Hey everyone welcome to this week’s Otaku podcast before we get started I Just want to say sorry the video quality Is not necessary gonna be what you used To we had some problems with doom but I Think it’s false powering through that Because this week we have a really cool Interview I know you guys like the Interviews I did recently I did another One with Matt Germany’s key from money Lab cool and it’s one of the guys that I Really like because he’s not full of [ __ ] like a lot of online marketers he Accepts that he doesn’t always wins and He makes his content based on real-life Experiments which I think a lot of you Guys will appreciate so I’m not gonna Tell you more but what’s really cool About Matt is that he does things very Differently from what we do he does not Build links to his site he uses of Social media etc and he’s still doing Pretty well So I think it’s worth listening to the Way he builds sites and I think there is Lessons that we can all take away from The way he does things so that we can do Better but before I get started with the Interview you know what I’m gonna say I’m gonna remind you we have a subscribe Button below these don’t forget to click It click on the bell as well pick on the Like it’s all free and it really helps Us grow the podcast I would really
Appreciate if you did that and thank you For listening let’s get started with the Interview [Music] Hey Matt welcome to the podcast Thanks for joining the Atari hacker Podcast I’m not sure everyone knows who You are actually was reading your blog Before you contacted us to join the Podcast so I knew you I knew who you Were and what you were doing but I don’t Think everyone does so can you just Introduce who you are what you do and The project’s you welcome yeah well Thanks for having me appreciate it so I I run a few sites but my biggest one is Called Swim University calm and I teach People how to take care of their pools And hot tubs and I’ve been doing that Since 2006 ish 2004 and if I’ve been Full-time since 2011 and I also have a Site called brew cabin which is a home Brewing web site where I teach people at Home brew cuz I’m home brewer I also Grew up in the pool industry hence the Reason I have the full site and I have a Site called money lab co where I Basically do experiments and do Challenges on those two sides and I just Kind of like live well I want to say Live blog or live journal about them Publicly on money left yeah I think That’s full of money not because you Know like a lot of online marketing
Content is just like it’s it’s pretty Terrible let’s be honest yeah it just Feels like it’s written by people who Never did that but I like the Experiments I like that you chose and I Think this is were always like some kind Of learnings that you don’t necessarily Find in similar articles when you do the Experiments so it’s quite interesting They don’t work out or something you’re Like oh that’s probably why I didn’t Work out or something and and also yeah You homicide committee doesn’t work out You just tell me if I didn’t work out Which yeah it is know a lot of people Who do know and the one thing that I say About that too is sometimes when you you Know everyone’s like oh fail fast and When you fail you learn an exciting it’s All about like oh you know this didn’t Yeah it’s like this didn’t work out but Oh you know what I learned so much in The process where where I go this sucked That was just terrible like ah yeah yeah Maybe I learned something but come on Man this is awful and so I’m not afraid To say that yeah I think he’s Interesting as well because what you do Very often is you take what you find in Like most articles that talk about a Topic when you do I say like like you’re Doing this podcast one for example nice Ha ha I feel like you’re following like You know read like a hundred guys on
Like optimizing for iTunes etc I feel Like you’re doing that it’s like it’s Like I feel like a lot of the times People try that it just just doesn’t Work I was just like no real good day You exposed that essentially because Well right cuz a lot of them will write How to articles and they’ll just like They’ll collect all this information Right it’s like a job Right exactly SEC nepeta nipa doe Whoever writes a guide without having Done it very deeply and then everyone Just copies the article and ever because We will once that intent on page one They essentially assume that this is the Correct information that’s about ranks On page one everyone believes that so You should do nobody try and then what People try they’re like man yeah and no One will expose that right and and I Guess that’s why I don’t have a lot of SEO traffic on money lab because I mean I mean I’m not I’m not you know part of The reason part of the like why money Lab money that’s my favorite thing that I do and I’m very proud of it which is Weird for me to say because I’m just you Know as a as somebody who creates things Online like I quit Get bored and I quickly move on to Things but money lab is that thing I Keep coming back to you like man I’m I Like doing this because it is I am
Honest I’m ominous in real life like I’m Just a kind of where everything on my Sleeve and if you asked if you know but If I feel pain if I’m in you know I’m Hurt It’s the first thing I’m gonna walk up There like how are you like you know What my foot hurts my I got a headache Today like yeah okay see my real Question though yeah yeah and I think Putting that on line is it is authentic And I try not to do quizzers definitely A lot of people who do false Authenticity right false honesty or it’s Like oh I’m I’m gonna I’m gonna be Honest with you guys but blah blah blah But then that the way that they speak Feels like you’re getting marketed it Too right and I and I try I kind of kind Of like I don’t want to say anti Marketing because I guess what I do is Marketing but it’s just like I don’t Really care if you buy my stuff I just Want to do the content that I like to do Which is just and what’s the easy for me What’s easy for me is just to sit there And talk about what I’m doing and if it Fails it fails if it works out works out And if it works out like kind of okay I’ll say that – it’s like I’m not trying To fluff my numbers or anything yeah That’s all your content is interesting To follow like there’s not a lot of Online marketing so follow but you don’t
Have time so be sure because of your CDs Take a long time and they’re quite mean I understand we’ve done that before it’s It takes forever Yeah yes I don’t blame you yeah I’m just Saying like when is is quite interesting To follow though before we get to talk About all that stuff I want to talk About a university I want to talk about Your authority sites all that stuff Because you’ve only done that longer Than we have and we call Atari hacker And you slide before us yeah well I Don’t know if I’ve been doing it good For a long time But I’ve been doing it for a long time Yeah I mean I I stumbled my way for the Last 15 years into this I mean yeah it’s Like it’s easy when someone has already Done other tutorials to follow that and Do it up really quickly to them we have A lot of our members who cut up to us Really quickly as well but like we did Our course I’m like showing how how we Did our stuff and some people were like Really loaders took these things and Sometimes they’re beyond us at this Point right When you’re the first ones doing this is Normal to like that’s difficult and so Yeah it’s uncharted territory so let’s Talk about Swim University You had another site called rasa coffee You sold it right I sold it yeah I sold
It 2018 for fifty five thousand which You can read about on money lab yeah I Had it for yeah I had it for two years And what I do book that site was I was I Was basically like and I can talk about Some university because I’ve been doing That one for so long and it is an Authority site the meaning that’s Exactly what it is and I was like you Know what I like coffee I want to start Something new and I didn’t even research It I was just like I was in college I Like coffee so I’m just gonna do a copy Site and I immediately came up with Roasty it off top my head I was like that’s cute and my goal was To take the last 10 years of running Some university and and all the mistakes And everything that I did and go can I Do this in half the time or soar faster And two years I was able to grow it from Zero There was nothing it was it was not I Didn’t buy the site or anything it went From nothing to about a hundred thousand Visitors a month in two years Oh Only by producing one article a week Every Monday we would produce a new Article so by the end I had about a Hundred and four articles nice like it’s Quite interesting that you didn’t try to Scale content more like usually when People build these kind of sites you Know like starts working they’re like oh
