I’m going to give a quick rundown of building these campaigns.

Step 1 – Finding trends

The first step is to find a trending topic. You can use any of these sites to find trending topics.

Google Trends

Google Insights for Search

Google News

Bing Social

Yahoo Buzz

Yahoo Clues

Social Mention Trends

Twitter Trending Topics and Trendistic

It’s Trending (Facebook)

Like Button (Facebook)

Hitwise

This is a good site that aggregates some of the above sites http://trendsbuzz.com/

There’s no special trick to picking trends, just pick something that has good volume.

Step 2 – A landing page

You have a few options here. The classic idea is to do a ‘poll’ on a trending topic. Just for an example, lets say I chose the topic ‘girl with the dragon tattoo’. I might create a landing page like this

Get free movie tickets! Vote now for your chance to win..

<pic of the topic>

Will you see Girl with the Dragon Tatoo?

Yes – No
Vote now for your chance to win

If you need a good poll script, you can find some here

After ‘voting’ the person is taken to the offer which brings us to the next topic…

Offers

With this technique people try too hard to match the offers to the topic, and that’s not always necessary. Don’t assume you know what type of offer will convert with these campaigns. Ideally, you would rotate multiple niches until you figured out what worked. Some niches to try:

Gaming
Freebies/Sweepstakes
Downloads

If the topic is niche specific like ‘The biggest loser’ or something, you could do weight loss offers, etc.

Traffic

This works well with PPV traffic. It used to do well with search, but the advent of quality score has made these more difficult to run.

The most interesting way I’ve seen this done recently, was in a case study our forum member Yabby posted. The idea is to create a Facebook app around a polling script and use the “Precise Interests” targeting option. The possibilities with that are endless and you can often get very cheap traffic.

You could also send PPV traffic to your poll/landing page on FB.

Some of my best campaigns have produced $10k profit in a single month. Not a huge campaign, but for about 20 min setup time and a couple hours of optimization that’s some pretty easy money. Those campaigns don’t happen all the time, but when they do it’s great.

Lots of possibilities with this one. Have fun!

This is business and I’m doing this to make money. I can be friends with anyone I want, but I am going to run with the network that gives me the best results.

With that in mind, I tested the average offer page load time for 4 popular networks. I am going to leave these anonymous so you can do your own testing and reach your own conclusions. Chances are, you are running with one of these networks though.

I tested 4 offers in different niches for each network. I used the same offer if it was available on the networks.

The best network had an average offer page load speed of 1.7 s. The worst network had an average of 2.9. That’s a full second slower than the second slowest network. If you don’t think that would have an effect on conversions..well, 1. You’re wrong and 2. Split test it for yourself.

Here is a chart showing the results

I see over and over again in the forums people who say “I’ve done so many campaigns and I can’t get anything to work!’. There can be a lot of reasons for this, but one of the simplest it to split test offers on different CPA networks.

I really encourage you to test your offer page load times. It can make a HUGE difference in your conversion rates.

*edit* After reading the comments, I realized I should show you how you can test. You can use http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/ (you can pick where it runs the test from).

I also use Live HTTP Headers and http://wheregoes.com/ to see the redirects. You won’t believe how many redirects some affiliate links go through.

Here is a screenshot from Shareasale

As you can see, the majority of sales comes from people who come back 15 days after clicking through my link. Why is this important? Well, for one thing it means you might be stopping your campaigns too early. In the above example I might have run this campaign for a week and thought it wasn’t going to work. It’s only after waiting for those return sales to come in that I can get a good idea of what’s working.

This varies by merchant. Some merchants have customers who purchase the first day and then again in a few weeks, so you need to take things like that into consideration.

Return days don’t really matter for CPA offers, this is mostly for physical product merchants.

You might notice there is a high return time for merchants that have big ticket items. This makes sense because people like to think about big purchases more before they make them.

If the merchant’s cookie is long enough, you can actually get a lot of “bonus” sales. Someone might only click through your link once, but they might come back and buy several time from that merchant during the time your cookie is active. If you were doing a PPC campaign you might earn multiple commissions from just one paid for click…pretty cool!

