Super Affiliate Marketing Blog

Well, it’s almost finalized, but enough so that I can officially report it..

I will be hosting a weekly either live or pre-recorded radio show for webmasters. We have a REALLY sweet lineup of super stars to interview, and all of our questions will come in from you guys, not us. So when the radio project launches, I’ll give everyone a heads up a week in advance and let you know who the guest is, and what industry/market they are from so you can submit your questions. I’ll then pick the top 25 best questions, and grill the shit out of the person.

Also, every week I’ll be answering questions submitted through my blog. I’ll set up a page for that week’s show, and you can post your questions in the form of comments. Try and keep them easy to some point, I’d hate to pass over a great question due to someone being sloppy where I can’t understand what the hell they are writing.

I also plan on adding more members to my team so we can provide answers from all sorts of perspectives.

The radio broadcast will be free for everyone to use. Again, the only thing I ask is that if you are going to report it, please provide a link back to my blog with “Affiliate Marketing” as the anchor text.

That’s all for now, keep pluggin away!

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A few days ago I was going over some ideas on how to leverage my time, and make it worth my while to keep giving out necessary advice to people who really need it. I figured posting the blog would slow down the amount of emails coming in asking for free advice, but of course, I was wrong! So I figured I needed to put some serious thought into this and come up with something quickly.

Here is what I will be doing:

I will be launching a new website that will deal with 1 on 1 consulting. It’s not going to be a by the hour type deal, instead, the client will submit a list of 20 questions, and I will answer those on top of their goal that they’d like to reach. I will most probably be charging about $300 for this. Coming up with the price was a bit tough for me, because like all consultants, we all think our time is work a cajillion dollars. I figure, if I had to take some time out of my day to help someone, I may as well make it worth my while and theirs, especially with the type of advice I’ll be giving out.

Just to let you guys know, this is not some general advice about what would work best for the industry/niche the client is in. It would be straight forward, no sugar coating bullshit answers to EXACTLY what the client needs to do, from some very personal and unique perspectives. Meaning, the advice/consulting they’ll get is tailored specifically to THEIR site, not their industy’s. Which I think is a very important aspect that is generally not found anywhere else.

Sure, you can read forums and boards, and spend $35 on ebooks that you’ll never follow, or read tons and tons of threads about how this guy made this and that guy made that, and all sorts of bullshit like that. Or, you can pick up your skirt, grab your balls, and make some fucking money. (That line is from Boiler Room — I wish I came up with it on my own!)

That’s what this business is for me. It’s a money making business, not a social group to impress people and make a ton of friends. Sure, those are always nice perks, but when we get down to it, I’m here to make money, and I think that is one of the most important and overlooked aspects of this game. People on forums these days are always trying to “make and play nice”, and it really bugs me, because that’s not how real people act. We are crude, we use profanity (not asterisks!), and the less censorship and more free speech the better. That’s just my approach to everything really..

So anyhow, back onto topic..

I am also trying to figure out a way to accomodate those that can’t afford the 1-1 consultation. I know, when your site isn’t even clearing $100 a month in profits, spending $300 seems like it’s impossible. But remember, YOU HAVE TO SPEND SOME TO MAKE SOME. So coming up with maybe a paid weekly/monthly newsletter for like $10/mo may be in the works. Maybe I’ll try and answer 20 submitted general and industry specific questions in each newsletter, I don’t even know. Those of you that emailed me and commented on my blog posts about doing some type of paid forum sparked my interest, but honestly, it seems so overly time consuming and annoying.. If someone wants to get into it with me and contact me to really explain how it would be beneficial, I’d like to hear what you have to say. Don’t be intimidated either, but only really contact me if you know your shit. Don’t try and do it so you can get some free instant advice just because you have me on IM’s or Skype.

Well, that’s it for now, I’ll be keeping everyone updated as new developments arise, until then, keep the comments coming, and to all you lurkers, start commenting already, you know you want to!

Comments(6)

I’ve been putting a lot of serious thought into this topic, because of the 100’s of emails I get each week from people seeking advice from me. Now, I’ve always stuck by the fact that I don’t plan on ever putting any ads on my site for webmasters, because I don’t give advice as a form of income, but I do want to give out as much advice as possible without any strings attached.

I don’t have any services or ebooks to upsell to anyone, and no requirements of anyone to buy anything (partly because I don’t push anything either), but I have been thinking about charging for advice.

What I’m asking from you guys is do I charge for advice or not. If I charged for it, I would be obligated to answer EVERY email that came my way, whether I was busy with other things or not. There’s no way I would have someone pay for something and then not perform the service for them. I may be slow in the ethics department, but I’m not a prick like that!