Okay we’re gonna 10x the content and do Things and keep doing that I guess you Focus more on quality or like you try to Build some kind of promotion engine yeah Yeah a quality and just you know organic Backlinks you know I didn’t build any Backlinks for that site I’m kind of uh Just um I just kind of my move is to Just mainly focus on the quality promote It to the people that you know give us Permission to market to them whether It’s through email marketing or social Media you really didn’t do for Borowski We only had a YouTube channel with maybe 25 videos and then We had all the other channels like we Had a you know interest and we really Didn’t do any of those we just focused On you know building articles on the Site with some videos and promoting that To our to our audience and then Google Just kind of finds you and reward you Because you make good stuff and that was Yeah it was really about focusing on Quality over time and we’re only talking In two years which isn’t really that Long but we didn’t yeah I didn’t yeah I Didn’t go and build you know ask a bunch Of people for backlinks I didn’t try to Scale up and do two articles a week Three articles a week every one every Single day I know that you know when I Sold it that certainly I think was the Case because they cuz when I saw it at
The site I can see like oh yeah like Something was personality do something That’s just like a generic session about Yeah right and it but when you look at The traffic and especially in something Like a draft you just see it go like it Just skyrockets and I’m like okay and That was just stuff I wasn’t willing to Do because I you know I had some Principles on the site specifically the Coffee one where I was like I’m not Gonna talk about you know Keurig Machines and espresso machines because It was a it was really about like making Really good coffee at home so you know Principles get in the way sometimes I agree it’s like it’s we were talking About that with a mock my co-founder on Another podcast or like imagine blasted Our email list with jvzoo offers yeah All our souls but like we would probably Make pretty good money Exactly yeah I guess is that kind of do You ever do team building for your sites Like never mm-hmm it’s very interesting We’re kind of like the opposite here so It’s good yeah actually think about this Yeah I I’ve you know so um you know kind Of going back to some university and Talking about how that whole site Started because I was in the pool Industry since I was 13 and you know I Was a pool guy I worked at I mean I Didn’t go to people’s houses to clean
Their pools I worked in retail so people Would come in to me I was a thirteen Year old adults would come into the Store and be like i’vei’ve puls green And I’m like alright come on dad let me Show you how to do this and it’s like There’s a lot of power behind that and Then I learned how to do website design Because I was in a band and long story Short I just married those two worlds Together and I created swim University And that was in 2004 was the idea And then I bought the domain names and I Procrastinated for a couple years I lost Domain names had to buy them back and Then I really started 2006 and so yeah And it was the same thing I was writing All the articles and I wasn’t a good Writer I actually did I actually dropped Out of college didn’t fail to every English class in high school and I just Had to kind of you know beat my way Through it and started doing videos and Stuff and at the time this was 2000 I Want to say 2007 I joined a community Called the keyword Academy and yeah this Was this was like the first this is like I think this is like pre Platte Flynn Pre all you know all this yeah and at The time they were and you know I could Tell you the story right it was was it Before that or was it was it was it Community by market samurai it’s like no No let’s completely know do you know
There’s there was a guy it was a it was Courtney Tuttle I believe his name was And Mark who I’m drawn a butler and so These two guys basically started this Community I think it was $35 a month and Though they were teaching us how to Build backlinks write articles and we Were you know we were using unique Article wizard we were we were spinning Content that is the time to Eve number Ezinearticles oh yeah yeah so I was I Was dude I had they sent me they sent me Merck because I was giving them so much Content and just getting backlinks and Then 2008 hit which was either panda or Penguin and my yeah my site was like Very firm like one of the sites that Rank in every search to literally not Existing anymore Yes and yeah and I was just I literally Had like a 300 word article about Robotic pool cleaners and I was just Putting it in unique article wizard and It just like you know changes sentences And just keeps you know produced like 10 Or 15 articles for you which were unique And I had a spreadsheet where I was just Like all right I had like 150 backlinks On ezinearticles and all these other Article directories and then they were Building in the community they were Building software so that all of us In the community could share posts Between each other in our in our likes
Like are really basically a content our Link form we were basically building but All of this was done in earnest no one Was we weren’t being taught because this Is how you gain the system of a bla it Was just how you did things back then Everyone did a show that way like Gallery White Hart was not economically Viable yeah when you look at the amount Of backlinks you could create and how Successful they were ranked websites in Four hours with unique article wizard Right it’s like it was it was just too Good for white had to be available yeah And and Google wasn’t using AI at the Time they were you know they were using Backlinks as votes right and it just Worked so and then 2008 hit we tanked They completely changed their business Model and that’s kind of when I left the Community and was like um and these guys Did really like we all kind of got we All kind of took a hit and I was like I Need to find another way and then I Found Pat Flynn at the time and then I Found Corbett Barr who ran at the time Think traffic and I followed his mantra Which was just right good stuff for Human beings and that was not that was a Novel idea to me at the time and I Started doing that and all of a sudden Like I just I said I remember sitting Down and writing a post about pool algae Like really sitting down and going like
Okay yeah I’ve been writing these 300 Word articles all about different parts Of pool algae but I’m gonna sit down and Write the ultimate guide just like Getting rid of pool algae and film a Video and show graphs and charts and Like I you know cuz I can do you know my Skill set is not writing it’s it’s all The other multimedia stuff surrounding Right and that article took off and now And then I did a cloudy pool one I was Like oh this is really working so I Started to come back and I haven’t Turned back and I stopped building Backlinks with that day and the site has Just every year just you know triples or Doubles in growth interesting and how Fast was the gross like was it like slow Grow so did you like really go fast no It was slow there was a year I was 2000 so 2000 man this is like in From 2008 to 2014 or let’s call it 13 2013 I was working full-time and I Really really hate writing and it you May not if you look at all of my stuff It may not look that way but to me Sitting down on this computer and typing And writing is just a it really just Sucks the life out of me and it’s Because of my whole life I’ve been told I was a shitty writer and then when I Started doing this I’m like alright I Want to learn some grammar on my own Because I have to do you know writing is
How you make money on the internet like It’s kind of an important skill to have And so I so I did that and for those Years I was working full-time at a pool Company doing marketing so doing like The online marketing stuff was writing For them and I was designing their Website and I was doing their newspaper Ads I was filming TV commercials I was Doing radio ads like all the marketing Stuff for this like big pool company and So I come home and I’m like the last Thing that I want to do is write more About this topic and and to do my own Stuff and so I kind of you know did I Started a website as I started learning How to code like in PHP and I was Building a social network for dogs at One point I thought that could be a Thing and I I had like all these other Affiliate sites like a Crocs website and A snowboarding web site and a home Recording studio web site and you know I Just kind of was losing my yeah losing That focus and and like all right so Then 2013 hit and I’ll or 2011 hip I Lost my job which was I which I knew was Coming and I knew I was gonna get Unemployment and I was like oh my god Cuz i had already once you know didn’t I Didn’t know about unemployment when I First got laid off like many years Before that and I got I went and got a Job at Target for like six months
Because it was the it was the winter I Didn’t know I could have took taking That entire six months off and gotten Unemployment so I knew now but that was A thing and I used it as a like Small-business loan from the government And I you know sold my play sold my car You know lowered my expenses and just Hammered out content on some university For an entire year and then and then Nothing happen and I started another Thing with my buddy Andrew we started Losing money matters.com and a podcast That is pretty successful now and at the Time was pretty successful because it Was early on in the podcasting stage and We and then that year I didn’t do Anything on some university and it Tripled so before and Google just like It takes that yeah and plus my business Is seasonal – so you know they’re not Gonna rank cool stuff in the winter They’re gonna when people start Searching then I think it yeah so all of A sudden I’m like I went from making Basically like 10 grand a year from my Site with like Adsense some Amazon or Not even Amazon at the time it was Google double-click I think I was doing My affiliate links through and now Google double-click is something Different but before it was a before They had an affiliate program before Yeah yeah and I was using link share and
