need a top three position to make money and you don’t receive anymore or less for a lead if someone is searching for “dating” or “dating photos of people in new york“. Take a guess at which of the two will cost less! Bid on long tail keywords and the non generic keywords and you will make money. During my testing with a few dating campaigns, I was able to have some nice margins and traffic with only paying around .10 per click. I would prefer to focus on getting a ton of low cost click offers and having wider margins, then spending a ton per click and smaller margins. You simply need to spend more time on keywords and test tracking. Try focusing on long tail keywords. During my testing, I was paying pennies per click, yet the traffic was consistently converting at better than 10%. If you are being paid $3.00 per lead, buying clicks for .10 each and converting at 10%, you’re really earning .20 on top of every .10 you spend. It’s all a numbers game. Remember: You are paid the same price no matter the lead, so don’t stress over obtaining high cost / quality keywords!

If you haven’t already, apply for NeverBlueAds through this blog and you’re application should be approved without a problem and very quickly. To entice the offer even more, send me your affiliate id and I’ll send you a free t-shirt when you earn your first $50 with NeverBlueAds. (This has nothing to do with NeverBlueAds, nor a paid promotion by them. I simply want to help others make more money!)

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ShoeMoney vs John Chow RSS Contest

There is a contest going on between John Chow (Chow’s prizes) and ShoeMoney (Shoe’s Prizes) to see who can get the most subscribers by the end of the month. Before the contest started, ShoeMoney already had a few more subscribers than John Chow. Since the month is midway through now and the numbers are getting close, both sides have stepped it up with their own promotions and contests. The most recent contest promotion is a massive one from ShoeMoney, where he has received over $13,000 worth of prizes. Most of them being ebooks, reviews or services. I decided to throw in a prize of my own to the contest as well. You can win this sweet limited edition Spiderman statue valued at $100! (I can’t think of anyone better to represent this blog) If I was entering the contest, this is the prize I would be aiming for!

Who will win the contest in the end? We’ll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, feel free to join either or both of these great feeds. New winners will be selected from John Chow and Shoemoney throughout the month.
http://feeds.feedburner.com/JohnChowDotCom
http://feeds.feedburner.com/shoemoney

Looking for even more contest fun? Don’t forget, I’m still giving away plenty of Free Conference Passes to Affiliate Summit West in Las Vegas during February 2008. This prize is valued at $949 and attending this event will change the way you do business online forever!

Enter to Win "Zac’s Free Affiliate Summit Pass!

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WidgetBucks Top Performer

I received an email yesterday from Sean Crotty, the Vice President of mPire and creator of WidgetBucks. The email was to let me know that I am "ranked in our top performers by both impressions and clicks" for the WidgetBucks network. Let’s take a look at the initial numbers I had in the first release when the stats first went live.

200,000 Impressions, 304 clicks and $6.94 Commissions… average of 0.022 per click.

I had just went live with the program and wasn’t sure what to expect. Off these first sets of stats I wasn’t thrilled, but also not too disappointed. I then found out these stats were quite delayed, as you needed to click the "+" button to display stats on a daily basis. While impressions, clicks and commissions were accurate, the commissions still had some updating to do. I was also promoting only the "Movies" category, so low earnings per click were expected.

Since I started testing WidgetBucks, I’ve sent almost a million impressions and have earned almost $70. The key stats here are what I expected… the "Movies" category did pay much lower than the other categories, but it did pull a much better CTR. I did some additional testing with Jewelry, MP3 Players and Game Consoles… with MP3 Players leading the way, at around .43 per click.

I already needed a new program to replace AuctionAds, so WidgetBucks came out at a great time for me. It’s not a huge earner, but it’s a fun case study in itself. With a few more categories in place, I will continue to rotate and test each. Once we have a good idea on what’s earning the most money, I / you can focus on that niche and maybe setup some new dedicated sites or blogs.

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The Super Affiliate’s Guide to PPC Marketing

There are many ebooks out there that promise you riches for the low price of $97 (but only if you act within the first 24 hours!)… but in the end they are usually nothing more than broken promises, outdated strategies, or just an overall waste of time. I took the time to create this guide because I want others to learn how to make money online, without having to weed their way through expensive ebooks and other programs which pass them further along the path of shelling out more money. In this walkthrough I will show you how and where to find offers to promote, how to setup a new Google Adwords campaign, and at the end I give you my GOLDEN TIPS to help make your ppc Marketing Succeed. Though this is a long post, this is only my first chapter of many, which will be included in the master “The Super Affiliate’s Guide to PPC Marketing” when I feel it is complete. Feel free to post any questions or comments and I will get to them in the next chapter. (UPDATE: Promote your ppc campaigns through MSN AdCenter & Receive $75 in Free Clicks. Click here for my latest chapter in the Super Affiliate’s Guide to PPC Marketing.)

