Tiffany Dow’s 30-Day Warrior Article Marketing Challenge

[kiwichamp]

Well I have 7 articles waiting on EZines to approve and have 3 live. Now I'm stuck til they do approve them all, cause they will only upgrade me to be allowed to submit more once I have 10 articles live.

Mm guess this puts me out of this game. However I plan on keeping up and just submitting in other places. At least I can still pace myself and reap the benefits of team work on this challenge.

So far no articles approved that were submitted since the challenge started. - waiting

[Peggy Baron]

Day 8

I missed yesterday, Sunday, as we went up to the mountains to see the fall color. I had to get my nature fix.

But I was already one article ahead so now I'm even.

I submitted an article today and did my keyword research. I've got one very long tail and two very boad. This article is actually a Part 1 and now I'm going to write Part 2 and 3. I've not submitted a series to EZA before. I'm broadening my horizons.

Peggy

[Julie Fletcher]

I have just submitted my first 2 articles, I am a few days behind but will try to catch up fast!

Articles Submitted – 0
Articles Live - 0
Article Views - 0
Clicks – 0
Leads - 0
Sales - 0

[idogi]

Good post, keep it up!

[TiffanyDow]

Humph. I didn't know if you made a mistake in submission that you got nixed for a boost. I made 2 today - I didn't know I couldn't mention my business partner Lewis Smile n my bio box unless I listed him as a co-author and I also didn't know I couldn't link to my affiliate page because it redirects to the PDC affiliate page for our business.

So oh well...

I'm listed as a Basic Plus but I bought the Premium membership, so not sure how that'll work. It says I have 4 submissions left before I qualify for Platinum review.

[Tenzo]

Okay, today I submitted two articles, because I skipped yesterday. Note to all IM'ers, make time to get out and be away from the computer sometimes. I went out to see a ceili band, and it was awesome.

So as of today, I have eight articles submitted-4 are live, although one just went live this morning. I have 102 views, and 24 clickthroughs to my landing page.

Back to work

Regards,
Kevin

[kevin campbelle]

Originally Posted by TiffanyDow

I'm listed as a Basic Plus but I bought the Premium membership, so not sure how that'll work. It says I have 4 submissions left before I qualify for Platinum review.

I'm really interested in how this will work too. So are you paying the membership fee and not having the articles go live in fast times or even though you have basic plus status, are they reviewing and making them live fast while you just have the basic plus title?

Kevin.

[TiffanyDow]

Hi Kevin!

I paid $97 for the Premium. But I'm still in basic plus status. So I get faster service anyway I guess...

[onlinemoney00]

Most people slack off in this department, inspired by the challenge

[Shannon Herod]

It looks as if I have reached an article submission cap. I had an article that is under review because of a bad link, so I have to wait until that article is approved before I can apply for an upgrade. That kind of stinks, but I will keep writing articles and then just submit them when I'm able.

Shannon

[TiffanyDow]

Hi Warriors!

Submitted Squidoo to Brand Your Business (keyword in bold) today. Here are current article stats – got a sale today, but not yet sure where from. Checking…

1.) Make Money With Squidoo Using Professional Content 42 views, 2 publishers, 5 clicks
2.) Squidoo Marketing Mistakes You Should Avoid 39 views, 2 publishers, 2 clicks, 1 vote
3.) On Squidoo - Everyone Can Make Money 26 views, 1 publisher, 1 click, 1 vote
4.) Squidoo Still Holds Power in the SERPs 25 views, 1 publisher, 3 clicks
5.) How to Squidoo From Start to Finish 61 views, 2 publishers, 7 clicks, 3 votes
6.) Squidoo Social Network Is a Boon to Internet Marketers – 20 views, 0 publishers, 1 click
7.) For Squidoo Affiliate Success - 25 views, 0 publishers, 5 clicks, 1 vote
8.) Squidoo to Brand Your Business – Just submitted tonight

Just checked our stats for the site and over 1/3 of our income this month was made in the last 7 days. Hmmm….that’s interesting! Might pay off for us But right now I can’t be sure they came from articles on EZA.

Tiff

[Adriana Copaceanu]

I got derailed today, And haven't been able to submit an article, but will do 2 tomorrow.

My first 3 articles went live today, and between them I have 20 views. How do you guys get the other numbers you are reporting, like how many clicks you had for each article?

[traceye]

Daily Results - Day 9

Clickbank Product: Strip That Fat
Key Phrases Used: emotional eating, tips for fast weight loss, tips on fast weight loss, flat abs, belly fat, flat stomach, hot abs, ab exercises, weight loss motivation, fad diets, nutrition facts, dining out while dieting, exercises to lose weight, lose weight,

Articles Submitted – 15
Articles Live - 9
Article Views - 318
Hops – 56
Sales - 0


Tracey

giftsolution - I am direct linking from my articles so I can log into clickbank to see how many hops I have.

