Affiliate Silver Bullet
413 words | Last Updated: February 2, 2008 |
Is the Affiliate Silver Bullet truly the answer to your internet success? Or is it just a wolf in sheep's clothing? The easy turnkey solution does look quite enticing. Afterall, the instant video opt-ins, the quick as a flash salespage, and the hands-free email autoresponder system can make selling online a breeze.
But is ASB just a scam? Consider the following...
Dustin Struckman's ingenious Affiliate Silver Bullet (AffiliateSilverBullet.com) is an entire out-of-the-box system that tries to get your readers to opt-in to an email autoresponder. The autoresponder then sends people who signed-up a series of emails, and hopefully someone will end up buying any of the following promoted products:
- Web 2.0 Secrets Revealed
- Membership Site Secrets
- Unlimited Traffic Tactics
- Steal Your Way to Millions
- Secret Affiliate Formula
- Internet Money Making System
- Butterfly Marketing Effect
- Google AdWords $160k Monthly
- Program Yourself for Success
- Secrets of Email Optin Lists
Now all this sounds great and exciting, yet the Affiliate Silver Bullet system does not appear to address the following key question: Who Is Signing Up?
Imagine, you will pay someone for the chance to have a series of webpages that YOU will send traffic to. And yet you don't know how many people sign-up.
In other words, you don't know how effective the sign-up process is. And neither do you know how well those email autoresponders motivate their subscribers to buy the product.
All you know is that you're earning commissions (assuming people do buy).
The ASB Team, on the other hand, is building several mailing lists.
Yep, you pay them for the ASB package.
You drive traffic to your ASB-powered web pages.
You end up helping them build lots of mailing lists.
Did you catch that? You give them traffic and subscribers, even after you've paid them.
I hope the marketing people behind the Affiliate Silver Bullet do tweak their video opt-in pages, and also their email autoresponder series, if only to help improve your chances of earning a commission from the sale of the promoted products.
And until they become more transparent about those metrics, then we might need ASB the way a werewolf needs a silver bullet.
(In the end, I still encourage you to check out their video opt-in pages, if only to get a feel of how attractive an opt-in page can look.)
"Affiliate Silver Bullet"
First Posted: February 2, 2008 | Filed in: Affiliate Marketing
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Hi, Manuel
I wandered over here from your link on Eric Giguere's OPAG, Day 4, and I can't stop reading your blog!
Such good ideas and great writing. I'll look forward to reading lots more of your posts in the future. This is a great blog!
Kathleen
Hi Kathleen! Great to see you participating in Eric's OPAD Challenge. Blog design and regular content? That's an in-demand combination out here on the web.
Hi Manuel,
I've just started using AffiliateSilverBullets, I can't honestly tell you that it's a great system or not. Any affiliate pro will tell you that list building is the way to go and I have already found that to be true over the past 6 months with other non-ASB sites. I've been using video with list building and it generates at least 40 % more sales for me.
I thought that for the $37 USD month it was worth giving ASB a try - thats quite affordable for me, it's not a such a large amount to risk. I was also suspicious of ASB with the whole list building thing, however there is the option to use your own Aweber autoresponder - I see my list, who's on it and have complete control of it. ASB don't discourage their subscribers from using their own list or hosting their own ASB sites. In fact they take you step by step showing you how to activate your own Aweber account. I'm sure the lazy guy will lose out - I have to create 10 new Aweber lists each month for each new ASB product. But from past experience this extra effort pays off.
Being a successful affiliate isn't as easy as people make out - for me it's a job and I make my living from it, always experimenting - I look at all the pros and cons before I sign up to anything - I always google the product and read reviews before i do anything - and after. thats how I found you !!
Keep up the good work,
cheers,
Paul
Thanks, Paul! I hope you'll offer a course in the future about creating videos for opt-in lists. That 40% increase is quite remarkable.
Thank you for clarifying things regarding ASB and mailing lists. You've inspired me to conduct another experiment.
Hi Manuel
I received an email extolling the virtues of Affiliate Silver Bullet, so I thought I'd look for reviews, and fortunately came across your site. As I'm relatively new to internet marketing (just started a Blog in late November), I'm naturally wary of anything that seems too easy! Thanks for the great info.
