Can clickbank vendors shave?

Hello,

For about previous 3 months I had nice $35 epc with one particular network.This month epc has dropped to $0.7.
This is not a seasonal product and I have no idea what could cause such radical changes.

I think, that my vendor or clickbank might have started to shave my leads.

Can they or clickbank actually do this?

Yes, radical changes. Me too. I don't know how to do next.

dlyhai said:

Yes, radical changes. Me too. I don't know how to do next.

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Strange. If they really do shave it must be like suicide for them.
I am waiting for reply from support, will give it a go in November and then move to the next payment processor if the problem still exists.

Have you talked with their support?May be this could be the commission.because if you are getting profit from them then they could have at least some %.

lejolasho said:

Strange. If they really do shave it must be like suicide for them.
I am waiting for reply from support, will give it a go in November and then move to the next payment processor if the problem still exists.

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It is not like suicide for them. Lots of aff promote their product. I also will give it a go in november then decide what to do.

Ambitious12 said:

Have you talked with their support?May be this could be the commission.because if you are getting profit from them then they could have at least some %.

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What commission are you talking about? They are already taking commissions from vendors and shaving is not the correct way to do this anyways.

dlyhai said:

It is not like suicide for them. Lots of aff promote their product. I also will give it a go in november then decide what to do.

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Yes, it is, because money making affiliates are smartasses, not dumbasses.

lejolasho said:

What commission are you talking about? They are already taking commissions from vendors and shaving is not the correct way to do this anyways.



Yes, it is, because money making affiliates are smartasses, not dumbasses.

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..Are you also working with amazon affiliate? Maybe it is a good option.

maybe or may not

dlyhai said:

..Are you also working with amazon affiliate? Maybe it is a good option.

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Amazon is a good idea, I was planning to go there but dropped because had no starting budget (I think I need about $2k because I will outsource everything except website building&niche research) but now am planning to build a niche website in about 3 months.

lejolasho said:

Amazon is a good idea, I was planning to go there but dropped because had no starting budget (I think I need about $2k because I will outsource everything except website building&niche research) but now am planning to build a niche website in about 3 months.

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I outsoure my article. I expect the best result.

A few vendors are indeed dishonest or make use of shady or poor business practices, as I elaborate on this thread here:
http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackh...s-clickbank-sites-you-should-not-promote.html

However, most of time when affiliates notice a drop in sales for days or weeks, the reason is simply seasonal fluctuations. For example, I am involved in the health niche, which is as evergreen as you'll get. However, even in this niche we notice strong fluctuations.

For example, products that have to do with how the skin looks (eg vitiligo), will do best in the summer months (May - Sept) as people are concerned about how their skin looks when they are wearing short clothes.

Products that have to do with weight loss/muscle building will do best in January (NY resolutions) and the summer months (people going to the beach etc...)

Products that have to do with issues such as alcoholism and other 'vices' will do best in January for reason above

Products that have to do with nasal issues (e.g. nasal polyps), will do best during allergy/pollen season.

Products that have to do with foot problems (eg shin splints or plantar fasciitis) will do best during track season

Etc etc etc...

In addition, you will have periods of the year where digital products in general do better or worse. For example, December tends to be a poor month for digital sales (e.g. ebooks) as people are spending their money on physical products (gifts, decorations, etc...).

Moreover, when you get a general economic dip, (eg government announcing adjustments in interest rate, the dollar dropping compared to FCs, political shocks due to changes in gov or changes in foreign/economic policy etc...), you will get a drop in sales in general (both online and offline). Watch the stock indices such as the nasdaq or dow - when they are going down day after day, chances are your CR/sales will be poor. These "dips" may last for just a few days, to a few months (eg during foreign crisis that affect us economy), to a few years (whenever you have a "bear"market)...

If I look at my earnings for the past 12 months, I can see that my best month's earnings were over 6 times more than my worse month - that's some massive variation right there!! If people think that us internet marketers are making a fixed x dollars each month, they are very wrong.

So before people get spooked because their sales and conversions are poor compared to the previous month and jump ship, they should try to understand the online and economic scenario and adjust their expectations and techniques accordingly. IM, as any business, requires dedication, commitment, and a know-how of all the factors that affect the business and sales, if you want to be in this long term. If a person is not comfortable with seeing their earnings fluctuate, then they should stick to a 9 to 5 job which will give them a 'sure, steady' income, and avoid the 'hassles and uncertainties' of internet marketing.