Then that changed so then I moved to Amazon and I went from like 10 grand to 40 grand a year and I was like oh ok This is working and then the next year Was a my zone commission scheme right on The volume one that was yep that was When I was like I was hitting 8% because I was at the very top yep and it was Great because it didn’t matter what Category at the time and then the Following year I went from 40 to a Hundred thousand so it was like a big Job and I was doing sponsorships I was Doing affiliate stuff with Amazon I had Built my own plugin which we’ll talk About later that eventually became lasso And I what else was I doing I had my own Products and I had my own digital Products that I was selling on the site So yeah Kind of like and it wasn’t even that it Was a traffic thing and a you know just Better monetization strategy overall Yeah and then that was in 2000 I like that you’re doing multiple Memorization methods because a lot of us I see did you just do affiliates you Know it’s like it’s like I feel it it’s Actually it’s a feeling yeah nothing Else I’m like guys actually at stripe is Pretty good if you want to do eyes or Like right even building an email list It’s very difficult to convince people To build an email list I can see we have
A Costco Latorre I could probably have a Lot of members I can see people doing Really well with marketing stuff for Like trying to get people to to deal That email list and email people and Actually talk to people is yeah yeah Especially when affiliate marketing is Just so easy right you just throw some Links on there and it’s like hey people Are clicking yep well the part that’s Exiting is that the companies have taken Notice now and a lot of our food serfs Are getting filled to is very big media Sites etc I mean like yeah like folks Calm and business insider wire cutter Peace email if you’re in the software Industry yeah like all these guys are Essentially taking these cuts I’d say It’s multi cause I think it’s a good Idea to today by talking about the Diversifying revenue like first of all Like were you are today with that site Like what is it that right now what Should be diversity yeah it’s doing About four hundred thousand a year well That’s on that site and the traffic is About it kind of fluctuates uh its I Want to I’m gonna say four hundred fifty Thousand unique visitors a month on Average so in the season yeah in June we Get like a million and a half and in January we get like two hundred and Fifty okay yeah make sense I mean we Have seasonal sites as well we know
Exactly how that works what percentage Of the revenue is like I mean you not to Give me exact numbers I’m trying to get Like a you know bird’s-eye view of like Marketing what’s ads and what’s it Products slash emails that stuff like so So I stopped doing ads Two or three years ago because I was Just terrible at sales I tried hiring a Sales team it wasn’t working out I Didn’t want people on my site to think That these how-to articles we were Writing were just big sales pitches for These these corporations and also in the Pool industry A lot of pool companies don’t advertise Direct-to-consumer they advertise to Retail stores and then the retail stores Are the ones so it was a really Difficult monetization strategy for us One neat the bit the biggest year we Ever had with what sponsorship ads and I’m talking about like we did all the Work all right you know getting the Sponsorship not something like add Thrive or buy sell ads right yeah yeah So we the biggest year we ever had was Seventy-five thousand dollars in revenue And it was all me and it was just I mean Like the amount of yeah the Soul-crushing the amount of work that it Took to just get an ad I’m like this not Worth seventy five thousand so I stopped That and the so I’m sorry I’ve
Completely lost Oh so so the percentages right so you Have right now yeah so right now it’s About 70 percent affiliates from from Amazon exclusively interest and 30 Percent from digital products so i have Two products once called the pool care Handbook and video course the other ones Called the hot tub handbook and video Course they’re both forty-nine dollars Each one-time purchase and yeah that’s That’s that’s it but and i’m trying to Even go 60/40 so it used to be 80/20 and Before that was ninety ten and i’m just Trying to like yeah increase the the Product sales like that so you don’t Monetize your info content other than Collecting needs at this point right Yeah so it’s it’s the the articles on The side and even the videos the videos Specifically are advertising the Products that we sell the content itself Is is affiliate links and also the Products that we sell and collecting an Email address so that we could sell our Products or future prod products or Affiliate links I would recommend you try you try at Rival media vine actually like you some People will get like really goody pcs From these as it removes the work part That you don’t like and it’s like even Us we tried it on like you know Rondo Previews etc and like you know common
Sense would tell you that oh this is Distracting people away from clicking Update links etc and we haven’t found That and and yeah my diggity did the Same test and got the same result Actually were he did not find that it Would reduce the effort owning so if it Was it was like a small single-digit Thing like within margin of error you Know how do you justify this the the Speed of the site because that’s to me The biggest reason well there’s two Reasons I don’t do ads yeah and I’m a Speed like okay speeds incredibly Important to me if you go to my sites They are like they load under a second I’m I’m like yeah there’s no there’s no You can like you know I think honestly Ludi ads etc like you can do all these Things first of all if you I sink low Diaz above the fold then actually won’t Necessarily show by the time people Start scrolling so you actually raise Revenue so there’s that there’s that You’re giving up yeah but the thing is Like I mean my personal view page speed Is you just need to be better than your Competitors which I was by a landslide Exactly insert already oh yeah I have Some some bargaining page mean then you Can give up for monetization provide it Doesn’t affect your ranking so maybe Like try it with in what category or Something like that like for one yeah
One article or something you know I mean Give it a test because I understand page Fee is important but it’s only important To be competitive in your industry it’s Not like and and honestly I think in the Full industry people they’re not take Website now now what’s important but What’s important about the the pool Industry is these my audience is like Forty to fifty year old so yeah not very Tech savvy but a lot of them are on IPads and iPhones that’s where I mean Seventy five percent if not eighty Percent of my audience comes from that And they’re out at their pools which is Far enough away from their Wi-Fi network Which things just have to load quickly Or they’re gonna get frustrated that was Been Then I sink load yes if you’re a Synchronicity with Lydia’s you’re not Giving up on the contents page load Speed you can I mean for us we use a Tool called nitrobacter io that’s Basically our CDN / it basically takes All the HTML takes all your plugins Etcetera I just rewrites it we rise your Pages and optimize it and service that As a city and then what I do is I have That and then I exclude the ads but I Make them asynchronously load so that’s Content loads first and then when I’m Willing to lose a little bit of revenue Because maybe an above default that is
Not going to show because peoples called Too fast or something right but it’s not Too bad and I’m not saying that it Doesn’t cost you anything that’s know What I’m saying yeah sure saying you Might be able to squeeze that generate Quite a lot more revenue yeah I’m not Really do starting do you how does that Make you feel though as a just a person To serve you don’t mean like you know That you mentioned you mentioned I think So it’s fray and you mentioned I think I Don’t know if you mentioned before the Show or if we were talking about it on The show we were like you know yeah the Whole like the whole idea of like it Being a soul-crushing endeavor but we Would all have a lot more money if we Did understand you know yeah that’s yeah The things like we that’s right like you Can tell that you can choose which Categories you want except like you can You can make sure there’s no like you Know like Rapids which I would not be Really happy with especially like for us We were like in weight loss success Right so like you know you know the kind Of stuff can start showing up in these Dishes and so yeah careful Yeah it’s a balance to strike right it’s Yeah and so actually it’s funny because I was talking about that but I was gonna Talk about you email funnels next which I’m sure you’d be happier to grow that
