ITT: Feeling Generous. Answering CB Questions

biks said:
So what's your feelings on choosing topics?

One of the things that perplexes me is the huge area of selling "how to make money on the internet" to other people who want to make money on the internet. It's like this weird Ouroboros Matryoshka doll. (Snake eating it's own tail Russian doll) OK, there's money to be made, but long can you sustain it? I personally like the idea of selling to "civilians", anyone NOT in the IM biz.

Which then goes down to "I've got my fat/acne/wart I want fixed" categories or "I need a loan/lawyer/my debt fixed".

Where have you found the best hunting grounds?
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I'm not in the IM niche either (other than an old blog that I wrote 10 posts on one day a couple of years ago and never touched again).

Personally, I go for topics I know people will look online for solutions for before even considering talking to a real person about.

Embarrassing stuff. Private stuff. Even itchy stuff. Haha.

Seriously, go look at the popularity of those hemorrhoids products on CB. Not too shabby. Same with hair loss, penis enlargement, or erectile dysfunction...or anything like that.

If you promise a guy that you can make his hemorrhoids go away, his hair come back, his penis will get larger AND will stand up again...and actually deliver on those promises?!?

My man, you just stumbled into a diamond mine ;)
 
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this is a good Q&A, thanks for it. i have a few questions if you get a chance:

1. Do you make more money by creating your own products and letting others promote them on CB, or by promoting other people's products? If you could only pick one to do, which one would you pick?

2. What are your thoughts on the 1 page landing page? Some people have a very short one, and some people have a landing page that you need to scroll down for like 5 minutes to get to the end? Which do you think is more effective?

3. If you make $XX,XXX a month, how much money are you spending to make that (or is that profit?)
 
What's your feeling on video? As either part of your ebook package, or part of the landing page?

Most of the video I see being sold with an ebook training package is just tedious re-tread of what you can easily read in the .pdf in a quarter of the time. I realize that it creates "value" and you can charge more, even though it really adds nothing.

I'm a video professional by trade, so I see video under utilized in the sales aspect. Everyone seems to to just show a bullshit Photoshop rendering of their cover, but never show what your actually GETTING for data and photos inside of it. I've created videos that go over EVERY page and I explain what your buying. I think I've had only 2 returns from over 300 orders.

I've promoting a few other Clickbank products that are VIDEOS for Gods sake and they don't have any up front in their landing page. I can see all these hops going to their landing page from my site, but nothing is converting. It's driving me nuts, I KNOW if I made a descent video SHOWING what the hell your buying, I'd get some sales.

Do you bite the bullet and BUY all the products your promoting?
 
nam6641 said:
1. Do you make more money by creating your own products and letting others promote them on CB, or by promoting other people's products? If you could only pick one to do, which one would you pick?
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I've definitely made more having my own product but I know that I wouldn't have if I didn't learn to be a successful affiliate first. Believe it or not, being a product owner is much more rigorous than being simply an affiliate. Whereas if things don't work out as an affiliate, you can simply yank the links and go find another product, when its your own product you have a ton of time and money invested to make it work so you can't just give up (or at least I won't). Also you have to deal with support for both affiliates and customers, provide a constant stream of tools such as fresh content, reports, banners, kw research, etc to your affiliates, plus keep the sales copy optimized for peak performance (which comes out of your budget in PPC, etc costs) and everything else.

Knowing what I know now, I'd definitely stick to being a product owner because I have a pretty firm grasp on how to make things run smoothly. However, if I was just starting out I'd stick to being an affiliate for a while until I had that down stone-cold pat before moving on. It really is a lot more work to make a product successful than most people imagine until they're in the midst of it.

nam6641 said:
2. What are your thoughts on the 1 page landing page? Some people have a very short one, and some people have a landing page that you need to scroll down for like 5 minutes to get to the end? Which do you think is more effective?
Click to expand...

