Back on May 23rd, I posted that I was starting a case study on the promotion of an MLM business through typical beginner Internet marketing techniques.
The MLM used was NPN. The point of the case study was not to determine if NPN was a good opportunity or not, but to see how well the typical techniques a beginning Internet marketer might use worked.
Here’s a review of how I promoted NPN:
- Using NPN’s own lead packages ($30 per month for a few hundred leads)
- Posting in appropriate forums
- Sending emails to safelists
- Some bulk pop under traffic
The leads were sent NPN designed autorepsonder letters for a month. For safelists, I used Herculist and GOTSafeList. For the bulk popunder traffic I used BuyHitsCheap.
All told, I sent about 13,000 visits to my NPN affiliate link. Also, remember that NPN is a forced matrix, so there was the possibility of spillover from above. I deliberately picked NPN from a safelist ad, figuring that if my sponsor was using the same techniques to promote NPN as I planned on using, the spillover wouldn’t skew the results of the case study.
Total results: 0 signups under me. This counts personal signups and spillover.
The conclusion you should take away from this is that the typical beginning Internet marketing techniques do not work very well.
I’ve posted recently about techniques that can be used to do the job more effectively. Splash pages, for example, are far better than sending visitors to your affiliate link. Building a targeted list will get you more signups than sending out to a safelist.
While creating and tracking splash pages, and building a targeted list, take more time and energy than using the simple techniques, the increase in effectiveness is worth it. Your primary use of traffic exchanges and safelists should be to build recognition of who you are, and to build your list.
If you must promote an opportunity like NPN on a traffic exchange, do so using a splash page. You’ll see much better results than by using your affiliate link directly.