Unfortunately a lot of merchants (like Amazon) are aware of this and set a really short cookie as a result. If you can’t get a commission increase from a merchant, see if they can increase your cookie length. This isn’t something affiliates are used to asking for, but can end up earning you a lot more than a commission increase.

So, start paying attention to return time and you can earn much more than people who don’t. You also need to really pay attention to how long a merchants cookie lasts to make sure it’s worth promoting.

First, let me say the world of physical product affiliates is quite different than CPA affiliates. I went to the Shareasale think tank in Half Moon Bay in 2010 and it was a far cry from the affiliate summit type parties. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing at all…just that when you start mixing with that crowd, keep that in mind. A lot of physical product promotions are done by groups of people and not necessarily individuals. One example is companies that create and run coupon sites. These aren’t kids sitting in their mom’s basement slinging Acai, but rather actual companies that have an office, employees, etc. but operate only as affiliates.

With physical products you are paid a % of the sale (usually) instead of a flat fee lead/sale like most CPA offers. What turns a lot of people off to promoting physical products is the small % you usually get. This % can vary a lot, but it can seem quite low to those new to this. Affiliates usually see something paying out a 5% commission and say screw that, I’m going to push that offer that pays out $30 a pop. I’ll show you later why earning a % commission isn’t a bad thing.

There are some pretty good advantages that promoting physical products has over CPA offers

- Physical products don’t usually scrub like CPA offers. You make the sale, you get the commission – simple and straightforward.

- Physical product networks almost always pay out. Forget this ‘oh the advertiser didn’t pay us so were not paying you’ BS you get from CPA networks.

- Physical products can be promoted on a lot of traffic sources that you can’t run questionable CPA offers on.

- You can find some really unique niches without much competition.

There are also some disadvantages though

- The payout terms are usually net 30 and can’t be changed. These networks usually won’t put you on weeklies.

- This isn’t usually a quick cash thing. You don’t get the same highs you can with CPA marketing (but you also don’t get the same lows)

- It can be tough to negotiate increased commissions

So how do you promote this stuff anyway?

Here are IMHO some of the best ways to go;

PPC

Lot’s of room for physical products there and direct linking still works great.

Coupon sites

These can take a lot of work to do right, but can really pay off. I know a couple people who earn great money only running these types of sites.

SEO

Lots of low competition keywords to go after.

As far as what types of sites to make, I’ve found blogs to work really well. My blogs for this are usually in a specific niche, and each post is just some unique content about a specific product.

A lot of affiliates do datafeed sites which are also great. If you have coding skills (or know someone who does) you can do some really cool things.

CTRTard has a cool 4 part series on data feed sites worth checking out

Barman did a good post on auto blogs and datafeeds

One of your best friends in doing this is Pop Shops which makes it super easy to add products to blog posts and a whole lot more so definitely check it out.

Another good blog to check out is Eric Nagel who has some good physical product and automation content.

Ok, that’s nice, Can I stop reading and go back to promoting CPA offers now?

I know some of the stuff I talked about doesn’t sound too exciting so let me share one example with you. This is a screenshot from this year for merchant I promote on Shareasale. You can see I’ve generated $94k in sales for this merchant (I account for about 60% of their affiliate sales).

Now unfortunately the $94k is sales I have generated for them, not what I get to keep. My cut so far this year is about $7,500. That isn’t a large amount by any means and really nothing to write home about until I say this; I have probably spent a total of about 2 hours work promoting this particular merchant. That would be a rate of $3,750 and hour or so..not bad!

Like I said, $7,500 isn’t too impressive but when you factor in the time I spent on it, the ROI is insane. This is just one example of a merchant I promote, so you can imagine how this can add up quick. They aren’t all this easy and profitable, but there is a lot of money to be made promoting physical products!

Part One: Services You Can Offer & What You’ll Need

Pretty much everyone would like to make some amount of money from home – whether to replace a day job, to pay down some debts, or just to supplement existing income. In pursuit of that often-elusive income from home, a lot of people consider freelance writing, web writing, MLM, or affiliate marketing – but surprisingly, not a whole lot of people consider marketing consulting.

