Finding affordable Keywords for CPA Campaigns

8 replies
I've recently been accepted at a few CPA networks and started running a few campaigns across a variety of niches. Down the road I want to get into Media Buys etc., but for now I'm focusing on Pay per click to buy traffic. I've already checked out several recent CPA Courses including Zero FM, Arbitrage Consp, Comm payload etc. to help with the all-important Offer selection.
By and large, the courses typically emphasise -
1. Choosing popular niches
2. Using various trending websites to identify up and coming markets in those niches, and
3. Assessing the offer landing page itself and how attractively it is designed.

But it seems to me that after estimating the Earnings Per Click for an offer, it is critical to identify whether any reasonably targeted quality adwords traffic can be bought at a potentially profitable cost, in sufficient volume.
i.e. It doesn't matter whether an offer converts at 33% with a commission of $30 giving an EPC of $10 - if our clicks cost $20 then we're not going to be making much money!

Of course I'll be using my Philippine contractor to build a Wordpress Landing page to boost my Quality score and get clicks as cheap as I can, start bidding high to get a good Click through rate, etc, etc. But from my research so far it seems that the majority of 'obvious' keywords for the majority of offers are too expensive to offer much hope of a profitable campaign. In which case, surely it's a waste of time and money to even attempt to run Adwords test campaigns for those offers & keywords...?

So I'm concluding that the whole trick of using Adwords with CPA Offers is using lateral thinking to find related, not so obvious keywords which are much cheaper, but can still lead to plentiful conversions using a cleverly constructed Landing page. Kenster's excellent CPA Rages to Riches mentions this, another example being Amish Shah's Magic Bullet Trailers where he bids on MSN Messenger keywords to promote a Smiley campaign.

So if this is the name of the game, then fine I'll head in that direction, but so many courses still strongly imply that it's more of a numbers game i.e. crank through as many offers as possible with the 'obvious' keywords in the hope of finding gold.

What do all the $1K-a-day Warriors reckon?
#adwords #affordable #campaigns #cpa #finding #keywords #offer selection #ppc
  • Profile picture of the author MikeMorgan
    Originally Posted by fallonp View Post


    So I'm concluding that the whole trick of using Adwords with CPA Offers is using lateral thinking to find related, not so obvious keywords which are much cheaper, but can still lead to plentiful conversions using a cleverly constructed Landing page. Kenster's excellent CPA Rages to Riches mentions this, another example being Amish Shah's Magic Bullet Trailers where he bids on MSN Messenger keywords to promote a Smiley campaign.

    As this is a very clever strategy, it is advisable that you use it as one of your weapons.

    But, it is hard to conclude this is the only way to go. Because, there are instances that with the right keyword strategy, you make a killing even with the popular keywords.

    There are lots of keyword research strategies to come up with cheap, less competition and highly targeted keywords. So, I highly recommend that you study and master these techniques.

    I hope it helps.

    Mike.
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  • Profile picture of the author tryinhere
    what is a cheap keyword ? is it a keyword that converts at a profit regardless of cost, or is it a keyword that is penny cheap but never converts that in effect costs ?
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  • Profile picture of the author adsquare
    ^ I think what he is saying is a cheap keyword basically just costs less. Even cheap keywords convert well if they are in fact targeted.

    Jared
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  • Profile picture of the author Kenster
    Hi Paul,

    Glad you found the guide helpful!

    Yes you are dead on. They key with PPC, especially when you are newer is to find godo creative keywords that are still very relevant...not an easy task. But some of the largest advertisers have campaigns built around only the main keywords of their campaigns and leave so much on the table because they dont want to deal with keywords under a certain volume.

    I will gladly pick up 50 of those keywords and if each only makes me on average $10 per day, that is still $500 per day. Pennies to them, but I'll take it.

    So yes, look laterally and built your landing page effectively and you can make some serious bank.

    as I always say, creativity pays well in CPA
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  • Profile picture of the author SiL^Er_HunTeR
    This is a great strategy, but best combined with other strategies such as various free traffic methods, be sure to diversify your (targeted) traffic sources.
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  • Profile picture of the author indexphp
    I bet you're forgetting to lower your bids as you establish CTR
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    • Profile picture of the author fallonp
      Many thanks for the advice guys, that's very helpful.

      In response, when I talk about a 'cheap' keyword I mean a keyword where the EPC is significantly less than the CPC, and still has decent volume. For example:

      By 'expensive' I mean the $16.44 which Google Adwords Editor estimates for 'free credit report', $5.26 for 'colon cleanse', or $1.94 for '**** berry' - in each case the obvious keywords for the offer.

      By 'cheap' I mean the kind of keywords this guy is using - $0.50 or less per click for a offer with a payout over $30.

      Cheers,

      Paul
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  • Profile picture of the author Kenster
    Yes Paul trying to compete for those main keywords in popular niches like the ones you mention is financial suicide if you aren't an advanced marketer. Those keywords are squeezed as much as possible to its hard to beat the big guns there.

    Seems like you have the gist of keyword strategy. Come back and let us know what is and isnt working for you!
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