John Hasson

Somebody contacted me using that little chat widget on the right with this opening line:

Greetings I have been trying to get into the PPC arena for about a year without much succes constantly getting google slapped and tried a few other PPC source with no real measure of performance can you help

I was kinda busy at the time, so I simply said

Do you have a specific question?

You know what. here is the whole thing, I am in a rush to take all my girls to see High School Musical 3 tonight.

Guest: Greetings I have been trying to get into the PPC arena for about a year without much succes constantly getting google slapped and tried a few other PPC source with no real measure of performance can you help
Me: Do you have a specific question?
Guest: what am i doing wrong or not doing (I know you have no info about me or my site at this time) but would you be willing to look at my site and give you opinion\
My Thoughts: No specific question really.
Me: usually i na case like yours it is not just one thing
Me: *in a
Me: google slaps = stop making crappy sites
Me: biggest thing you need
Me: is tracking
Guest: I’m sure but i have doing this for a year with little return I have bought books and endless searches on the net right now  i workwith click bank and already have a site and ads but not sure what else to try
Guest: what “googles” defination of a crappy site
My Thoughts: How can I tell him to “google it” nicely….
Me: that is something you should be able to find out foryourself
Me: by just looking through Adwords Help and FAQ
Me: if you can’t do that then PPC is not something you should be doing
Me: There is no “shortcut” or trick
Me: it is just a matter of hard work
Me: trying and failing a lot
Me: if you are going to ASW I’ll gladly spend a few min glancing @ your stuff to tell you if anything comes to mind
Guest: unfortunitly i’m not but i would be happy to forward my site and maybe an ad for your opinion
My Thoughts: Hmm.. do I really want to mess with this? Ah ha. I can use it as a sorta blog post/site review, that would be worth my time.
Me: can I useit in a blog post
Me: make it public, etc?
Guest: can i send it in an email
Me: I’ll post my reply as a new blog post
Me: that cool?
Guest: yeah that would be great
My Thoughts: Gotta make sure they know what they are getting into.
Me: and your ok with others seing the site and the ad
Me: *seing
My Thoughts: CURSES! I can’t spell crap.
Me: *sEeing
Guest: depends you how bad you rip my site /ad apart
Me: lol
Me: I’ll tell you what I tell everyone
Me: Don’t fall in love with your site or your keywords or youe campaigns
Guest: no really i don’t want to look like an ass even if i am one
Guest: ok i should be chating anyway i will email later today
Me: k
Me: tlak l8r

Guest what… no email from them.

I am glad to answer questions, etc. but something like “why am I not making any money” is way to general for a simple answer.  And don’t ask me stuff that you can find out if you just read AdWords FAQs.  However, in person at a conference when I am in a good mood, I’ll happily answer stuff like that. 

Tags: Advice, Affiliate Marketing, PPC, Pay Per Click, Personal by John Hasson
3 Comments »

Woooo, fancy title claiming to make gobs of cash in no time at all.  Well the reality is you have to work up to this point.  Here is an example.  Say you are bringing in 90 leads a day with a payout of $2.50.   Not bad, not bad you say to yourself.  If you have a good relationship with your affiliate manager (and who doesn’t?) then ask for a payout bump.

My conversation went something like this.

8:55:46 AM Me: on another note, there are a few campaigns I am getting some traction on.  wondering if I can get a payout bump on them?
8:55:52 AM Awesome Affiliate Manager: of course
8:56:00 AM Me: <private cool stuff>
8:56:08 AM Awesome Affiliate Manager: you name the campaign and i’ll name the payout
8:56:15 AM Awesome Affiliate Manager: <private cool stuff>
8:56:28 AM Me: this one
8:56:29 AM Me: <private cool stuff>
8:56:31 AM Me: and
8:56:36 AM Me: <private cool stuff>
8:56:38 AM Me: that one
8:56:40 AM Awesome Affiliate Manager: ok
8:59:21 AM Awesome Affiliate Manager: ok, on the <private cool stuff> i can go to <private cool stuff>
8:59:30 AM Me: cool
8:59:48 AM Super Affiliate Manager: and the <private cool stuff> 2.70

So now instead of 2.50 it is 2.70.  If the campaign sustains (if anything I should be able to get higher volume) that is ~90 * .2 * 365 = over 6500.  In less them 5 minutes.

I usually don’t ask for a payout bump unless I am providing a decent amount of volume and I know I can keep it up.  Nothing lamer then getting a payout bump and then dropping the campaign.

Tags: Advice, Affiliate Manager, Affiliate Marketing, PPC, Pay Per Click by John Hasson
1 Comment »

I’ve got a private offer I have been running for a while now.  I even built a tracking and payout system for the 3 affiliates I have with this so far.  Payout is $20 for a 5 field form (no Credit Card) in a very narrow niche.  If are are new to PPC/affiliate marketing or lead gen, etc. then this will be a good thing for you to try.  We can give you keywords and site examples that have worked and what hasn’t worked. (Basically we can hold your hand on this to help you get started — one of our (3) affiliates has taken what he learned from this and moved onto a totally different segment (payday loans) and is seeing some success with that niche )

I will warn you, the system to log in and check your stats is ugly and all that but things have been designed such that the input form and confirmation pages can easily be branded on your own URL (in fact that is really the only way you can do it).

