Summary
Summary of chrislingle’s info packed affiliate campaign sticky thread
Since I’m a newb I haven’t been able contribute much to WF so here’s my Xmas gift to you all. If I left things out please add to this.
Finding the right keywords:
You want “Buy Keywords”
chrislingle:
Keywords are very specific, product name and then if practical something more general but at a much lower bid.
So, I would like to "brainstorm" buy keywords, lets do general keywords starting with buy xxxxx. Be specific if you want, buy left handed widgets. I would say targeting the right keywords and pre qualifying the person clicking on your ad is about 60% of a successful aff ppc campaign.
Jdog:
XXXX sale
shop xxxx
xxxx storeGet
Before you buy XXX, try our XXX.
And if the item has a free trial, throw that in there. free trial and risk free have been doing ok for me.
Moon54
Buy Keywords:
buy natural xxxxx
buy xxxxx supplies
buy xxxxx treatment
buy discount xxxxx
buy xxxxx product
buy xxxxx care
buy xxxxx brand
buy xxxxx cheap
buy cheap xxxxx
buy xxxxx secrets
buy xxxxx online
buy xxxxx medication
buy xxxxx drugs
buy xxxxx sale
buy xxxxx today
buy xxxxx wholesale
buy xxxxx direct
buy xxxxx now
buying xxxxx
purchase xxxxx
Mill:
Purchase, Low Cost, Cheap, Discount, Buy, Reduced
You can really rock with model numbers and variations of the brand. say Lexmark HD70
Reduced Lexmark HD70
Purchase Lexmark HD70 Cheap
Buy Discounted Lexmark HD70
you can literally take 1 product and make thousands of variations of that one kw. Which you want to add to 1 adgroup with 2-3 ad copies. The next model number 1 adgroup 2-3 ad variations.
Drusam:
Broad Generic Keywords are bad!
Ok I just looked at my reports for my MSN adcenter keywords and I realized that all of my shit traffic is coming from broad generic keywords. I accumulated a few hundred clicks that were not buyers at all!!!
You have to single out the "just looking" prospects from the "I want it right now!" prospects. Buying keywords...
Adcopy
Chrislingle:
ok, we all understand that keywords can not be general? as targeted as you can. Break keywords up into ad groups and write 2 ads per group, get rid of the low performer and then right another ad until you have your gains are minimal - but what makes a good affiliate ad? for specific products I like putting the product and price in the ad. If you are selling a Sony Vaio xxxx laptop and you say
Sony Vaio XXXX
Fantastic laptop for$xxxx
free shipping or $xx off
or something to that effect you are going to discourage more browsers and lookyloos! Any one want to expand? also your display url should be product related, I have found it to help. There is alot more to writing ads but this is the basic idea...
RobTid:
Another thing that works well with Google adwords is to add some type of proof to the claim.
"As seen on 60 minutes."
"Mike Tyson's recommended boxing gloves"
"US Government's preferred supplier"
Remember, that if you can maintain a good CTR on your ads, your adwords will become cheaper / go up the ranking over time (as the quality score kicks in)
Where to buy traffic and what to avoid
chrislingle:
AVOID the 2nd and 3rd tier engines! my 3 rank as follows,
adword x10, adcenter, yahoo as far as ROI goes!
Engaged
Domain doesn’t matter. Don’t track every keyword!
Landing Page Examples
chrislingle:
Someone posted about the wolf and his observation that having to put up links on an affiliate landing page kill sales. I have to agree and it is a big issue. This should be discussed. My solution that I am testing is to just make pages about 1 product. (look at 2nd to last example below for an example.) Also look at the last 2 sites. They are both for the same product but 1 is a mulit page deal the other 1 page. The 1 page site is for people who are buying, the multi page site is for people who are looking for the type of software.
Here are some links to pages, none mine all info given out by the owners. Not sure how they would do after the quality score so -
New Offers from Telewest - Broadband, Digital TV and Phone
Spyware - how to protect your PC
Dating Site Critic
Christmas Gifts - Gift Baskets - Gifts for all Occasions
Free Budgeting Software - Manage Your Personal Budget
Revolutionary Online Budgeting Program
Don't ask about stats and who owns etc.
big byte:
The landing page can help you to drive a visitor to right product. Actually your ad should already do this. Example: not every ringtone provider supports every phone and carrier. On your landing page you can have links to different programs for different providers and so weed out issues sending a Verizon customer to a ringtone offer that does not support Verizon. But in general - your ad should already take care of that ..
Landing pages/New Google Algo
pocket rockets:
Google slap video:
Jim and Perry Slap Google
Kentster:
Forum post about Google Quality Score for Adwords
http://forum.keywordsanalyzer.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=203
chrislingle:
If you are using adwords you are going to have a hard time going direct. Page structure is different every time. It depends on who I am targeting. If I am after someone who is comparing products or knows they need to buy product x but not sure witch one, I am looking at making an information site. I also have organic search in mind when creating most sites. The new google algo's should have an affect on the quality of the site you are producing. If I am targeting a buyer I make the product I am selling 1 page but as part of a complete site.
From my personal experience, the more complete site you make the better your ROI.
as to how I determine witch what to do, I try to cover all bases but I don't worry about it. I work on something and put it up, if it works great, if not I change it. If I see alot of traffic in the niche I am willing to spend some money to get it right
chrislingle:
make my sites more seo friendly. I want the free traffic so I might as well build out that way. But think like a big company. If amazon is doing a ppc campaign for product x they send you to product x on there site. product x is 1 page because they are targeting "buyers" now if you are targeting people who are comparing products you might want to make a multiple page site on just 1 product you have in that niche and sell the shit out of it. That should help with the new google algo. the whole point is google says they want "quality" so give it to them.
chrislingle:
according to the information that is currently available yes, linking directly to the offer is bad in the sense that google picks up on it and affects your quality score raising your prices. how that will play out I don't know.
Andrew:
From my own testing and talking to others, the new google algo is doing a lot of things. They are claiming its quality, but as shoemoney posted, they are trying to squeeze out your profit margins. Google is looking very closely at external linking to affilaite networks like azoogle (some are saying to cloak, definately could get you booted from adwords)
Single page or Complete site
Avalanche:
The gist of it is that unless you are a seriously good copywriter, the user is going to have questions that one page wouldn't answer well. Plus, some people look in the scroll bar and say, "Ugh a long copy page - I'm outta here."
People use the Internet as a research tool first, vehicle for commerce second.
What you do is create a small niche site where each page covers one aspect of the product. They end up pulling some organic searches as well if you do it right.
Yes, it requires more work than arbi... but not really - it's just a different kind of work. For example, I have a site that is pretty darn ugly but still pulls about $500/month on not much traffic. Sure you can't retire on that, but it goes on autopilot. How many of those sites does one need to put together as compared to arbi sites?
Part 2 on next post. Too long to post it all.