Looking to Start CPA Network.

F

Fendi

Banned
Nov 8, 2012
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Hello, I'm currently looking into creating my own content locking incent network.
I have alot of experience in incent and have been a very successful affiliate for some time now. I have a few questions about starting a network for those of you with experience. Thanks in advance for all constructive and helpful responses to this thread.

1. I currently have about $15k saved up from being an affiliate and I can save up an additional $3k-$4k a month. I know this answer is different for every network and there's no correct answer, but about how much capital would you consider "safe" to start with atleast? Yes, I do know I need to have enough money to potential pay my affiliates for 2-3 months without receiving any payments from advertisers.

2. I'm currently 17 years and I know by the time I do have my network up and running I'll probably be 18, but are there any extra barriers I would have to hurdle because of my age? I would assume a 40 year old man and father of two would probably have problems doing business with someone who cannot legally drink in a bar. What are your thoughts on this?

3. What type of team would I need to help me run this network? I know networks have a couple AM's, a guy who overlook the AM's, business dev guy to pull in offers, a couple guys to check for fraud, someone to send payments (I can do it?). Am I missing something?

Thanks for reading this thread. Any and all helpful responses would be appreciated greatly. Some may assume I'm aspiring for this because of the potential profits, well of course that's part of it, but thats not all I see in this and I do know the difficulties and problems a network can face. I like to help and manage others and I can sort of see myself being more successful running a network then being an affiliate.
 


Fendi said:
I currently have about $15k saved up from being an affiliate and I can save up an additional $3k-$4k a month.
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Fendi said:
I'm currently 17 years
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Impressive. Why don't you keep doing what you are as an affiliate to make a buck and begin volunteering for free at a content locking network to learn the ropes before going out on your own? You'll avoid wasting a lot of money that way IMO and can keep saving up for the expenses of starting up a network.

Either way, I wish you luck.
 
Esquire said:
Impressive. Why don't you keep doing what you are as an affiliate to make a buck and begin volunteering for free at a content locking network to learn the ropes before going out on your own? You'll avoid wasting a lot of money that way IMO and can keep saving up for the expenses of starting up a network.

Either way, I wish you luck.
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I can and I will do that. But I don't see myself doing that 3-5 years down the road and I want to start something I see as long(er) term.

I like your 2nd point. How can I volunteer at a network? I know I can just email some network owners I know of, but why would they give me accessto their network? What tasks can I do that they can't easily do?
 
I wouldn't consider 15k in saving and ability to save 4k a month a successful affiliate.

On top of that, who would want to work with a network with only 25k in cash flow?

what if an advertiser decided to fuck you for 30k in payment? Business closed?

Scale your affiliate income by 10x, then you can maybe thinking about creating a network.
 
Jardini said:
I wouldn't consider 15k in saving and ability to save 4k a month a successful affiliate.

On top of that, who would want to work with a network with only 25k in cash flow?

what if an advertiser decided to fuck you for 30k in payment? Business closed?

Scale your affiliate income by 10x, then you can maybe thinking about creating a network.
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Thanks for the response I appreciate it.

1. I never really said I would have $25k or anything like that. I'm at $15k now. By the time I really get serious and this is more then just an idea, I'll probably have $55-$65k to play with. I'm constantly scaling and would probably save much more when I'm closer to opening.

2. There's prepay and I wouldnt run 30k in traffic without any sort of payment. I'd probably be Net 30 to test quality but I wouldn't be pushing $30k just to get fucked.

3. This is irrelevant but I don't think affiliates would know how much a network has in cash flow. If they did, EWA and the likes wouldnt have gotten a chance to do what they did.

Thanks for the advice and help!
 
I once started a CPC/CPA network with my rent money... managed it all by myself in the
corner of my bedroom next to my bed.

2 years later sold it for $80k

That was back in the late 1990's and early 2000's so I'm sure things have changed quite
a bit since then. But I always got my advertisers to prepay me...
 
Fendi said:
Thanks for the response I appreciate it.

1. I never really said I would have $25k or anything like that. I'm at $15k now. By the time I really get serious and this is more then just an idea, I'll probably have $55-$65k to play with. I'm constantly scaling and would probably save much more when I'm closer to opening.

2. There's prepay and I wouldnt run 30k in traffic without any sort of payment. I'd probably be Net 30 to test quality but I wouldn't be pushing $30k just to get fucked.