I usually split test short copy vs. long copy almost right off the bat. I'll usually end up testing two forms of each and then carry on my tweaking and testing from there. Another really good format that I've seen work well (and that I'm using for a product being released just this week) is more of an "informational" kind of sales copy where it doesn't *really* look like sales copy at all. A good example of this is the TruthAboutAbs*com site. That thing converts like crazy (currently Grav is at 637.14) and has been since about 2007 or so.

I think there are several reasons this type of sales copy works well:

1) Long-form copy still works, but people do kind of groan and roll their eyes when they first see it. It's become almost a cliche' of itself in the last few years. Can it still work? Of course. But testing other forms is well worth the effort.

2) It breaks up the information into chunks. Reading a long copy sales page can seem like an ordeal to people. They like to click around on a site to find exactly what they want when they want it.

3) It actually gives good information - not just "sales speak" There are at least 20 informative articles on that TruthAboutAbs site - and every one of those articles leads to another. It keeps the reader engaged and doesn't make them feel like they're slogging through a lot of hype to get to the price.

Short form works too sometimes. A nice headline, subhead, a brief paragraph and some bullet points with an "Order" link can be a great converter. It all depends and it all goes back to testing.

nam6641 said:
3. If you make $XX,XXX a month, how much money are you spending to make that (or is that profit?)
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I cited net earnings. I won't go into specifics because, 1) it fluctuates month-to-month (thankfully, it usually goes up :)) and 2) I'd have to drag out my monthly expenses and gross income to give you even a rough figure within the nearest $10k. But I can honestly say that I, personally (not my corp, my personal earnings) are $xx,xxx every month and have been for a while now. I consider myself pretty lucky and I don't let any success go to my head, but I know that luck only had so much to do with it and almost all of it had to do with a shitload of failures, and a shitload of 2 and even 3 day workdays.

I'm not afraid to admit it: I work my ass off. I'm not in this game as a hobby. It's nothing but a business to me. I'm not one of those guys that will tell you to "do what you love and the money will come" because that's about as much of a crock of shit as I ever heard. If that were true, I'd be a multi-millionaire just from watching college football and drinking beer. :D
 
biks said:
What's your feeling on video? As either part of your ebook package, or part of the landing page?

Most of the video I see being sold with an ebook training package is just tedious re-tread of what you can easily read in the .pdf in a quarter of the time. I realize that it creates "value" and you can charge more, even though it really adds nothing.

I'm a video professional by trade, so I see video under utilized in the sales aspect. Everyone seems to to just show a bullshit Photoshop rendering of their cover, but never show what your actually GETTING for data and photos inside of it. I've created videos that go over EVERY page and I explain what your buying. I think I've had only 2 returns from over 300 orders.

I've promoting a few other Clickbank products that are VIDEOS for Gods sake and they don't have any up front in their landing page. I can see all these hops going to their landing page from my site, but nothing is converting. It's driving me nuts, I KNOW if I made a descent video SHOWING what the hell your buying, I'd get some sales.
Click to expand...

I use video both as an affiliate and as a vendor but since my video skills suck, they may be the kind of videos that frustrate you :) haha.

I typically do nothing more than simple but informative slideshows, sometimes with music, sometimes with just me reading a pre-written script. Almost all the time they are not what you'd call "true professional quality" BUT I actually have gotten comments saying that goes in my favor a bit. Even though I use a "pen name" for all of my products, I really give that "persona" a personality and I let it show through in my writing, my audios, and my videos (I typically add mp3s to my products as well for added value...its really easy so why not?)

But I've never released a product that actually has any video in it. I could probably benefit from it on some, but most of them it wouldn't really add any value at all so I don't bother. Like I said, I'm not in the IM niche, so I don't really feel the need 99% of the time.

And sure, I could probably hire a professional to do some of the stuff I piece together using Camtasia + Audacity, but I see good results from what I've done so far so in the interest of keeping my overhead as low as possible, I'd just rather spend an afternoon banging it out myself and being done with it.

However, in your case I'd definitely use those skills that you have to my advantage if I were you.

biks said:

Do you bite the bullet and BUY all the products your promoting?
Click to expand...