[Ben Roy]

Day 8 Results
Articles Submitted: 16 (8 each in two niches)
Articles Approved: 0 (STILL!)
Other stats: n/a

My first article in each niche is now showing as the 3rd bar, so I imagine they'll go live tomorrow finally. I have 4 submissions left before I'll be stuck, which REALLY sucks given that they are a full week behind my article writing. So it'll take them a week to catch up to where I am, at which point they'll approve me for another 25 articles. That means I'll have a whole week of writing without being able to post. That stinks. But what can you do?

[ezrock]

I believe I read somewhere that premium membership has no bearing on your actual membership level. They say they will not allow people to 'buy a platinum membership'. The quality of your articles is what gets you to the platinum membership.

-Ezrock-

Originally Posted by TiffanyDow

Humph. I didn't know if you made a mistake in submission that you got nixed for a boost. I made 2 today - I didn't know I couldn't mention my business partner Lewis Smile n my bio box unless I listed him as a co-author and I also didn't know I couldn't link to my affiliate page because it redirects to the PDC affiliate page for our business.

So oh well...

I'm listed as a Basic Plus but I bought the Premium membership, so not sure how that'll work. It says I have 4 submissions left before I qualify for Platinum review.

[ezrock]

Submitted "Betta Fish - Guide to Buying a Healthy Male Betta", targetting "male betta" and "betta fish".

Day 8 Results
Articles Submitted: 7 (mostly in betta niche)
Articles Approved: 1 (plus now one at 3 bars)

Stats:
Tropical Fish Tank Setup in 5 Easy Steps -65 views, 4 URL clicks, posted on 3 sites.
I managed to make the links on this article all point to a non-squidoo page so these aren't really helping my main goal so far. But, if I get ebay sales from the site it is linking to, I'll be happy with that too

[ezrock]

Three posts in a row for me

Has anyone noticed sites publishing JUST their teaser copies of the articles? I have found a few doing that for my first live article. They post the title, then just the teaser paragraph. They're obviously just trying to get some quick content without having to credit (and especially link to) an outside site!

It ticks me off. The one site, I can't even really mention it to the author (not that they'd care) because there is no contact info

[Sami]

Originally Posted by traceye

Daily Results - Day 9
Clickbank Product: Strip That Fat
...
Articles Submitted – 15
Articles Live - 9
Article Views - 318
Hops – 56
Sales - 0
...

Traceye, it's me again.

I took a look at the stats and the product. I hope it goes well for you and let's see what happens but here's another tip:

I like the product. It appeals to the scientist in me. But prospects "never" see any product until after they've bought. So a good product has very little effect on your sales. Sad but true.

It is the "sales letter" that sells. No matter how bad the product, you'll do much better with a great sales letter than the other way.

And that sales letter (Strip The Fat) starts well but loses it's way quickly. It lacks focus and worst of all it has "NO sales punch". There's NOT ONE ORDER BUTTON. Order buttons way outperform order links on sales letters.

The sales letter never asks for the order except for just once at the end! Shocking! Tests show 3- 5 times is best.

Their guarantee is very poor.

There's NO URGENCY!

No list of bonuses that I'm about to miss out on either!

There's more but I won't go on right now.

Traceye and everyone else obviously do monitor the situation and then may be reconnsider your product and watch out for a good sales letter. For this reason I never use direct links from the article to the sales letter.

I always keep control of all my traffic (forever) and so should you all.

... and that in itself becomes a tremendous assett in no time at all.

BTW, I know people who actually rewrite the sales letter and use their own! That's hard work but it pays handsomely, especially if you're getting the traffic.

Food for thought guys.
Sami

[Sami]

Originally Posted by ezrock

Three posts in a row for me

Has anyone noticed sites publishing JUST their teaser copies of the articles? I have found a few doing that for my first live article. They post the title, then just the teaser paragraph. They're obviously just trying to get some quick content without having to credit (and especially link to) an outside site!

It ticks me off. The one site, I can't even really mention it to the author (not that they'd care) because there is no contact info

Hey EZ

If the teaser heading doesn't link to your full article, they're breaking EZA's publisher terms.

You can (A) tell EZA and (B) contact their host* and get them to shut down for breach of copyright. ISP's and hosts care about getting shut down themselves much more than they do about dropping one site. They've been paid upfront after all. The other weapon you have against the site and the host is another breach of US law - the site having no contact/indentity details is also illegal I think and has been for a few years.

