Here is 2019's guide to kicking some pop traffic ass, but be sure to read this post in its entirety.
No matter how hard I try, newbie performance marketers assume pop traffic is where it’s at.
Well…
It’s honestly not the “easy money” most are spoon-feeding you.
So instead of selling a $47 eBook on how to make “massive profits with pop traffic” and flat out lie to you…
I decided to post everything I know for free and level the playing field.
Rather Learn With Video Tutorials? Gain Access To PopAds Domination
Why, You ask?
Pop traffic isn’t worth my time, but it will allow me teach you new techniques.
These techniques will be useful for when I teach what I currently run in paid traffic.
If everyone is going one direction, I go the complete opposite.
In fact the reality is, everything in the affiliate space is getting killed off.
Adwords doesn’t want you, Facebook doesn’t want you, and the only reason most RTB networks tolerate you is because they don’t have enough branders yet to get a $MM evaluation so they can tell you to go F*** yourself.
After all that you’re left with adult traffic, redirect, and pop traffic.
But
There is another problem… the affiliate space is growing while the traffic available is shrinking!
That means the opportunity is shrinking while the competition is increasing.
Now
Have I made money with this type of traffic?
You bet!
Just back in early 2014 I pulled in $xxx,xxx profit in just a few months.
I’ll be honest though, the only reason I pulled in that kind of profits was because I was the first one there.
My competitive advantage was that I had no competition.
Another thing to be aware of: affiliates that flat out don’t care about the legality of their marketing creatives.
It’s hard to compete against other affiliates who are using copyrighted images (such as logos). Using fake testimonials and even in most cases flat out claiming the user has won XXX. That is the world we live in, and you need to know that it exists. Personally, making a few hundred/thousand dollars a day isn’t worth the risk to me.
OK Brent, I’m Bat Shit Crazy and Still Want To Get Into This…
Prerequisites
- Have a front end tracker such as iMobitrax or Adsbridge (Read: Marketing tools)
- Launch Planning Checklist >>Download<<
Now before we get into more advanced stuff, let’s be sure you understand the basics first…
Where Do I Buy Traffic?
Now before we simply go buying traffic, it’s best to understand all of our available options.
Not only that but it’s crucial to choose a source that has the highest quality traffic for the lowest possible price for our chosen Geo/Demographics. By following our Launch Planning Checklist, we can easily identify the research needed to be done to identify the best source.
It is also important to understand exactly what the user is doing prior to when you purchase the traffic. This is all dependent on the type of traffic you buy, I.E: Redirect vs. Pop and also based on the source themselves.
Now let’s go through each of the traffic sources I would recommend for pop & redirect campaigns.
I have listed the pro and cons that I have personally experienced with each source. Also, included is the tracking macros for each source that you’ll need to put into your tracking platform.
Redirect Traffic
What is Redirect traffic?Redirect traffic, also known as domain redirects, is traffic that comes from parked domains. Domainers purchase expired domains that still have traffic going to them from old links and content found through the web. They then take the traffic from these domains and sell them to you. There are some golden nuggets to find in domain redirect traffic because the traffic can originate from a super high-quality source. The other great thing about domain redirects: the traffic is usually dirt cheap. Perfect for any marketers running campaigns for “impulse buy” products or services.
DNTX
Pros:
DNTX has over 1 Billion/clicks a month with a minimum CPC of $.002 a redirect. That’s right ladies and gentlemen large amounts of traffic cheap! DNTX has some good targeting options, such as keyword/category, GEO, and day parting. I’ve had several successful campaigns with DNTX with ROI’s of upwards of 1000%. Their traffic quality is awesome for the price. Also, DNTX is one of the only networks I’ve ever seen that has instant campaign approvals ;).
Cons:
My only real con with DNTX is I wish they had a bit more targeting options. Also, outside of the US their traffic numbers starts to dip.
Conclusion:
If you’re looking for dirt cheap traffic that’s pretty decent quality, then check out DNTX.
Traffic Macros
Tokens Description [sourceid] Passes a unique ID for each publisher [Advertise on DNTX](https://www.dntx.com/)
ZeroPark
Pros:
ZeroPark has a great interface and a lot of targeting options. They also have massive amounts of traffic for pretty good prices. What’s great about their platform is real-time price bidding on various metrics.
Cons:
Traffic can get pretty pricey and is very volatile. Review times can take a while.
Conclusion:
If you’re looking to expand on your redirect traffic, ZeroPark is a great option. They’re also the owners of Voluum mobile tracker.
**Zeropark Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts**
Tokens Description {keyword} keyword {target} publisher unique ID {match} match type {cid} Unique clickID [ Advertise on ZeroPark](http://zeropark.com/)
Pop Traffic
What is Pop Traffic?