Part of that may be that many people don’t even know it’s an option. I have a younger sister who works for a traditional ad agency in St. Louis, and she’s had several co-workers tell her that “it’s not possible to go freelance in marketing”. They tell her I’ll be broke and looking for a job in no time. I can’t help but laugh, considering that I’ve been enjoying a better salary and more leisure time than all of them…for several years now.

My goal, though, is not to hoard all the freelance marketing jobs. My time is limited and there are plenty to go around. My goal is to help people learn how to use their marketing skills to earn more income and gain more control over their lives.

Before we go too much further, let me say that this is not a speculative guide written by someone who doesn’t know what the heck she’s talking about. I’ve been doing online marketing in one form or another for almost 10 years (more than 15 if you count a brief incident when I was still in high school back around 1994-95). I started off around 2000-2001 by selling virtual currency in an online game called EverQuest. I didn’t really think about it at the time, but everything I was doing to grow that little mini business was some kind of online marketing. I didn’t exactly get rich off of it, but it was nice to have the extra spending money when you’re in college.

I graduated college in 2005 with a degree in Economics, but I knew all along that the kind of jobs my classmates would go into were not the kind of jobs that would make me happy. I turned down a few very enticing offers before deciding that I would freelance until I found something worthy of 40+ hours of each week.

After 6 months or so, I saw not one, but two jobs in online marketing pop up. I submitted my application for both, and both called me in for interviews. One seemed too corporate and I passed on their offer – but the other one was for a small, quirky company with very little knowledge about online marketing, so I went for it. I like being somewhere that I can make a difference.

Within a couple of years, I was growing very tired of the 40+ hour work week, and I despised the fact that I was driving huge profit growth while my salary increases were not much bigger than anyone else’s. Maybe I’m silly, but I like being rewarded for my achievements

I decided it was time to quit. Although I was earning a decent amount of income in ad revenue and affiliate sales (I owned quite a few small websites at the time), I wanted to add an extra dimension of stability to my income. That’s when I returned, once again, to freelance work.

I’ve been able to enjoy working from exciting places all over the country, tackling new projects on a regular basis, and dealing with clients all over the world. I’ve had several trips to industry shows paid for, and I get to use free software and check out free courses all the time. And of course, I get all of that while charging anywhere from $50-500/hour (one of the perks of freelance consulting is that you can lower or raise your rate depending on how much you think you’d enjoy the work).

The best part is that it’s surprisingly easy. If you have a head for marketing and halfway decent powers of persuasion, you’ll likely have no trouble getting started in your own freelance marketing business.

Is it possible to freelance marketing services?

YES! Like I said, I’ve earned a very comfortable income doing this for quite a while now. The problem is that a lot of people have watched movies about traditional advertising agencies, so they think of big client presentations, brainstorming sessions where people talk about getting in the mind of a running shoes buyer, and so on. They picture the kind of advertising that is rarely done by freelancers simply because those types of big companies generally prefer agencies.

So what’s available for freelancers? Plenty. Almost every business in existence would like more customers. Most businesses today either have or want a website. Almost everyone wants a good web presence. And the best part – very few entrepreneurs are capable marketers.

A few of the many types of jobs you can do as a freelance marketer…

•Search engine optimization (SEO) – Search engines have to go through billions of pages to deliver the most relevant results for a given search. If your site is the one they deem most relevant for a popular search, that can mean a HUGE amount of free visitors to your website. The problem is that the rules change often, and can be difficult for some people to understand and act on. So, whether a business wants to rank well for “NYC chinese restaurant” or “giant gag underpants”, they might want the help of an SEO expert.

•Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC) – Search engines like Google, Yahoo!, and MSN have advertising platforms that allow business owners to bid on different searches and have their ads appear in the sponsored area along the top and sides of search results. While pretty much anyone can set this up, it takes a certain amount of skill to know which keywords are likely to perform well, to design text ads that get the most clicks possible, and to analyze results for maximum performance and cost effectiveness.

•Copywriting – Compelling copy can make a huge different in whether people decide to buy what you’re selling. Whether you’re describing the luxurious features of a seaside resort or selling the cost-cutting features of a software program, good copy means more money for your clients.