Oh yeah So once you have noticed is both on Money lab and swim University you have The title of the article and you have an Opt-in right below that mm-hmm How well does that work for you I don’t Know I am NOT measuring them Individually so I will say that I will Say what what I did do and why this was Really just kind of an eye-opener for me I when I in 2015 Started using sumo me mmm to do pop-ups Yeah and my goal was to see if pop-ups Would increase my email subscribers and Then I would build my own version of Sumo me because I am a developer because And I just knew that was gonna it’s Crushing PageSpeed and I I didn’t it Looked like crap and I’m like all right Well let me just see if it works so did That for a couple months it worked very Well I went from my goal like my goal Was to get at least a 1% traffic to Email conversion rate I think I got a 0.9 and the end I’m like cool I didn’t Did I know it was a just seconds 30-second pop-up and I had it different On every page so if you’re reading a Pool algae post it was like hey here’s An opt-in for a pool algae thing you Know so I was getting very specific on Which pages and what what the offer was And it worked really well but then I Realized a lot of the email addresses
Were kind of like and not really engaged With my were like not really engaged my Email content and then I started Noticing like qualms just paying more to MailChimp at the time for all these Email addresses that like I’m constantly Cleaning my list this is awful I ended Up switching the convertkit because uh You know I’m I know Nathan and the team Over there and I was like you know what I’m gonna you know give my I want to I Want to be a part of the community and Give you know give back and so I move There and that’s more expensive than MailChimp and so I was like oh now it’s Really important for me not to you know Not to have a list of just a bunch of People who don’t open emails and it’s Not worth it but the reason that I Wanted so many email addresses in the First place was because I was selling Ads against though that huge number of People like I had fifty thousand people On my list and I’m like we have a fifty Thousand pool owners you know you can Advertise to you know if they didn’t Know the open rate the open rate was Like twenty four cents they don’t know They want the big numbers exactly so so Long story short I got rid of everything And The emails dropped you know the optin Dropped to like 0.2% and I started using Write message which is a just software
Yeah yeah so that software basically Will create like toasters and accident And pop-ups and embeddable things but You can change the message of what’s in Those opt-ins based on the content which Is really really fascinating interest um And I was like you know what I’m gonna Try this and I’m gonna see if I really Target you know if you’re you know if You again if you’re reading an article About cloudy pools I’m going to create An opt-in three different opt-ins on the Same page that say you know hey I’ll Help you fix your cloudy pool blah blah Blah just very like relevant and I again Climbed up to about as point zero five Percent was where I was at I was like Pretty decent [ __ ] our dry series Pretty good yeah yeah and at that point I was kind of like really focused on Page speed like I was kind of like I Really I I was I really wanted my site To load under a second and that that one Plug-in was slowing it was adding a full Second to my page load and I was like I Don’t want to do my own yeah and I was Like I don’t want to build my own Version of this where things pop up I Just don’t want to deal with JavaScript And so I decided well let me just add a Super lightweight you know pure HTML Form and I’m gonna add it at the top I’m Gonna add at the bottom and I’m gonna Add it whereas where else is it top and
Bottom and that’s it and I was like I Didn’t see it I didn’t see a change of Numbers it stayed at it went from state Of 0.5 to 0.6 so I’m like I think having It at the top works I think having it at The bottom works and I have it somewhere Else to like sometimes it appears in the Middle I guess I’m like a reject your Putting the content maybe I think so I Wanna I think with money lab Did I do something else I’m shaking Right now yeah I’m looking top yeah I Know that they could just have the top In the bottom uh-huh yeah that’s all I’m Asking cuz it’s interesting like baby Babies less is more you know well and I Also didn’t change like now I’m not the Message isn’t changing so every single Pool article has a message and the Message is just subscribe to our email List and one of the things that I did Which I recently did and Andrew at Listen money matters told me this as a As a tip you know now the word subscribe Has connotations of pay because we have Netflix we have you know everything so When you litter and I again dealing with An older audience I have to write my Button says I think it says um it only Says this on swim University but it says Subscribe it’s free yes right so uh and Yeah I think that and that worked I mean It’s very little very little increased But still like oh people know that this
I don’t have to pay for whatever this is Like what am I subscribing to and the Only thing I would do differently on Some university is perhaps add some kind Of text at the top that says what it is You’re getting by subscribing you know You’re you know cuz that’s the only Place I don’t have it I was gonna add it In the text box but yeah I mean I’m very Very happy with how lightweight it is And how many subscribers were actually Converting okay it’s interesting that’s All I’m asking you because like not many People do it that way when everyone’s Just trying to do something really fancy Excetera and I was like up actually it’s Not that bad yes I’d like to see yeah How does actually have a friend Especially if you have like an older Audience I would friend who was also an Older audience and what he does is he Has a system that automatically makes a PDF from the post and opt-in is just Down this post as a PDF yeah so it’s Just like a solar built in WordPress and Essentially creates a lead magnet for The post that’s like semi irrelevant and All the people who have downloaded PDFs From what we yeah I bet makes so much Sense but you know the biggest one of The biggest problems I have is we have a Our product is called the pool care Handbook and I added a video course to It I said no matter how
No no Matt it is just it’s just a PDF Right but no matter how many places on The sales page that I mentioned this is A PDF downloadable PDF I still get Emails yeah where’s my book I never got My book I’m like you never entered your Address how am I supposed to send you a Book and I’m in and they’re like well Can I get a book I’m like it’s Full-color it’s gonna cost you like $50 If I were to send these books out so you Know 300 pages full colored you know so Yeah it doesn’t matter it doesn’t matter How many times I write it people don’t Read that’s that that’s the bottom line There they buy I mean we had the same Problem we sold like as I said we sold Info products in the house industry and That was exactly the same like exact It’s we had to literally put some kind Of like animated gif that says that this Is like some kind of like this is online It’s like downloadable download okay now My screen you know right yeah anyone That like a small percentage was still Yes yeah what happens when they opt-in To your list which one let’s do some University you get a series of emails Forever basically it’s one it’s one long Automated sequence of pool emails Teaching you a different thing each week Every Tuesday so you get the first email That’s like hey welcome to stream University here’s what to expect and
Then every Tuesday you get a new email With links to our content all kind of Themed around one one subject cool and It’s like I think it’s like sorry that Was gonna say I think it’s like 50 Emails so it’s just and once you’re done Because we we found out that the average Life cycle of a subscriber is 246 days So we were like okay as long as we have Enough content for that we’re good and I Very 2% rate yeah yeah so the goal is to Sell our products and if you don’t buy Our products do you have sound to you at Least do i what do you how do you like So Oh promos yes actually that is what You get in the beginning you get like a Three I forgot about that yeah so we so we did A but we’ve tested this so many times But basically we have it set up to where As soon as you subscribe as an email Subscriber you go to a Thank You page Thank You page is all text and all it Says is it’s just me as a person going Hey thanks for subscribing here’s what You’re gonna get by the way we have These two products everything on this Website is free but these two products Is how we keep the lights on it’s how It’s how we make money and if you want To support the site with all this free Content I would be happy if you if you Bought these things and it just links There’s no like anything fancy that page