1.) Where to Find an Offers
One of the most important factors in making money with PPC Marketing is utilizing a high quality offer which will effectively bring in sales. I recommend using NeverBlueAds to search through a large amount of high paying offers that you can promote through PPC. In this guide (demonstration), I will use their network and one of their offers to walk you through the process. (If you are not already a NeverBlueAds affiliate, you can click here to signup and your account should be approved quickly.)
- Apply to NeverBlueAds
- I also recommend running PPC campaigns through RocketProfit, AzoogleAds and AffiliateFuel.

2.) Setup a Google Adwords account
If you don’t already have a Google Adwords account, you will need to signup for one now. Through Google Adwords, you will setup and track all of your pay per click campaigns. In addition to Google, I also recommend using MSN and Yahoo. However, this guide is based on the Google Adwords method.

3.) Selecting Your Offer to Promote
Once you are a member of NeverBlueAds, you can log into their system. On the main login page you will see a “search box” and you will also see a field for “Top Ten Search Campaigns”. If you want to try running an offer that others are already doing well with, you can simply grab one of the top ten offers listed, or you can search and find a campaign on your own. One benefit to finding an offer other than one listed in the “top ten” is that you will have less competition and saturation. Lately I have preferred working with higher end CPA offers, this way I can spend more on lower click amounts to test the campaign (example: 1000 clicks @ .05 = $50. If a campaign is paying $50 per lead, that allows me to test with a “1000 clicks to 1 lead ratio”, before losing any money. 1000 clicks at .05 will not be easy to obtain on most high paying offers and volume may be slow, but it’s still profit. Set this same method up for 10 campaigns and you are earning at a faster rate.)

For this PPC Guide, I will use the “Amazon Weight Loss” offer on NeverBlueAds. The offer currently pays a $32 commission and is ranked 5/5 for Network Earnings. I have not personally tested or run this offer, this is just for the walkthrough.

4.) Setting up your PPC Campaign
Once logged into your Google Adwords account.
A:) Go to Create a New Campaign, and click “keyword Targeted”

B:) On the next page you will setup your “Campaign Name” and “AdGroup“. The “Campaign Name” of course should be the same as the offer name you are promoting. You can setup multiple “AdGroups” for a campaign. AdGroups are basically the different sets of keywords that you want to promote. To start out I would stay with ONE AdGroup. (On this same page you can also target by “Language” and “Country“. We won’t change these fields)

C:) The next page goes into more detail on “Country” tracking. We will stick with United States targeting.

D:) On the “Create Ad” page, you will write up your ad copy that people will see when they use Google Search or see your ad on a site using Google Adsense. The mock write up I did for the “Amazon Weight Loss” campaign is shown below.

E:) After writing up your ad copy, you will be sent to the “Choose Keywords” page. From here you will decide on all the traffic keywords that will target your ad to appear. Your keywords will greatly effect your traffic, conversions and pay per click bid rates. One way you can get more keywords is to use Google’s “Want More?” keyword feature. Simply enter any keyword or phrase, such as “weight loss“, and Google will provide you with a bunch of relevant terms. You can then click “Add” next to each term, and this will add it to your campaign keywords. Another tool you can use to gain relevant keywords is Google’s Keyword Tool.

F:) I went through and selected the first ten results from the Google “Want More?” keyword tool for “weight loss“. On the next page you will decide how much you are willing to pay per click, and set your daily budget. I setup bid pricing at a max of .05 per click and my daily budget is at $100 per day. Setting the daily budget is very important, as this will limit your ad costs and any loss you may incur while trying to make your campaign profitable. You will also need to be more creative with your keywords (for a particular weight loss campaign like this), as bid pricing on these targeted terms is much higher than .05 per click.

G:) We are now at the last step of setting up your ppc campaign, and this is to simply review everything you have setup.

H:) You have now completed setting up your campaign, and it should now be live. If there were any problems with your campaign, Google will send you an email letting you know if your campaign was denied and why. Depending on your keywords and bid prices, traffic should start flowing through your new campaign. If at anytime you want to pause or stop the campaign, you can do so at the main page of your Google Adwords account.

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GOLDEN TIPS TO MAKE YOURS PPC CAMPAIGN SUCCEED!
1.) SubID Tracking: When first grabbing your offer from NeverBlueAds to promote, make sure you go to the offer creative page, click “Paid Search Creatives”. Once on this tab you should see an area that says “Use Subid”. You can put a simple tag in here like “googlediet“. A new url will be given to you in the above url section. You can grab this url and promote it on your Google Adwords campaign. By doing this you can pull separate tracking reports based on your campaigns. If you were two run this same offer on Google, Yahoo and MSN, create three separate subid urls and you can easily track your campaign performance for each.

