Ad HustlerConfessions Of A Serial Internet Entrepreneur

I can argue the point that my boys Wes &  Steven from Tracking202 have changed the affiliate marketing industry.  There is a lot going on over at 202, so here are some updates:

Tracking202 PRO

Tracking202 PRO is a long time in the making.  It is a fully functional search engine management software for affiliate marketers and search engine management (SEMs).  In the past, software like this was called bid management software and put out by companies like Marin Software, Inceptor Bidcenter, Acquisio & KeywordMax.  Although T202Pro doesn’t automatically change your bids, it gives you more information then you could possibly imagine about your campaigns.  One of the coolest features of this new release is that you can see the actual bidded keyword side by side with the searched keyword.  This allows you to make much more intelligent determinations about which keywords are profitable to your campaign.

Tracking202Pro also does not require you to set up custom links for each campaign like Prosper202 does.  It uses the API’s of Google, Yaoo & MSN to automatically import data.  This means that you are no longer relying on your server or Tracking202′s server to redirect links which is a huge advantage if your or their server ever went down.

T202Pro is also extremely reasonably priced.  I remember days when this type of software cost $1,000+ per month which kept it far out of the reach of the every day affiliate.  T202Pro is very reasonably priced and any affiliate can afford it.

True to form Tracking202 Pro is willing to prove themselves before you have to spend any money.  They are currently offering a 7 day risk free trial so you can try it before you buy.

DISCOUNT FOR AD HUSTLER READERS: Tracking202Pro set up a custom coupon for all of us.  Simply use coupon code ADHUSTLER to save 10% off your first 3 months of service.

Prosper202

For one reason or another, not everyone wants to use Tracking202 or Tracking202Pro.  If this is your case then you will be happy to hear that Prosper202 will be doing another release.  In the new release they will be adding requested features and upgrades to the software.  To request a feature leave a comment on the Prosper202 Blog.  I’m personally very excited to see what they put out in the new release.

Donate202

The tracking202 team have done a lot for affiliates without asking for anything in return.  They never charged for prosper202 or tracking202 and never plan to.  The only problem is that they have immense server and development costs that they are paying out of their own pockets.  They are not a venture funded company.  Donations are completely voluntary but if you can spare a little bit of money, and use their software, send them a few bucks and help the cause.  Donations are accepted at Donate202.

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If you still have not tried any of these services, it’s time to.  Your competition is using it and with more data, they are probably making more profit then you are.

This is NOT a paid post, nor am I making ANY commissions if you buy any of these products!

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I will be there 1 day this week (either Tuesday or Wednesday).  If you are going and want to meet up, just hit me up

Ad Hustler

OK, the title is a little extreme.  I was reading through some old RSS posts and read Jon Fisher‘s (owner of Wickedfire) blog.  He doesn’t write much but his last post dated December 20, 2008 is pretty interesting.  The title of his post is Affiliate Marketing Hard Times Are Coming! Although affiliate marketing will never be dead (there is always something to market and a traffic source to do it on) it has it’s peaks and valley’s just like everything else.  Jon called that a valley was coming in December and I think he was spot on.

Sure there are those who are still hitting combined caps, but caps at 2k leads a day for each offer are pretty easy to hit when you have hundreds of affiliates all hitting the same type of traffic sources, using the same damn landing page for the same damn offer.

Reasons to be wary are because our typical traffic watering holes are drying up. Recently Facebook decided to nuke all ads pertaining to diet and Google is bitch slapping the shit out of those blog landing pages for Acai too.

These are two very valid points.

#1 – Copycats basically destroy profit margins on offers.  They also kill the offers themselves because they get oversaturated.
#2 – Copycats lead to major traffic sources cracking down on affiliates.  Traffic sources cant show their users 10 of the same ad that lead to the same landing page all of which are a scam.  It leads to bad user experience.

These problems mixed with the bad economy lead to a bit of a lull in affiliate marketing right now.  I think it will be more evident once some of the scammier rebills that are making the affiliate networks lots of money are gone.  If you compare the variety of offers right now to the variety a year ago, there is a huge difference.  A great deal of new offers coming on to networks are rebills.  There are a lot less lead gen campaigns or anything unique for that matter coming onto networks.  This is probably because advertisers don’t want to spend the money right now.

Bottom line is this.  As Jon called it a few months ago, we are in harder times right now for affiliate marketing.  If you make it through, you will be stronger then before but everyone is going to have to adapt.

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People love stealing other peoples ads on facebook.  Did you ever wonder, how can this be made even easier then using the Ad Board?  MadPPC.com has come up with a great script to do this called FBSpy.  Some of it’s features include:

• Multi-Account Capabilities – You have the freedom to set up and get ads from as many different Facebook accounts as you deem fit. Oh it’ll even tag up the ad with important information you had set for that user, like age, tags, sex, and sexual orientation.
• Easy to use – If you have a US or Canadian IP, just setup a profile.  Then when setting it up change where the profile is from, you should be able to get ads from all over the place.
• Multiple Search Features – Find out what ads are targeted by age, sex, sexual orientation (Likes in the above image). Also search by keywords found in the title and adcopy.
• Tags – Tag each ad with important keywords to not only describe the ad in general but make searching a breeze.

MadPPC is a great guy who does some sick coding.  If you are looking for a tool to spy on your Facebook competition, I suggest dropping the small amount of money to buy FBSpy.

This is NOT a paid post, nor am I making ANY commissions if you buy his product!

PLEASE NOTE: I DO NOT ENDORSE STEALING ADS. SPYING IS ONE THING.  GATHERING INFO ABOUT NICHES IS ONE THING.  STEALING ADS & LANDING PAGES WORD FOR WORD ARE ANOTHER.  USE YOUR BRAIN!

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The Girl Scouts hate the internet.

In the article  Why Do Girl Scouts Ban Online Cookie Sales? aspiring online entrepeneur, 8-year-old Wild Freeborn (future berry peddler) came up with the idea to market her Girl Scout cookies online (An idea I have actually pondered in the past).  She set up a youtube channel with a sales pitch and her dad set up an online ordering system.  Pretty entrepeneurial and worthy of some big ass merit badge or something right?  Nope.  The girl scounts hate the internet, and other parents of Girl Scouts support the denouncing of using the internet to sell cookies.  The parents issue is that it gives an unfair advantage to girls like Wild Freeborn who THINK BIG.

I HATE KIDS but this Wild Freeborn is a go getter.  Why should the Girl Scouts hamper her ability to sell more cookies then the next girl?  They shouldn’t and they should be ashamed of themselves for trying.  Life’s not fair.  If you want to make it to the top you have to be innovative and fight for it.  Wild Freeborn has that fight in her and the Girl Scouts are trying to kill it.  Girl Scouts of America: you should be ashamed of yourselves.

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