I'd say these 2 actions are quick and painless. But beyond this I wouldn't worry about it ... it goes on all over the place. And you know what these guys rarely get much benefit from this type of "theft".


* You can do this by running their domain name thru WhoIs - using sites like:

dnsstuff.com or dnstools.com abd find out who hosts that domain. You'll have the contact details such as an "abuse" email address. Also go to the host website ... you know the rest.

Good luck

[traceye]

Hi Sami & Others,

Totally agree with what you've said about keywords, sales letters etc - all brilliant advice!

My usual way of affiliate marketing is to examine the product and create an indepth review / comparison and sometimes build a mailing list depending on the product.

However my object for this exercise was to see how I could do with JUST article marketing. No influence from anything else except the article (which is why I chose to direct link for this exercise). I've never promoted a weight loss product before either so I just chose one at random - usually I spend much more time deciding on a product.

I think that's pretty typical for how most new affiliate marketers start so I was curious how well this would work (or not work ) whichever the case may be.

It's more a little experiment for myself if anything. I agree it's not the most effective method for squeezing all the money I could out of a campaign, but I'm still very curious at how the results turn out after the 30 days.

Tracey

[TiffanyDow]

Originally Posted by ezrock

Three posts in a row for me

Has anyone noticed sites publishing JUST their teaser copies of the articles? I have found a few doing that for my first live article. They post the title, then just the teaser paragraph. They're obviously just trying to get some quick content without having to credit (and especially link to) an outside site!

It ticks me off. The one site, I can't even really mention it to the author (not that they'd care) because there is no contact info

Yes and that bugged me, too! You can go to whois to find the contact info but too much hassle for me...

[MADMONEY]

Originally Posted by TiffanyDow

Hi Warriors!
Just checked our stats for the site and over 1/3 of our income this month was made in the last 7 days. Hmmm….that’s interesting! Might pay off for us But right now I can’t be sure they came from articles on EZA.

Tiff

Tiffany,

What do you use to track your traffic, Stat counter, Google analytics??

I find it essential to know where my traffic is coming from in terms of conversion.

To answer some earlier questions regarding affiliate links, if I am sending traffic directly to the affiliate, which I never do, I would use a 301 redirect. This way I can stuff my affiliate code before I send them to the affiliate sales page.

Mad Money

[Allen Graves]

Check out www.Woopra.com. I love it!

[Peggy Baron]

Day 9 results here

Articles Submitted -9
Articles Live - 5
Article Views - 35
Ezine Publisher - 6
URL Clicks - 4

The views are a lot lower than I'm used to, although I have noticed previously that my IM articles get fewer views than my articles in other niches. Ditto with the URL clicks.

Peggy

[TiffanyDow]

Originally Posted by MADMONEY

Tiffany,

What do you use to track your traffic, Stat counter, Google analytics??

I find it essential to know where my traffic is coming from in terms of conversion.

To answer some earlier questions regarding affiliate links, if I am sending traffic directly to the affiliate, which I never do, I would use a 301 redirect. This way I can stuff my affiliate code before I send them to the affiliate sales page.

Mad Money

I'm using my cpanel stats - is that not good?
I'm just verbally asking my customers (since it's a service, personable interaction) where they found us but that won't help with an eBook download.

For my new CB product which I just did an article about using the redirect, I included a tracking id of eza so i'll know.

[WritingMadwoman]

Just submitted 11th article. 6 Live, 5 Pending

Not much else to report at this stage! ;-) Getting a handful of clickthroughs, a few optins, a few publishers, no sales yet.

Wendy

[Adriana Copaceanu]

Originally Posted by Peggy Baron

Ezine Publisher - 6
URL Clicks - 4

Peggy, how do you know the above info? Where do you see how many published your articles and how many clicks on your URL?

thanks.

[WritingMadwoman]

Originally Posted by giftsolution

Peggy, how do you know the above info? Where do you see how many published your articles and how many clicks on your URL?

thanks.

It's in the tab that says Author Tools, My Article Reports. Click on that and you'll get a list of all your articles, along with stats for how many times they've been viewed, published, clickthroughs, and so on. Very handy! :-)

Wendy

[jensrsa]

At last!

One approved and one with three red blocks - no views yet, no money yet apart from some Adsense.

Question: Do you promote one product with all the articles or different ones depending on the subject?

Jens

[Ben Roy]

Yay, so excited! My first article (of this challenge) finally got approved and is now live. I have two more with 3 bars and one with 4 bars, so hopefully I'll have 2 live or maybe 4 by the end of the day. Go go traffic!

