Let’s just recap…why did I choose [to try] Affiliate X?

1. I looked at some of the other Affiliate Marketing websites available but decided to try this one out as I’ve read that Chris X is an experienced marketeer with a proven track record.
2. The sales page states ease of setup, ease of use and, ultimately, quick results.
3. The sales page states they do all the work (somewhere between all the work and all the hard work – depending on which paragraph you’re reading).
4. Ultimately, with all this ‘stuff’, there’s a 60-day money back guarantee.

So, what happened and where are we?

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I’m still getting hits on the site. Some of them are bouncing straight back (100% bounce rate) but it’s still traffic far faster than I’ve ever got before on one of my websites. The only thing is, not one sale as yet.

The page setup is the default one. I’ve changed the logo a bit, re-written the post away from the standard spiel but kept it ‘tight’ and still no sales.

The support at AffiliateX is saying I have to work through the pdf’s and I’m sure there’s a wealth of information in there to evaluate, absorb and regurgitate to make this site work. I’m getting hits on the site but still no-one’s clicking through to purchase.

Where am I ranking in Google? My backlinks have been setup (the other day), where am I? Read the rest of this entry

So, the recommendation from AffiliateX support is that I ‘work my way down the material on the download page‘.

I download the pdfs and then have a look at the preliminary reading:

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I’ve got Google Analytics setup on the site and it’s telling me I’m getting hits on my website. That’s good news as it’s only been going a few days. Information on the website said it’d take upto 48 hours to start getting ‘traffic’ on the site so that’s good going by those standards.

Still no clickthru sales though…

Anyway, I have a bit of time on my hands so I look at the AffiliateX site a bit more. The only problem is, a lot of the links don’t work. Another email to AffiliateX (the gist of which is here):

I’m trying to get this to work, insert the hoplinks, etc., but a lot of the site functionality is either down or just isn’t working. It’s frustrating to say the least.

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Later that day, I receive another email saying it’s time to setup the backlinks.

I go though the steps outlined in the email, download the zip file and then notice something and email AffiliateX with a few questions:

As you can see, I’m querying the date on the file I’ve been sent. It’s over 4 months old!!

I get Chris’s reply on the 3rd June:

Okay, but not that regularly, the date on this one is February! Now, I’m only a beginner at this but I have been doing some cursory reading and, because of using GB’s GS (and other sites), I am aware of Google Panda, – a major update which was introduced by Google in late-February – mmmm….not that regularly indeed!

I’m beginning to have my doubts about this AffiliateX…still, I’m getting traffic. No sales, but increased levels of traffic. I have never had traffic on a website this fast before. Not a huge amount granted, but traffic nevertheless.

Not much…but, it’s coming.

Now, as I mentioned, I’ve never had traffic at my other sites quickly before, it all takes time. And, I’m very pleased to say, though it’s only a few hits, I’m getting traffic now! Nice one!

(As I mentioned in an earlier post, this is all being done retroactively). From clicking the ‘Activate Traffic button’, I started receiving traffic the very next day – no purchases, but traffic.

That’s one of the promises that AffiliateX make. They will drive traffic to the website.

The day after the website is set-up I get an email saying [to the effect of] ‘It’s time to get traffic to your website…’

I click on the link and get taken to this page:

Now this form seems a bit strange to me as they (AffX) know my URL, they know the niche I’ve selected so why do I have to fill in a form and activate it? I selected the niche yesterday, chose a domain name, they then set the website up; it all seems a bit too lame to me. Almost like, ‘We have to show you we’re doing this, as opposed to just doing it.’

Nevertheless, I fill it all in and hit ‘Activate Your Traffic‘

Now, I’ve had a few websites in the past and it does take a while to get traffic to sites. It’ll be interesting to see what traffic I get and how fast it comes.

Well, the setup is complete. I have my website and I haven’t actually done anything.

Okay, over to the website. I chose a website in the weight loss niche remember.

The product I’ve been given to promote/use is FatLoss4Idiots.

Browsing around the AffiliateX wesbite and looking at the other niches and the setup/spiel for these, I see a pretty standard format for each. How do I make my website stand out from the crowd? Well, it’s going to be difficult because there are already a lot of websites promoting this product. Looks like I’m going to be another ‘review’ website giving my take on this ‘fantastic’ product.

Anyway, there’s a lot of bonus material on offer. I’ll be downloading this for a while:

There’s a lot of stuff here. Lots to read, to digest, to understand. It’s a good job AffiliateX are doing all the work for me.

This is straightforward (as I mentioned) but you can’t help thinking there’s a lot more too this than meets the eye. Where do you learn all this stuff.

Now, please remember that the sales spiel says all is done for me, the site will be setup for me, traffic will be driven to the site without me having to do anything, effortless…we shall see.

Onto step 3… Ads by X

I click on the link and go to the page. Nothing works, I get SQL errors.

Try again, nothing! SQL errors again. Okay, site might be down. Try later.

Next day – SQL errors.

Raise a query with the helpdesk:

and sit back and wait for a reply.

Thankfully, this is only a day or so coming but when you’ve just bought into something, the last thing you want is for the functionality to be ‘down’.

Anyway, onto Ads by X:

I’ve taken a little but of artistic license here and squeezed it all onto the one page (you can’t have two drop-down lists open at the same time on a page) just so you can see how easy it all is.

You select your niche, arrange by popularity, select your other options from the tick boxes, and click on the Search button.

This then performs the search and show you the affiliate ads based on your selection criteria. This enables you to use this material to copy to your website and begin ‘making money’ (my emphasis) right away.

Now, I had, and still have, a bit of a problem with this. If I’m looking for a review on a product, then I want the review from someone who’s qualified not just anyone. If I goto a website and just see lots of banners promoting other stuff, then I’m going to question what this site actually is and what I’m actually doing here.

This seems to be the way some of these ‘schemes’ work – set your base site up then just put lots of links on it. Now this may work for some but I’m not sure I’m confortable with this. It doesn’t work for me. Is AffiliateX going to be just another one of these?

Okay, so far so good but on the face of it, there’s a wealth of information here. For someone new to this, it’s almost, almost overwhelming.

Figures, statistics…access to more figures, graphs, statistics…what’s good? What’s bad? Where do you learn all this stuff?

“Oh right! You don’t have to do anything.” so sayeth the sales spiel. If I don’t have to do anything, then there’s a lot of info here for me to do nothing with.