Pop traffic is a great way to get started in Media buying. I started with this and now I've moved on to promoting nutra offers with native ads.
Some tips for beginners:
1. Use tracking software. If Voluum is too expensive for you, try BeMob. If you don't track your campaigns you can't optimize an you won't make money. (Unless you get lucky)
2. Buy Adplexity Mobile spytool. Guru's will tell you to test landing pages, offers etc. and figuring everything out by yourself. That's not how it works. Just copy what's working for other affiliates right now and improve on that.
I struggled for 2 months before buying this tool and got my first profitable campaign the day I started using it. Yes it costs money, but it's totally worth it. You will lose way more test budget by figuring everything out by yourself.
3. And finally, learn how to properly setup campaigns on your traffic source. Take Popads for example. As a noob you would probably let Popads smartbid for your (default option). But just by switching to legacy bid you will save a shitload of money. Find a good tutorial. I can't post links, but Google PPCMode Popads Guide and you'll get a good one. The guy who made the guide also has a paid version with video walk-through. Totally worth it for noobs.
Yes you will need about 2k for the tools and testbudget. This is serious business and needs an investment. But once you get it to work, you can scale as high as your cashflow allows. You can't do that with SEO sites or whatever.
Pop traffic + mobile offers is a great way to start. Once you get some traction. You can scale up to other sources and verticals. BUT there's a lot more to it than what OP is suggesting in this thread.
Having said that, paid traffic is where the big money is. $x,xxx daily profits are very doable in a couple of months if you put your mind to it.
Sorry for the long post!