Archive for the ‘Case Studies’ Category

Getting Traffic But No Sales

Monday, December 28th, 2009

Hi Guys,

Jerry, one of our members, has been busy working on his site since he got back home from our Chicago “Tell Your Boss to Shove it Seminar“.

He is getting plenty of traffic but no sales. I reviewed his site and
adwords campaign and gave him my suggestions. I copied the email
string below:

Hey Ben,

I know you said I could call you anytime during business hours but I
wanted to give you a heads up so I can make the most of your time.
I’ve been working several hours every day on my campaigns in addition
to my new corporate job, to keep educating myself and increasing my
knowledge of this industry.

After returning home from Chicago, I started a google adwords
campaign, implemented negative keywords, am running separate parallel
campaigns for content network and search and have been split testing
ads. I have a $20 daily advertising budget ($10 search / $10 content).
I have approximately 140,000 impressions, but only 300 clicks.

Once on my site, I had 1200 impressions and only 34 click throughs to
merchant sites and no sales to date.

I need some guidance here. I have a Siberian Husky website and my
keywords are focused on that subject. My affiliate programs range from
pet medication to pet friendly hotels and everything in between.

Can you take a look at my website www. and give
me your input? I’d be happy to provide log in info for CJ, Google
adwords acct, etc. I have some theories but need some confirmation. I
need to make this website work or set this one aside and try another
project. Is my niche too narrow? Does it not generate enough traffic?

I really need your help. If you need me on the phone, if you want to
take a look first yourself, whatever it takes. I’m committed to making
this work. Please take a look and give me your input and let me know
what you need me to do.

Hi Jerry,

I spent some time reviewing your website, Google adwords account, and
ran a few reports – which you can find in the “Reporting” section of
your website. A couple observations/comments/suggestions for you:

1. First, the good news is that you know how to operate Google Adwords
pretty well. Your campaigns are set up just the way I would set up a
campaign. It’s not that easy to operate a decent adwords account so
congrats on that step.

Accordingly, you are getting some good relatively inexpensive traffic.
Your keyword search and content campaigns are both getting traction on
clicks that will not break the bank.

Your ad copy is pretty good with a decent click through rate. It could
be better but it’s a good start and it is nice to see that you are
split-testing ads. In sum, Traffic looks steady so now we have to look
at the conversion side of things.

2. Second, with respect to affiliate website conversion, I looked at the message to
offer match. In other words, what do the keywords tell us the person
is looking for AND, are you giving them what they want with your
landing page.

This is critical.

I ran a keyword report to see exactly what people searched for when
they landed on your website. Since you are bidding on the broad match
version of your words, you are getting all types of searches relating
to “siberian husky”.

The report is there for you to review, but my point is that with the
broad match enabled on the keyword “siberian husky”, you could get the
following searches on your ad:

- “buy a siberian husky”

- “siberian husky breeder rochester ny”

- “sell siberian huskies”

- “siberian husky diet”

Do you see how each of these people would want/need something TOTALLY
different?

With that being said, it seems like the main message of your landing
page is about giving advice on getting a siberian husky for new
siberian husky dog owners, correct?

Assuming that’s the case, that is totally ok. There are probably lots
of people looking for the great information you are offering. However,
that doesn’t make for a good match to the affiliate offer on your
landing page. The offer is probably better suited for CURRENT owners
who are looking for a discount on ped meds.

If I owned your website, I would do the following:

(a) figure out exactly WHY people are coming to your site. Obviously
this is a hungry market because you can easily get hundreds of
visitors per day, which is very exciting. You just need to find out
WHY/WHAT information they are looking for, etc.

(b) let’s assume they are looking for info on getting a siberian
husky. You may consider doing your own ebook and offering that for
sale INSTEAD of affiliate links – unless you can find an existing
ebook for sale that you can promote as an affiliate.

You could produce a great ebook probably within an afternoon. You’d
have your own product and could make money on the ebook, develop/
cultivate a list of avid siberian husky owners which you could later
market to – via autoresponders, etc.

Those are my initial thoughts in a nutshell.

