Affiliate marketing – when to stop

Yesterday I paused one of my Adwords campaigns. The results were in; my chosen affiliate product was not selling.

The facts;

• Autoresponder was working with multiple emails set up at various intervals – check
• Product paid a generous 70% in commission – check
• I was beating most of my competition in Adwords – check
• My own “sales page”, optimized with hidden affiliate links – check

So what on earth went wrong?

I went after the wrong keywords. Wrong keywords will lead to click through’s, but no sales. This is a vital statement to understand when launching any affiliate marketing campaign.

The product of choice was a Guitar eBook package and I choose it because I have been playing the Guitar for a good number of years. Remember my advice, pick a topic that you already have knowledge in.

When I was doing keyword research, I saw that hardly anyone was targeting the keywords “guitar tabs” or “guitar tablature”. Great I thought, low cost per click and no competition – perfect.

But people who are searching for “guitar tabs” are not looking to purchase anything. Even though my advert claimed that you can learn how to READ guitar tabs, it didn’t have the information that the searcher was after. People who search for “guitar tabs” are after just that, tablature of their favorite bands. I did try targeting the keyword “guitar lessons” but alas wasn’t contempt paying the $1.38 per click.

While I had many opt-ins, no-one was buying. It was time to end it.
I wiped a tear from my eye, logged on to adwords and hit the pause button.

It was all over in a matter of seconds.

The point of this story? You must be able to determine when your affiliate campaigns are not working, and be prepared to stop and move on. The Internet is filled with untapped markets – the secret is finding them.