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Clickbank Recurring Billing Gravity

by BenShaffer
17 replies
Does anyone know whether for recurring billing products on Clickbank, whether gravity is added on just the initial sale or also for each recurrent billing sale?

Ben Shaffer
#billing #clickbank #gravity #recurring
  • Profile picture of the author Mike McAleer
    I believe that it is added for each reccurring sale. That is what makes the most sense to me.
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  • Profile picture of the author Soren Jordansen
    Hey Ben,

    Gravity is based on initial sales only - and the main component is number of affiliates making a sale in the last 30 days. There are other (hidden) variables in the gravity score too - they are trying to not make it the be all end all of CB rank as it can easily be manipulated.
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    • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
      Banned
      Originally Posted by FreshDomains View Post

      I believe that it is added for each reccurring sale. That is what makes the most sense to me.
      Not so.

      And to me, if you'll excuse the observation, that would actually make no sense at all, on any level.

      Originally Posted by Soren Jordansen View Post

      Gravity is based on initial sales only
      This is correct.

      Originally Posted by Soren Jordansen View Post

      - and the main component is number of affiliates making a sale in the last 30 days.
      This is nearly correct. (It's actually 8 weeks, not 30 days).

      Originally Posted by Soren Jordansen View Post

      There are other (hidden) variables in the gravity score too -
      Although very widely believed, this is actually not quite right.

      Gravity is treated by marketers, and anyone else discussing it in forums, as if it were some sort of arcane formula with mystery components desiged to keep everyone guessing (just as Clickbank's "popularity number" really is, in other words!). In fact, this isn't the case at all.

      Gravity is fully defined on Clickbank's site, and there's actually no mystery about it. It's true that it's not well or consistently explained (they make typical Clickbank contradictory statements about it), and although one of their explanations is correct, many people apparently misunderstand it, and some of them also have all sorts of weird and wonderful beliefs about "how gravity works" (Sir Isaac Newton is turning in his grave!) of which perhaps the commonest arises because many people writing "guidebooks" advising marketers still seem to imagine that there's some sort of correlation between gravity and sales numbers, and/or some sort of correlation between gravity and conversion rates - both of these beliefs are, of course, entirely mistaken.

      Each affiliate who has sold one of more copies of a product during the 8-weeks over which the gravity is measured "contributes" a score toward that product's total gravity score, their individual component of that score being measured on a scale from 0.1 to 1.0 in inverse proportion to the time elapsed since their most recent scale, before the summation of those individual components. It's actually no more complicated than that.

      Originally Posted by Soren Jordansen View Post

      it can easily be manipulated.
      This is certainly so. And very commonly is.

      The "skinny" (latte?) is in this post.
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      • Profile picture of the author BenShaffer
        Thank you.

        It seems that CB themselves do get slightly confused by gravity.

        In one place, they say that it is sales in the last 30 days.

        In another:

        Finding Products to Promote in the Marketplace

        they say 12 weeks.

        What gravity does show though is that a product does convert even if that is a low percentage.

        As it seems that gravity does not take price into account, one tactic could be to price your product very low initially - especially if you are driving paid traffic.
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        • Profile picture of the author WillR
          Originally Posted by BenShaffer View Post

          As it seems that gravity does not take price into account, one tactic could be to price your product very low initially - especially if you are driving paid traffic.
          You could do that but each affiliate can still only increase the gravity score by a maximum of 1 point during that period. The only way to manipulate it is to use a whole lot of different affiliate accounts to make sales for you. Gravity is more a measure of the number of successful affiliates selling your product NOT the number of sales those affiliates are making.
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          • Profile picture of the author Kev Stevenson
            Originally Posted by WillR View Post

            Gravity is more a measure of the number of successful affiliates selling your product NOT the number of sales those affiliates are making.
            Is that only a measure of the sales from affiliates actually signed up to promote that particular product?

            i.e X% of affiliates promoting product Y made sales in the last 30 days.

            Or is it measured against all other affiliates and products across the board at CB?

            I'm still trying to get a handle on gravity, what it does actually signify and whether it has any bearing at all on choosing a product to promote.

            If not - gut instinct alone?

            Regards to all...
            K
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            • Profile picture of the author WillR
              Originally Posted by Kev Stevenson View Post

              Is that only a measure of the sales from affiliates actually signed up to promote that particular product?

              i.e X% of affiliates promoting product Y made sales in the last 30 days.

              Or is it measured against all other affiliates and products across the board at CB?

              I'm still trying to get a handle on gravity, what it does actually signify and whether it has any bearing at all on choosing a product to promote.

              If not - gut instinct alone?

              Regards to all...
              K
              It shouldn't really have a bearing on what you promote. All a high gravity number is telling you is the number of unique affiliates who have been successful in selling that product in that time frame.

              You could have a whole lot of affiliates who have managed to make 1 or 2 sales and nothing else.

              Then there are those products with a very low gravity where you could have 2-5 affiliates who are absolutely killing it and selling hundreds of that item everyday.

              I know which one I would rather promote.

              The best way to choose a product to promote is to do your research. Have a look at the sales page and their sales funnel. If it looks like something that could work then test it yourself and see what happens.

