Posts Tagged General
My Week On The Web – Far Travelled Freebies
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on November 19, 2010
I’ve been back in Australia just under a week now and getting caught up with my sites. Alas, I’ve had to renege on my promise to not work upon my return as we have to sort out some Google Adwords issues I’ve mentioned previously and get our new site up and running.
Seeing as I’m at my desk anyhow I thought I’d get back into my semi regular Friday posts and let y’all know what I’ve been up to and some of the stuff I’ve been reading about.
Don’t Know Your Canonical From Yer Elbow?
Confused by the difference between 301 redirects and rel=canonical? I know I was, but thanks to this extremely comprehensive guide from the lovely people over at SEOMoz I now need wonder no more! Basically 301′s are for your everyday site and content moving situations, redirecting traffic from expired content to the most relevant page on your site, and preventing multiple home page versions from being indexed. The canonical tag can be a much easier to use alternative, is handy for letting search engines know about pages which may be duplicates where a 301 is inappropriate, and stopping automatically generated URLs such as those containing session id’s being indexed.
Simple eh? If, like me, you’re a bit behind on the wonderful world of canonical fun catch up here!
Could You Make A Better Job of a Site Than Someone Else?
A great post from the very entertaining Finch pointing out that there may be financial opportunities to be had by taking on someone else’s dud project and adding a bit of affiliate magic. If a site’s current owner doesn’t have the mindset to monetise a project, maybe you do!
A4U Awards – The End Of The Blog Awards
Entries for the 2011 A4U Awards are now open. I see that the best blog category is now defunct as my fellow blogger and current holder of the accolade Jason Dale pointed out.
The reason is “due to the lack of active bloggers”, and to be honest I agree with Matt & team’s decision completely. Without a larger pool of bloggers I think the award was going to get a little bit pointless this year with no new blood for voters to consider. They’ve said if the pool expands they’ll revisit having an award for affiliate blogs. I’d love to see more people blogging within the UK space so here’s hoping the award will resurface at some later date.
Think There’s a lot of Money in 2nd Tier Affiliate Marketing?
Well think again! John Lammerton has referred just oodles of new affiliates to UK networks, some of whom are now pulling in very nice monthly amounts of up to five figures per month. So did he write his post from his private yacht moored off Capri? Well, maybe not…
Whilst we’re talking about Mr Lammerton, he’s recently started a brand new and original feature called “Ask Lammo” *cough* 
If you’d like to ask this experienced affiliate marketer and owner of Easy Content Units any questions just use the little box in the bottom right hand side of his site.
It’s ages since I had any Ask Kirsty questions (between John and Affiliate Doctors perhaps I’m being edged out of the market?!?!). So if anyone has any problems they’d like unpicked and analysed for public consumption please do drop me a line.
Are These The Furthest Travelled Affiliate Freebies Ever?
As you may or may not remember, we picked up a fair few freebies from various sources at the A4U Expo. To prove that there’s no lengths an affiliate won’t go to in order to bring home their conference goodies here’s a picture of our stash which has travelled on no less than 7 flights since we were in London at the Expo.
By far the most impressive feat is the transport of the 6 Peroni glasses my Duncan liberated from the opening party with the help of two willing accomplices with very large handbags. Fitting them into our already stacked to the brim luggage and actually keeping them in one piece ended up being the mission of the century. They now have just as much sentimental value as our wedding crystal and serve as a reminder of just how much an affiliate values a good freebie
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
My Week On The Web – Far Travelled Freebies
Affiliate Inspiration From Far Off Places
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on November 16, 2010
Actually, I think a far more appropriate title for this post would probably be “why it’s impossible for Kirsty to have a real holiday”. Having just got back from a very, very cool trip I want you to know I was thinking about affiliate marketing and this blog at some very improbable junctures!
Its clear that my passion for affiliate marketing is verging on the obsessive. I couldn’t stop those insistent little analogies popping into my mind when I was supposed to be concentrating on some of the world’s most impressive sights.
Pompeii – Don’t Build Your Business on The Side of a Volcano
"So we'll build the main plaza so that scenic volcano sort of dominates the town. Whats that? Nahhhh.... it won't go off!"