Converts that page converts like Gangbusters you know just from and then And then the next three emails are hard Sells but if you’ve already bought you Don’t get them right you’re just kind of Like taken off of it or if you buy so It’s like three days in a row boom boom Boom You know hard sell hard sell hard sell And then you get your weekly emails now If the weekly emails once you if you go Through that whole hard sell basically You know four days of really kind of Just pitching our product if you can get Past that and not buy then at the bottom Of every single email for the next fifty Weeks you’re gonna see a PS here’s our Book and that PS is different in every Email Depending on what the email is about and If you do buy you never see that so you Never get pitched again because we only Have content yeah yeah and then you’re Basically just getting free content Forever and we just hope you click Affiliate links at that point until yeah Until we have future products maybe There’s a membership coming up maybe There’s a you know individual like micro Products about very specific topics we Don’t know yet But that’s uh that’s kind of the that’s How that’s kind of the strategy there so Once so we cannot have like similar
Similar things I really like they’re Like one non auto responder it’s like Mmm I like it and then sometimes I build Like sub segmentations like people like Like they click on the blog post about I Mean I’ll take an example on Tiger Because people who since its podcast Know it but like people click on the Link building post then it might just Like up to you into like a link building Sell see And resumed the content so I’m able to Tag people for what they like as well I’m building their profiles right but One thing that we found that increases Sales like crazy is using evergreen Scarcity actually I don’t know if you Have looked into that already maybe we Use a tool called deadlines funnel right So yep so basically what we do is we Like well these cool cells for this much Case the sales page you can see and People do buy it and you know what you Can dislike a 40% discount for the next Seven days and then there would be a hot Seller anyway so but it’s just like back To casual content there is you know to What you do but as soon as you and and It really does close with something like Deadline phone like it’s not just trying [ __ ] timer it’s like you really try to Like do your tracking obviously this is Never 100% proof like it never works on Somebody works 99% of the time you know
Right um and you do respect your Deadlines if someone emails you have to The date I need like don’t do that I Think it’s too much according to my book I think it’s ethical enough at the same Time you get a massive boost in sales so Right you should probably look at that Yeah I think we do something similar Where we’re and I it’s been a while you Know I’m kind of I really do dislike Email marketing if I’m being okay I know it’s fine cuz it’s bull but the Reason I dislike is because I just if You know I Well it’s you can you can very easily Over complicate it especially with all These new email marketing tools and and I want to so bad you know over tag Everybody and really build profiles but Then I have literally nothing to do with It like it’s like once I have and I’m Like it’s like I felt I used to I mean At a time I was just finding out like do You have when you subscribe do you have An inground pool or an above-ground pool Do you have a are using chlorine are you Using salt and I go I don’t care It’s like yo you’re buying the same Thing at the end of the day anyway and But and and so every time I Overcomplicate it I end up losing sales And when I simplify it I gain sales and I think we do that that three day Sequence is
Like 70 72 our sale right and then after That goes back to the original price and That’s it so yeah we do 10% off we don’t Even go cuz it’s a $49 product it’s not A you know it’s it’s really relatively Expensive and I figure like 20 percent Is a lot but 10 percent is like just Good enough to be like Oh 72 hours ten Percent off its pool season yeah I’ll Get this thing that’s a lot of like it’s Like some people you know they’re like Oh you to do all these nurturing we Found that this is wrong Like you know same same we found that Thing to do is just to sell right over As people obtain is like where you get The most of sales by a longshot I sure Do and and the products that you’re Selling how much are they I’m on having Like we’ve done Mary the range was Twenty seven to two thousand dollars so There’s been there’s been some ranges You know it’s like but so single time it Works the same actually really so I I Would I would naturally assume that Higher priced products would require More nurturing so they do but like the Thing is like you do the nurturing in Your lead magnet for example so for Example the lead magnet is gonna be like A free to our videos like you know be More involved and in the neutering is Like right here right there he’s a chunk Of value and yeah people do make that
This they’re like the hottest and at the Same time you just deliver the value you Know Netflix way like people want to be In content right yeah yeah and so so Yeah you just front-end the content That’s and it was work yeah that’s what Has worked better for us actually and It’s real simple Yeah I want to talk to you about social Media because you do a lot of social Media and honestly we’re not like we’re Getting there But we’re not amazing at social media And a lot of our followers are like pure SEO people and I think there would be a Lot of benefits to them if they were you Know adding a little bit of that stuff So yes in that you active on YouTube Twitter Facebook and Pinterest for swim University it’s not yet like I’m the Only thing the only Facebook is is is So for soon university we only do Pinterest in youtube we did do Facebook And Twitter I realized well one I Realized Twitter just our audience you Know they’re just not on Twitter yeah But it was so easy with with buffer and And like it’s like the same content he Would just spit across all the different Platforms the with Facebook I basically Just said you know I basically hate Facebook because of ethical reasons and So yeah and and I you know I’m the other Day we were like we were like weary of
Like focusing our Pinterest strategy and I was like you know I we really should Do Facebook cuz I know our audience is On Facebook and we get a lot of Questions on Facebook and what we have Is a autoresponder that just says hey Emails instead because we I don’t need My BA being in two places but and then I Usually do they you know they’ll usually Send in the question and then it pops up Automatically saying hey email us and Then just copy and paste the question Over to email and an email we can have a More engaged like we’ve you know we had This whole thing an email where my VA Has a whole document of if-then that if That and this you know I mean so and and She’s really intelligent so she can go Okay this person’s asking this question About whatever she knows how to find That question either on our site or on Google and answer it for them and then She basically says thank you for sending Your question hope it helped here’s a Coupon code for our product right so We’re using that as like a marketing Engine as well and if Facebook just to Me what I hate about it is that you Create this content and then it Disappears into the ether and you’re Just constantly having to do this and Blame your confidence yeah yeah whereas Like YouTube and Pinterest are search Engines that you can create content that
Actually is evergreen and I and I also Just you know when you look at Facebook As one of our traffic sources in Google Analytics it’s just like not that great It’s compared to the other two so we’ve Doubled down on YouTube and Pinterest And Facebook they give you said then you Need to pay for to get DC Your free spectral you know yep yeah That’s the best way to put it yes and But on money lab it’s very much Twitter Because that is literally where Everybody is right if I’m sure everyone Listen to this has a Twitter account They’re probably there as they’re like Main social media or Instagram but Instagram doesn’t I can’t put links in There therefore I completely ignore it You can put links if you have more than 10,000 420 is it 10,000 I thought was 20,000 for the swipe up on those stories And as well they have this thing you Know Did you see the biolink thing for Instagram so you can you have that bio Link that basically creates that page That takes the image from your Instagram Post that you showed you on tailwind out And then it links to that so you’re like Oh click on my bio link and people find The same image click on it and then they Get to link your obviously it’s not Great it’s not very user interface right But that’s one way yeah yeah and I just
Think like what’s me University what am I gonna one of my pictures gonna be People like shock a shock bottle a Algaecide bottle a swimming pool but That’s not what we do right so like Anybody’s gonna like look like looking At swimming pools how do you target pool Owners with up with a picture uh but Money and again with money lab it’s like What am I gonna show screenshots and That’s a I feel like that’s a boring Instagram account although for brew Cabin that is we’re all home brewers Hang out they hang out on Instagram and YouTube and and and we do have an Instagram account for a brew cabin and It’s very good it just doesn’t give us Any traffic whatsoever so yeah it’s just Like how long do I do this yeah well It’s like you know you should definitely Run retargeting a Jeff product something Heavy No no not yeah so when you have products Like running retargeting on people who Engage on these social media this is how You justify spending the time baby 3 Right otherwise yeah it’s kind of hard To monetize right yeah we did a lot of Retargeting on Swim University for Facebook ads and we ran Facebook ads for Those products and I actually had a Facebook Ads coach for like half a year We just could not figure it out and I Think it was because
