Follow Along My first PropellerAds campaign

[JonathanB]

That one zone with 2 conversions is looking very promising. Hopefully they have a lot of traffic you can buy

According to the traffic estimator it's about 1.600 clicks per day that I can buy from that zone id. I now created a separate campaign with this zone id alone and look forward to see what happens.

 

[anarchy01]

Great work on getting the conversions, is the conversions with PPV or push ads as you mentioned you was testing both? I never got any luck with push ads in Propellerads I spent about $200 without one conversion.

 

[toptopoffers]

With Propellerads, The {cost} token is only for onclick popunder. With Push ads, you should set campaing in bemob > Cost Model CPV > type your bid

 

[JonathanB]

Great work on getting the conversions, is the conversions with PPV or push ads as you mentioned you was testing both? I never got any luck with push ads in Propellerads I spent about $200 without one conversion.

Hi Anarchy01, the 3 conversions where all from push ads. It's a very interesting format and I think a lot can be done with the ad-design and copy to pre-sell the offer.

With Propellerads, The {cost} token is only for onclick popunder. With Push ads, you should set campaing in bemob > Cost Model CPV > type your bid

Thanks

 

[anarchy01]

Hi Anarchy01, the 3 conversions where all from push ads. It's a very interesting format and I think a lot can be done with the ad-design and copy to pre-sell the offer.


Thanks

Great to know, when I selected the high or medium I never got clicks even though it said I would so always had to run all traffic. Glad you getting conversions hope to see more in this follow along

 

[afiq]

Alright, gotcha. So how would I be managing a campaign like this? By adding costs manually by the end of every day?

I usually insert a fixed bid as CPV in Bemob, this way bemob can register the cost for every click.

 

[afiq]

Great to know, when I selected the high or medium I never got clicks even though it said I would so always had to run all traffic.

I also experience this during the early introduction of the new ad format, but now I think the problem was solved. Most of my campaigns targeting High, and they all get impressions and clicks.

 

[JonathanB]

That one zone with 2 conversions is looking very promising. Hopefully they have a lot of traffic you can buy

Quick update:
Yesterday we discovered that one ad zone was looking promising so I set up a separate campaign targeting that one only. The traffic estimator showed 16.000 available daily clicks. But I think it was 16.000 impressions.

EDIT: Here's the screenshot of the estimated clicks: 2.163. Not sure why it doesn't show impressions today.

So after spending only $7.20 and getting 13.209 impressions (of total 16.000) that campaign has been pause (automatically) because "Out of daily impressions limit". My budget hasn't been spent here so I don't know how I'd get these 2.106 clicks... Maybe as a Popunder instead of Push ad...!?

With a (rather low?) CTR of 0.45% I generated 60 clicks. Now that CPC looks much better than with the CPM bidding: $0.12. (Thank @afiq for your tips of cpc).

So I guess that one zone looked good on a small scale. But with only 16k impressions daily there is no room for growth/scale...

However this was an amazing learning experience. I learned a lot and am super excited (and a little worried) about ALL the data that a tracker tracks. I can see from what city, what device, what OS etc. the clicks and conversions come from. It leaves me speechless.

Does anyone know if we as media buyers/affiliates have to do anything in regards of GDPR (data protection act)? I mean we collect a lot of data without the users knowing it. Do you have any tips on that?

 

[afiq]

Yesterday we discovered that one ad zone was looking promising so I set up a separate campaign targeting that one only. The traffic estimator showed 16.000 available daily clicks. But I think it was 16.000 impressions.

CPM campaign will should impressions, whereas CPC campaign will show clicks in the traffic estimator.

So after spending only $7.20 and getting 13.209 impressions (of total 16.000) that campaign has been pause (automatically) because "Out of daily impressions limit". My budget hasn't been spent here so I don't know how I'd get these 2.106 clicks...

Maybe you set a daily limit, the system will pause your campaign to avoid overspending. If you want to get all the click, then you are willing to spend $292 per day on that campaign (2163 x $0.135)

With a (rather low?) CTR of 0.45%

I would let the campaign run for a few days more, if the CTR not improving then it's time to change the creatives.