When our Roman chums built this amazing place they knew Vesuvius was a volcano – they just didn’t realise it was an active one. I was quite shocked to find there are 700,000 people living in the Naples area today. If this old lady blows her top (a trick she’s long overdue to perform) there are hundreds of thousands of unlucky residents in the danger zone. There are also some fairly firm doubts about the effectiveness of the evacuation plans
Seemingly madness, but there’s a huge number of dodgy adwords accounts, sly cookie stuffers, website copiers, and naughty fraudsters determined to make that easy buck building their empires on shaky ground. If you’ve based your income on something a little bit dubious, have been getting away with it for a while, and think you’ll never be caught – think again! There’s nothing worse than being shaken from your bed at 3am by the distant rumbling of a financial pyroclastic flow heading straight for your bank account.
Much like Vesuvius it’s not a matter of if, but when.
Rome – It’s Not All About The Colosseum Darling!
When you think of Rome, you instantly think of the Colosseum - but it ain't the only amazing bit of tourist eye candy in the neighbourhood!
Affiliate marketing suffers from what I’ll call “Colosseum Syndrome” for the purposes of this little rant-ette. “So Bill, I hear you’re taking up affiliate marketing. What are you going to promote? Ah yes. Mortgages and Gambling – a wise choice. However, have you considered checking out the rest of the affiliate neighbourhood?”
Time and time again in affiliate marketing people target the obvious and don’t put any effort into finding out about any beautiful yet underrated gems that might be nearby, and much easier to exploit without having to fight through crowds of competitors.
Not far from the Colosseum and only 4 other people there.
Leaning Tower of Pisa – Solid Foundations Are Essential!
Duncs refusing point blank to do the traditional holding up the tower pic (thank goodness or I'd have started divorce proceedings).
The Tower of Pisa was built in 3 stages, each stage tried to correct the obvious lean which means this tower has levels hanging all over the place to try and give the impression of a straight, well built tower. It was finally stabilised just a few years ago. Only took just under a thousand years to sort out
This anaology would have been obvious to anyone, the only way to build your affiliate business is on foundations of hard work. Anything else and you’ll have to spend an unpleasant amount of time and money going back and doing the underpinning work which may, or may not, work!
Some Other Pics Sans Smug Analogies
Thanks for bearing with me during those, it was essential to my mental wellbeing that I get them out onto the blog as I couldn’t believe how they kept popping into my head when I was supposed to be busy touristing!
Nice was... nice although my Dad is looking unimpressed here!
Me on the cruise ship in a dress, behaving myself, wearing makeup, and hair done. Quick! Call Record Breakers!!
Meeting the local wildlife in Krabi….
But the best bit of the trip… god it’s so good to be back home in Australia!
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Affiliate Inspiration From Far Off Places
Totally Expo’d Out
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on October 19, 2010
I’m still tired and broken after an incredibly busy and hectic 2 days and 3 nights at the A4U Expo.
I went straight from London to spend time with old friends and have returned to my Mum’s with a bad case of the horror lurgey – so my apologies for the lamentably late round up
The Sessions
Most of the sessions I ended up seeing were SEO related. I think this was mainly because I’ve been feeling a little rusty on that front recently and wanted to top up my knowledge . I have taken thousands of words of notes and there’s about 3 or 4 half formed potential blog posts that I’m hoping to get up in the coming weeks once I’ve had a chance to absorb and test the new info to try and add more of a practical affiliate slant to the info (and have some time for my feet to
touch the ground!)
I went to: -
Day 1
• The 3 Pillars of SEO – an overview of techical, on page, and off page SEO considerations we’d all be foolish not to consider.
• Advanced Analytics for Affiliates – An in depth look at getting more than just the standard unique visitor and bounce rate type malarkey from your analytics interface.
• Becoming an Affiliate a Reality Check – no choice there really, I was on the panel.
• SEO Ranking Factors – A good old panel type chit chat about SEO and its varied wily ways at present.
• The Webgains Speed Networking Session – talking fast about affiliate marketing and champagne, two of my favourite things!!
Day 2
• Feed and Microformat Optimisation – a fascinating session on how to get those review and events based listings into Google and a great case study with performance examples.
• Expanding into Europe – Good info about getting started in Germany. Worth attending just to experience Marcus Tandler for the very first time. Very funny guy.
• Link Building Strategies – Great insight into the Google brand update and some in depth analytical techniques. Made me very glad to no longer be involved in SEO but thoroughly fascinating!! Have about 1,000 words of notes on this session alone. One of my favourites I think.
The Hall
Pens-a-plenty, USB’s massages, drinks, games and lots of networks and agencies to chat to. I have to say my favourite freebie was the Tradedoubler chalk mugs. Affilinet were handing out some very nice energy drinks also which really helped Duncs and I wake up and make the best of the sessions on day two! Check out Hodge’s post on the Freebies here.
