Attention Pepperjam Network Bloggers – We are happy to announce that Pepperjam Store Builder™ is now optimized for Wordpress bloggers!

If you are a Wordpress blogger and want to place products on your Web site using Pepperjam Store Builder™ all you have to do is build a store by logging-in to PJN HERE and selecting “Wordpress Optimized” before copying the code that you’ll ultimately place into your Web site.

Best of luck!

If there are other features that you’d like to see on Pepperjam Store Builder™ please post them here. 

It’s only been a few days since we released the Pepperjam Store Builder and the response has been absolutely incredible – it definitely goes down as our most successful launch since we launched Pepperjam Network on 1/15/08.

Transaction volume is at an all time high on Pepperjam Network and much of the uptick has come from Peperjam Store Builder – if you aren’t using Pepperjam Store Builder you should definitely check it out.

As I mentioned HERE – Pepperjam Store Builder was built based on dozens of interviews with super affiliates and product feed experts. The question we posed to each of them was – “What does the next generation of product feed technology look like?”  “What does it include?”

Based on our discussions we quickly realized that we needed to build something that would be used by the least sophisticated to the most sophisticated affiliate marketer.

Well, today we are proud to announce that the Pepperjam Store Builder is available to all affiliates in either the dynamic (java script) format and the recently added flat file (CSV) format.  In short, we now offer both options to address the needs of the least sophisticated (dynamic / java script) to the most sophisticated (flat file / CSV) affiliate marketer.

Here’s a quick run down on both formats:

PEPPERJAM STORE BUILDER – DYNAMIC FORMAT

Our release last week was primarily for the newer, less-experienced affiliate who wants to create a dynamic storefront.  All an affiliate has to do is select the products they want by filtering by merchant, category, and / or keyword – once products are selected the affiliate can easily customize the look and feel of the feed so that it matches the their Web site or blog. Once the product storefront is created (it takes less than 60 seconds) – for instance, here’s a link to a store created by blogger John Chow – all the affiliate needs to do is copy a small amount of code and place it into their site.

PEPPERJAM STORE BUILDER - FLAT FILE (CSV) FORMAT

Most of the more sophisticated super affiliates and product feeds experts we met with said they would prefer to just download our product feeds in excel or another similar flat file format (i.e. CSV). The flat file format has some clear benefits over the dynamic format, including search engine optimization benefits since Google has diffiulty reading java script. Also, sophisticated affiliates like to further manipulate product feeds after they download them by integrating them into existing product feed Web sites.

Well, now Pepperjam Store Builder affiliates, regardless of experience level, have both options – Dynamic or Flat File formats.

Probably the coolest thing for the flat file affiliates is that unlike all the other major networks….Pepperjam Network allows flat file affiliates to use Pepperjam Store Builder prior to downloading the feed.  This means the affiliate can mix and mash feeds, refine feeds by keyword, and ultimately do a lot of the dirty work in the Store Builder PRIOR to downloading the feed.  Based on the conversations we had with product feed affiliates this in-network customization will allow most flat file affiliates to save as much as 80% of the time that is spent manipulating the feed in excel sheets.

Stay tuned for future updates to Pepperjam Store Builder.

If you are an existing Pepperjam Network affiliate you can go directly to the Pepperjam Store Builder by clicking HERE.

If you are not a PJN affiliate you can sign-up for free HERE.

Welcome to Week #22 of the Pepperjam Network “Meet the Affiliates” Interview Series!

This week I interview PPC super affiliate Will Haimerl.  Will is founder of PPC-Coach.com, which is a membership site for affiliates who want to make more money with pay-per-click and affiliate marketing.

Read on to learn more about Will and his inspirational story…

Here are the rules… 

The Pepperjam Network “Meet the Affiliates” Interview Series will feature an original up-close interview with an affiliate marketer every Friday.  Priority will be given to Pepperjam Network affiliates, but that is not a requirement to share your story.  If you’d be interested in being interviewed please submit your request here – please make sure to tell us why you think your story is especially entertaining or educational and worth sharing with our readers.

As the series progresses we will do our best to ask questions that both entertain and educate!  We encourage you to comment on each of the interviews, as well as ask follow-up questions of the interviewee.