Pop traffic is driven from advertisements that open in parallel with the website they’re trying to reach. This traffic is generated in two ways: The first is when the site physically has the ad code for the popup on their property. The second is when the website visitor has a toolbar or plugin on their browser that is generating the popup. Many pop networks allow you target by keywords or domains as a way to determine when the popup should occur.
Popads
Pros:
PopAds has a ton of traffic in several geos for both desktop & mobile. The traffic can be bought for as low as $1 per 1000 so is for people looking for a ton of traffic for a cheap price.
Cons:
Like most pop sources, PopAds has a ton of low-quality traffic. They’re also considered a blind network and will only pass a website ID as opposed to showing the actual referrer. This is also a source that many people new to running paid traffic flock to, because of this there are 300-400 different advertisers per country that you will have to compete against.
Conclusion:
If your offer is simple to complete and is “impulse” driven such as Sweeps, Email submits, App installs, etc. – PopAds will do very well for you.
**Popads Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts**
Tokens Description [WEBSITEID] ID of the website that was source of the popunder [QUALITY] Quality score of the website which triggered the ad impression [ADBLOCK] Set to 1 when visitor uses AdBlock or 0 otherwise [FORMFACTORNAME] Form factor name [BROWSERNAME] Name of the visitor’s browser [CATEGORYID] ID of the category website target [CATEGORYNAME] Category name of website target [ISPNAME] Name of visitor’s ISP [OSNAME] Operating system of visitor [SCREENRESOLUTION] Detected screen resolution of the visitor For a full list, I suggest taking a look at [TrackingTokens.com](http://trackingtokens.com/popads-tokens/) which is an excellent resource.Suggested Reading: PopAds Guide – Your Key To Profitable Campaigns in 2017
adcash
Pros:
If you look at the top traffic domains in most countries, you’ll see adcash at the top. Rightly so because they have a TON of traffic. Adcash used to be a managed by platform but just recently released their self-serve platform.
Cons:
Much like the other blind traffic sources available, adcash has a lot of low-quality traffic. You will have to spend quite a bit of money to find which placements aren’t working for you and blacklist them appropriately.
Conclusion:
If you are already having success and want to scale your campaigns on a larger source, adcash is a great place to be. Just remember to limit your variables as much as possible or you can burn through a marketing budget very quickly.
**Adcash Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts**
Tokens Description [zone] Zone ID (recommended) User main browser language [clickid] Click ID (for server two servers) [time] Time in seconds since Epoch (aka. timestamp) (cache buster) [campaign] Current campaign ID in Adcash system [Advertise on adcash](https://www.adcash.com/)
Popcash
Pros:
Tons of inventory available for a very cheap price.
Cons:
Lower quality traffic, generally adult & torrent sites.
Conclusion:
PopCash is very similar to Popads and even buys and sells traffic with them. If your offer is simple to complete and is “impulse” driven such as Sweeps, Email submits, App installs, etc
**Popcash Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts**
Tokens Description %siteid% Site ID %cc% Country Code [Advertise on Popcash](https://ppcmode.com/out?id=popcash)
wigetmedia
Pros:
One of the best interfaces I’ve used, and has much higher quality traffic than many other pop under networks.
Cons:
Required a minimum deposit of $500 for self-serve. Which is also a pro as it’ll keep a lot of newbs out.
Conclusion:
Wigetmedia is a great network that hasn’t been saturated yet.
**WigetMedia Dynamic Tracking Tokens/Macros/Scripts**
{pid} The Placement ID the visitor came from. {adId} The ID of the ad. {campaignId} The ID of the campaign. {campaignGroupId} The ID of the campaign group. {advertiserId} The ID of the advertiser {width} The width of the ad {height} The height of the ad {country} Two letter country code according to ISO 3166-1 {region} Region codes. Usually three letters. {browser} Browser as string {os} Operating System {transactionId} The transaction ID can be used in S2S Postbacks for conversion tracking. {cache\_buster} Random numbers to create a unique url so that browser cache will not be used. {cost} The CPM/1000. [Advertise on wigetmedia ](https://wigetmedia.com/advertise)
Now that we understand the majority of the available options to us.
It is now important to understand the types of offers that are often seen on these networks but also how these different offers convert.
Offer Monetization
- Content Billing – The visitor completes an action and is charged a fee directly to their phone bill.
- Lead Gen- Single Opt-In (SOI) – The visitor must fill out information usually a phone number or email address. No verification is required of the user; the conversion occurs simply once they submit their data.
- Double Opt-In (DOI) – Similar to an SOI but requires the visitor to confirm their data by clicking an email link or SMS message.
- Cost Per Sale (CPS) – The visitor purchases the product, and a conversion occurs.
- Cost Per Install (CPI) – Once the visitor installs the application on their, PC or phone, a conversion occurs.
What Do I Promote?
I see this happen a lot…
An Affiliate Manager will blast out a list of offers of what’s “hot”.
Most newbies drop everything they’re doing to run them.
When in reality just like picking a traffic source to focus on, you need to choose a “niche” to focus on as well.