I have to confess I didn’t do a whole heap of networking in the hall, sticking to pre-arranged chats with people. I think the narrow focus of my affiliate business means that I was never going to find new business opportunities so I chose to spend time lounging on various comfy sofas drinking the plethora of free beverages on hand for tired affiliates and getting ready for the next information packed sesh.
The Parties
Well what can I say – if NippleTassels.co.uk or similar has not been regged by an inspired affiliate after the highly entertaining burlesque show at the Troxy I’ll be very surprised.
Although the opening and closing parties were pretty standard (almost quiet!) the middle night was simply superb. I’m a massive 30′s fan and loved every minute. Duncan looked more than slightly interested in the highly developed tassel twirling skills on display as well. I hope it didn’t give him any Xmas gift ideas LOL.
My Favourite Bits
- A near death dancefloor experience at the hands of Dom “Fred Astaire” Hodgson. He decided to attempt a very daring dance move with me – but unfortunately I didn’t see him coming and was disconcerted to suddenly find myself travelling backwards at a great rate of knots and looking up at the ceiling.
- The photo booth at the Troxy. Many a ridiculous snap was taken in there on the night – and one lovely chap in particular almost caused some marital discord by hijacking me and taking a series of pictures which my Duncan thought made his behaviour look “quite bad”. My mild mannered Kiwi other half saw the funny side – eventually
- Talking to a lovely chap from Mattressman.co.uk at the speed networking. Then another, and another, making 3 mattressmen in a row. By the end of all that bed related chat I was a convert – so don’t delay guys and gals sign up to their programme today. Huge range and great conversions!
- Duncan hijacking the handbags of the lovely Existem girls at the first night party. You’d think he’d never seen a Peroni glass before, but he’s now the proud owner of no less than 6. He might not be a full blown affiliate but he’s got the hang of the freebies and taken it to a new level. The burning, burning shame LOL.
A Great Conference
I’m very glad I made the effort to attend this year’s Expo – I thoroughly enjoyed all the sessions I attended and learned a lot that I’ll be able to put into practise when I go back to work in January.
The only thing missing was a lot of the usual affiliate suspects – I was sorry a lot of my old friends decided not to attend. Hopefully Matt & team will be able to tempt them back to future events as it wasn’t quite the same without them (although it did save me some nasty hangovers!!!).
I’m not sure when the next time I’ll get a chance to attend one of these events might be as I’m now planning to head back to Australia for at least 2 or 3 years. I’m sure by that stage the conference will be even bigger and better than ever. This year’s event was really a credit to the events team, so well done to them all 
Read what others are saying about the conference here.
I’m off to pack for my cruise now, so more from me in a couple of weeks!
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Back in UK & Getting Ready for A4U Expo
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on October 8, 2010
I’ve landed back in the mother country, my accent has become so Scottish my husband no longer understands me, and it’s T-Minus 3 days and counting till this year’s A4U Expo London kicks off!
Win a Ticket
If you haven’t got a ticket, Kieron Donoghue is running a competition over on his blog which closes end of play today (8th October). Just drop a line into his comments box and tell him what session you would most like to see and why you deserve to win the ticket. The comment he likes the most will win.
Only 11 comments there so far, and a bit of sucking up going on about Kieron’s own session – “Making it Happen : On a Shoe String Budget” which is running on day two. Can’t blame the suck-ees mind you, it does sound like a very interesting one and I’d say I’ll most likely be dropping in on that one myself.
Definately worth entering Kieron’s comp – so get your skates on and get over to his blog to enter now!
Speaking of Sessions Featuring Affiliates…
I’ve gotten myself onto the panel for “Becoming an Affiliate: A Reality Check” at the Expo Theatre on Day One. Turn up at 13.15 to 14.15 to see the goings on and ask us some questions.
I’m hoping for an interesting session so don’t be shy.
Don’t Forget To Say Hello
If you see me around I hope you’ll come on over and say hi. I’ve been starved of affiliate networking for two years now and really want to chat to as many people as possible. I’m a total chatterbox and love meeting new people!
Boring Affiliate Holiday Snap Bit
We stopped over in Bangkok for 3 nights on the way here and stayed at Lebua State Tower. We had a very nice suite right up on the 58th floor – I did feel a bit sick out on the balcony though. Was mind bendingly high! Thanks to Chris Johnson of Existem for the suggestion, they don’t only do conferences they do travel advice as well.
Here’s some pictures of what I’ve been up to whilst keeping my promise to myself to stay away from the blog.