The prices were so low on the product Sale too cheap yeah yeah cheap so like And it was just like yeah I like I’m Like I’m spending $50 to make $50 I know Yeah I think yeah I think the firm is That you need $150 product hundred fifty To two hundred and I think I think you Can make this work and you fairly Profitable like yeah the other thing we Yeah the other thing we could do and This is something I have on my list of Like I gotta put a process in place and Figure it out I started paying for Crowdcast to do money to do money lab Kind of just like hey I’m jumping on Crowdcast to do a QA about podcasting do A QA about PageSpeed whatever and you Know just as an audience kind of what I Want to call it like just a you know I Feel like the podcast is really like an Audience engage er but the house isn’t In any well for you it is because you’re On YouTube but it’s not a place where It’s it’s not a discovery engine but It’s a solidification engine where if Someone likes money lab and they’re like Oh he has a podcast I’ll listen oh I Like that you know it’s like yeah so Wearing your podcast is opinion yes yeah Yeah so yes how many bad I mean it was It was great back in 2014 when we you Know cuz our personal finance podcast Has 80,000 downloads an episode right But we built that before there were
Really any podcast and and now we’re Just kind of maintaining at the top but It yet it’s still growing it’s really Tough and I think even that’s what I’m Doing with crowdcast and I have this Idea that I wanna do like a pool school Which is like maybe every week or every Other week where it’s a Q&A style pool School for four people a webinar and I Sell the products through it right and Maybe you drive you know Facebook ads to That and you grow your audience that way And then who knows so so things I’m Testing out this this summer and trying To make it the biggest problem is I Can’t put all my time and effort into it Cuz I have these three brands and it’s Like well where do I put my time Actually yeah yeah stuff And I think you need yeah I need a more Expensive product on if you have this Much traffic on soon university like Holy [ __ ] you need a more expensive yeah Yeah I just wonder I just wonder if People will spend that you know I you Know for but you know you know it’s yeah It’s to do it right I think yeah they’re In and it’s like I you know the pool Care handbook in video course it’s kind Of like everything right so it’s like What can I add to that or maybe I can Treat I well I did it used to be 29 now It’s 40 so here’s you do it I don’t know If you remember leadpages when they
Started but the way they were doing this Is they kept adding to a product fitting And they were running price increase Campaigns so they would take the entire Audience guy is the pride like which was Studied these features and these Features and these features in the last Few days Unless you’ve known sorry so the ice is Officially gonna go from you know $49 a Month to $69 a months but you have seven Days to catch the forget it is right now Yep and so your audience is not annoyed Because they get a real opportunity to Actually get the product at the best Price and then you slowly you’re growing In product that’s how we did I tell you How good promontory okay it’s exactly That nicer two thousand dollar product But um at the time when I start it was Five videos that we sold for $29 me just Keep you just keep growing to it you Know yeah well we I did that with a Armani lab I did that So with asana for bloggers which was my First course used to be 25 bucks and People were like you are under charging So much for this and I was like got it I Redid the course I made it I updated it Because I had been like four years Inside updated it and added a whole Bunch more content and gave everyone a My audience an opportunity to get it at $25 before I raised it $2.99 no yeah oh
Absolutely so it was great and I’ve done I did the same thing with some University when the price was $29.99 Bomb and he actually every time we do a Sale cuz we do a sale every quarter huge Bumps huge huge huge bumps and sale and It just we just automate that so every Quarter is just We’re doing a we’re doing a spring sale We’re doing a summer sale we’re doing a You know a fall sale and it works but I Agree that yes we university needs Higher price products or the opposite a Bunch of lower price products right I Want on the other but well yeah you need To be able to get two hundred dollars For one person let’s say I need to check Out and you just sell them a bundle or Yourself in like one big products you Know yeah I mean and and I use podía to Do all my sales and I could do bundles And upsells very easily and yeah It’s definitely something that I’m Considering this song this this summer Is to really kind of double down on Money on Swim University and money Laughs to be honest nice um that was Literally not the point of the question Yeah one of the question welcome to go Actually I wanted to go to Pintrest Because I know you like quite a bit of Interest I guess to be big onto interest But the truth is I haven’t done for a While my family does it like house I
Gets a lot of traffic from Pinterest but I haven’t so Wester what’s the plan on Pinterest days like how do people get Traffic so the the this is really kind Of like I all right so I’ve done Pinterest for years and I wouldn’t say I’m huge on Pinterest but it’s but I’m Certainly like I definitely feel like I’ve I understand it and I’ve understood It since day one but there’s a lot of Talk there’s a lot of education that I Got that was again very early day a Black hat stuff where it’s like hey take The same pin repin it take the same pin Repin it and just because it’s all about Freshness and is my head I’m just like Yeah I’m in my head yeah there was a Thing called board booster there’s this There’s this program called tailwind Which I mean people promote hell when is The worst you I have ever seen for like A modern SAS product of my guys We put it get it together come to excess Yeah I won’t use it because it looks so Terrible I use buffer right cuz it just Looks better and but it doesn’t do the Same thing like buffer doesn’t have all The all the stuff yeah yeah but I just Kept saying to myself well if pincers is A search engine and that’s the way we’re Treating it then it should work The exact same way as your blog right Where your the every single piece of Content that you add to Pinschers should
Be new should be fresh and new and so The strategy that I employ is you take What you have one article right you can Promote that article several several Times on Pinterest as long as the image Is different and I’m not talking Different enough fully different right Because some people might it’s kind of Like when you go on Facebook and you’re Running ads you create like 15 images For one ad because you know one’s gonna Work better than the other so if you Think of it that way all Pinterest wants Is more images that’s what they are They’re an image driven it’s like it’s Like Instagram the fact but but like Reap inning over and over again just Never made sense to me but I kept Hearing that and then I kept hearing About like there’s so it’s like you want To use tall images you want to use high Contrast photos you know you know you Want to pin consistently you want to pin To your own content you want to do like They were talking about this 80/20 Principle where it’s like 80% of the Content should be yours and then you can Repin 20% of other people’s content but You really have to be a curator to do That and to be honest with you I have no Interest in that 20% I’m just gonna do My own thing because I’m trying to grow My own thing and not their thing and if You look at a Home Depot or any of the
Other or Martha Stewart or any of the Other huge pit you know pinners that’s Not what they’re doing they’re pinning Their own thing right because they know That what’s kind of a waste of time to Pin other people’s things so that’s not So my strategy is basically like go Through all of our content and basically Create right now four pins per post and We have about 200 posts and we’ve Already pinned a lot of those and we’re Just keeping track of it in the Spreadsheet and then once we fill up all Four then we’re gonna do five that’s Right so then it’s like oh do all the Post again add one more yeah so that’s Kind of the strategy there and it’s a Matter of just like putting as much Content on Pinterest as possible because Whatever you know as you might like You do like well so we yep so we so we Already do that on some university you Know for Google and I just I’m like We’re already doing it we’re already Using hrs we’ve already you know done All that research and so I feel like yes Pinterest is a different engine but People still have the same in queue it’s There so that there’s still the same People and so we know the answer to that Question is no we’ve already done it and So we already have a good title we Already have a good you know we just we Already have good text so we just copy
