Cheers
1. Just meant before you start up a network with your own offers, you should have at least a few of them that are proven to perform already. Sounds like you're rolling out a network and an unproven product all in-house at the same time. I stand corrected. < Not to mention you'd be a perfect target for shady shit re being in-house.
2. Yeah there are tons of variables at hand. By default they have the most aff's in the world, both great ones and total idiots. Either way - they are just the processor + aff technology, your offer still has to convert well for YOU first. If you researched comps on CB, then you probably saw keywordelite and a few of the others. I'd inspect them to death and not deviate too much from their model including backend shit, affiliates LOVE backend shit. Shameless plug, first sig link re sick launch, it's a $29 offer, with 3 up/downsells and then members area with xx more products + cb's 60 day cookie = affiliate love all the way around, and they stick around/promote longer because of it. You should consider maximizing the pitch and testing for a month or two across 2/3 splits or proper multi-variate tests, THEN structure a proper launch not just start recruiting one by one.
3. Forget the term 'media buys' - I just meant convert the offer and maximize it yourself through whatever media/resources you can. Put yourself in a real affiliates shoes promoting your offer. Even do some grass roots shit re articles, 2.0 sites, youtube vids, all going to a lander your aff would use. I often find that on the grass roots products when you simply prove to yourself that you can maximize conversions on your own acting as your own affiliate, you can easily recruit and others find YOU really fast.
4. Trust me, it might seem like you're giving a big chunk of your business away however bump your shit to 70% asap for now, and start thinking of backend one-click-upsells (actually you have to get approved for that by CB). It WILL attract more affiliates, but don't just rely on that alone, again you have to make sure the thing converts. Otherwise you'll get a high turnover rate of aff's constantly coming, testing, and leaving. It will trickle in sales and you'll think you're doing ok but it's just turnover with very little retention.
It's pretty much every other vendor on CB (not saying this is you) - they launch a site/quick product and recruit from dp/wf fast hoping people test it for them, do your own testing, SHOW your conversions/screens/hops per order/you'll get boatloads of aff's. If you just think "all i need is more volume on affiliates" I think you might find it's more complex than that, otherwise they would have already found you instead of you hunting and coming up short.
5. You might even find that bigger aff's avoid programs with more than one tier. They consider prime programs golden and will want LESS affiliates. Not sure you're going to want to have both your own network and CB both pushing the offer - aff wars may ensue, better be sure both networks offer all the same payouts/pricepoints/etc. I used to think the more offers I could get my shit on the better, I've since reverted my thinking and now love having all my shit with one good network on one tier. Aff's like it better too.
6. I'll assume you've been to warriorforum, it's full of your prospects, and some of your competitors even
- You're also in a niche that clickbankers will indeed find useful. So - if you can get someone to do a blast for you to their IM niche CB lists, you stand to make considerable moves fast and here's why:
Clickbankers love buying shit with their own hoplink, which in turn gets you a gravity point. Which is a charting system clickbank uses (sorry if you know all this, just being TLDR so all can benefit). So if you attract a few heavy hitters to do blasts for you, even if you give them 100% (paypal the bonuses) it's still worth it for you re your gravity. Mailer sends to a huge list, a shitlaod of clickbankers WILL buy with their own hoplinks to save 70% (once you raise it), your gravity can easily hit 50-100 fast like this. Now it 'seems' like your program is flying, because all the affiliates see it rising in the charts fast, so they come promote (common tactic now but still works really well). This also often makes it really easy to turn your customers into your aff's. This is all still assuming that you got your STEP ONE right, being conversion mastered and having a good healthy backend for aff's to bank on and create great retention for them.
fuck sorry this is turning into a book.
7. Yeah don't beat yourself up over it man, a network and a vendor are not too often exclusive to each other. Look around here, granted most shit is CPA, networks are not offer owners, and usually they want it that way for many complex reasons/liability/etc. You think a popular 7 figure network doesn't have the power or resources to launch a bunch of internal offers? Risky shit for them, though it does happen once the network is established and has tons of pubs. That's what I meant by backwards, usually a network will be a great middleman for a while until they harvest enough pubs, then launch internal offers for them (or hide under friends names - 'we have a good new offer'...). Anyway, in-house can be a nightmare bro. Let's assume your shit takes off, you now have to look after payouts, incremental chargebacks, fraud/QC, on top of customer support, affiliate support, offer tweaks, resource additions, blah - for 7.5% I gladly let CB do the most important parts (process cards, protect me and affs from shade).
Best of luck w/it. You should absorb a couple really good launch formula resources, apply what you can and do a relaunch properly on CB. Haven't seen the product but just hearing/seeing here it sounds like you could be a good player in the niche. Also - often times the brightest minds and best scripts/softwares go unnoticed due to lack of marketing know-how. It might suck to call yourself a clickbanker or to model your site after the traditional long scroll shitty look - but you should 100% follow suit imo (my college prof's would fucking turn over in their graves if they saw some of my sites, and call me a sellout for sacrificing design for conversions but they don't pay my bills or for my toys so don't ever be scared to try ugly).
Word.
N.
