There's one perennial question you come across everywhere: How do I choose a traffic source for CPA marketing. Oddly enough, it's more relevant than ever as Facebook and other advertising networks are actively complicating affiliate marketers' work. Under the current circumstances, trying to diversify the risks, webmasters develop several traffic sources simultaneously.
But choosing a better option is not easy and may end up in a destructive trial and error method: it will eventually lead to spending tons of money on endless tests. No worries, we're coming to the rescue with our traffic sources CPA offers, their characteristics, and recommendations that may come in handy.
What Is a CPA Offer
CPA offers include the offers where users pay for a specific action: making a deposit, signing up for a paid subscription, or linking a credit card. CPA offers have a higher payout compared to CPI (pay for install) offers since it's more difficult to convince a user, for example, to make a deposit than to convince them to install an application.
Success Guarantee
If you want to succeed in the CPA business, you need to find out how to attract users. But there's more to it: you are supposed to effectively monetize them by converting users into a target action. The conversion rate depends on many factors: landing pages, promotional materials, offer pushback, and other important aspects, but in this article, we will mostly highlight the sources and their main characteristics, concurrently explaining the choice.
Measuring Good CPA Traffic
We will get back to the sources shortly; for now, let us stop and discuss which parameters make these sources more or less converting.
Targeting
Targeting is one of the vital aspects, as it ensures the effectiveness of your ad campaign. The more targeted audience we attract, the more often users perform targeted actions, increasing the conversion rate. The more targeting options a source has, the more likely it is to attract interested users. For example, if we promote a webcam offer, our target audience consists of single men aged 25-40. For better results, the ads should be shown at non-working hours to users who have already visited similar sites. So, the sources should have retargeting options to work with those who have previously checked out webcam sites.
Cost
All traffic can be divided into cold traffic, which includes disinterested users, and hot traffic, which implies interested users. CPM (cost per 1000 impressions) for these types of traffic can differ enormously.
For example, on a contextual advertising platform, the cost of a click on some queries can reach hundreds of dollars because interested users enter these queries themselves, so the chance that they will perform the targeted action is high. On Facebook, on the contrary, the cost significantly drops: there, ads are shown to users without their consent; people aren't very interested, so the chance of them performing a targeted action is much lower compared to contextual advertising. Each niche needs its own source, which will be optimal in terms of cost and quality of traffic.
Reach
The amount of traffic in each source is different. For Facebook, it's 2.7 billion people; on Propeller Ads, only 100 million users see ads monthly. As a result, the latter leaves fewer opportunities for geotargeting, and the amount of traffic generated will also be incomparable to what we could potentially get by running Facebook Ads.
Moderation
Each ad network has its own policy regarding the placement of promotional materials. For example, advertising for weight loss products is strictly prohibited on Facebook. And in teaser networks, such products products don't get banned at all. This point should also be taken into account when choosing a source.
The Best CPA Traffic Sources
When we say CPA, you say high quality. Let's take a closer look.
Search Advertising
Google Ads is one of the largest advertising networks in the world. It includes 3 subnets: search, content and display network, and universal app campaigns (UAC). Google processes 3.5 billion searches every month and has 18 types of targeting. Suitable for promoting in almost all verticals.
Are there any more Google secrets for you to know? Definitely. And we're divulging them in our article:
Baidu is the biggest search engine in China. Moderation is way stricter than in other contextual advertising networks. Provides the ability to be placed in the search and CMS (content and media network).
Social Traffic
Facebook is the largest social media platform in the world, with over 2.7 billion users. Facebook Ads is known for its AI algorithm that effectively optimizes advertising campaigns. Targeting options: by age, by gender, by geo, by device, and more.
Instagram is a social network with a total audience of more than 1 billion users. Advertising on this network is launched through the Facebook Ads account. Main advertising formats: feed and stories.
TikTok is a young social network that is actively gaining momentum. The total number of users has exceeded 800 million. TikTok Ads only supports mobile ad format. Valid placements are all ByteDance campaign apps, including Halo and Pangle. Targeting functionality: by age, by geo, by gender, by interests, by mobile devices.
Native Advertising
Taboola is a teaser network launched in 2007. The functionality includes behavioral alerts, A/B testing, detailed analytics, and more. Weight loss products, binary options, and adult dating are prohibited. Possibilities for targeting: by geo, devices, OS, and topics. Major advertisers can apply for premium placement on the Bloomberg website.
Outbrain is a network for placing native ads, founded in 2006. Partner sites include CNN and the Washington Post. This network promotes whitehat offers only. Equipped with a behavioral targeting option. The total audience is more than 560 million people.
