I want to share a simple solution to a problem I experienced recently. I run online marketing campaigns. A few weeks ago, my numbers weren’t looking great and out of boredom I launched a bunch of campaigns at the same time.
I think it happens to a lot of marketing people with creative brains – we have more ideas than we have time for and sometimes things can get messy. This is where I found myself recently and as soon as I found a way out of it – I thought I’d pass it on.
So – what’s the magic, complicated, scientific secret that turned things around?
I Turned A Whole Bunch of Campaigns Off
(Really… that’s it.)
I’m a curious person. I am always looking for new campaigns to run. I love testing new ideas and seeing if they work or not. This is a great thing and I consider it an asset.
The problem is – sometimes my test campaigns lose so much money they balance out my profitable ones and I end up making no money.
This is what was happening last month. Has it ever happened to you?
Think About It
- How many campaigns do you have running right now?
- How many different traffic sources are you running on?
- How much money are you currently making?
If your answer to Question 3 sucks… you need to address 1 and 2 immediately.
First: If you’re running more than 1 campaign and they’re not profitable – pick one and kill the other ones.
Right now, stop reading this and go pause those awful campaigns and then come back and read the rest.
Next: If you have more than 1 traffic source running and they’re not profitable shut ALL of them off but one. Do it right now. Kill all but one – leaving just one traffic source that you’re willing to focus on and master for the next 6 months.
Here’s What Happens
I just went through this. By turning off most of my campaigns I was able to turn a weak two months in a row into one of my better months of the year.
I ended up with 3 campaigns on 1 traffic source that are all related. All are making money. All are growing.
By focusing on one traffic source and a campaign that was working I was able to increase the main campaign’s profits by 400%. I added one placement. The campaign was ready to roll – all I had to do was pay attention.
In Conclusion:
There have been times in my career when I’ve been able to run 3-5 campaigns in different niches on different sources and make money on them all. But honestly it’s been a while (years) since that has happened.
By adapting to my new circumstances and changes in the business – I was able to pull my head out of the sand and drive my profits up and out of the gutter.
Remember
- Take a look at your current situation
- Audit your campaigns immediately
- Kill all but one campaign and one traffic source
- Focus
Then come back and thank me later.
Great this can really help me
I’m a newbie, and I tested a whole lot of campaigns with a whole lot of angles, which got me nowhere, really. Your writing just made me realized, that it’s normal. -Learn from it, and grind on.
yeah tee, failure is part of the process. it also helps if you stop saying “grind” 🙂
Malan, do you build list? I do personally for other stuff but never have for aff. marketing. Im wondering if this is actually a smart strategy or just plain waste of time.
in some cases it’s a great idea. like for your own products or if you’re being really helpful with your campaign.
if you’re promoting crappy offers though, the last thing you want is a list of people who want to kill you.
Solid advice. When I started trading the futures and equities markets 5 years ago I would spread myself too thin. I tried to do whatever I saw success people doing thinking it would ‘just work’ for me.. I lost thousands of dollars. It wasn’t until I killed all but one of my trading strategies and simplified that I actually made money.
Keith – yea it can be applied to anything. Affiliate marketing, stock trading, time management — even friends. Wipe out the losers and focus on the gems…. Simple simple and… simple