1st tier 2nd tier networks and scrubbing?

[mohamed1986]

Hi Joey,
Looking forward to that live event webinar you guys announced on Offer Selection. Just need more information on how to pick the right offer relating to my circumstances. As I dive deeper into the rabbit hole of this CPA thing I'm realizing that not all affiliate networks are the same. The question I have regarding Vault Media is whether you guys are a First Tier Affiliate Network who are working directly with the Advertiser on Record or a second tier or third tier network. I recently found out that a lot of networks apparently scrub the leads from other affiliate networks. When each one starts scrubbing leads (which they do all the time), you have no profitability left. Could you also shed more insight on how these affiliate networks work as well?

Thanks

 

[joeybabbs]

I don't agree that there are tier-1 and tier-2 tier-3 networks but maybe it's just the terminology thing. But let's assume tier 1 is the offer owner or claims to work only direct...

The bottom line is there are people that own offers and there are Networks that put many offers on to their Network. These offers sometimes are shared between networks so Affiliates have access to multiple offers without having to chase down multiple offer owners.

Some networks even own offers like ours.

Many networks out there that may call themselves a so-called Tier 1 are working directly with offer owners.

Vault Media media only works direct with owners. We do not broker other network offers as a general rule of thumb.

BUT every Network out there has the ability to become an agency on record which means they have an exclusivity which they get from the offer owner.

This means that no matter what, anyone that wants to run that offer (whether affiliate or network), must go through the AOR network. Now every time an offer gets brokered like this to another network there is a potential for tracking discrepancies. So if a "tier 1" wants that offer they must broker it.

This also highly depends on what kind of tracking is being done between each Network as it continues to get brokered from Network to network. (iframe tracking misses about 3% of the time) So many conspiracy theory affiliates believe that networks are actually scrubbing when in fact the offer is just getting brokered too many times and every time it goes to another Network there's potential to lose another conversion through tracking. But legit networks should be telling affiliates when those tracking issues arise.

This is why we only work directly with offer owners and we use Postback tracking which is pretty much 99.9% accurate. Every month we do an audit to make sure all tracking is working and if we ever find that a potential lead was missed we add it to your affiliate account.

Now many Network platforms have the ability to scrub or throttle including the cake platform everflo and a few others. I am not sure why it is a function because really there absolutely no use for it.

But for a network to throttle would be a massive disservice to themselves. A real network needs affiliates to make money and if affiliates aren't making money the network fails.

Networks that have been around for years you can pretty much guarantee they are not scrubbing people but every now and then new networks pop up usually built by affiliates or inexperienced people with "hoorah" moment...who think they can just start running a network.

They broker a bunch of offers they don't know how tracking works and then they turn on the throttle because their network is not making any money.

There are definitely some risks though working directly with advertisers or owners and usually it comes down to payment processing and longer payment times. Offer owners generally have to wait for their mids to pay sometimes it can be 60 to 180 days and if they get trapped with no payments, than the network won't get paid sometimes...however good networks and offer owners carry enough cash flow to pay their Affiliates anyway.

 

[mohamed1986]

Hi Joey,
Thanks for the awesome feedback! I'm super glad to have come across you guys. There is just so much conflicting information out there and conspiracy theories. It's really great to have you guys as a sounding board plus you guys are Canadian and doing this full-time which is awesome. I just want to soak up as much information as I can so I'd be able to see the forest for the trees. Also I have to make sure I don't get myself into some some sort of analysis paralysis and actually start running campaigns instead of over-analyzing things. Now that I have found you guys and Vault Media I should feel comfortable enough by next week or so to start running campaigns. I would like to know more about what goes into you guys selecting offers for Vault Media? What are the criteria that go into offer selection? Also other than the obvious what are the main differences between running CPL offers that mostly involve form submits and CPS offers which Clickbank mostly has.

Thanks
Mohamed

 

[joeybabbs]

I would like to know more about what goes into you guys selecting offers for Vault Media? What are the criteria that go into offer selection? Also other than the obvious what are the main differences between running CPL offers that mostly involve form submits and CPS offers which Clickbank mostly has.

We will be doing the next webinar on offers and offer selection!

As for you questions I can only speak for myself on this.

When I choose an offer I analyze a few things including the EXACT point of conversion. I have been a CPA affiliate for along time, and I typically look for offers with a good payout and easy conversion point. The easiest conversion (lead submit) is great but most times have many restrictions and you have to make sure the traffic is solid or you will be pulled from the offer.

This means you need to buy from good traffic sources and not shady ad networks. Bottom line you need good traffic no matter what. People who try to drive cheap shady traffic to CPL offers will always be pulled off the offers. This doesn't mean cheap traffic doesn't work. I run offers in many geos where the cost per click is less than 15 cents and leads are backing out. CPS or cost per sale means someone needs to break out a credit card. You can be more aggressive in your advertising with these and still not jeopardize the quality since the advertiser is generally happy if someone submits a credit card as long as you don't lie to people and provoke refunds. We had this problem recently with some people promoting Powerhouse Affiliate as a CPS offer. They were promising people they would make millions and get paid for doing nothing if they joined Powerhouse Affiliate. We had a bunch of people refund because of the lies, and we banned the affiliates responsible.

Clickbank offers I don't use in my arbitrage campaigns. It is just too hard to sell digital products by buying traffic to a landing page and hoping people convert after reading your presell. I do occasional get checks in the mail from them for email follow ups. I hired a guy to manage my lists and he sends clickbank offers to the lists and they sometimes convert if the offer fits with the niche.