If you are interested, you can contact me via the chat window to the right or send me an email.  I’ll give you a call and see if it is something that would work for you.

Tags: Affiliate Marketing by John Hasson
No Comments »

@Nick - Thanks.  I live in Utah.

@Wordpress SEO – Thanks for the advice, I did a bunch of research on hiring/managing teams and so on

@Dmitry Nosov – As far as the thoughts of Russan freelancers vs other places.  I think it is the same as anywhere.  It really seems to be hit or miss.  Sometimes you get somebody great and sometimes you get somebody terrible.

@Benny - Look forward to seeing you at Affiliate Summit East.  I’ll try not to say anything stupid in my presentation.. but no promises

@PPC Fool – Yep.  Those are ron paul magnet signs.  I keep them hidden in the garage though.

@Nate – Can’t take you under my wing at the moment, but if you are interested in an exclusive lead gen affiliate offer I can get you started with keywords, sample ads and places to buy traffic.  Shoot me an email john[at]johnhasson.com.

Tags: Affiliate Marketing, Personal by John Hasson
No Comments »

I finally took a look at Jeremy’s black ink project.  There is some really good info in there.  In fact there are things in Black Ink Project that I was hoping to learn at elite retreat that I didn’t.  The short of it.  Sign up.  It is totally free (but you should participate and share).  Hurry before Jeremy changes his mind.

Tags: Advice, Affiliate Marketing by John Hasson
1 Comment »

Seems that everyone is doing an office tour.
Amit has his new place in florida
Zac has a blog post showing lot of people’s offices…

• Chad
• Mark
• Ian
• Jeremy
• Shawn
• Jim

Paul showed off his new house.

So… I can give into peer pressure. Here is my house/office:

Tags: Affiliate Marketing, PPC, Pay Per Click, Personal by John Hasson
12 Comments »

“You know what I can’t figure out? How is it that all these stupid neanderthal mafia guys can be so good at crime, and smart guys like us can suck so badly at it.” – Michael, Office Space

Here it is. Smart people sit around being smart and thinking up all sorts of cool ideas and projects and so on. They have all these great ideas for making money, curing cancer, w/e. But that is just it. They think about it too much.

The secret to success is getting off your rump and actually doing something. Sure being smart and having good ideas helps a lot. However without actually doing something with your great idea you won’t ever succeed.

Most smart people think and think and think about great ideas. (Some are really good ideas and a lot of the ideas are garbage–but don’t tell them that ) The point of all this is: don’t sit around brainstorming all day. Brainstorming is good for a while, but eventually you need to actually try things.

You will fail. A lot.

But with each failure you are closer to success.

Here is another poop related analogy.

Kid 1 is put in a room filled with poo and a shovel.
Kid 2 is also put in a room filled with poo and a shovel.
An hour passes.
Kid 1 (is smart) is sitting there bored and wants out. “It is just a bunch of poo. I am wasting my time.”
Kid 2 is covered in poo and smiling brightly and digging all over the place. “With all this poo, there has to be a pony in here somewhere.”

Now eventually kid 2 will figure out there is no pony. (But if there was a pony how dumb would Kid 1 feel?)
Summary

• You actually have to work to make things happen (or pay someone else to do it for you–but this is also work)
• Don’t get in analysis paralysis (over analyzing things so much you never try things
• Stop reading all these blogs and put together a campaign and test, test, test.
• You can come back to read mine though

Tags: Advice, Affiliate Marketing by John Hasson
3 Comments »

This is a short video I made of how keyword tracking works. Some people were asking me about it. I figured this should be a decent enough overview of how it actually works.

Questions? Comments…

Tags: Affiliate Marketing, Online Moola, PPC, Pay Per Click, Whiteboard by John Hasson
2 Comments »

White board Episode:

I think affiliate marketing should be moving more towards full sites about a particular product/service. Instead of just linking to a site you can use API’s and direct server posts. This will let you make a real website about a product (not just a redirect page). You can then even help people reach their goals (if they couldn’t qualify for the initial offer)…

Video is below:

If you want my to whiteboard anything else feel free to contact me.
You can contact me via Twitter or Email (john @ johnhasson.com)

Tags: API, Affiliate Marketing, Whiteboard by John Hasson
8 Comments »

I am sitting in the Denver airport at the delta crown room watching N’West and Minn play, but I was thinking about PPC and my plans for the future. Really PPC is not the end game. It is the beginning. There are lots of different ways to gain traffic, PPC is just one of many.

So what is the endgame? In my mind it is a site sustainable by its users. Users come back to your site over and over because you fulfill a need, not because they saw your ad.

Using PPC in a “big plan” site would be a way to get users, but the litmus for the traffic coming to your site will be generating a user that returns on a regular basis. (What do you think many of the places you have been driving PPC traffic to in the first place are doing? )

In summary, sure… making minisites and sending PPC traffic to it is all fine and dandy, but to move to the next level you need a site that people go to on their own without ads.

Tags: Affiliate Marketing, PPC by John Hasson
1 Comment »