And paste a lot of the text from our Article and throw it in the description Of the pin and we make sure we link to It and it’s all there rich so we know so They’re already pulls in the title Already and we just make sure that the Image has the a couple of the keywords From the title in it and that the image Is relevant and we use we use I say we It’s me I’m the one doing it yes oh We’re doing I’m doing yeah right cuz Yeah there’s a there is a team but they Don’t have it they don’t they’re not it Hasn’t been passed on to them yet cuz The way that I the way that I approach All of this stuff is like let me do it Like and let me figure out the process Write it all down and then go who wants It Who wants to do this exactly the same Like yeah literally right now I’m I’m Editing out thought cast to figure out How people should read the podcast video I am doing that go to actions yep I’m doing that with uh so we have a I’m Doing it the experiment you mentioned Earlier about the podcast for some University that’s not working that well Right now I knew that from the beginning And yeah I started using the script and I’m like I’ve never used this before I’m Really curious about it and so I’m kind Of like doing the the podcast suit to Nuts which is how I did money lab which
Is how I did listen money matters and Then eventually we handed it off to Somebody else and though here’s the Process just duplicate yep so uh you Meant I don’t think it’s a waste of time Like we have a company wiki we’re just Like I write every task I do and I Document it and I felt this was the time And it gets done a lot better than if You try to pass it on to someone without Really caring about it you know yeah I Do Giemon plus a video on how to do it I Just quickly record a screencast like Here’s how I do it and then I assign it To somebody hey watch this video here’s The SOP in a Google Doc or whatever or Directly in asana and they’re like great Understood if they have questions they Little comment but other than that it’s Pretty smooth but yeah that’s kind of The pincher strategy and I’ve been I’ve Heard from people that Pinterest has Pretty poor traffic meaning like if you Look at Google Analytics your bounce Rate will be very high from Pinterest Traffic your sales will be very low from Pinterest traffic I’ve I’ve noticed that My bounce rate on pinch from Pinterest Traffic is the same as Google traffic so That’s decent to me But yeah the product sales are much Lower but affiliate links are the same Like click wise so yeah I’m I’m about to
Do a huge pinchers experiment or an Experiment but a challenge and I’m just Gonna like bulk to like a hundred and Fifty 250 pins and like schedule them All and buffer and then just measure you Know are we increasing product sales are We getting more traffic what’s the Bounce rate what are we getting more Affiliate link clicks are those clicks Converting etc like all these different Metrics to be like does pin is pinchers Of viable traffic engine for search for Certain people yeah I think a good Question because it’s quite easy to get Traffic from Pinterest but I agree like The bounce rate I’ve seen is pretty odd So it’s like I like it on site style for Example no ties feels like I Drive Immediately this is great yeah they have A model right hey I’m settings I’m Willing to test anything so that’s uh I’ve definitely talked to a lot of People who were like you know zoic is The one I’ve heard at thrive media vine But yeah yeah and was the best one um I Found out strivers the highest-paying up Here I’m actually like the best rpm okay I don’t know I think media vine has more Options for site speed in their work Force plugin so you might want to look At them okay so and it’s it’s it’s Closing I’ve heard also some people switching For media into a drive and getting plus
30% revenue so oh you know you got you Got you got a peak your trade offs yeah Yeah yeah yeah To talk about less oh sure Yeah so I mentioned earlier and I could Tell you the whole kind of evolution of It start it with some university in 2014 And I was I was doing the podcast the List of money matters podcast with Andrew who was a developer and you know Here that was that was his day job and At the time some university was using Link share and I was dealing with one Company one and they were called pool Supply world and as this one one E-commerce store for pool stuff and they Had an affiliate program and they had an Affiliate manager that literally would Talk to me like we would call call each Other so I had a really close Relationship but then Andrew is like Dude you could be on Amazon and getting 8% instead of 5% I was like really he’s Like yeah and they have an API so you Should build something to automatically Add products to your your content and I Was like um dude I’m not that good of a Developer like I’m dangerous but not That like I don’t know how to use api’s And he’s like dude you could figure out Like I bitched and moaned about like Doing it he was like just go do it and It was February 2014 and I sat down and I just did everything in my functions
Dot PHP file like it was it wasn’t a Plug-in it was just me smashing this Code into my theme and what it did was I Would add a shortcode to an article that Would say Amazon ID equals and then the B number with an Amazon and what it Would do is might this is this this code This class that I built would go to the Amazon API find that you know search for That B number grab all of the Information title description price Image and when you load the page it Would happen when you load the page and It would go find all that store it into A local database and display this box on The page that had the image I had the Description that had the Idle at the price and had a Buy button By now in Amazon and then I ran a cron Job every 24 hours to go through the Database and refresh image and price and Title if it needed to anybody only it Would be like hey if the price changed Change the price whatever worked I mean That’s what sent me from 40 grand a year To a hundred grand a year it was Building that little thing that yep There’s like yeah a little breakout Boxes and then many years went by and I Would just keep getting emails from People like how are you doing that you Know what plug-in are you using and I Kept saying like it’s not a plug-in I Built it I couldn’t even give you the
Code if I wanted to because it would not Work on your website and I eventually Moved it to a plug-in style but it was Still very much like only worked on my Site and it allowed me that when I moved It to a plug-in it allowed me to install It on across all three of my sites but I Would have to go in and change the code For each one so it was really just Clunky and bad and well there’s that There’s a article on money lab it’s Called like building and launching a WordPress plugin and 40-day as I think Where I teamed up with a developer and We took my code and turned it into a Legit plug-in called earnest which was Earn is T and we that’s and we ended up Selling that for $49 for the whole year So every year you would you would it Would be for nine dollars a year for the Plugin and at the same time I was doing That I didn’t know it but Andrew was Building lasso which was not the whole It it didn’t actually use my code where It would display boxes on the site which Was really all mine did it was it was Like an affiliate link manager in like In WordPress and it would like if if you Had a link to say me give me an example Like if you linked to convertkit like Literally like convertkit comm and You’re in your content and or Bluehost.com in your content but then You signed up for an affiliate program
For a Bluehost well then it would go and Find all of the times you linked to Bluehost And you’ll be able to flick a toggle and It would Go to that content and convert it to Your affiliate link and I was like well You know you know for us like even if The companies don’t have a fake programs We tend to like make a short link anyway And then be like oh the day they have an FFA program and we can use that as a Pinion yeah because I sometime want to Just give a do follow lean kicks I try And I can’t because it’s in my affiliate Links thing because I’m like well my dad One day it might be one way he takes a I Said yeah right yeah so that was what he Was doing and then we teamed up and and We built last so together and we Combined the two different styles so we Have it’s a display box thing plus that Affiliate link manager that lets you go And find these things but the other Thing we did was and this is coming out In like April May where we’ve redesigned The whole thing and now we have keywords So let’s say you have Bluehost okay and Let’s say you’ve mentioned Bluehost On your site but didn’t actually create A link for it so you can type in blue House as your keyword it will go through Your content and find all of the References to Bluehost and it will at
