How to Make Money by Saving Money!
At one point or another, we all buy a new plugin or script (aka software) that promises to help us make thousands of dollars in no time at all, and most claim you will need to expend very little effort! I keep track of every dollar I spend and not one month passes that I don’t buy at least 1-2 new plugins or software scripts! The fact that I buy these does not even begin to tell the tale of how many I review for purchase and walk, no RUN… away from though! This post will give you all a bit of insight to the process I use when evaluating a new plugin or script, before wasting that hard earned money! (Which I have done countless times)
The Promise of Instant Riches Can be Deceiving!
Click on the image below… the one on the left is the actual, real, unedited report snapshop from my clickbank account for a 2 week period. By using the Firebug plugin, I can actually edit the file inside the browser in less than 2 minutes, and multiply the earnings screen to read ANY way I want, which is what you see on the right side of the image! If you don’t think some of the snake-oil salesmen on the web are doing the same thing… well, this post is for sale for $100 per view, just click on the donate button to the right and send your money, it will make you rich! (I’m kidding)
The bottom line, is that you cannot believe everything you read – after all, people are SELLING something, which means they profit from the sale, which means the promises are 100% biased to their sales message!
Evaluate Plugins and Scripts Before you Waste your Money!
The biggest problem we all face when looking at a new piece of code to help us with our site building, is that we cannot really see the software in action! When we DO see it in action, how do we really know if it works or not?I look at several things BEFORE I spend a penny on it… you will be surprised at just how easy it is!
The process usually goes like this:
- Find the Software and read what it claims to do for me!
- Find a forum or support area.
- Find example sites on the sale page.
- Find a footprint to locate in search engines.
- Locate at least 10 sites running the Script or Plugin and evaluate them against what is important to ME!
1 - This is pretty self explanatory, and I will use Build a Niche Store for the example… versus some others I have purchased in the past. :-) BANS is a software framework that allows non-techy users to build a niche focused website in short order, which earns money from the eBay partner network affiliate program. Since most of us here are already BANS users, I will not go any deeper into what the program does… you already know!
2 & 3 - The forums on the BANS site are blocked to registered buyers ONLY, so you have to dig a little deeper to find out if it works or not. Fortunately, BANS has several sites available for us to compare on their sales pages. Again, since this is a sales page, its safe to assume it is going to display some of the best out there, and I truly want to find a few on my own to compare. One thing I CAN take away from the sale page however, is that the software DOES have a good outlook, since the sites are very different in layout and design.
(Hint – the Forums offer the BEST view into how well a piece of software or plugin will do for you over a longer period of time, just view the old posts where people ask for help or site critiques)
4 - Most of the owners of the sites on the sales page have done away with a common footprint, but there are a couple that still have the “Powered By” statement… Using a search engine, I can search for the string (in quotes) “Powered by Build a Niche Store”, combined with the market I plan on using it for and get a great list of other sites running the same software. In this case, I will search for: “Powered by Build a Niche Store” + “womens shoes”. You can do this for many of the popular scripts or plugins in the marketplace… try phpbay, storestacker, etc.
5 – Using the various methods above, I now have a group of 8-10 sites (Which I WILL NOT list all in this post) that I can use as a test for popularity, indexing and overall look and feel. So how will I measure them?
Measuring the Sites Against My OWN Values
Before I decide to buy the software or not, I look for the deal-breakers! I WILL NOT buy anything that:
- ALL sites look the same!
This is usually a sign that the software is very complex, or scrambled by IonCube, thus not allowing ANY customization. Nothing bugs me more than buying a script that looks very promising, only to find out you cannot edit the templates, or underlying footprint code, due to IonCube. I RUN away when I see it 100% controlled by IonCube! - The page url’s are full of variables!
If you cannot get search friendly url’s out of it… forget it! - ALL of the sites are deindexed by Google!
Pretty self explanatory – if I visit 10 sites and all of them are removed from the G index, its not a good sign and an immediate deal breaker! - Aged or PageRanked sites have NO or very little Alexa Rank
Alexa may not be perfect, but it does provide a small bit of insight to a websites traffic trend. If I find that one of the sites has 100 backlinks and many pages indexed, but it shows in the 5 million rank in Alexa, that usually means its not doing too well, regardless of the owners effort. Having PageRank 5 on a 2 year old site means nothing to me if the site has a low alexa rank! I will take a PR1 site with 1000 daily visitors over a PR5 site with 10 daily visits every time! - Support – Support – Support!