•Social Media – Nearly every company wants at least a basic presence on Facebook, and many more want comprehensive coverage on sites like Squidoo, HubPages, MySpace, Digg, and beyond. A good social media expert can help companies identify “angles” for promoting themselves and avoid embarrassing public mistakes.

•Media Buying – Although many types of companies can benefit from media buys, it’s an especially popular service with e-commerce companies looking for direct sales or other companies looking for branding. A good consultant can help locate, negotiate, and analyze the purchase of advertising through both advertising networks and independent websites.

•Email Marketing – Helping a client build a mailing list and effectively correspond with customers can be extremely lucrative. Even though a lot of mailing providers charge just $20-30/month, there’s much more to it than physically sending out the emails. Businesses need people to help them grow their lists, create professional emails, and optimize for maximum results.

•Marketing Planning – Often, clients have a general idea about what to do, but they want someone to help them create a balanced plan for spending their marketing budget most effectively. If you’re well-versed in many areas of marketing, you could do very well specializing in planning.

•Marketing Training – Sometimes, it’s just not efficient to have an expert carry out all steps of marketing a business. Many tasks are simple, and require minimal training. A marketer who recognizes this can do very well just by training the staff of other companies to carry out marketing tasks.

•Marketing Audits – Often, clients want someone to step in and let them know if they’re headed in the right direction, but they’re not looking for someone to actually take over the work. In these cases, they look for someone who can look over everything they’re currently doing and give them pointers or corrections as needed.

With a little imagination, you can probably come up with even more services to offer. Pretty much any kind of marketing task that a business would need can be accomplished by a freelance consultant.

What do you need (personality and actual STUFF) to be a freelance marketer

Becoming a freelance marketing consultant is actually much easier than becoming a lot of things. You don’t need a special degree, you don’t need a huge amount of startup capital, and as long as you have access to basic office supplies and internet access, you probably won’t even need to buy any equipment.

That’s not to say that you’re going to have a ton of luck if you start going up to clients and saying, “Hey, I’m a high school dropout with access to the computer at my local library. Will you pay me $100/hour to do your marketing?” Remember, you’re in marketing now – it’s all about putting things in a good light and enhancing positives.

Your career as a freelance marketing consultant is going to be easier if you have a college degree of some sort, but it’s definitely not a requirement. Results matter more. If you have a degree, then by all means, include that information in your pitches and on your website if you decide to have one. If it’s from a prestigious college, mention it once by name (and only once…let’s not be obnoxious). If you didn’t go to college or didn’t finish college, just ignore the topic completely. There’s no need to apologize for something that doesn’t really matter. Just focus on experience and results instead.

You will need some amount of experience to get jobs, but that’s not nearly as bad as it sounds. The next section will cover a variety of different ways to build a portfolio, and you can also dig into your past jobs to find instances where you’ve been involved in marketing. For example, I worked in a bank in college, and you’d better believe that my first few clients heard all about how I presented customers with the benefits of different investment and deposit products in a way that improved the success rate, or how I coached other tellers on presenting products in the same ways. Part of being a marketer is about being creative and recognizing marketing opportunities in situations that aren’t necessarily “marketing jobs”.

As I said before, your equipment needs are going to be pretty basic. I’ve included a list of what I use below, and I’ve starred the items that I would consider absolutely essential. Remember, of course, that you don’t necessarily have to OWN every item. Reliable access is usually good enough for a beginner.

•Computer* – A laptop is handy if you work and travel frequently, but don’t run out and rack up your credit cards to buy one if you don’t have it and your lifestyle doesn’t absolutely dictate that you need it.

•Internet Access* – Not only do you need access, but you should have some form of backup access with a second provider. There’s nothing worse than carving out a block of time to work on something for a deadline, only to find out that your ISP is down for some reason.

•Printer / Scanner / Fax* – You don’t have to have both a scanner and a fax, but you should at least have one or the other – or a Kinko’s nearby. Although you can do a lot online, you’ll almost definitely have cases where you need to physically scan in a document and send it to someone’s fax number.

