This blog was created to help other marketers find great ways to promote their affiliates. But there's another side to it, one that hasn't been addressed until now. For those who wonder why this blog isn't updated more often, why more great deals aren't promoted and may even think I've just been spending too little time on the internet or, at least, at work, here's something that may help fill in the gaps.
To wit: a list of all those tried and failed promotional systems.
Until now, the consensus among AMs seems to be that, if something doesn't work, just don't promote it. But that's not good enough anymore. That's not the whole story. Because, like those who allow evil to exist being equally guilty of evil in their silence, so not speaking out against these sites is just as evil as they are. Because, the whole story isn't just what does work, it's also naming the names of those sites that promise all kinds of traffic/sales, and don't deliver.
So many people continue to promise that, yes, they are making fabulous money online. Yet, apart from following that up with some sales pitch, I have yet to see anyone simply recommend anything. Even on the Warrior Forum, which is supposed to be a place where professional marketers can "meet and share" ideas, all half of them do is promote their own schemes to other marketers. Last week I even took one to task for doing nothing more than promoting PIPs-- ON a PIPs forum!, no less!!
But worse than that, so many sites very convincingly promise that, if you use THEIR system (eblasts, adblasts, FFAs, traffic pop-unders, whatever) you will drive TONS of traffic to your site. . . yet, here I sit, having tried all those things and still waiting for my first, damn sale.
So I've decided to be a little more pro-active. From now on, not only will I promote those systems that DO work, I will critique each portion of my efforts, for better or worse, including those that have failed miserably. This isn't meant to be a hate-mongering reaction: I only wish to help other marketers avoid the false promises that seem to be rife in the internet marketing community. I won't lie, nor exaggerate any experiences I've had so far. I will try to simply report, as accurately as possible, my findings versus the promises the site and/or affiliate gave me. In addition, since I have a sincere desire to help others avoid the places where I've wasted money, I will not follow up each slam with a, "but if you try THIS..." line. And if the authors of these sites don't like what I have to say, all I can say is maybe they should re-evaluate their own promises.
To catch up a little, here are some of the businesses, with their URLs, that I have NOT found worthwhile, followed by the reason for my findings.
LEAD FACTORY (www.leadfactory.com)-- Lead Factory is supposed to be a quality lead generating company. It's been recommended by many established internet marketers. Yet my experience was less than satisfactory. I signed up on July 25, 2005, for their system, choosing a "100 leads for $50 per month" campaign. To date, I have received exactly 28 of the original 100 promised leads. That's right, in 2 months (twice the time that they promised, mind), I have only received a little more than 1/4 of the promised leads. Of course, when I only received 12 leads in the first month, I cancelled my membership to their system. To their credit, they have continued to send leads (1-2 a week) and promise they will do so until they fulfill the promised 100. I tend to wonder how grey my hair will be when this happens.
I think I have figured out why this is going so slowly. (Mind you, they never explained how their system works-- and that, in itself makes them guilty of deliberate deception.)
When you sign up for Lead Factory, YOU create an ad, that they edit and publish. When someone responds to YOUR AD, it is forwarded to you as a lead. This is somewhat misleading (if you'll pardon the pun), since when a marketer signs up to a lead-generator, the usual assumption is that the leads are generated from all kinds of ads, not just ONE ad, posted on their board and, especially not YOUR OWN AD.
It would be better to take the $50/month and buy 1-2 solo or classified ads, for all the good the leads from Lead Factory are.
10-MILLION-HITS.COM (www.10-million-hits.com) -- BEWARE! This system may or may not work-- I can't honestly say, since I never got it to work. Despite that, I do happen to know that they never refunded my money, nor acknowledged that they would. It was only $20, but that's $20 richer for them, poorer for me and for nothing.
The system is supposed to be a "Safe-List". By that, they mean that you are actually joining a list of recipients who agree to view ads from everyone else on the list. So if they promise 2.5 million ads, that means you are also agreeing to view just as many. Ugh. None of this is explained prior to joining.
But, worse than that, many of the email systems automatically ban their emails, so that when you attempt to join, it is blocked. This is what happened to me. While signing up, I was supposed to receive a confirmation email. Though I sent them several email addresses, none ever received it. This leads me to speculating that the whole site is a scam-- hey, I didn't receive emails, even at email addresses that allow all email. So, go figure. Anyway, I do NOT recommend them.
SUBMITPRO.US (www.submitpro.us) -- This site sends "guaranteed" traffic to your site via "pop-unders" and "exit pop-ups". As I'm not a big fan of either types of advertising, I don't have a lot of experience with them. However, I have heard many people recommend them as effective forms of advertising, which only goes to show that you should always trust your instincts.
I paid the required $29.95 to this company and, according to THEIR records (I really should get my own ad-tracker, I admit), my ad was shown 11,000+ times. But I didn't advertise for my main site, rather for one of my favorite affiliates-- and, after 11,000 hits, I am sorry to report I did not receive even one sale. Whatever the reason, the fact remains that this falls so far short of the proven statistical average (1-2 in every 1000), that I must say this company is doing something wrong. Perhaps it's the pop-under marketing altogether.
Well, those are the worst for today. I am still in the process of trying others and I will make my reports as determinations come in.
Happy Marketing!-- Tracker MO
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