2.) Pixel Tracking: In addition to SubID tracking, you can pull a pixel code from Google Adwords. With a pixel in place on the offer confirmation page, Google can then provide you with some really great stats on your campaign. Instead of just seeing what your click, impression and cost amounts are, Google can now show you your conversion rates and average price to obtain a lead. (To setup pixel tracking, go to any of your existing campaigns on Google Adwords, then you can click “Conversion Tracking” on the top menu”.) To place a tracking pixel on a CPA offer run through a network like NeverBlueAds, you will need to contact your affiliate manager about having them place the pixel for you.

3.) Content Network vs Google Search: To get listed on Google’s main search, you will need to create your own landing page and have your own hosted site and worry about quality score rankings, which will effect your bid pricing. If you are advertising on the “content network”, you don’t need to create your own site. Through the content network you can send traffic directly to the campaign you are advertising. (To advertise on the Google Content Network, go to your campaign main page on Google Adwords, click “Edit Campaign Settings“, then only check off “Content Network“.)

4.) Link Url: When setting up your Google Adwords campaign, you were asked to give a “Display URL” and a “Destination URL“. If you are going to advertise on the “content network”, here’s a tip that can really improve your CTR. Instead of listing your “Display URL” as http://nbjmp.com/click/?s=444&c=33790&subid=googlediet, you can purchase a domain through GoDaddy and redirect the url to your offer landing page. You can only imagine how many more people would show interest and click a link that said something like http://www.MyBestWeightLossNow.com (fake url), rather than a long string of letters and numbers that aren’t relevant to the ad. Once you have done some testing with your campaign, throw a few bucks into a referral domain name and see how much it may improve your overall campaign numbers.

5.) Ad Variations: Having more than one advertisement for everyone to see, can greatly improve your ppc campaign. Setup a new ad creative and add it to your rotation by going to your main campaign page, clicking on an “Ad Group“, then click the “Ad Variations” tab near the top right. Click “Text Ad” (next to Create New Ad) and repeat the process above for writing your new ad copy. Once you have a few ads in rotation, you can further optimize your ppc campaigns by seeing which are pulling the best click through rates as well as conversion costs.

6.) The Big 3: Google, Yahoo and MSN are the big three search engines and between the three of them, they will produce enough volume for you to successfully make money enough with PPC. There are a ton of second tier search engines out there, and plenty of them offer clicks as low as .01 each. I highly recommend staying away from these search engines for marketing, at least until you have some experience with PPC. The majority of the second tier search engines will send low quality and/or foreign traffic. Stick with the BIG 3… test with each and see where your ad dollars are converting best.
DISCLAIMER: As much as I would like for everyone who reads this to make money, I’m sure it isn’t possible. This is a disclaimer to state that I have no affiliation with Google, Yahoo, MSN, NeverBlueAds, AffiliateFuel or AzoogleAds, beyond the aspect of being an affiliate and or advertiser. Zac Johnson and ZacJohnson.com are in no way responsible for your actions, gains or losses from ppc marketing after reading this guide. Please feel free to ask or comment with any questions or comments you may have.

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Secrets of PPC Marketing

How many ebooks have you seen, or even ordered, that promise you the inside secrets on how to become rich with pay per click marketing? I’m sure you’ve seen a ton, and maybe even bought a couple… only to find that you wasted$27, $67 or even $97 on some crappy pdf ebook file that just has some basic lousy info. I understand your frustration, and I have never been a fan of these marketing techniques or methods of cashing in by these authors. If you’re going to sell something, make it worth our time… I don’t mind paying up to $499 for a course or product, just as long as it does what it promises.

After writing my last post on "NeverBlueAds ppc Marketing & Earnings" and reading the comments and emails, I was surprised how many questions there were from people on PPC marketing and their frustrations on not having successful or profitable campaigns. Pay per click marketing can be extremely tough, and it’s not fair that so many ebooks and marketing sites out there take advantage of the people wanting to learn. I’m all for making money and paying for products and services if the quality is provided… but in so many instances, this is not the case. Almost everything I have done to make money online has been self taught, I’m still losing money on new ppc campaigns today… but you need to spend the time to tweak, test and tweak some more. The best well written ebook in the world won’t make you rich, unless you put in the dedication it takes to make it to the next level.

With that said, later this week I will release my "Zac’s Guide to Making Money with PPC Marketing". A step by step guide (post) providing detailed information on how to setup your own PPC campaign, finding and grabbing an offer to promote, how to select the best keywords and some other helpful information. I only hope to inspire others and provide you with what you need to get started. I’m offering my time and advice for the amazingly low price of FREE! All I ask is for anyone who reads my post/guide to provide feedback and share with others who are looking to learn. to link to the post, when published, for everyone else looking to make money off pay per click marketing.

Please feel free to leave any comments on PPC marketing or questions you might have, which I can add into the post.

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