I was thinking of one of the two, and mind you, these are only thoughts, not saying I would do any of these, just dabbling with the idea mostly.

1- Creating a service with an affordable monthly fee, where advice was given out on a general and per user basis. Tips and tricks no one else uses, places I use for ideas, etc etc.. Users would be given the option to ask questions about their sites, and get a well drafted response back, directly from me with what they should and shouldn’t be doing. Unfortunately the only drawback would be the 1-on-1 support. I would not be able to “be there” for extra support due to the fact that I do have so many damn sites going on at the same time, and need to keep a priority focus on those.
2- Offering a flat fee consulting service to webmasters, affiliates, and internet marketers alike. I’d probably charge something in the range of $100-$300 for a complete asessment of their site from perspectives of seo, revenue and traffic. I’d answer up to 20 of their questions via email and give them in-depth advice that would help THEM and wouldn’t be such general advice. The answers would be straight forward, without the candy coating bullshit that you can usually find from advice given by consultants (I used to read their reports and think to myself — “What the fuck?? Did this guy go to the University of Bullshit?!”.

I’d really appreciate feedback on this topic and thoughts, comments, or constructive criticism on this topic. Again, I may not even go this route due to time constraints, but if I do end up doing something, it would make it worth my time and effort, because with all jokes and bullshit aside, it all comes down to the fact that time is money for me.

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Just wanted to post some news and announcements real quickly..

First off, in regards to my post on SitePoint’s marketplace, and on here about hiring some extra hands for the project manager positions, there are a total of 8 positions, with 5 remaining positions to be filled. If you’re interested in applying for it, please read the job posting carefully and make sure you meet the requirements. My time is quite limited in general, and I’d hate to have to contact you and find out that you are just eager for the role, but don’t actually posess any of the requirements or basic skills for it. It’s really frustrating. But on a better note, the post has gotten me over 45 emails on the topic. I promise to go through each one and answer all of those as well. Whether or not I think you’re a fit, I’ll be sure to respond to you and let you know. If you’re one of those that I do choose to speak with either on AIM or over the phone, you’re not a shoe in just yet, so don’t go announcing anything to anyone.

Second announcement, I’m proud to report that this blog has been getting a little over 1000 uniques a day. It seems there are quite a few lurkers here. Don’t be intimidated to post! Post at will, whether it’s good, bad, or a little bit of both. I don’t give a shit if you have something negative to say, saying it is what counts and all feedback is welcome.

Third and final announcement and some news for the blog, I’ll be making a category called “The Leak” which will leak information about some of my projects and personal life. I know a lot of people have interest in my so far well guarded sites and personal life, but since this is somewhat of a personal blog, I think it’s only fair to the readers to give everyone a quick peek and see what’s going on in my day to day operations and personal life.

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I’ve been getting loads of emails, from friends and followers of forum threads asking to help them get included into certain CPM networks in which I have some pull in. The most common complaint is that when applying to one of the CPM networks, both small and major, they are being rejected due to an overwhelming amount of websites in their sector.

Now this sort of surprises me, because from an ad network’s perspective, wouldn’t your goal be to have as many sites (quantity over quality baby!) so you can spend as much of the advertiser’s coin as possible, and then split that with the publishers (and probably skim a bunch off the top as well — those thieving bastards!) and then keep having the advertisers spend more and more? I mean, this is America, and isn’t the goal of corporations to make as much profit as possible, regardless of how it’s done? That’s my goal, so why isn’t it theirs anymore??

What I think is at work here is a much different animal. I don’t think the CPM boys and girls are changing their work ethic, what I think is happening though, is certain markets are getting flooded with really shitty sites, really quickly. Seriously, you guys need to start making quality sites, even if you’re duping the same old one by a billion others, spend a few minutes more on cleaning it up a bit, because it’s getting too sloppy, and not only do you end up lowering your overall CPM rate, but you fucking ruin it for everyone else! (everytime something is ruined, I get more emails asking for help, so stop it already!)

CPM is a very fragile and HIGHLY lucrative due to the fact that you pretty much control your revenue stream as a publisher. No one has to click, or buy anything, all you have to do is make sure pages load. It’s so simple it should be illegal! But thankfully it isn’t.. just yet. So unless you want CPM rates to drop drastically, clean up your damn sites, and stop redirecting all of that useless Chinese traffic to your site to increase your impressions, because as a fellow publisher, who now relies on CPM like a drug addict does on coke to survive, I don’t appreciate it and neither do the rest of the coke addicts…err.. I mean publishers!! Yeah! So tone it down you guys, for the good of the community at least.

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