When to drop a sponsor?
 

How poor do conversions for a sponsor have to get before you say enough's enough and you drop them. I have one sponsor that's creeping upwards of 1:2000 which doesn't look good.

I've only been doing this business for about 2 1/2 months so I can't really tell if it's the sponsor, the season or me, so I'd be interested in hearing what criteria you have for dropping/sticking with a sponsor.

I rarely base anything on less than 5000 hits, but I will say that I did shitcan a sponsor yesterday since I'm 0:3500 sicne Nov 1 :(

If you don't make a sale or two after sending 10'000 unique quality hits in a 30 day period to a sponsors site I'd say can them.

I too get edgy if I'm not seeing sales when I'm sending the same type of traffic that would/should have produced sales with sponsors I have already marketed. I have a sponsor right now that I've sent a bit over 4,000 hits to from free sites without a sale. To me, that is unexceptable. If it was TGP traffic I'd say 'big whoop', but I have always had a better sales ratio with free site traffic. But it is also a very generic niche that I have not promoted in the past. So I ask myself, do I conitinue to promote that program and cross my fingers for future sales, or do I wash my hands of them and consider the traffic I have sent them a total loss?

I think everyone has their own threshold for loss. Mine is pretty low.

I would have droped them already

I am ready to drop all mine and start over - dam sales suck |angry|

Christmas time and surfers are spending money on gifts and not porn|pissed|

I think I'll keep them through the next pay period and see what happens. I guess it's somewhat of a hit and miss thing to identify a good sponsor before you send thousands of clicks their way.

Some nerve they've got! |angry|

The time of year is also a thing to consider I have a sponsor that from Jan-oct converted 1\600

in nov it was 1\3500

this month 1\1000

I would not stop sending traffic untill after the holidays pass it may pick up after christmas

Fred

The great thing about this industry today is that there are many choices. And that line about things working different for everyone is 100% TRUE. What converts @ 1:100 for one webmaster might convert @ 1:10000 for another... there are so many different variables - the season, your content/site/gallery, the banners you choose, your traffic, the niche you are targeting, etc. etc... it goes on and on...

Same thing with choosing a limit - or a cut off point for dropping a sponsor. The cool thing is that you don't have to drop them completely - they just might not be converting well for you on one niche, or one type or program - again, there are many variables.

The best advice is what I was given years ago by many of the smart veterans on this board... try a little bit of everything, experiment, get messy - make mistakes, learn from them and keep going until you find what works for you.

Don't throw away the sponsor completely - just try other sponsors as well to increase your potential for $$$ and try the old sponsor in a new way.

|pcsucks|

My rule of thumb has always been, "You can't make a decission until you have sent at least 5000 hits to a program".

Actually: the last 2-3 days had been at least above average for me :)

I can understand Lemmy's concern: I have one sponsor which used to be a constant 1:200 to 1:400 in 2003, now it's down to 1:2500 in several consecutive months, in October I gave it a last try with some galleries (no change), so now, where I'm slowly pulling my links, I had 2 sign-ups in a week...

This is too funny. Since I started this thread this morning I got the first signup with them in over 3 weeks. |bananna|

lol - so post again tomorrow! |jester|

Damn. If I thought posting here would jinx some of my non-sales records, I'd fill this board up.

if i don't make any sales for a month, i'd give it up...there's no reason to keep them if i won't make any money.

I am with Green Guy, I do not make a decision on a site until 10k hits, that is 10k hits to a site, not their entire program as I have seen some people talk about.

I usually stick to that rule unless it is a niche I know I market extremely well then I have been known to stop promoting a site for awhile with as few as a few thousand hits.

Other factors to consider before dropping a site:

How many hits are you sending in a given period. 20 hits a day over enough time to generate that much traffic to me is not a good indicator.

Are you pushing the site because you think it will convert or because you read on boards that people are doing well with it. As Kath pointed out, what works for me will not always work for you. Before pushing a site, look at it and ask yourself if you were a surfer, would you buy and things like that.

Are you preselling/qualifying the surfer before they get to the sponsor. Sending blind hits, traffic from misleading ads, extremely general ads, etc. will garner you poor ratios.

What niche are you selling. The niche can account for poor conversions, if you are trying to sell a niche that is massively saturated and don't have a handle on marketing yet, that will be a factor.

Where your traffic is coming from. SE or Link List, which ones. After awhile submitting you can start to spot trends in which linklists send you the best traffic for a given niche and your style of site building.

But, the bottom line is, how well you think you should be doing. If you feel a site does not convert like it should, then move to a different sponsor.

I put 5 galleries over a 3 week period that got accepted on the Hun because I was excited about a new sponsor. I really thought it would convert. Well, those 5 galleries got well over 10K hits and NOT 1 SINGLE SIGNUP.

So basically I used a ton of bandwidth for nothing. I dropped them like the plague after that.

So now when I submit to the Hun, I will only submit with sponsors who are proven over and over again to convert. I learned the hard way !

The Hun ?

Now we are talking a whole new ball game.

With traffic from The Hun you'll be lucky if you get a sale or two out of 100'000 hits, no I lie, 1'000'000 hits.

I don't agree with that.....

I average consistently between 1:400 and 1:600
on the hun using my other sponsors.

Just that one time....didn't get anything.

Wow! That's rather impressive. What's your secret ?

What sites do you promote that give you such a good ratio?

And what site did you promote that gave you such a bad ratio?

Is that impressive? I didn't really think so. I hear some other people convert a lot better than me.

One thing that helps a lot is to log in to your sponsor's site and see the top converting sites for the last week or so and I concentrate on those.

Here's the REAL secret - he could give you all his secrets... he could give you the blueprint to his sites, descriptions and submit info.... but still - it won't be the same.

We used to call it "magic" when a site/gallery would just "click" and convert like that. Why magic? Cuz most of the time there's no explanation for why one worked over another.... they could be identical and they would convert differently.

Everyone used to kick ass on PK traffic. Me? Never got a freaking sign up. I was so thrilled with that listing and then nada... it just didn't work for me.

|sad|

I absolutely agree with you. What works for one person does not necessarily work for another. Absolutely right.

There really is no secret or magical way to convert. It's just a game of trial and error.

I agree with Tev, you have to look at your own traffic before looking to blame the sponsor. If you have a consistent flow of traffic which always gets 1:500 on other sponsors and you swap sponsors and start getting 1:4000 then obviously that sponsor is not good for you....but you have to know your own traffic first.

That being said, there are tons of sponsors out there and if one does not work for you then go find one that does.

cheers,
Luke