[Ben Roy]

Ummmm ok. One of my two articles that went live has 3 views and 13 clicks! Can anyone beat a 433% CTR on any article they've ever posted?

I think I'm an article writing genius and will soon be launching a major WSO, "How I made $235,231.63 in one day with only 14 views and 2,256 click throughs!"

[Munch Mama]

Yippee!!! All three of my first three articles went through in a matter of hours after waiting 8 days!

Anyway, I will be loading the next articles by the end of the day. And that may put me into Platinum??? Once they are approved --in another 7-8 days. I don't know...

Anyway, I was just checking in - i am back in the saddle again!

[joefission]

Originally Posted by Ben Roy

I think I'm an article writing genius and will soon be launching a major WSO, "How I made $235,231.63 in one day with only 14 views and 2,256 click throughs!"

BUY, BUY, BUY, BUY!

Oh, sorry, habit.

Shaun

[Adriana Copaceanu]

Originally Posted by WritingMadwoman

It's in the tab that says Author Tools, My Article Reports. Click on that and you'll get a list of all your articles, along with stats for how many times they've been viewed, published, clickthroughs, and so on. Very handy! :-)

Thanks Wendy: very helpful!

[TiffanyDow]

Alrighty, I'm out of submissions. Awaiting an upgrade or something So I'll write and wait.

Write and wait.

Write and wait some more

[WritingMadwoman]

Originally Posted by jensrsa

At last!

One approved and one with three red blocks - no views yet, no money yet apart from some Adsense.

Question: Do you promote one product with all the articles or different ones depending on the subject?

Jens

Jens, some people are promoting different products/niches with their articles, and some are focusing on just one. (I'm doing just one niche/product for this challenge.) Do whatever works best for you! :-)

Wendy

[WritingMadwoman]

Originally Posted by TiffanyDow

Alrighty, I'm out of submissions. Awaiting an upgrade or something So I'll write and wait.

Write and wait.

Write and wait some more

Bummer Tiffany. Hopefully it won't take too long, if I remember it's usually a week or less once you request the upgrade, but you have to wait until all of your articles have been approved and live before you get the opportunity. Maybe it will go faster since you have a premium account. Here's hoping!

Wendy

[Allen Graves]

Why not try a couple of other places while you wait???

[WritingMadwoman]

Originally Posted by Ben Roy

Ummmm ok. One of my two articles that went live has 3 views and 13 clicks! Can anyone beat a 433% CTR on any article they've ever posted?

I think I'm an article writing genius and will soon be launching a major WSO, "How I made $235,231.63 in one day with only 14 views and 2,256 click throughs!"

LOL How funny. All I can picture is EZA having a glitch at that moment and the person clicking, clicking, clicking again..."Dammit, open the page!!!" Or maybe they just really liked your site and had to make sure they weren't dreaming! LOL Sorry, gotta tease you! :-)

Wendy

[Khemal]

Very interesting thread Tiff's really got a lot of people to "TAKE ACTION" and that's awesome! Great job Tiff.

I noticed that many of the people who are participating in this challenge are sitting around until EZA approves their articles. Some have approached their submission limits. So here's a suggestion:

If you're just waiting around, why not rewrite your article and post it on another few high PR article sites other than EZA?

Places like goarticles.com has a PR of 6 the last time I checked so why not leverage your "down time" and double your results?

Just a thought.

[jensrsa]

Well, whatever happens with this challenge I've already learned a lot here, and from Steven and Jennifer's ebooks/reports. My CTR results form this challenge, although I have only one article approved so far WAY outstrips my old articles at EZA. The few I published in the past were purely for the linkback.

Approved today: 6 views 4 clicks

2006 article: 189 views | 19 publishers | 0 clicks
6/2008 article: 97 views | 0 Publishers | 0 clicks
6/2008 article: 23 views | 2 clicks
9/2008 article BC: 53 views | 3 clicks (BC = Before Challenge)

Thanks

JEns

[Craig McPherson]

Published articles with number of views and clicks and keywords in bold:

Make My Dog Drop - The Easy Way | Views 12 | url clicks 0
4 Reasons Why Your Dog Drinks Excessively | Views 55 | url clicks 1
Dog Nose Bleed - Why and What to Do | Views 38 | url clicks 2
Eating Disorders For Dogs and Puppies | Views 23 | url clicks 4
Does Your Dog Stray Or Chase Cars? | Views 32 | url clicks 2
Treatment For Hair Loss in Dogs | Views 51 | url clicks 2
5 Qualities All Great Dog Trainers Have | Views 32 | url clicks 3
How to Recall Your Dog and Teach Him a Lesson | Views 29 | url clicks 2
3 Steps to Teach Your Dog to Sit on Command | Views 30 | url clicks 3

Of the 19 clicks thru to my site 11 have gone onto my sales page for nil purchases.