The beautiful (but frighteningly high) view from our room! Thai approach to balcony safety standards didn't help
Revisiting our backpacking days and trying out some street food on Khao San Road.
Renting a long tail boat and stopping to feed some fish at a temple along the Bangkok canals.
Visiting the very beautiful Wat Arun.
OK, that’s enough of boring you with our holiday snaps – I’m extremely excited about the Expo and can’t wait to tell all you guys about the goings on and interesting sessions I’ve seen next week.
Have a good weekend
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Back in UK & Getting Ready for A4U Expo
Getting That Affiliate Monkey Off My Back!!
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on September 21, 2010
After no less than 20 days on holiday I’m finally at the point where I can just about relax and enjoy myself! Like many addictions the withdrawal from my usual working routine has been somewhat painful.
The Sky is Falling In!!!!
At least that’s how it felt for the first few days. Several times a day I got the “affiliate horrors” because I wasn’t working (and after all, doesn’t that mean everything will go wrong???!) and I kept on getting my knickers in a right old twist over whether I was doing everything I should to keep my beloved business running smoothly.
However, like Chicken Licken my anxieties were ill placed. It transpires that to ensure my own personal sky remains roughly in the right place I don’t actually have to be permanently glued to my office chair.
As Important As It Is To Have Your Finger On The Pulse…
It’s also important to find some large chunks of time to exorcise the ever present spectre of affiliate marketing from your mind. Even when on holiday us affiliates are not great at stepping back mentally from their job. I think a large part of the reason for my semi regular pangs of panic has been that conflict between the part of me that is knackered after 8 months of work with very little break and the other part that is completely addicted to affiliate marketing.
Performance athletes couldn’t eat, sleep, and breathe their occupation 24/7 without burning out completely.They pause for significant rest periods to ensure they are fighting fit to give their absolute best when it really counts. Of course, Tom Daley doesn’t book himself a relaxing fortnight in the sun only to turn around on the beach and see an Olympic sized diving pool has sneaked up on him unexpectedly. For an affiliate the mere sight of an internet cafe can be enough to send them dashing from the beach back into the warm and welcoming arms of a good old internet sesh.
And The Final Fatal Flaw In My Relaxation Plan?
So here I am droning on about the importance of giving your mind a break and where am I? That’s right, in my office writing on this blog. A few major pangs of panic have been over the fact I’m not updating on here as much as usual. The signs of true affiliate addiction methinks
The solution? It’s clear I need to give myself permission to take a break. So dear readers, Kirsty will be attending “Real World Rehab” until the A4U Expo commences on 12th of October.
I’ll talk to you guys then.
Kirsty Out
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Getting That Affiliate Monkey Off My Back!!
Are You Stuck In The Venus Affiliate Trap?
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on August 26, 2010
The public image of affiliate marketing which attracts people in droves is the vision of a working week of just a few hours, great financial rewards, and an amazing life filled with vast amounts of leisure and general adventuring.
Is it accurate?? Well for some. But for many people it’s a case of “Oh well, 2 out of 3 aint bad eh?? I didn’t like short working weeks and holidays anyway!”
Arrghhh! I didn't sign up for this!!
Affiliate Marketing is Like A Venus Fly Trap
The rewards can come at a price, and the work can ensnare you in a sticky world of changing goalposts that’s hard to escape.
This year I achieved the monthly income I set out 3 years ago as “the absolute pinnacle” of my financial aims. I decided that when I finally got to that level I’d be happy and relaxed about my finances at last. Am I? Of course not. I’ve trebled the target. I’ll be happy and relaxed once I’ve reached that in two years time, won’t I?? Ummm….
So What Creates The Venus Affiliate Trap?
The earnings potential for any individual is open ended, and we are surrounded by tales of super affiliates earning riches beyond their wildest dreams. This means it is easy for affiliates to suffer from feelings of inadequacy about how much they are earning and also to constantly push themselves on ever harder to earn more.It doesn’t matter what the Ten Commandments say – it’s human nature to covet your neighbour’s Ox and in affiliate marketing there are some might damned fine oxes for the purpose of coveting.
The side effect of this is ever increasing working hours meaning the self employed affiliate can easily work twice as hard as they did for someone else and will most likely be half as happy. Now that is arse about face logic but I know more than a few people will read this and feel a little stab of self-recognition.
Don’t End Up Being A Slave To The Affiliate Wage
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with working hard to earn more. However as with all things a little balance is needed. A few things that might help…
- Make a contract with yourself. Agree some working hours with yourself and stick to them. You’ll probably find you get more done when presented with a finite amount of time to cram those important tasks into.