Lastly, if you are a blogger or just someone with a network of likeminded affiliate marketing friends, we encourage you to share our interviews series with anyone who you think may benefit. Also, since you won’t want to miss an interview once it’s published I encourage you to join the Feedburner Pepperjam Network RSS Feed, which is located at the top of this page or by clicking here.

Well…let’s get on to the interview!

Meet the Affiliates: Interview #22

Will Haimerl
PPC Super Affiliate
Cofounder,
www.PPC-Coach.com

Question #1

KRIS: Where do you live?  Are you married?  Any children? Animals?

WILL: I live in London Ontario Canada, am married and have 3 daughters.  No animals but we are looking to adopt a dog sometime soon.

Question #2

KRIS: How did you get started as an affiliate?  Share with us your story…

WILL: I was a financial advisor for 5 years and was very good at prospecting but horrible at closing the deal.  I started in January of 2000, (just before the last market crash) and struggled along for five crappy years before finally being able to walk away from it all and go full time into affiliate marketing.  I worked for 4 firms in those 5 years
and the last one was td waterhouse where I worked the phones taking stock and option orders for seniors and people who had an online account but never traded online, (that makes sense?).  I took the graveyard shift at TD Waterhouse which meant I had very little to do and could spend my time researching online marketing.  I looked at
seo, but didn’t like how long it took and it felt like I wasn’t really in control.  So I found webmasterworld and the adwords section and was hooked.  That’s where I found my first mentor who guided me through the UK Secured Loan market.  I remember vividly the conversation I had with my wife soon after my first $17,000 check came in from CJ.  I told her that I had to quit that job in order to start making real money.  The job was eating up 8 hours of my day that could have been spent making 10 times as much.  She looked at me like I was nuts and said “But we’re just starting to get our heads above water with all the debt and we’ve got another baby on the way!”.  I had to tell her that we were getting out of debt because of the online money, not because of the “day job”.  Soon after that conversation, I quit and never looked back.

Question #3

KRIS: You are the founder of PPC Coach (www.ppc-coach.com).  What is PPC Coach?  Why should people buy it?

WILL: PPC Coach is a membership site that trains affiliate marketers in the art and science of pay per click marketing.  I teach/coach members in how to use adwords, yahoo search marketing, msn adcenter and some second tier ppc engines.  The site leans on training members in how to promote CPA offers like ones on Pepperjam.  PPC Coach not only coaches you but each month I show members the exact technique and/or niche to promote and how to do it right.  So far we’re the only site giving away niches and techniques directly like this.  People are signing up for the coaching, the forums, the videos and especially all the custom tools I have made available to members.  The tools are the ones I use personally in my campaigns and include: the landing site generator, poll bot 2000, adwords magic, big three generator, the content network generator v1 and v2, the maximum bid calculator and the ppc coach tracker.  The tracker is what I’m most proud of.  The newest version includes automatic updating of adwords and yahoo cost data via their api systems nightly.  It also is the only tracker to rotate not only offers, but also landing pages.  This is something that a lot of people preach but few actually do.  I’ve tried to make it as simple as possible for members to keep track of keywords that are profitable and keywords that aren’t.  My tracker doesn’t use any pixel placements either, which makes it very unique in the industry.

Question #4

KRIS: Share your top 5 tips for being an effective PPC affiliate…

WILL: 1.) You will have to work hard to be successful, all the ebooks and courses that make it look like you can work 2 hours per day and make millions are lying to you.

2.) Adwords is NOT the only game in town.

3.) Automate as much of your business as possible.

4.) Understand that not every campaign is going to work, don’t become “married” to any campaign, you have to ditch it if its not working.

5.) There are no shortcuts and no magic pills for success in the ppc affiliate marketing world, no matter how hyped a product or service is.

Question #5

KRIS: Some affiliates exclusively promote retail (revenue share…i.e., Target) programs, while others exclusively promote CPA or CPL offers (i.e., Flycell)?  What types of offers do you promote?  Do you believe that CPA / CPL offers are easier to promote through PPC?  If so, why?