Waiting for approval, all with 3 bars:

Should I Spay My Dog?
Bringing Home a Brand New Puppy
Flatulence and Your Dog.
First Aid Kits For Dogs: What You Need

[Justin Jordan]

Interesting.

My first ezinearticles articles just went live, and got 6 views and 2 clicks to the url. That's kind of neat for just having gone up an hour or two ago.

Neat.

[jensrsa]

I've fallen behind totally on my articles. Will have to work to catch up.

Articles Submitted - 5 (2 in 3/5 and 2 in 1/5)
Articles Live - 1
Article Views - 7
Clicks - 6
CB Hops - 11 but not all from the article
Sales - 0

Jens

[Tina Williams]

Just saw this post. Hope it's not to late to join in. Even if I'm not eligible for the prizes, it's awesome inspiration!

Tiffany, thanks for giving me a nudge to get writing. I am behind by about 10 articles but will catch up ASAP!

[Adriana Copaceanu]

I submitted 2 articles today, and I am up to date.

Articles Submitted - 9 (2 in 3/5 and 4 in 1/5, 3 live)
Articles Live - 3 (all went live today)
Article Views - 59
URL Clicks - 6
Ezine Publisher: 3 (one for each live article)

Tomorrow I am planning to tinker with Buzzle Web Portal: Intelligent Life on the Web (I have an account, but never submitted any articles there), and hopefully submit all my articles so far there.

[ezrock]

Originally Posted by WritingMadwoman

Bummer Tiffany. Hopefully it won't take too long, if I remember it's usually a week or less once you request the upgrade, but you have to wait until all of your articles have been approved and live before you get the opportunity. Maybe it will go faster since you have a premium account. Here's hoping!

Wendy

Oh no!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am submitting my 10th article tonight. I will likely have to wait a week for them to get approved. Then I have to manually request a bump up in status (or do they automatically consider me)? That will really set me back for this challenger significantly since the earlier the better for something like this (so your articles have time to be effective).

[ezrock]

I fully plan on doing that. Do they HAVE TO be rewritten? Or is it only to help have more unique content out there all linking to your sites?

-Ezrock-

Originally Posted by Khemal

Very interesting thread Tiff's really got a lot of people to "TAKE ACTION" and that's awesome! Great job Tiff.

I noticed that many of the people who are participating in this challenge are sitting around until EZA approves their articles. Some have approached their submission limits. So here's a suggestion:

If you're just waiting around, why not rewrite your article and post it on another few high PR article sites other than EZA?

Places like goarticles.com has a PR of 6 the last time I checked so why not leverage your "down time" and double your results?

Just a thought.

[ezrock]

Another three posts in a row for me

So I submitted my 8th article today: "Niche Market - Secrets of Choosing a Sucessful Topic for your Niche Blog" targetting 'Niche market' and 'niche blog'.

Day 9 Results

Live Articles
Tropical Fish Tank Setup in 5 Easy Steps - 70 views, 4 clicks, 1 pub
Tropical Fish For Beginners - Start With a Betta - 26 views, 4 clicks, 1 pub

My fish squidoo blog is starting to get more traffic (up almost 10%)

Both are already on multiple websites. One site is clearly scanning the fish section of EZA daily and publishing all new good articles That's fine with me since webmaster is properly linking back to my site!


Note: I hit my limit today. Need to wait for 6 articles to be approved (one at 3 bars today). Likely another week for that. Then I will ask for account upgrade! I'll be out of commission for EZA for up to two weeks apparently so I'll start working on the same articles at different sites as several people have suggested

I'm having a lot of fun doing this!

[Ben Roy]

I'm going to track my two niches separately from now on, because the one I've been promoting and building for a while. I've got a site with lots of articles and what not, and I'm just piggy backing on this to boost traffic (and hopefully sales, right?). My other niche I am ONLY promoting through this challenge, and I basically just have my articles land the user on a warm-up page before they get to the sales page. It's pretty plain vanilla affiliate marketing stuff.

Day 9 Results
Niche 1 (existing site)
Articles Posted: 9
Articles Live: 2 yay!
Views: 13
Clicks: 18 ??
Sales: 0, unfortunately. A couple of auto-responder signups though

Niche 2, brand new
Articles Posted: 9
Articles Live: 2
Views: 33
Clicks: 11
Sales: 0

I really didn't feel like writing/posting articles today. The ONLY reason I did was because of this challenge. Yes, that's another 'thank you'.