- Define “happiness” – sit yourself down, work out what you’d be happy with in terms of your income, what you think you need to do to get there and if it’s achieveable within the scope of the hours you want to work. If it’s not, under no circumstances should you compromise your contract. You’ll have to find another way to achieve your aims either through outsourcing or nutting out some way to get the tasks that take up most of your time done efficiently.
- Plan leisure – If you’re earning any money at all from affiliate marketing make sure you spend some of it on enjoying yourself. It could be a Friday night down the pub with your mates, a day out, or a luxurious holiday. Whatever it is, make regular time for yourself to benefit from the money you earn. This will help you keep a balance between the numbers in your bank account and what they can actually do for you in the real world. There’s no point in being mega rich and trapped in your office 18 hours a day.
- Investigate your attitudes to money – I think if you want to make money for yourself it’s important to work out how you feel about it. I recently read Secrets of The Millionaire Mind by T. Harv Eker and there was some very illuminating things in there about how your attitudes to money can affect your ability to successfully earn it, and keep hold of it.
In my own special little case, I think I need to follow a bit of my own advice. I don’t mind revising my targets upwards, purely because I have found a method that works within my margins which will ensure additional profits won’t mean additional working hours. In fact, I’m about to take 4 months off and will be working only 2.5 days a week when we return.
However I think there’s a distinct possibility that unless I put a bit of a cap on my ambitions I’ll be in the unique situation of earning great money, having bags of leisure time, and STILL not being happy because of my need to always drive things onwards and upwards.
Clearly time to write a bullet pointed list concerning myself rather than worrying about all you guys!
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Are You Stuck In The Venus Affiliate Trap?
How An Affiliate Marketer Deals With 9am – Guest Post
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on August 24, 2010
Not many people have the discipline to work on their own. If you haven’t yet had the freedom of cracking open Facebook without looking over your shoulder, maybe it’s time you had the sensation of wanting to slap yourself every time you did.
To waste your own time is unforgivable. It’s arguably the cardinal sin of any self respecting entrepreneur. Procrastination is like masturbation, you’re only ever screwing yourself. I was taught that back in school. Okay, maybe not in such a colourful tone. But didn’t you just hate it when teachers nagged “if you don’t give 100%, the only person who suffers is yourself”. I’d grumble and kick my feet under the table. Well now in 2010…burden yourself with a business, take one look at the economy, and suddenly those slaps across the wrist seem like sensible lessons in life.
For me, the vital ingredient to a productive working day is momentum. Affiliate marketers survive and thrive by the virtue of momentum. Building steam and seeing projects through to the bitter end is paramount to success. How do you know if you suck at finding momentum? Well, take one look at your domain portfolio. Are you repping enough abandoned URLs to fill a graveyard with ideas that sounded good at the time?
Without momentum, it becomes very difficult to build long term assets in this industry. Many affiliates love pushing CPA offers. And they enjoy a lot of success. But I think it can be partially attributed to the fact that you can have a successful CPA campaign up and running in hours. You’re not building Rome in your bare feet. The same attitude and faltering attention span is a severe hindrance when it comes to working on sites and projects that demand time and perseverance to come together.
To develop long term assets, we need to train ourselves to see the bigger picture. To look beyond morning stats, weekly ROI, and actually stick with what we know we should be doing. Even when the results aren’t immediately clear. I’ve found that as a CPA marketer who thrives in achieving short term goals, maintaining the momentum and breaking down larger projects in to achievable milestones is the only way forward.
It’s nice for me to throw philosophy out there, but dealing with the reality is a different beast altogether. It’s a lot easier for me to pen a condescending blog post than it is for you to actually get your shit together and change the way you work. So what can we do to build momentum? How can you take yourself closer to the finishing line with your projects?
I don’t think it’s any coincidence that my own productivity levels improved dramatically when I slammed the axe through half my working day. I was one of those guys who spent every hour of sunlight at my desk. I’d slump there, trawling around the Internet, torn between working and scratching my balls for comfort. When I realized that time spent at my desk rarely reflected time spent putting in an actual shift, I changed my ways.
Working excessively long hours is the hardship that you wouldn’t embrace if you were doing it for anybody else, so why be such a bitch to yourself? Every night, I set myself a to-do list for the following day. It’s divided in to three sections.
1. Short term work – Maintaining campaigns, optimizing my creatives, split testing landing pages. You get the drill.
2. Long term work – Developing actual assets, planning wider web projects and working on the shit that would still feed my imaginary cat if the CPA business died tomorrow.