I'd love to tell you that I did, but I don't. Now, if a product looks like it is going to do really well I'll contact the owner and ask for a copy so I can give more accurate reviews on what I'm selling. Even if you're a "big" affiliate, some owners are still sketchy about doing this - and I understand - but usually I'll still ask for at least a portion of it. This isn't just an "out of the blue" request, though. I'll always wait until I've made at least a few sales before contacting him/her. But until I test the product's conversion a little, I don't even bother.
 
So what's you take on Clickbanks ranking system?

Popularity
Gavity
Avg $/sale
Ave %/sale
Future $
Total $/sale
% referred

Does any of this come into play when choosing a product? Which ones do you consider useless? Any indicators that hold the most weight with you?

Any advantage on jumping on new offers as they show up, or does it make sense to see how they pan out and pick the good ones?
 
Any techniques for increasing your product's gravity on Clickbank?

Do you use any products like http://www.autopayswitch.net that swap out Clickbank buttons for Paypal buttons if a hoplink isn't detected?
 
biks said:
So what's you take on Clickbanks ranking system?

Popularity
Gavity
Avg $/sale
Ave %/sale
Future $
Total $/sale
% referred

Does any of this come into play when choosing a product? Which ones do you consider useless? Any indicators that hold the most weight with you?

Any advantage on jumping on new offers as they show up, or does it make sense to see how they pan out and pick the good ones?
Click to expand...

I try to take all the data into consideration, but I always account for low gravity vs. the time the product has been out and stuff like that. More importantly for me is my own data, which can only come from testing the traffic. I'm always shocked by how much conversions can jump with just a little tweaking in my pre-sales copy. Since I don't know what - if anything at all - others are doing to pre-sell a product, I can't really put too much stock into clickbank's available data.

I don't go out of my way to jump on new offers. The IM niche is pretty secluded in that its probably the only one that enjoys an audience that actively waits on products like this (maybe some Forex products do? I dunno, never been in that niche either) and I'm not in that niche so I don't fret much about pre-launch this and hype-building that. I just try to get an offer in front of a customer that needs it.
 
Lurking said:
Any techniques for increasing your product's gravity on Clickbank?
Click to expand...

Sure. Get more people to sell them. You can go out of your way all you want to artificially inflate your product's gravity but sooner or later it's going to become evident. If people that did that spent that energy on actually recruiting good affiliates and helping their affiliates make sales, they'd get so much farther ahead, in my opinion.

Lurking said:
Do you use any products like http://www.autopayswitch.net that swap out Clickbank buttons for Paypal buttons if a hoplink isn't detected?
Click to expand...

Nope. I don't use anything like that. I trust Paypal just as much as I trust Google (read: none) but Clickbank has always been pretty good to me (*knock on wood).
 
Hey got a small question. Do you think promoting things with free blogger blogs is a good thing? I can make professional looking squeeze pages with blogger. And I think they rank pretty decently too in google, so do u suggest it?
 
miansc said:
Hey got a small question. Do you think promoting things with free blogger blogs is a good thing? I can make professional looking squeeze pages with blogger. And I think they rank pretty decently too in google, so do u suggest it?
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Sure, if you can rank it, etc. Another alternative would be to set up blogger sites that pointed to your .com squeeze page/review page that I was talking about in this post.

That way, if the niche turns out to be profitable for you, you have some backlinks to a brandable .com that you can keep as a review site, sell things other than CB on (if that's more profitable) or maybe even turn into your own product page.

I like going that route because I like my primary "money maker" sites to be mine, not a blogger blog that's subject to the whims of Google taking it down due to some idiot submitting a spam complaint because he didn't like the CB product he bought through the hoplink. Because if that happens, there goes all your hard work out the window with nothing to show for it.
 
gonzomcribbinz said:
Sure, if you can rank it, etc. Another alternative would be to set up blogger sites that pointed to your .com squeeze page/review page that I was talking about in this post.

That way, if the niche turns out to be profitable for you, you have some backlinks to a brandable .com that you can keep as a review site, sell things other than CB on (if that's more profitable) or maybe even turn into your own product page.