Donnie
Hi Manuel-
Do you know of anyone who is acually making good money from ASB like the sales page says? I am considering trying ASB and I want to know if you think its worth a shot for the $37/mo. Also- do you know if the tactics they use to promote these products are google friendly? Great blog by the way.
Thanks-
Steve
@Steve - No, I don't personally know of anyone who's using ASB profitably. Maybe they're keeping a low profile.
Is ASB worth the shot? It is worth trying if you will use your own listbuilding service (i.e., Aweber) instead of just relying on the email autoresponder of ASB.
@Donnie - Thanks for visiting! Perhaps in the near future you'll also try listbuilding.
Hi Manuel - me again,
ASB has been down for the past 18 hours so not sure whats happening - can't find any ASB sites that are showing ASB squeeze pages - they all show a blank screen so I would say probably just one of those teething problems. However it's a teething problem that could be costing some affiliates a lot of money - especially those using ppc to get trafic to their ASB squeeze pages. Anyways I'll keep you updated - still, for me 35 USD isn't such a great risk - is time consuming though - uploading all those squeeze pages to my own server and my own autoresponder - in 3 months maybe I can give you a full report,
cheers,
Paul
Thanks for the feedback, Paul! Looks like remotely hosted services have been taking quite a hit lately (i.e., Amazon storage service).
Just the same, I'm looking forward to hearing about your experience in the coming months. Hopefully those email autoresponder messages are doing a good job of closing the sale.
HI,
I was hoping this wouldn't be a problem. ASB give subscribers the option of being hosted by ASB or self hosting i.e uploading all the neccesary files they provide to my own hosting account. My squeeze pages are self hosted with g'daddy and I use my own autoresponder however it seems it still doesn't help. At first I thought I might have done something wrong but I noticed AffiliateSilverBullet sites other than my own are just showing a coloured background, nothing else. Also - I haven't received any email from ASB notifying me of problems although I have sent them 2 queries in the last 30 hours. Anyway it is Sunday so I guess they're all in church
Will keep you updated.
Thanks, Paul. I'm surprised not to find other accounts about the recent ASB issues. Either their market is composed of non-bloggers, or the bloggers who do use ASB haven't noticed the blank pages. Yet.
Got word back from ASB that they were experiencing a hardware issue that was resolved by their engineering department - so things are ok now. See how things go over the next few months anyway, will let you know if I start making any serious money.
Cheers.
Thanks, Paul! Do you have a blog? I'd like to drop by and read your posts someday.
[...] reader asks if PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising is his best option for promoting Affiliate Silver Bullet, if he does not blog nor has a social [...]
Hi Manuel
Thank you for your inside and also all the people for comments. I was considering ASB for 1 of my IM sites, but now I have my doubts about it. Especially if I don't like my own list building/ezine marketing.
(yeah, yeah, I Know Your comments, so spare it please! I Always made More money just by promoting Affiliate programs than some stupid time-consuming email marketing)
Anyway, does anybody know/could recommend any other program WITHOUT a list building?
Thanks
Dagmar
Thanks, Dagmar. There are lots of programs in the Clickbank Marketplace which do not invite people to subscribe to a list. Your promotion-focused approach to affiliate programs can work with those.
[...] No wonder people sit up and listen when someone offers an instant listbuilding solution (remember Affiliate Silver Bullet?) [...]
Hello Manuel and Thanks to all for your comments -
So I am trying to gather the info for ASB too- My question other than list building since it was said that you can use your own autoresponder so thats answered my first question but my second question is duplicate content - if we all have the same squeeze page - video and articles (which i assume you are allowed to use your own or at least rewrite them? Then other than ppc wouldnt the duplicate content make it difficult to rank?? I mean it does seem there is a lot of work done for you but to me its all dupilcate so wont that hurt you? First time to this blog manuel and love it!!!
Krista
Hi Krista... Duplicate content will not hurt you. There's no guarantee your page (which contains the dupe content) will rank high, but you can use your existing pages (i.e., in your blog) to drive traffic to your video squeeze or ASB-generated article pages.