3. New business – Opportunity is everywhere in affiliate marketing. If you’re not dedicating just ten minutes of your day to exploring new horizons, opportunity has already passed you by. I guarantee it. Some other affiliate cowboy is laughing at you as he rides tomorrow’s gravy train all the way to the bank.
Having a to-do list is essential. You already knew this. But being realistic with what you expect to achieve is just as important.
A technique I discussed on my blog not too long ago highlighted the positives of breaking down those tasks in to smaller timed segments. I like to use this strategy. It helps to build the all important momentum that enables me to feel like I’ve achieved something by the time my dinner is in the oven.
So here’s how the first hour of my day might look:
10 minutes – View performance of campaigns, make minor adjustments.
10 minutes – Check emails, reply to anything urgent, star the rest.
10 minutes – Introduce new split tests for my Facebook campaigns.
10 minutes – Devise some new ad texts for my PPC campaigns.
10 minutes – Clear the shit from my desk, grab the post, chuck in some laundry.
10 minutes – Brainstorm a list of articles to be outsourced for one of my sites.
So you’re probably thinking, that’s one hell of a scattergun approach. How can you expect to build momentum when you’re jumping from one task to the next? I find that it works, simply because I’m never getting bogged down. I can hear the clock ticking and I’m in a hurry to achieve my objective before the ten minutes are up. But it only works if you force yourself to move on when the time is up. Even if your undies are half hanging out of the tumble dryer when that moment strikes.
After the first hour, I’ve built up enough momentum to break the early morning brain freeze. You know that feeling? You wake up, shuffle out of bed and plump yourself at your desk. You vow that you’re going to have a good day…if only you knew where to start. Sound familiar? When I follow this technique, I feel like I’m achieving something. No matter how small. It helps me to dive in to the bigger tasks. So I’ll start to ramp up the workload.
20 minutes – Research hot new product X, analyze my competitors and brainstorm ideas.
20 minutes – Work on content to feed out to my email lists.
20 minutes – Build a landing page to split test in to one of my campaigns.
20 minutes – Sign up at a new traffic source, get in touch with rep.
20 minutes – Add a couple of new products to my turnkey site, get down with the SEO.
20 minutes – Throw down some bullet points and an intro for a blog post.
I’m making up these tasks on the fly here. They don’t actually represent my working day. But you can see the idea. That’s another two hours where I’m constantly jumping between tasks that I could probably stretch out for hours at a time if I didn’t discipline myself with a time constraint.
The third and final part of my day is divided in to six 30 minute bursts. That gives me a six hour working day. It doesn’t sound like a lot but the momentum of constantly ticking off tasks keeps me motivated to the very end.
You can give 16 hours a day to affiliate marketing, but guess what? Affiliate marketing doesn’t owe you shit in return. If you’re not working efficiently, well, you might as well be whacking out articles for $5 per piece.
By having the freedom to work from home, we have to sacrifice the occasional boot up our arses that would normally keep us in line. Some marketers are born with the ability to sit down and work like troopers until the inbox is empty and the light outside has faded. Personally, I still need that boot up my arse. So I still rely on techniques like this to keep me pushing forward.
This post was contributed by Finch of FinchSells.com – when I asked him for a quick bio to put on here he suggested “Hi, this is Finch, affiliate marketer and blogger. Jesus, doesn’t he ramble a lot?”
I think I like Finch’s style
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
How An Affiliate Marketer Deals With 9am – Guest Post
Why Adversity Should Be An Affiliate’s Best Friend
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on August 17, 2010
Affiliate marketing is all about change and innovation – that’s what’s fun about it. If you enjoy stability and stultifying boredom – get a job watching grass grow, cos this simply ain’t for you bucko!
Sometimes a good pruning results in amazing growth!
An Affiliate Business Is Like An Apple Tree
It gets pruned every now and again, but patient affiliate gardeners will be rewarded with greatly enhanced crops. Each and every time any changes outwith my control have impacted my business it’s come back bigger, better, and stronger than before.
Why? Because I’ve always viewed change as an opportunity for my business – not a threat. I just get the old affiliate gardening overalls out, and look at what I need to do to satisfy Google, or find a new revenue stream. Like most hard gardening, the actual mechanics and sheer volume of work required is not fun at all – but the end result is always well worth it.