 

[JonathanB]

Maybe you set a daily limit, the system will pause your campaign to avoid overspending. If you want to get all the click, then you are willing to spend $292 per day on that campaign (2163 x $0.135)

Hi @afiq , thanks a lot for your tips. Yes my daily limit was too low for all the clicks. Since the campaign is not profitable yet I don't plan to spend $292/day. However I'd love to do so once the campaign is in the green...

I would let the campaign run for a few days more, if the CTR not improving then it's time to change the creatives.

Okay thanks. I could also split test more headline/creatives in order to find a winner. But then I'm far over the suggested 3-5x payout. After spending the initial test budget I made conversions, so the offer seems to be working. What would be a good "benchmark" now to invest to get it profitable?

Example:
Payout is: $3
Initial Test Budget (10x): $30
Conversions: Yes ($9 revenue)
Now what? The offer is generally "proven". Now how much should I invest to try to make it green? $50, $75, $100?

What benchmarks do you use? OR do you only keep working on campaigns that are green right from the start (which would be very rare I guess)? Maybe @Luke has some benchmarks as well?

 

[Luke]

Hi @afiq , thanks a lot for your tips. Yes my daily limit was too low for all the clicks. Since the campaign is not profitable yet I don't plan to spend $292/day. However I'd love to do so once the campaign is in the green...



Okay thanks. I could also split test more headline/creatives in order to find a winner. But then I'm far over the suggested 3-5x payout. After spending the initial test budget I made conversions, so the offer seems to be working. What would be a good "benchmark" now to invest to get it profitable?

Example:
Payout is: $3
Initial Test Budget (10x): $30
Conversions: Yes ($9 revenue)
Now what? The offer is generally "proven". Now how much should I invest to try to make it green? $50, $75, $100?

What benchmarks do you use? OR do you only keep working on campaigns that are green right from the start (which would be very rare I guess)? Maybe @Luke has some benchmarks as well?

I don't have set benchmarks because I don't think they really exist. If you spend $30 and made $9, but do not make any changes, you will likely not ever get it profitable no matter what you spend. However, if you optimize the campaign and with those changes, make $20 on your next $30, you're making progress and I'd assume you'd be profitable before you spend the next $30

 

[JonathanB]

I don't have set benchmarks because I don't think they really exist. If you spend $30 and made $9, but do not make any changes, you will likely not ever get it profitable no matter what you spend. However, if you optimize the campaign and with those changes, make $20 on your next $30, you're making progress and I'd assume you'd be profitable before you spend the next $30

Hi Luke, thanks for your reply. Haha yeah I know, nothing like that really exists (until we create it now). It's actually very helpful how you describe it. Maybe I can go with this in $30 bucks steps and check in each time with tests/optimizations...

I just want to make sure I set certain "benchmarks" so I don't waste too much time and money on each campaign. Once the 3rd test would be done I'd be down only $90 and maybe breakeven. That'd be great if it turns all green after the next $30...

It can't be wrong to set some sort of "stop loss" like you would in the stock market. Just to go with numbers, not emotions.

Thanks again

 

[Luke]

Hi Luke, thanks for your reply. Haha yeah I know, nothing like that really exists (until we create it now). It's actually very helpful how you describe it. Maybe I can go with this in $30 bucks steps and check in each time with tests/optimizations...

I just want to make sure I set certain "benchmarks" so I don't waste too much time and money on each campaign. Once the 3rd test would be done I'd be down only $90 and maybe breakeven. That'd be great if it turns all green after the next $30...

It can't be wrong to set some sort of "stop loss" like you would in the stock market. Just to go with numbers, not emotions.

Thanks again

Yeah, I understand. I think if you aren't making progress towards profitability after your first set of optimizations then it's probably time to just call it a loss and move on to the next campaign. If you are, then there's opportunity still

 

[theredirishman]

After my first ad has been rejected (copywriting was misleading) I know have an approved campaign live. Yey

Now my next steps would have been creating 3 more ads to have them run against each other. The only thing I would split test in this early stage would be different images. Like if it's a fashion voucher I'd try out different fashion images (male vs. female, shirts vs. shorts etc.)

In facebook you can simply duplicate the ads and replace images... This doesn't seem to be able with Propellerads.

Does someone of you know how I can have 2-3 ads run against each other?