I like going that route because I like my primary "money maker" sites to be mine, not a blogger blog that's subject to the whims of Google taking it down due to some idiot submitting a spam complaint because he didn't like the CB product he bought through the hoplink. Because if that happens, there goes all your hard work out the window with nothing to show for it.
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Yes, that's exactly right. I want to buy my own domain, but there's fair too any things always setting me back. Also, I have a great free webhosting solution, would you suggest free hosting with paid domains.

Thanks for your reply, I appreciate it. I'm sure when I hit that "Submit Reply" button ill have 100 more questions haha
 
miansc said:
Yes, that's exactly right. I want to buy my own domain, but there's fair too any things always setting me back. Also, I have a great free webhosting solution, would you suggest free hosting with paid domains.
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No, but I guess if you're strapped for cash and that's all you can afford at the moment then do what you have to do but get your own hosting as soon as possible.

Not to be rude, but I think everyone reading would appreciate it if we could keep the topic related to Clickbank. Thanks.
 
This is an excellent thread and I think your success boils down to the factors that shine through in your posts - your attitude and your facility with words.

Rather than relying on some crappy 'method,' yours is a solid, professional approach and it's evident that you're incredibly thorough when it comes to your business. And that, as you say, is what it is - a business. Marry that with the wit and intelligence that shines through in your copy (are you blushing yet?) and you, to paraphrase, have got gold.

I've soaked up every word and I'm going to emulate you to make more of what I'm here for - the money.

Now where's that ten bucks you owe me?!
 
gonzomcribbinz said:
No, but I guess if you're strapped for cash and that's all you can afford at the moment then do what you have to do but get your own hosting as soon as possible.

Not to be rude, but I think everyone reading would appreciate it if we could keep the topic related to Clickbank. Thanks.
Click to expand...

My bad.
 
foxy1 said:
This is an excellent thread and I think your success boils down to the factors that shine through in your posts - your attitude and your facility with words.

Rather than relying on some crappy 'method,' yours is a solid, professional approach and it's evident that you're incredibly thorough when it comes to your business. And that, as you say, is what it is - a business. Marry that with the wit and intelligence that shines through in your copy (are you blushing yet?) and you, to paraphrase, have got gold.

I've soaked up every word and I'm going to emulate you to make more of what I'm here for - the money.

Now where's that ten bucks you owe me?!
Click to expand...

Hey! Thanks a lot! Payment sent! Check your paypal! haha

Maybe when some "enterprising" young wanna-be blackhatter comes and copies this thread word-for-word to sell on DP for $10 a pop, he can use your post as a testimonial.

(thing is, I bet that shit really happens too! haha)
 
I want to acknowledge the direct linking thing.
I personally find that direct linking does not work aswell.
I spent some money on it when I just started & got almost nothing.

Many of the vendors, even if they have a good product / good sales copy, do not know how to monetize the traffic + the fact that buyers are not always on a purchase mode makes it a losing strategy.

No exit grabbers, no email subscriptions, too long sales copy. not mentioning the fuckers that use your traffic to link to other CB vendors makes it a lose lose.
But when you have their email addresses, its almost half way to own your own product, because you can control the traffic.

Excellent thread. thanks for sharing all of this.
 
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gonzomcribbinz said:
Hey! Thanks a lot! Payment sent! Check your paypal! haha

Maybe when some "enterprising" young wanna-be blackhatter comes and copies this thread word-for-word to sell on DP for $10 a pop, he can use your post as a testimonial.

(thing is, I bet that shit really happens too! haha)
Click to expand...

LOL - he/should could try but I have something much nastier up my sleeve than the FTC in the shape of a rapacious literary agent who would want his 15%...

If you ever want to write a (physical) book let me know. You're good.
 
First of all: Awesome thread. You really answered a lot of questions I had.

I've been an affiliate for a little while now, but I really feel I should make my own product and sell it instead.. I feel I could make a far better sales page and product than most of the people out there.

Do you use SEO/PPC/All that to actually promote your own products, just like an affiliate would, or do you only have other people promote your products and do all the work for you, while your site just runs?
 
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