How My Business Has Been Pruned In The Past
- At the end of September 2003 I set off on my first ever affiliate marketing funded adventure with a year long trip to Australia. November 15th 2003? Florida Update. For those of you who’ve never heard of it, here’s a description of what happened. In a nutshell, Google blew the entire methodology I was relying upon to pay for all my antipodean adventuring right out of the water – all the rules changed. My mass produced spammy pages no longer cut the mustard, so I moved on to be heavily reliant upon direct to merchant PPC.
- Adwords Display URL Rule Changes – this was so long ago I can’t even remember when it happened! Aaaaages ago, Google allowed multiple repetitions of the same display URL in their results. Google decided (correctly) that this gave a poor user experience. Unsurprisingly several merchants banned affiliates from using their display URL to keep them from driving their in house marketing costs up. This happened fairly slowly but it meant that I repeatedly went out and found new merchants to work with in this way only to have them close off use of the display URL after a while. It was very difficult to get ahead. To cope with this I started to build my own landing sites using merchant’s feeds.
- The Death of Brand Name Bidding. At one stage I was heavily reliant on this income stream (ahhh…. back in the day!). Some programme terms were changed, and – shazam!! No more easy money.
- Adwords Quality Score Rules Are Changed (Announced February 14th 2007. I love you too guys!!) Just as I was finally getting to grips with my feed type landing sites and Adwords, the goalposts were moved again. Adwords put the bite on thin affiliate sites and, yep you guessed it all my lovely campaigns got zapped again. This time I took a good few months to work out what sort of content Adwords would want from my sites whilst cheekily “churning and burning” domains to buy me time.
- Mayday Update – unaffected. Finally I’d gotten ahead of the Google game!
Far From Being A Tale of Affiliate Disaster…
Throughout all of the above my business still grew nicely. I must confess though, it’s only since 2007 when I ventured properly into creating my own genuinely useful websites packed with unique content that I’ve seen true income stability and excellent growth. I’ve created a few really good sites with healthy organic traffic.
Dealing with the changes above combined with the usual programme closures, network hassles, and commission reductions has always made me consider my setup and look at ways to strengthen my position and income. I not only enjoyed dealing with them (in a grim sort of way!) but I’m glad they happened.
It’s All Part of The Job Description
An affiliate can and should expect all manner of change and adversity to be thrown at their progress. I hate the success stories that seem to crop up all over the place where a super affiliate charts their meteoric rise into fabulous wealth and totally fails to mention what a complete and utter shit fight it can feel like at times.
This is not an easy job, but it is an interesting one. Even when things are going boobies up I’m constantly learning, growing and loving my job. If you’re just starting out and think you could deal with this – welcome to the club. If you’ve been in the game for a while – my sincere respects to you. If you’re an account manager or other industry bod who has to deal with affiliates and moans about them being a bunch of grumpy buggers – wouldn’t you be too??!!
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Why Adversity Should Be An Affiliate’s Best Friend
Life After Outsourcing – Ummm… so What is it I do now??
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on August 6, 2010
I said that outsourcing was the absolute dogs danglies – and I stand by that completely. To be completely honest though I am suffering a slight hangover after the “champagne high” of finally ridding myself of all those terrible sloggy tasks. The thing is, in the last few weeks I’ve been feeling a little ummm…. lost!
I’ve Only Just Realised
I didn’t notice this earlier on in the year thanks to the wholesale destruction and reconstruction of my home not 3 metres from my office – I was just greatful progress was still being made and my feeble firefighting attempts seemed to keep the business just about plodding along in the administrative sense. The almost palpable noise of the money whizzing from my bank account was distraction enough without me having to hear the actual mechanics of change as well.
I’ve Been Feeling a Little Disjointed Without Knowing Why…
I used to measure my progress and reassure myself I was working hard enough based upon how many articles I was writing in a day, plus an hour or two of PPC, and the crossing off of at least 4 minor tasks on my to do list or 4 major ones. The main thrust was always around getting those new pages up and published – content makes the affiliate world go around after all.
But Now What?
My role has become a lot more nebulous in my mind and I’m suffering from terrible guilt because I don’t have any measurable benchmarks by which to define what I consider to be a good days work.
Damn this Scottish work ethic to hell and all the way back I say. I can just about hear several dozen of you thinking “what on earth is this silly girl’s problem?? She’s living the affiliate dream!!”
Creating Some Benchmarks
The ultimate thing I’m working towards is 1 ) A realisation of where I want to be with the business, and how I’ll get there. 2 ) A strategy for me to be able to implement more of my ideas without spreading myself too thin. 3 ) Keep running and developing ideas on my current sites whilst 1 & 2 are running through my mind.