WILL: I tell my members that they need to diversify from day one.  You never know when an offer is going to go down or a niche is going to self destruct, (like the uk loan business).  The goal of every member of my site is 10 campaigns, in 10 different areas producing at least $100 profit minimum per day.  So to answer the question, I do retail, I do CPA, I do CPL and everything I do, I show on my site each month.  I believe CPA / CPL offers are easy to promote via ppc because of the fact that you can laser target what keywords you’re bidding on and what you say in your ads.

Question #6

KRIS: You mentioned to me over e-mail that you don’t make millions of dollars per year, but you make more than most doctors. Most affiliates would think that making more than a doctor is pretty darn good!  I’d like to get a better sense of what type of income is available to PPC affiliates.  What was your most profitable month ever? Is it
reasonable to think that others can have similar success to you?

WILL: I never show screenshots of my earnings and I don’t post checks on my sites, I think that’s cheesy and screams, “please stroke my fragile ego!”.  I don’t make millions, but I do make more then any kind of doctor in the world, yet I work at home in my underwear.  My most profitable month was $85,000 net profit.  Gross revenue doesn’t matter to me and those bloggers who post about making $500,000 in one month, never do say how much of that was actual profit, I would venture not much.  I think it’s perfectly reasonable to think others can have similar or even more success then me.  I’m at the point where money doesn’t matter anymore, now it’s just a big video game where I’m constantly trying to beat my high score.  But you have to find something that motivates you.  For me, there is nothing more satisfying then helping someone go from $0 profit per day to $100 profit per day to $1,000 profit per day and beyond.  I’ve helped several thousand people over the years now and it’s very rewarding to me.  I admit that I would make a lot more if I didn’t run ppc-coach.com, but I don’t run that site for the money involved.  I run it for the satisfaction of seeing someone succeed or seeing all the “ah-ha” moments that take place almost daily now for members. That’s why ppc-coach.com exists.

Question #7

KRIS: Name your top five favorite books of all time…

WILL: With 3 kids, I don’t get much time for reading, but right now the Cat in the Hat and the Cat in the Hat comes back are at the top of my list…

Question #8

KRIS: Name your top three favorite actors or actresses…

WILL: (1) Arnold Schwarzenegger, (2) Will Ferrell, and (3) Shyla Stylez (if you know who she is…)

Question #9

KRIS: Take us through a day in the life of Will Haimerl….

WILL: :00 am – get up
8:00 am – drive the kids to day care
9:00 am to 12:30 pm – check stats, work on sites, answer emails, finish projects, start new projects
1:00 pm – take oldest to school
1:01 pm – start afternoon nap OR go work out if I’m feeling very energetic
3:30 pm – pick up oldest from school
3:45 pm to 5:00 pm – might whip up another ppc campaign or work on project of the week
10:00 pm to 1:00 am – this is my best time for working on projects, everyone is in bed and I can work without interuption

On Wednesdays I try to get in a round of golf if possible too.

Question #10

KRIS: Share with us your top three most useful affiliate marketing tools.

WILL: 1.) PPC Coach Tracker

This is by far my most useful tool.  I’d be lost without it.  It gives me the details I need to manage all my ppc campaigns.

2.) Big Three Campaign Launcher

Allows me to quickly and easily launch campaigns on Adwords, Yahoo and MSN going very deep with the keywords.

3.) Keywordspy

Gives me a lot of inspiration when brainstorming my keyword lists to test.

___________________________________

Read Previous “Meet the Affiliates” Interviews:

Week #1 – Sam Harrelson
Week #2 – Scott Hazard
Week #3 – Rosalind Gardner
Week #4 – Colin McDougal
Week #5 – Zac Johnson
Week #6 – Harrison Gevirtz
Week #7 – “Uber Affiliate” Paul Bourque
Week #8 – John Chow
Week #9 – Scott Jangro
Week #10 – Darren Rowse
Week #11 – Carsten Combrowski
Week #12 – Thor Schrock
Week #13 – Garry Conn
Week #14  – Ron Passfield
Week #15 – David Adams
Week #16 – Marcus Tandler
Week #17 – Bob Jones
Week #18 – Anik Singal
Week #19 – Collin De Ruyck
Week #20 – Tyler Cruz
Week #21 – Amit Mehta