I ALWAYS email the developer before I buy anything! I don’t expect anything spectacular in the response, but I do hope to at least get one! If I don’t get a reply, I cannot expect to get a reply when I need help either… Even if the developer is gone out of town, I hope to get an auto-response, mentioning they will be gone for awhile. I am currently looking at a piece of software that is more than $600 and I emailed the developers on Friday. Within minutes, I had a reply stating that he would be out of town until Dec 21st – that’s acceptable to me! If there was no response… they would have never heard from me again!
The bottom line for me… is that I want a piece of software that has hope of survival. Even though BANS has been the subject of many posts about Google deindexing, it still does very well on the sites that have taken it beyond the point and click aspect of the script. PhpBay uses IonCube to run a portion of it… BUT, there is enough flexibility within the template system that you can make all the changes you want to reduce the footprint.
What do YOU look for when you find a new script for Niche Site Building?
Previously Published Articles You May Like to Read:
- The Pros all say the Same Thing, Be Different or Be Doomed!
- What is Most Important when Buying or Trying New Software
- And the Winner Is… Everyone!
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I have been doing my part to "Build the Internet" since 1994, when I built my first website! Since then, I have built hundreds of niche websites for myself and many others, focused on design, applications, ecommerce, search optimization and internet marketing.
Mark-
Good article. I have found myself buying software, trying it, and never using it again. I have learned to avoid the hype on the sales page and always search for real reviews.
Thanks Again fro the reminder
Great article Mark. It reminds us that we do not need any get rich schemes. Back to basics. We don’t need anything fancy. We can make just as much $ with a well developed blog spot blog as we can with something that cost a $100.00.
I must say though that bans has tought me about 80% of what I now know. More than a script. Its a community that helped me change my life. Any site can be deindexed if a big monster decides it wants to eat you.
I believe the stats for searches is skewed by the big G. I don’t believe its king. JMO
I dislike sites that claim that the product only has a few spots left or only will be listed for sale for a given time period. Usually there will be a counter at the bottom of the site. When you visit a few days later from another computer you will see the same number. Such sales tactics only reveal that this product does not sell on its own, but needs an aggressive sales pitch (and probably a bunch of bonuses).
Good stuff! I’ve never thought to do what you do before a purchase. I typically look for reviews of the items, which can be difficult, as most “reviews” are by affiliates wanting to sell the items. But if I dig deep enough I can usually find some honest opinions.
I’ve recently purchased several items. One was something currently selling for $47 (I bought it during a sale for $14, as I would have never paid that amount) that had no information that I didn’t already know. She kindly refunded my money asap. Two more were quite a bit more and too difficult for me to figure out. One has already refunded my money, the other I am waiting on.
Going forward, though, I will apply your investigative methods before plunking down my cash.
Rochelle
Great article Mark. It’s so easy to spend a ton of time looking over new plugins, automated tools, etc, and actually neglect the basic stuff like trying to write good posts, interacting, etc. I’ve only been at this a short time and with your help I’ve learned a lot, but it really seems to me that success in this affiliate marketing thing has to come from a slow and steady strategy. With the amount of information that one has to absorb and synthesize it’s easy to burn out and get sidetracked. I’ve been resisting buying a number of things lately so as just to slow down and try to keep focused on the main stuff.
Thanks for sharing that info. I had no idea you could edit the CB stuff. I’ll check things out a lot more carefully in future. Great list of what to look for as well.
Cherie
Mark,
Thanks for taking us inside that massive pumpkin known as your head to show us all a little bit of your evaluation criteria for software purchases.
My most important takeaway is we NOT be moved into action by emotion and let a cool-headed,detached analysis take place before any green leaves our wallets.
Jeff
Great post. I think this is a real problem for new affiliate marketers. When I was brand new, I would spend hours searching for way to make money online and just kept finding a lot of hype with lots of those edited earnings screenshots!
Great post man – Here’s what I almost always do, regarding purchasing any sort of script, software, ebook, theme, system, etc.. and I buy VERY few…
1 – I find a working, or semi working crack for the product (just google “product name”+”rapidshare” and you will find almost anything, everytime.
crap – I hit post by accident..
2 – I use the program/read the product.. dabble in the forums..
3 – If I like it, and it does what it says, I will discard the crack and put up my hard earned money.
4 -if it’s garbage, then I delete the file and move on..
Great article Mark. I absolutely agree if it comes to learn how to safe money as well. Especially if it comes to make money online – there is just to much scam around.
Read less, take more action is all I can say :)
I agree that forums are the most useful way to determine if software is legit. Also, your personal criteria are spot on.
One thing I’d add: history of the software. I know I’ve abandoned many applications because support and/or releases stopped coming. I figured the developers moved on, so should I.
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