Thanks for the advice and help!
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You apparently don't know how the incent industry works despite saying you have a lot of experience. I was in the incent business for over 3 years and here's a few misconceptions you have:

1. You will NEVER get a prepay for incentive traffic. It's just not how it works. There's too much fraud and lead quality is generally shit and you'll get a lot of leads scrubbed or just completely shaved.

2. Even if your quality is good one month, if an advertiser thinks your quality is shit six months down the road, they'll absolutely fuck you. I had a relationship with a network for 2 years and they suddenly didn't like my traffic and fucked me for 21k. It happens and you'll never have the cashflow for it.

3. The content locking industry is pretty competitive so unless you bring something ridiculously new to the table, you're not going to get many affiliates. Well, you might get the guys deliberately looking to fraud a new network.

Look, I've been there done that with anything in incent. Owning a network isn't fun and the incent industry is full of fraud and ass fucking. There's a 99% chance you'll get slaughtered if you enter it now or even in a year from now. You'd be much better off scaling what you're doing and look into starting a real business that doesn't require so much capital and so much risk.
 
jeffrey said:
You apparently don't know how the incent industry works despite saying you have a lot of experience. I was in the incent business for over 3 years and here's a few misconceptions you have:

1. You will NEVER get a prepay for incentive traffic. It's just not how it works. There's too much fraud and lead quality is generally shit and you'll get a lot of leads scrubbed or just completely shaved.

2. Even if your quality is good one month, if an advertiser thinks your quality is shit six months down the road, they'll absolutely fuck you. I had a relationship with a network for 2 years and they suddenly didn't like my traffic and fucked me for 21k. It happens and you'll never have the cashflow for it.

3. The content locking industry is pretty competitive so unless you bring something ridiculously new to the table, you're not going to get many affiliates. Well, you might get the guys deliberately looking to fraud a new network.

Look, I've been there done that with anything in incent. Owning a network isn't fun and the incent industry is full of fraud and ass fucking. There's a 99% chance you'll get slaughtered if you enter it now or even in a year from now. You'd be much better off scaling what you're doing and look into starting a real business that doesn't require so much capital and so much risk.
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Thanks, I really appreciate your post, especially since you have a ton of knowledge and experience in incent.

1. I know about the shaving/scrubbing. I've seen an incent email submit advertiser offer prepay in a fb group so I know its possible.

2. Okay. Yeah I know there're shady advertisers.

3. My network will have a few good things about it that other networks don't have. I know it's impossible to 100% prevent fraud and illegitimate affiliates, I won't just accept anyone who applies. I'll require a phone interview/picture of photo ID and there are other measures to prevent fraud. Definitely will have people who's job is to solely check for fraud.

I've never owned or been on the other side of a network. There's still stuff I don't know of course and there will be things I'll only figure out once I start running the network and go through experiences. I wouldn't expect myself to know everything a year ahead of me opening a network. I have alot of learning to do. You can read 100 accounting books for example, but you wont know shit until you actually get into the job and gain experience.

Thanks again for your post, really opened my eyes.
 
If you need advice from a forum because you aren't sure if you are ready to start a network, then you are definitely NOT ready to start a network.

Spare yourself the grief, and spare any affiliates you might get the grief they'll have when you go under by delaying any decision to start a network until you are ready.

Especially in the content unlock business, which is not much more than a giant shit show of garbage traffic being switched around from one network/sub-ID to the next.
 
Lets see, you want to start another unknown CPA network with shitty payment terms and no capital?

You need way more capital to even have a chance. You need to be able to promote your network and meet both advertisers and affiliates. You need a budget to fly to and attend affiliate events and ideally you need capital to be able to pay more often than NET 30.

It's near impossible to compete with bigger networks that offer vastly superior payment terms. Your only chance would be if you somehow got a bunch of offers that other networks didn't have.

Focus on being an affiliate for a few more years and build that business up and then re-think this whole starting a CPA network thing.
 
if you insist on doing this anyway, my only advice is to screen the hell out of your affiliates and only accept the most reputable advertisers that have a history of working with other CPAs and paying on time.
 
VinBed said:
I don't think anyone here would seriously consider running a significant amount of traffic through a 17 year old's network.
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You never heard of NotoriousCPA? Guy is 16 running that network with an AM that's 17 I think. Age doesn't really mean much. Younger guys can be responsible, while older guys can be stuck up and immature. Depends on the individual in my opinion.
 
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