Back to The Structured Day…
I’m going to have to resurrect my affiliate day planner and block off sections of the day for different types of task, thus giving myself permission to do the research that will ultimately make the business stronger and saving myself a lot of guilt about it not being proper work.
Don’t Say It, I Already Know…
I’m a bit odd, I’ll be the first to admit that my mind is unique and possibly bewildering. Do try to feel sympathetic. I have to live with it all the time – you guys only have to put up with selected snippets!
On the plus side, it’s never dull being me
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Life After Outsourcing – Ummm… so What is it I do now??
Affiliate Stuff is Coming to The A4U Expo – T Minus 9 Weeks & Counting!
Posted by Kirsty McCubbin in Affiliate Marketing on August 2, 2010
Wey hey! I’ve just realised the clock has just gone into single digits – it’s 9 weeks and 6 days till I’ll be at the A4U Expo in London. No pressure Matt & Team, but much like the 2008 re-organisation of my honeymoon to attend, I’ve ended up missing my Father’s 60th birthday so that I could tie in my visit to the UK with the conference. So don’t let me down.
Bigger & Hopefully Better!
The event has obviously grown considerably in my absence, the gig has had to switch locations to the larger ICC @ ExCel Capital Suite to accommodate all the affiliate type fun and games that the Existem team have in store for us. I’ll be interested to see what conference sessions are included in the line up. The agenda has been released, I’ve just not read it properly yet! There’ll be no less than 36 sessions to choose from so this year I may actually have to plan in advance what I want to see rather than my usual routine of asking whoever I happen to be standing near “what are you seeing then? Ooh, yeah. That does sound good!” five minutes before the next round of sessions is due to start.
I hear on the grapevine there’s to be a chance to grill / slag off the networks on key issues like closed groups, affiliate payments, preferential treatment of some affiliates and just about anything else us affiliate masses want to hear about from the horses mouth. Sanjit Atwal of Tradedoubler and Daniel Powel of CJ will be in the stocks. BYO rotten fruit and tough questions!
And Of Course, I Can’t Wait For The Essential Affiliate Parties
I’ve been sitting here in Australia absolutely writhing with Jealousy at the two glittering A4U Awards ceremonies that I’ve missed. Hopefully I can make up for missing them with the 3 shindigs that are being lined up to keep all the thirsty attendees well oiled. Free champagne has been mentioned, and I like the look of the venue for the middle evening party. My hot tip for dealing with all the free booze on tap is not to peak too early and get hammered on the first night. Jury’s out on whether I’ll take my own advice this year. I certainly didn’t last time!
I was also intrigued at the prospect of “Speed Networking” on the 12th – possibly of limited use when you work in such specific niches as I do but probably a great way to meet some new faces in a very short space of time and a good laugh as well. Specially if there’s free drink.
Did I mention that I’m looking forward to all the free drinks? Yes? OK. Just making sure. Maybe I should drop Matt Wood a line and suggest they put a little bit extra behind the bar now that I’m definately attending!
And The Issue Of This Year’s Price?
The cost of the Expo has risen considerably this year which has prompted some discussion of whether or not it’s worth attending. Personally, not attending simply isn’t an option for me. It will be my only opportunity for quite some time to network, see some information sessions of direct relevance to the UK industry, and generally catch up with what’s going on in the industry at the moment.
At £395 for an affiliate ticket on the early bird rate it is a lot more expensive than before. However that is an “all inclusive” price. I like the fact that once I’m there I don’t spend any more money (other than a taxi to the airport and a mega pack of panadol for the affiliate hangover). It’s still a lot cheaper than other affiliate conferences, and most importantly I will not be subjected to any sales pitches whilst attending. I have a friend who paid a LOT more than that to go to a conference which simply turned out to be speaker after speaker trying to sell their fantastic make money online products.
Of course, I am going to sit down after the conference and really work out if the money I’ve spent is worth it. In the past I’ve always found the expense was more than covered by new contacts who’ve helped me out here and there over time, handy tips from loose lips thanks to the booze, and of course the information content in the seminars.
I hope to meet lots of people there, Duncan and I are both really excited about going and seeing our affiliate pals
P.S. When I was chatting with the guys at Existem about the new ticket prices they sent over a £25 off discount code. Nearly forgot to post it! AFFSTUFF25
This post is from: Kirsty's Affiliate Marketing Guide - Affiliate Stuff UK
Affiliate Stuff is Coming to The A4U Expo – T Minus 9 Weeks & Counting!