•Telephone* – Most clients will want to talk to you on the phone at least once. Skype can work, too, if your computer is on most of the time and you have some kind of solution for mobile access.

•Notebooks / Pens / Pencils* – This is just basic office stuff that you should always have around. You never know when you’ll need to write down an idea and you won’t want to wait for your computer to fire up (or when the power will go out and you’ll feel like laying out a project on paper).

•Data Backup* – An external hard drive can work, but I prefer Dropbox because it’s completely offsite (and free for the first 2 GB).

•Microsoft Office* – Although it’s possible to get by with OpenOffice, MSOffice products have made my life considerably easier. They run faster, all of the odd little features work exactly as you expect (like notations that people leave in long documents), and you don’t have to worry about files not opening up and looking exactly like you left them in OpenOffice. Given the time it has saved me, it was worth the minor investment.

•Software Specific to Your Specialization* – It’s hard to be too specific here (we’ll talk more about this later), but most types of marketing can be aided with the use of software. If there’s a software package that will allow you to be more efficient and better serve your clients, make it a priority to buy it early on. At the same time, don’t just buy everything in sight. Make sure it will truly help your business.

•Mobile Broadband – It’s not a necessity, but I do love being on long car trips and being able to get online through my laptop and get a bit of work done. It has also saved me quite a bit during the months that I travel, since I no longer need to pay for hotel wifi.

•Business Cards – If you do much face-to-face networking, you should have a set. I like Moo.com Cards because you can make them really unique and people always want to talk about them.

•A Website – I used to have a website, but I shut it down years ago and I haven’t ever really felt like I needed it. In fact, for SEO clients it was almost a bad thing, since they expected my website to rank #1 for the search term “SEO”. I didn’t have time to worry about ranking for SEO – I was busy getting my clients to rank well. The same could be said of social media if they don’t see your site getting actively promoted.

This reminds me of a really well known blackhat seo guy I used to be friends with and what he told me one time; Apparently tons of people would come to him for help with questions about site structure, indexing, etc, etc, etc. and he said his answer 99% of the time was just that they needed to build more links. That was it, forget everything and build more links.

Going back to Adam’s advice above…I agree 100% that simply building more campaigns will make you progress faster and further than almost anything else. I’m not saying don’t ask questions or anything at all, just not matter what build new campaigns every day.

So, I want to see how many of you are up for a 30 day experiment. For the next 30 days, commit to building at least 1 campaign and up to 5 campaigns each day. A new campaign could mean simply taking a campaign you already have running and moving it to a new traffic source, or doing the same campaign in a different country. It doesn’t always have to mean building a totally new campaign from scratch. A campaign should not be taking you days to launch. If it is, let me know and let’s talk about your approach.

Don’t over complicate this…the point isn’t to make perfect campaigns, just to make campaigns.

If you want to keep track of this yourself that’s cool..get a calendar or something and cross out every day you build x amount of campaigns every day for the next 30 days. We started a thread in the forum where people can post each day the # of campaigns they make (myself included). It’s going to be really interesting to see how many people follow through with this. I will report back on that one!

I don’t know if many people will do this but it is probably the one thing I can recommend doing that would take you to the next level.

8 Reasons rich people hate their lives

Two campaigns, one theme, different outcome

Five Best Web-Based Conferencing Tools

6 Tips for When You’re Not in the Mood to Work

Article Marketing + Submission for SEO

11 Practical Ways To Stop Procrastination

Ecommerce Tip: SEO for Product Pages

So, without further ado here are some good blog posts from the last week you should check out:

A landing page makeover

How to sell products with direct mail inserts

If Abraham Lincoln taught affiliate marketing

What to do on the slow days

Using Social Media to Help Launch Your New Business

International SEO strategies

Forget multitasking, try unitasking

How to find energy for more than your day job

Bing the default search engine for the Iphone?

How search engines value links

People with jobs have a fantasy about…

Business ideas for musicians and their fans

12 useful ways to get out of ruts

Dealing with the haters

Block distracting sites and get more done

The #1 habit of highly creative people

I hope you find some of those links useful!