Many Body Theory

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Google AdWords now estimates how many clicks/impressions your keywords will receive based off of the recent 7 day data if you increase/decrease your max cpc bids.

A post that was originally written for manybodytheory.com has been instead posted on Search Engine Land.

You can read the article here: http://searchengineland.com/automated-keyword-bidding-more-like-automated-money-sink-21569

So word on the street is that affiliates running Google Grants, Google Cash, etc are getting permanently banned from advertising on AdWords.

I’m not sure how Google is going to enforce the permanement ban… What I imagine is they will put a block on your name and address on file (since they can’t ban any future John Smiths… but can ban John Smith who lives on First Street in Chicago)… I’m sure if Google is going through with the ban that your credit card number will also get blacklisted from AdWords as well.

SpeedDate.com is a pretty shady company. Less than 24 hours after my first post covering how shady speeddate is they took down their subscription page. When I noticed that their new subscription page looked familar I asked myself why… then it occured to me that SpeedDate has now stolen the MyLife subscription page. You can read the post about it from Chris Watkins, the UI Designer for Zoosk.

This is part one of a six part series where I will follow-up with the initial post covering all of the six weapons of influence by Dr Robert Cialdini. Unlike the book, Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, these posts will not maintain the same order as they are mentioned in Cialdini’s book and will be refocused specifically for affiliate marketers in mind.

Offer Spotlight: Cosmetyn from Clickbooth

In this offer we see a short form at the top right corner that lets the user admit that they are looking to remove their stretch marks. By making a person take a stand they will feel pressure to commit and continue filling out the form.

Unlike politicians, the average person does not like being inconsistent. Being inconsistent is a sign of weakness and our egos will counterbalance this weakness. Many times a person will stick to their guns even after knowing they made a mistake just to remain consistent.

Remember to always try to get your users to commit to a decision. With websites and forms it is difficult to get our users to call you up and admit they have a problem but by filling out a short form our users have taken a stand and will stick to their initial decisions.

Tip to Becoming a Super Affiliate: If you have a landing page setup where you have multiple “self improvement” offers available — get your users to admit they are looking to become healthier and more attractive. Have a form where they can write a short paragraph of “goals” that they would like to change after asking them if they are looking to remove embarrassing stretch marks and have whiter teeth. Once you are able to get your users committed to this mindset of bettering themselves, you can display offers from a wide range of campaigns available from Clickbooth!

Disclaimer: Remember never to use this tactic to deceive or “trick” your users.

Offer Details: If you are looking to promote this offer you can find it exclusively on Clickbooth - one of the top affiliate networks on the web. The offer pays $35.00 with a network EPC of $1.39.  One of the great things about running this offer through Clickbooth is that you can place your pixels on the confirmation page for affiliates interested in running search traffic. Join Clickbooth and start making more money online.

SpeedDate.com has ripped off Zoosk’s subscription page - the text, images, layout, javascript functions, you name it –http://tr.im/flattered

It is one thing for some 20 year old affiliate to copy another affiliate’s fake blog to market acai berry pills but SpeedDate.com is a VC-funded company.

This is a clear sign that they are not making any revenue.

One of the best books ever is Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Dr. Robert Cialdini. This is a six chapter book where each chapter is a different “weapon” on how to influence people. What I love about this book is that he takes examples from what people have done in the past — what is also great is that he takes a scientific approach versus the MBA approach when showing how tests were run.

Seriously, read this book. Whether you’re an affiliate, in-house marketer, selling your services.. whatever it may be: this is a must read and should only take you a week if you spend 1 - 2 hours a day on it. I have seen offers go from barley profitable to 2x-3x ROI when making changes based off of these six weapons of influence.

Reciprocation - People tend to return a favor. Thus, the pervasiveness of free samples in marketing.

Affiliates — That “free trial” where you’re giving away a month’s free of your product and all you ask in return is for the buyer to pay for the shipping/handling.

Commitment and Consistency - If people commit, orally or in writing, to an idea or goal, they are more likely to honor that commitment. Even if the original incentive or motivation is removed after they have already agreed, they will continue to honor the agreement.

Affiliates — this is why email/zip submits work. Just get the person in the funnel and interacting with the website.

Social Proof - People will do things that they see other people are doing.

Affiliates — Doesn’t this sound like those “Ashley placed this game on Facebook” or “5 people think they are smarter than you” type ads? It also should remind you of all of those fake blogs.

Authority - People will tend to obey authority figures.

Affiliates — can you say: Oprah? This is why affiliate offers leach off of celebrities and the offer page will mention that the product has been featured in 60 Minutes, NY Times, etc.

Liking - People are easily persuaded by other people that they like.

Affiliates — This is why you always want to have attractive people in your creatives and landing pages. People like attractive people.

Scarcity - Perceived scarcity will generate demand. For example, saying offers are available for a “limited time only” encourages sales.

Affiliates — how many times do those landing pages have a countdown clock whenever an order is supposed to be made?

Chris Sherman asked if I’d like to start contributing to Search Engine Land. This is really exciting news and I’m looking forward to my first article.

More details to come.