Now before I help you figure out what offer you should run, first let’s learn a bit more about the space…
Today 90%+ of the offers I see running break down to 4 main categories:
Sweepstakes
They influence the user to enter their data by offering them the “chance” to win various consumer electronics, gift cards or even large sums of money.
Pros: Pretty easy to get these campaigns up and to run. Ability to have a large variety of angles based on the demographics of your traffic.
Cons: Very limited marketing language is compliant in most geos. Most geos are getting more and more strict on these types of offers. Your competition will run non-compliant and flat out illegal landing pages that make it hard to compete.
“You May Have Won XXX”
Antivirus / Utility
These types of offers target traffic that has a slow phone, bad battery life or flat out needs to scan their device.
Pros: These offers have the potential to make a lot of money.
Cons: Depending on the monetization method and Geo offers only last a few months at best. Antivirus offers usually are only allowed on Android and much like Sweeps are plagued by super aggressive competition.
Angles Include: Antivirus Scan, Battery Improver, Chat Wallpapers, etc
“You May Have A Virus”
Some popular examples of this type of offer would be MacKeeper.
App Installs
These are pretty self-explanatory…
App developers want installs and are willing to pay for them!
Pros: Pretty high payout $1 – 10 depending on Geo. Also, there are lots of different types of apps to choose from allowing you to come up with a large variety of angles.
Cons: Quality is a huge factor with CPI campaigns and most networks have 100-200 installs per day caps on most campaigns.
Adult
I’m going to keep my blog PG-13.
But adult offers are geared towards males looking to “hook up” or “chat” with “sexy singles”.
Pros: Tons and I mean TONS of traffic available. Big money can be made with these offers if you’re creative enough.
Cons: The most competitive niche in the world. Big budgets are required to think even about getting in this niche!
Understand: The reason these types of offers perform so well is they’re instant gratification type offers. What I mean by that is, if you think you just won an iPhone you’re going to drop everything you’re doing to do what is required of you. Same goes for if you are lead to believe your phone has a virus, chances are you’re going to want to get that virus off your phone pretty quick.
Just know that most of these offers won’t last much longer as stricter rules all across the globe are being enforced. Also, the majority of “super affiliates” are only doing big numbers because they’re running super aggressive landing pages which speed up the various governments to enforce rules on these types of offers even quicker.
Follow The Herd?
Now I mentioned earlier to not get over-hyped by the emails that your affiliate manager sends out.
The reality is, their job is to push volume to offers they need more traffic to.
Yes, the offers in these newsletters are running hot. What they don’t tell you is, it’s generally one or two affiliates that are doing really well!
This also means that all of your competition has seen the exact same newsletter and in some cases recommending the exact same traffic source.
So what is gonna happen? A large majority of people are all going to flock to the same source running the same exact offer all at the same time.
This means that traffic prices will spike for a few days to a week because affiliates can’t get the volume they want…
Why?
Because the available inventory is split amongst 100 or so affiliates who will keep raising their bid trying to get more….
Now that isn’t to say your affiliate manager can’t be helpful!
Trust me they can, because they have access to all the offers on the network + stats associate with each one. Even better in some cases the clients of these offers provide them with details on exactly what is working best for that offer!
How do I know all this? Because I’ve been an affiliate manager and have helped countless affiliates find winning offers for their traffic!
Brent what should I do??
Instead, pick a country and an offer type that you have researched and understand.
Use tools such as Adplexity to get an overview of what others are currently running in the space.
Pro Tip: Find a few popular placements in the particular country you choose.
Then by using a proxy such as HideMyAss and an emulator(guide coming soon) visit the various placements you have found to see the exact flow of what the current competition is running.
So for example:
I’ve decided I want to run offers in Brazil and thing Popads would be a great place to start. 1. I would find popular sites in Brazil that have Popads ad code on it. (Video below)
- Once that is complete, I would then visit the list of sites with a Brazil proxy (HideMyAss) using an emulator to see the exact ads that are being served first.
- Take screenshots of each step in their funnel and even take notes on which offer they’re running.
- Change to a new Brazil IP on Popads and repeat this process for the next site.
Doing this will allow you to see what the current #1 bidder on your chosen traffic source is currently running. By doing this on a few different sites, you can start to spot similarities in their landing page and even the types of offers they’re running. This will give you a much better indicator about what is working right now.
Your Affiliate Manager
Once you’ve done all the research in your launch planning checklist & have a pretty good idea of what is currently working on your chosen traffic source, it’s time to approach your AM.
Ask Them:
- Do they have the exact offers you seen your competition running?
- Do they have any suggest offers for your chosen country that are doing well?
- Has the advertiser for these offers provided any metrics for what is currently working?
- Ask if there is chance to get a higher payout if you can provide volume?
Be sure to get more than one offer if possible from your AM this will allow you to split test right out the gate to see which one is working best.