Thanks Manuel - You hear so much about duplicate content and content is king - Thanks for getting back to me All the best K
Nancy tried to comment here, but there was some sort of webserver hiccup. Anyway, here are the answers to her questions about the Affiliate Silver Bullet:
1. If you refer people to ASB using your affiliate link, you will earn a 75% commission, less processing/transaction fees. ASB is selling at $37 a month right now, so you will earn around $25 per month, for every referred subscriber who continues being a subscriber.
I hear that the $37 monthly price will be increased to $97 in the coming weeks. If that happens, your referral commission will be about $70 per month, for every referred subscriber who continues being a monthly member.
2. The ASB system allows you to use only Aweber. My team of techies, however, knows how to incorporate a non-Aweber autoresponder. May I know which autoresponder you use?
3. I'll make a post about how to build Video Squeeze Pages (works for those who do not use the pre-built video opt-in pages created by ASB).
Thanks Manuel!
Nancy
[From Manuel] You're welcome, Nancy! Good to see the comment box is now working.
Hi Manuel,
I was thinking about buying ASB and then decided to have a look at what others had to say and I came across your site. Going on what I have read so far I am glad I haven't invested my money.
Okay there is no doubt some that have made good money but before I hand out my hard earned cash I would like to see a lot more positive reviews. There are so many money making ideas on the web that it is hard to establish what works and what doesn't and it can be rather confusing to a newbie like me.
Actually I have found web marketing to be rather frustrating because there is so much hype that makes a person think that you can put up a site one day and be instantly flooded with customers overnight.
I am ashamed to admit that I fell into that trap. About two months ago I established a blog, http://australianpathwaysmigration.blogspot.com/, thinking that it was the easiest way to get on the web and make my fortune. Sure putting up the blog was easy getting clients was entirley a different matter. I have no idea why it hasn't been very successful. Maybe because visas and migration aren't an everyday search topic.
I am considering another blog featuring home businesses and other money making ideas and hopefully this time I will be more successful. I was also thinking ASB would be good to promote but I will leave it alone for now.
Regards,
Con
Thanks, Con. If you're interested in making money online, earning affiliate commissions isn't the fastest way to do it.
I checked your 5-page Blogspot site, and only found two pages listed in Google. No wonder you didn't get as many clients as you had hoped for. And as far as the phrase "australian visa" is concerned, online advertisers are estimated to spend $20 to $170 each day (according to Spyfu).
I haven't conducted the required keyword research, but something tells me your visa site, when fully developed, will earn much more than a site about home biz.
Hi Manuel
WOW, thanks for the info, I didn't realise the phrase was worth that much. Oh well I will put it down to being a newbie and still learning the ropes. It sure helps to get feedback from experts like you. Very much appreciated and I will keep trying to improve my blog and sometime in the future, when I know a bit more, I will set up a website.
Thanks again,
Con
Hi Manuel:
In your March 15, 2008 response to me, you stated:
"2. The ASB system allows you to use only Aweber. My team of techies, however, knows how to incorporate a non-Aweber autoresponder. May I know which autoresponder you use?"
Would it be possible to edit the HTML code in the ASP
landing page so it could use a FREE autoresponder, such
as freeautobot.com? The paid autoresponders, such as
Aweber, are too expensive for beginners and until a person
really improves their abilities to promote, the free
autoresponder is probably all they need, for a while anyway.
They can always advance to the paid autoresponders if they
start to get good at promoting and getting a lot of paid
customers.
Thanks!
Nancy
Hi Nancy, You will need to host the landing pages. Also, those techies I mentioned work with paid autoresponders.
Using a free autoresponder and then later shifting to a paid autoresponder will lead to loss of subscribers, because you'll have a hard time convincing your existing subscribers to re-subscribe to another mailing list.
If you wish to treat internet marketing as a business, you will need to invest in a domain name, web hosting, and paid autoresponder services.
Yes, there's always the free route, and the successful ones I've heard about do not make use of mailing lists. They only use free blog sites and AdSense (and a bit affiliate marketing, too).
Hi Manuel,
Do you know if they let you host the sites/pages on your own server? And did they get things worked out where you can use your own Aweber acct? Also, do you know if they provide sites for other niches than just IM? I'm not really wanting to get into that for obvious reasons.
Thanks,
Terry
Yes, ASB still allows you to log in using the original system, where you can download and host the available ASB "bullets." And yes, ASB does work with your own Aweber account, although the products being promoted are IM-related.