Mancar

mancar487 said:

So before people get spooked because their sales and conversions are poor compared to the previous month and jump ship, they should try to understand the online and economic scenario and adjust their expectations and techniques accordingly. IM, as any business, requires dedication, commitment, and a know-how of all the factors that affect the business and sales, if you want to be in this long term. If a person is not comfortable with seeing their earnings fluctuate, then they should stick to a 9 to 5 job which will give them a 'sure, steady' income, and avoid the 'hassles and uncertainties' of internet marketing.

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I had over 10-15 sales every week constantly. Suddenly my sales stopped. I had no sales in 2 weeks after CB update. Then I began to work with JVzoo instead of CB. My number of sales returned to its previous value. I can't explain my earning fluctuate with economic policy, etc.

I'd suggest you check the landing pages of every single landing page you promote. And read the terms because some of the clickbank vendors can "steal" your sales by putting your visitors in an email funnel without actually crediting you as the original referrer. So be careful which ones you promote.

Check the landing pages, some of them recently changed to requesting emails before people can even order the product.

Clickbank is a service whereby third parties can "sell" their (digital) products to Clickbank at a wholesale rate. Clickbank then "sell" the products to the customer, and run their own affiliate program. The third party vendors will create their own pages to promote the products that they're selling via Clickbank.

In theory, yes, some vendors could "shave" you by doing tactics like requiring the customer to enter their email to then be sent to the checkout page through their own hoplink, cutting you the affiliate out.

If you see your sales drastically drop, you should:

• Check your own traffic. Ensure that the traffic is the same quality as before.
• Check the sales page to see if the page has changed at all. The design might've changed, causing a drop in conversions.
• Check the checkout process. Is the customer required to enter an email/something like that funneling your traffic away.
• Consider that your traffic source may have become saturated and conversions are naturally dropping over time.

Most Clickbank vendors will not shave you. That is extremely shortsighted.

Clickbank vendors want you to succeed, beyond your wildest dreams. They want you to do well, because if you do well, you'll keep promoting them. By doing well their gravity score will also increasing, attracting more affiliates. This makes even small affiliates doing 1-2 sales a month valuable, because gravity is largely based on how many different affiliates are making sales. And the higher their gravity, the more they'll get promoted.

Some very shady vendors (who are now banned) engaged in this practice when they were selling products that they didn't care about, products they expected to get banned. So they wanted to capitalize on their wildly converting, but terrible, products and sales pages while they could.

If you're concerned about shaving, then you should stick to products from platinum vendors. These are vendors that have been on Clickbank for a long time, have long term interest in the platform and you can trust. Mancar is a platinum vendor and he would never shave for the reasons I outlined here.

There is a lot of bad blood between affiliates and vendors, I wish there wasn't. Affiliates could make a lot more money with vendors if they were less afraid and skeptical of them stealing their traffic/sales.

I stay away from vendors that put their personal phone number on their website plus I find allot of vendors with videos on their sales page but no order link to be seen!! Very dodgy!!

BlackhatNeal said:

I'd suggest you check the landing pages of every single landing page you promote. And read the terms because some of the clickbank vendors can "steal" your sales by putting your visitors in an email funnel without actually crediting you as the original referrer. So be careful which ones you promote.

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I bet somehow your link is broken. check that out.

Some vendors maybe made a change to their internal links and if you did not sign up on their affiliate page to receive notifications you would not know this.

patkaa37 said:

I stay away from vendors that put their personal phone number on their website plus I find allot of vendors with videos on their sales page but no order link to be seen!! Very dodgy!!

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That's the magic button - nothing dodgy about that!

Basically upon the visitor's first visit, the button and price would not be shown until they have been hooked to the offer - it is timed to show when the video has finished doing the pitch and the price is mentioned (same reason why on traditional sales pages, you'd have text upon text before you meet the order button)

However, on the visitor's second visit, it will show immediately (you can test this by hitting refresh).

The reason magic buttons are used are because they increase conversions - which is good for both vendor and affiliate

Mancar