AFFILIATE NOOB

Just wanted to post a quick update and a recap on the current situation for anyone who is interested following in my footsteps.

1. I began by posting direct affiliate links on Craigslist. This was pulling a little over $100 per day in commissions with very little effort on my part.
2. Soon after I received an email from my affiliate telling me that I was in violation of their terms.
3. I put up a very simple redirect page designed only to act as a buffer between Craigslist and my affiliate.
4. My affiliate had some problems with this as well, so I took the page down along with every Craigslist post I had made.
5. I contacted the affiliate in an email asking them specifically what I may and may not do when it comes to Craigslist.
6. They told me that I am only bared from posting direct links on craigslist, however I can direct traffic to my own website first.
7. I was then investigated by CJ (my affiliate network). They said that I was in violation of their terms with the direct links.
8. I responded honestly explaining the situation and asked them if I may promote a fully functional website on Craigslist, which in turn promotes my affiliates.

Their response was as follows:
Kevin Smith:

It's true that you can promote your own site on Craigslist, and on that site you can advertiser links, but you need to make sure that you aren't setting up the site on Craigslist as a redirect straight through to an advertiser. That is the important part to remember when you set up your new site.

What I have learned from this is that Commission Junction does not care where or how you promote your website, so long as it is a fully functioning website and not a mere landing page that does nothing but send traffic straight to your affiliate. Now having full permissions from everyone I can move forward with my plans.

My commissions will be hurt because of this. When I first started I was using my affiliates clients as 'bait' for my traffic. I won't be able to do that any more, which means I will have to promote my website on it's merits alone. I should still be able to clear $100 per day, but it will take more work then before.


My recommendation for anyone that wants to use Craigslist for affiliate marketing: Build your website first. Make it good. I'm talking several pages of original content that is relevant to what you are trying to promote. THEN get affiliates onboard. Once this is done feel free to spam the shit out of Craigslist, but make sure you do it in a way that isn't going to piss anyone off. This means don't make false promises in your advertisements, don't claim to be someone you are not, don't do anything that could possibly make your advertiser look bad.

And most importantly do your research.

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I'm pretty sick of the video production scene. You can spend weeks working on videos, uploading them to paid video sharing sites, whoring them out in the forums, and never see a return for your work. I have amassed almost 150,000 views at Metacafe, but never saw a penny. I really feel like my spirit was broken by that company. Not being one to just give up, I migrated to Revver.

Revver is the complete opposite from the content nazi's that are Metacafe. They give you the freedom to make your video about whatever subject you want, but offer far lower rewards for your views. To low to be worth my time. 5,000 views at Revver earned me just over $1. Assuming I stuck it out, added more videos, and promoted my profile, I still would never see any money as Revver hasn't made any payments to anyone in months.

I started my journey with Metacafe. Months later it ended with Revver. There are other alternatives out there (good ones too), but this whole experience has left a bad taste in my mouth. I need to be responsible for my own income, and not be at the whim of a single company.

So I've been doing research on various affiliate programs. There are thousands of them out there, but finding one to fit a specific advertising method can be tricky, and many of them are similar to Metacafe in that they do whatever they can to weasle out of actually paying people.

I did come up with a brilliant plan which I will not go into detail about, because it would only take about 20 people doing this to ruin it. I have found a way to direct 3,000 hits per day to a website. My method is residual, though I do have to do couple of hours of work a week to maintain it. The traffic is made up of people that want to get a particular web tool for free. I found an affiliate that matched this purpose, and sent them 150 views in a 12 hour perdiod. I could very easily (with about 8 hours of work) expand the campaign 20 fold.

I'm not going to waste that traffic on a website that doesn't pay though. I've sent them 150 visitors who specifically want to sign up with their free service. I would guess that between %50 and %90 of those visitors will convert, earning me 1 fresh dollar bill every time they do. According to my statistics which I got from the website I am affiliated with, not one single person signed up.

This tells that one of the five following possibilities is true:
1: My affiliate is under reporting the conversions.
2: My traffic is signing up for the wrong free service.
3: There is a delay in the time it takes for my affiliate to report conversions.
4: It was just bad luck that no one I referred signed up.
OR
5: I'm an idiot.

Now the best thing for me to do would be to open up a proxy, and sign up for the offer with a newly created email address. Then I will know for certain what is going on. I will do that eventually, but I should do some more research first.

Now it took about 4 hours to find a post on an unrelated forum about my particular affiliate relating to the problem I am having. I found that this company has a 14 day waiting period before they report conversions! In addition to that, a person not only has to sign up, but also has to be an "active member" for me to get my money. This means that they have to take advantage of "a predetermined number of services" before I get paid.

The good news is that the particular web tool I am whoring works in such a way that the user will constantly have to go back to my affiliate to make more as they are needed. And the location that they are using this tool almost guarantees that this will happen.

The bad news is that the users might have to use other web tools besides just the one, and while some members of my traffic will inevitably do that, I wouldn't guess the numbers being any higher then %1.

If all goes according to plan, I should be able to make between $200 and $1000 per day using my method, for a few years before the market becomes saturated and everybody has already signed up.

I have done alot of searching for other affiliates to suit this purpose, and have found one decent candidate, though they don't pay for the free sign ups. Most of my visitors are stingy and aren't likely to pay for anything. A few of them may, and the higher commission paid by this website (something like $20 per signup) might, offset the difference.

I do have another very similar plan that is allmost identical except it involves the Job Search industry. Commisions for this average about 80 cents per free sign up (which consists of a resume posting). I believe this new spin (I'm sorry for being so vague), would earn money slower. Though it has the advantage in requireing less maintentence. AND there is no chance of my new plan ever saturating the market.

Want more details? You'll have to wait until I find a way to apropriately monetize the information. I know how I should go about it, and it wouldn't be difficult, but I can't guarantee that the affiliates I would use will actually pay me. I have to find reputable companies, and confirm that they pay.
(Edit: I decided to go on ahead and post my affiliate marketing idea anyways)

I do plan on making a website that revolves around affiliate programs. I would like to keep it as honest as possible. My plans are for it to be a one stop shop for all of your money making needs. The website will have sections for different types of earning money. I'm not giving any more details until it's up. From what you have just read it looks like the new site will be identical to a hundred other affiliate peddlers that allready exist. My website will have several features that make it unique though, and I don't want some pro to steal my ideas and beat me to the punchline.

This blog (the one you are on now) will also get a new address but probably won't be changed in any way. The address here (tfeb) was originally for a green energy blog that was in the works. It stood for "The Free Energy Blog". Green energy is something I am extremely interested in, and I would like to someday have something up about it, but right now my biggest concern is getting un-poor.