              Unfortunately there is no way to be certain you are on to a winner. Even if you find a product that someone else is selling hundreds of, they may be using a certain type of traffic that lends itself well to the offer so you might find it hard to replicate their results.

              You really just need to suck it and see.
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            • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
              Banned
              Originally Posted by Kev Stevenson View Post

              is it measured against all other affiliates and products across the board at CB?
              No - it has nothing to do with other products at all.

              Originally Posted by Kev Stevenson View Post

              I'm still trying to get a handle on gravity, what it does actually signify and whether it has any bearing at all on choosing a product to promote.
              It's questionable whether the time/effort spent on "trying to get a handle on gravity" is worth it.

              For myself, I admit, it is pretty relevant for a "first product in a new niche", but a lot of people don't agree with me.

              I would read this one post, see if it helps, and if it doesn't, just forget about it.

              Originally Posted by Kev Stevenson View Post

              If not - gut instinct alone?
              Er ... no. For selecting products, you mean? Product-selection is just about the single most important thing any Clickbank affiliate ever does. If you get that wrong, it doesn't even matter how well you do everything else - you'll be pretty seriously handicapped in the money-making stakes. If it helps you at all, my own little 10-point checklist for "selecting Clickbank products to promote" is in this post.
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        • Profile picture of the author WilsonA
          Originally Posted by BenShaffer View Post

          Thank you.

          It seems that CB themselves do get slightly confused by gravity.

          In one place, they say that it is sales in the last 30 days.

          In another:

          Finding Products to Promote in the Marketplace

          they say 12 weeks.

          What gravity does show though is that a product does convert even if that is a low percentage.

          As it seems that gravity does not take price into account, one tactic could be to price your product very low initially - especially if you are driving paid traffic.
          The problem with that is that your average $ per sale displayed on the cb marketplace will be very low and that will drive away more affiliates. Unless by low you mean between the $20 and $30 mark.
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        • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
          Banned
          Originally Posted by BenShaffer View Post

          one tactic could be to price your product very low initially - especially if you are driving paid traffic.
          This isn't quite right, Ben. Even if you price your product at $3, drive paid traffic to it and sell 10,000 copies, you'll still only add a maximum of 1 point to the gravity score, unless you make the sales through different affiliate accounts. Gravity doesn't measure the number of sales.
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          • Profile picture of the author BenShaffer
            Originally Posted by Alexa Smith View Post

            This isn't quite right, Ben. Even if you price your product at $3, drive paid traffic to it and sell 10,000 copies, you'll still only add a maximum of 1 point to the gravity score, unless you make the sales through different affiliate accounts. Gravity doesn't measure the number of sales.
            Sorry...I kind of shortened my thought process when I wrote that.

            What I meant was that at the beginning, it would be beneficial to price your product at the point where conversions are maximised which is often (but not always) at a low price.

            What this will mean is that (hopefully) affiliates who are promoting your product will make sales causing the CB snowball effect.

            One of the reasons why recent CB launches have been able to break gravity records one after the other is because of the trend to price products low.
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  • Profile picture of the author BenShaffer
    Sorry if I am getting boring, but CB also says here:

    Six Steps to Finding a Great Product to Promote | ClickBank Blog

    "ClickBank uses a measure called ‘gravity’ torepresent how well each product sells, based on how many sales have been made and how recent these sales were."

    which is quite inaccurate, no?
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    • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
      Banned
      Originally Posted by BenShaffer View Post

      "ClickBank uses a measure called 'gravity' torepresent how well each product sells, based on how many sales have been made and how recent these sales were."

      which is quite inaccurate, no?
      Yes indeed - entirely inaccurate. Ludicrously so, in fact. As they do clarify elsewhere, it simply isn't "based on how many sales have been made" at all. :rolleyes:

      Clickbank's "information pages" really are terribly badly, carelessly (and, as you rightly point out, inconsistently!) written. Even more unfortunately, I'm afraid they really do typify Clickbank's entire attitude and behavior toward "customer service".
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      • Profile picture of the author JohnnyPR
        I'm always told by other marketers to "avoid" looking at gravity as it doesn't really matter. I'm not so sure, if the product is selling well, why avoid it?

        Clickbanks getting annoying anyway atm, my analytics have been delayed for nearly 2 weeks now.
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        • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
          Banned
          Originally Posted by jpr106 View Post

          I'm always told by other marketers to "avoid" looking at gravity as it doesn't really matter.
          I think it's fairly sensible advice, really, for most people, most of the time. All that it "misses" is perhaps the high-risk element of promoting a high gravity product (there are actually some good and genuine reasons why their sales pages, overall, are statistically less likely to convert well, though that clearly isn't true of all of them).

          Originally Posted by jpr106 View Post

          I'm not so sure, if the product is selling well, why avoid it?
          There isn't a way of knowing how well it's selling.

          Sales figures are not disclosed, and (contrary to what many people imagine) the gravity figure carries no clue.

          Originally Posted by jpr106 View Post

          Clickbanks getting annoying anyway atm
          Nobody's going to argue with that. Not even those of us making a living that way.
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