Or will I have to create a completely new campaign (in PropellerAds AND BeMob) each time I want to split test images of a push or pop campaign?
View attachment 601
Update: I found an option to duplicate the campaign. It's at the right end of the stats in the dashboard. Now when duplicating it, will I need to get a different campaign URL for it inside BeMob, correct?
View attachment 602

With any campaign you need Data. Run general ad in the begining and then analyze the data to optimize your campaign. Just make sure that your tracking is working so you can optimize by the results you are getting.

 

[PureLander]

@jonathanbouchard any updates about this please ?.

 

[JonathanB]

@jonathanbouchard any updates about this please ?.

Hi Tyoussef, thanks for your interest. Sure, here's an update.

I basically followed Luke advice (to optimize the campaign and spend new $30 to see what happens). That's what I did.

A few optimizations I did:

• Devices:
  In my tracker I've seen that all conversions where from MOBILE, so I changed my campaign to mobile only.
• CPM to CPC:
  I also followed one advice to switch the campaign from CPM to CPC. This way my CPC was indeed VERY cheaper, but also very limited in supply. After 16k impressions my daily cap of traffic was reached. So no room for scale with CPC, only with CPM (but then the traffic was too expensive)
• Trying to increase CTR:
  I split-tested 2 more ad sets with different images (one was a very native ad style ad that circled an item in red color and having a red arrow pointing to it. The CTR was practically the same as the control ad.)
• Split-tested the direct vs. lander:
  I've set up a questions-lander which was a lot of fun! However the CTR was too low and most people didn't make it to the offer. I had more conversions direct-linked.
• Push vs. Popunder:
  I also tried the same offer with Popunder (instead of Push ads which I did the whole time). But Popunder is a weird traffic source. I don't like it (yet).

I've been doing advertising/marketing and selling online for a couple of years now and popunders feel more like spam-traffic point-and-shoot and hope something converts. I had more success in the past with FB, Adwords and Native, but I can't see that working for Sweeps.

After all these tests and spending 3x $30 for test-loops I have a relatively clear picture of basic optimizations and most importantly -> tracker-reading. That was my biggest pain point because from reading alone I didn't understood the true value of it. But after running my first few campaigns using a tracker I 100% understand the value of it. I'm amazed by the wealth of data you can gather and now I'm ON FIRE about it ;-)

Why I stopped the campaign:
Unfortunately the payout for this sweep/voucher has been decreased from €2.80 to €2.40. And then ultimately the offer has been paused/stopped altogether. I heard that's the nature of sweep/voucher offers. They don't last too long and it's all about testing a bunch of sweeps in order to get it rolling...To be honest, I don't see the value in managing 100's of sweeps in order to get somewhere. That's just a big mess to manage then

Learnings:

• a LOT...Like:
• setting up tracker,
• setting up campaigns,
• basic targeting
• basic optimization
• types of traffic + offers I like/dislike
• that I want to be part of a VALUE-chain, where users actually get something cool for their info/purchase.

Most importantly I learned more about myself and the direction I want to take. I LOVE advertising and the creative work involved in it. I even consider reading tracking/data relatively creative.

Because behind every click is a human being and we humans have wishes, desires, problems etc. In this advertising game we can - by understanding this data - create better ads for users. That's how I see it. And that's why I'll focus on traffic sources and offers that fit these human emotions. Sweeps/Vouchers don't provide any value and spamming the users computers with random popunders in hopes to turn a profit is just not my game.

I'd rather invest in promoting "real" offers (like eCom products, tools/software, nutra, lead gen etc.) where the customer actually "gets" something in return - not just "a chance" to win. I spent 10 years in the music business and I feel I've been selling to that "chance" long enough ;-)

 

[PureLander]

i like your post, and i am amazed by the way you think my brother.

 

[JonathanB]

i like your post, and i am amazed by the way you think my brother.

Thanks ;-)

 

[TylerD666]

Nice post Jona!!

 

[Guilherme]

Because behind every click is a human

I wished this was true but I’m not so sure. If was like that IM would be a lot easier. I’m afraid to break it out to you my friend but there is a lot of bots around. Fortunately we have trackers but by the point to cut all the bots you are already losing hope on the campaign. Sad