A few other random notes – I created a content report for you in your
adwords account. You can see which urls displayed your ads. Google is
showing your own ads on your own website – oops!

In other words, you
are paying for clicks on your site for people to go for your site – or
paying google double for the same person. I would exclude your site
from your content placements. Also, review the list of sites and see
what else is irrelevant that snuck into your ad serving.

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How Can I Improve my Website?

Tuesday, December 15th, 2009

We get this question quite a bit. I discovered that people are totally clueless when it comes to getting started.
Unfortunately, rather than focus on one topic, new affiliates often put up sites with dozens of completely unrelated offers (it’s probably not a good idea to sell web hosting and adult toys on the same site – true story by the way!)

Here is a question from Brian who is struggling to get started:

A brief introduction of me. In August of 2006 I lost my job of 19 years due to the company I worked for closing its doors, after giving my fellow employee’s and myself a 35% cut in wages and no formal warning that they were closing their doors for good. In October of that same year I got married to a girl I have know since kindergarten. We both had some debt and it only increased when we had to put her twin boys through a 9 month trade school, and we will be adding more to it in another year when her daughter graduates and goes to Ohio State (GO BUCKS!!!), sorry had to say it. I have borrowed money from friends and my parents from time to time just to pay the bills. It is almost 4 years later and I am not even close to making the money I was when I lost my job and now I am stuck in a job that I don’t like with an obnoxious illmanered ass for a supervisor.

I came across your program and watched your introductory video and was immediately impressed with what I saw and heard so I signed up. I am not the brightest crayon in the box when it comes to designing ad’s or web pages. I am trying to design my website www.shoperzone.com  to cater to the crossover between home and business but am now wondering if I should scrap the whole thing and start over. I have quite a bit of knowledge of raising domestic rabbits, since our daughter is in 4-H and I also spent 12 years as a city fire fighter. I haven’t found to many affiliates in these areas. This is why I am writing to you for a little guidance and constructive criticism. I have three Google ad words campaigns, have left two voice mails with Pulse 360 and no replies yet.

I want this to succeed so that my wife and I can quit our jobs and spend more time with each other and the kids, have less stress and not have to worry about if we will have enough money to cover this months bills.  We are living paycheck to paycheck and I could not come up with the money for your most recent seminar or to even purchase the DVD’s when they come out. I will not give up until I am making a six figure income.

Ben and Dave I want to thank you for your continued e-mails and supporting words of encouragement they mean a lot to me and I view them frequently.  I will not give up until I am making a six figure income. If you know of anyone in the Canton Ohio area that might be able to help I would appreciate a heads up.

-Brian

Hi Brian,

Thanks for the note and the info. I am also an Ohio State fan. My relatives live around Columbus and we visit each year for Thanksgiving. (We ran the Turkey Trot around the campus this year in the cold!)

IN any event, I checked out your website. My suggestion is to make the site more specific. I’m not sure about affiliate programs in your niche, but you may consider writing your own ebook and selling it rather than send people to an affiliate program.

In other words, perhaps you write an ebook about raising domestic rabbits and keep ALL the commissions rather than share with an affiliate.

It is really easy to do an ebook. You can basically write it in Microsoft Word and then convert it to an ebook format with a free download. Or, give the Word file to a worker on elance.com (you might pay $100) and have them design a cover and do all the conversions for you.

You can them sell it with Paypal, paydotcom.com, or clickbank.com.

This is just an option, but probably a good one since:

(a) you know about the product and
(b) there are probably very few affiliate offers in that niche

I hope this helps,
Ben

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“K.I.S.S” Method for a $5,600/Month Website

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Have you ever wondered what it takes to create an Affiliate website the cranks out 5,600 per month?

I can tell you it’s a lot less than you think.

There’s no complicated web design, html coding, or magic juice. Instead, it takes simple marketing fundamentals. Dave and I recently used our KISS method (Keep It Simple Stupid) to quickly build a $5,600 per month Affiliate website.

We revealed the website and our exact steps at our recent seminar…and share the video coverage here.

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