MGID is a native advertising network with an audience of more than 800 million users from 210 countries. Casinos, certified dietary supplements, and mainstream dating offers are allowed. Targeting functionality: by geo, device, browser, topic, and language. There is also a dynamic retargeting feature.
Want to know more about native advertising? Don't be shy to read our article:
Email Marketing
SendPulse allows you to import and create email templates. There are 130 ready-made templates and an HTML editor. A subscription form builder can be used to collect the database. Functionality for segmenting users and creating audiences is available. Email open rate and engagement analytics.
MailChimp is a visual email editor. There are ready-made templates that can also be modified. A whole range of options for segmenting recipients: by activity, by subscription source, by age, and more. The database collection process is carried out manually by loading a table or transferring data from CRM. Additional functionality: creating surveys, website builder, and communication with subscribers through the interface.
Popunders & Clickunders
Propeller Ads is an international advertising network, bragging to have more than 1 billion impressions per month. The CPM rate starts from $0.05. All offers are allowed except for adult topics. Targeting options: by OS, device, browser, and geography. The network has an additional feature: automatic ad campaign display optimization based on AI.
HillTopAds is an advertising network founded in 2011 in the UK. Desktop and mobile traffic options are available. Targeting functionality: by country and city, mobile operator, language, browser, and keywords. Retargeting.
ClickAdu is an ad network with over 150M impressions per month. Supports 5 ad formats in 2 placement options. The CPM rate starts from $0.2. Most of the traffic goes from Asian countries. Targeting parameters: by traffic type, OS, device type, browser, and language, black and white lists.
Push Traffic Sources
Push.House is a push notification advertising network allowing you to buy traffic from 180 countries. Traffic is purchased through an RTB auction. Fast moderation prohibits the promotion of offers that violate the law and the use of celebrities and politicians in promotional materials. A database of ready-made creatives is available. Targeting by city, OS version, and subscription age.
Trading.Bid is an advertising network launched in 2018. The number of daily impressions reaches 100 million. The user base is more than 11 million. Targeting by country, device, and OS.
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In-App Traffic
Unity is one of the largest advertising networks specializing in in-app traffic. Reaches 1 billion users worldwide. The minimum deposit is $1000. Targeting by country, OS, connection method, and screen size. Advertising format: interstitials. Once an advertising account is blocked, money is not returned.
Liftoff is a mobile-only ad network acting as an intermediary between application publishers and advertisers. Payment models: CPI (for installations) and CPM (for impressions). Advertising format: video. LTV (player lifetime) optimization technology. Statistics for 120 days. A/B testing options.
AppLovin is an advertising network for in-app traffic, launched in 2012. The platform is based on machine learning algorithms for optimizing ad campaigns. The minimum deposit is $100. Advertising formats: video and banners. Payment models: CPA (per action) and CPC (per click). Targeting by OS, category, GEO, and device type. Automatic creative generation function.
CPA Marketing Tips
Here are the three most significant aspects you should focus on while whipping up your ad campaign. The tips cannot be limited to the three options we've mentioned, and if you crave for more, feel free to check out an exceptional tool bringing CPA Marketing to a whole new level.
Prioritize creatives
The history you draw up is crucial for any effective CPA offer promotion: the user should be aware of the ways the product or service can benefit them. Promotional materials must be relevant to pre-landing pages. Pre-landers should contain the history told by a user who has bought and enjoyed the product and do not forget to resort to the elements of social proof: reviews, direct contacts for communication, and so forth. Landing pages should also be elaborate: work on the emphasis on the limited supply, point out the client's pains, confirm the quality of the product with certificates, etc.), and this will result in the highest conversion rates you can imagine.
Explore targeting settings
Advertising networks with push traffic tend to have limited targeting options, but contextual and targeted advertising networks are equipped with well-tuned targeting devices that ensure success. Understand your target audience, and draw up a portrait of a potential buyer.
Look Out for New Offers
Offers are subject to burning out (the users who could convert already converted several times in the past), so if you want to maintain a high ROI (return on investment), you must always look for new products/services to promote. Old offers are notorious for being swarmed with competitors, but new ones are practically neglected, so you can make good money from the beginning. Test new GEOs and verticals to remain profitable.
Wrapping Up
The CPA marketing market is extremely vast and dynamic, so each vertical demands its unique traffic source. To diversify risks, develop different traffic channels by constantly conducting tests and keeping your finger on the pulse... just in case a major event is coming.
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