And it will have a list of like these Are all your opportunities if you want To flick a toggle It’ll take that keyword and turn it into An affiliate link on your site that’s Kind of the shake right yeah it doesn’t Matter because it’s not in the content Part it’s all done through database Stuff okay yeah the the content builder Stuff is what gets tricky there is the Display boxes and how you do that but The display boxes are just short code so If you can add short codes to a you know A page builder then that’s it you know So so what we’re doing with the new Version of lasso so lasso does this now Besides the keyword stuff but all the Stuff I mentioned earlier is what it Does now but basically we can tell you To like hey you’ve mentioned you know You again like let’s say you’ve been Linking to convertkit all these years But you didn’t have an affiliate program So now all of a sudden you do and you Can go and literally just toggle over And all those times you mention it and Turn it into yeah and you can find and We do that for all your links so we Track all of your links Just your affiliate links and what if You find out that you know I’ve been Linking to this I’ve been linking to Authority hackers so much hey do you Guys have an affiliate program you’re
Like yeah we do I’m like great so now I’m gonna go back through my content Like I would have to go in the each and Individual page and change it Oh it lasts like another question is it Gonna be able that’s a you need to like Three of our blog posts right and you Mean affiliate each book will you be Able to maintain the slug and tear you Know yeah so we’re gonna have deep links Available so for each affiliate link you Can create like so if you have yeah so For let’s let’s use your site as an Example if I’ve been linking to Individual pieces of your content right Why would have to create a new link for Each one of those because you have to Add that appendage to the end of that URL but they would all be categorized or Basically children underneath Authority Hacker.com so that’s how we’re yeah That’s how we’re doing like basically You can for every domain or every Affiliate link that you have you can Create multiple deep links under that And then you can choose when you go to Like click the toggle over do you want The main link or do you want one of the Deep links so you know it’s pretty cool It’s like I use so ste affiliates for Like other programs and I use it yeah AWP for yep now here’s one thing that I’m telling you would get people crazy Over you plug in and that’s comparison
Table for products already in already in The scope but we think yes not any Comparison table so the problem is like A WP does comparison table right yep um But the problem is like a WP will do Like a top 10 products comparison table However a lot of our marketers have Found is let’s say like I see like you Have the best pool alongside what people Like is like they like to put a best Like best budget best wire cutter style Option exactly and so it would be really Nice if that because a AWP can not do That and it’s nothing out of the box I Can do that right now and I know a lot Of my face would appreciate that I think All we’re all we’re doing this is like The main goal of lasso Is to make your site function like wire Cutter okay though yeah so imagine you Take imagine you create a display box or You let’s imagine you have them you have A product on your in your affiliate link Like manager right and that is the that Is your budget option as a microphone For a podcasting or whatever yeah you Can go into that link and you can add a Flag and a tag to it called budget and So when you create the display box it’ll Have a like a flag wrapped around it That says like our budget pic or Whatever we just you know whatever you Decide and then when you create the Display box it’ll it’ll say that but
They’d also when you go to do that and This is not this is not in the the Current version but it’s we’re coming Out with it this year when you go to Create display table or yet comparison Tables those flags will also appear There and you can choose like you want To compare two products one product Three products ten products doesn’t Matter and you can build those tables And then display them wherever you want To so yeah it’s the the goal is to kind Of like imagine a AWP mixed with thirsty Affiliates mixed with pretty links and All of that on steroids so that’s kind Of like it’s like kind of like Everything cuz Andrew now your affiliate Marketers everything we’ve ever wanted An affiliate marketing plug-in is kind Of what we’re doing which is why it’s Premium it’s a here’s another request Yeah so like let’s say you promote like An individual fit program most of them Support custom tee IDs which allow you To put the URL or that item it would be So nice if you guys allow us to put Dynamic T IDs so I can put my URL slug For example or something like that so I Have an idea in my FA people in my Dashboard which page is generated the Conversions and then I can like a sub ID Yeah but like you wanted dynamic you Only to like pull the URL or put the Post title or pull something like this
Dynamically so that you make the same Box but you put it on like ten pages but The link is going to dynamically feel The information for that patient you Know which one make money you know and Where are you getting these reports from Um usually dashboard so like if they’re Using ID facilities for example or Something like that You are able to just add that slug at The end of your link and then you can Use that for internal tracking but the Problem is that you to create a new link Every single time it would be nice if You died any portion that piqued some Information about the page that allows Me to say okay this is the page I Generated to sell here let’s try to Bring this page high on Google this one That’s not compared to etc I think that So we so that’s easy to implement and a Great idea at right now and I have to Talk to Andrew about it we’re do you can Do sub IDs so like if you’re using Impact radius like he’s using right now He’s using something called a fluent Which is like an affiliate link tracker Which is a which is our third phase of Lasso is you know the first phase is Like basically inventory style and like Display boxes and stuff the second one Is like crazy display boxes like the Tables and list posts and all that kind Of stuff and themes and custom themes
And all that stuff to make it look However you want to look then the third Phase is we want to show you reporting On everything like not just what pages Are getting the most clicks but how much Money are you actually making yeah so That’s the it’s really gonna be like a Soup to nuts thing but right now I know You can add sub IDs to the target URLs Within lasso and get that information Pushed up into a impact radius and Whatever like a flow or whatever the Other thing you can do is we we do we Connect with Google Analytics so what we Do is yeah and we add we append display Box or link so we know in analytics Through events which products are Getting the most clicks on which pages And what style they are if they’re a Link or if they’re a like an in-text Link or if they’re a display box so you Can look yes you could look at that now And say well this page is getting the Most affiliate link clicks and so we Want to you know obviously rank for that Or what’s best about it which I’ve I’ve Used several times is let’s say you have A page with four or five affiliate links That are all different well you can look At that page and go well wait a minute The fourth link on this page is getting More clicks in the first link on that Page so we just go post and move it up Yeah
And as works like gangbusters and that’s That’s built in there right now and it’s Just through Google Analytics yeah That’s I guess the next type to save you Testing as well that would be yeah that Would be the price maybe testing Everyone will say be testing and nobody Does it no one does it right either Right it’s like and also you need a ton Of traffic to really get results quickly And if not you got to let it ride for You know a year or so especially for These rounded pages like it’s like yes Some queue was ugly but a lot of kills Are like medium or small and it’s over The long term make good money and then You have a lot of these pages but you Can’t really like yeah it’s tricky Actually I guess you know it takes makes More sense let me just take my notes for A second I think I’m pretty much done Here is there anything that I should Have asked you that I didn’t know I Think I think we covered everything yeah I mean we did we covered some University I think kind of as much as you could Cover some university money lab I think You have to kind of go see it to Understand it’s really hard to sell I Guess not no not that I’m trying to sell Anything I get out actually that’s the Things like we talked about a lot of Things you do and these things Documented money lapse oh all right yeah
We should do is they should go and check Out the rest if they want to read more See yeah I totally agree and then lasso Is just is it’s kind of a separate it’s A separate company that Andrew and I you Know because we do the podcasts both Podcasts money lab and listen money Matters together and lasso is sort of Our joint project and it’s what we use On all our sites currently and we are we Just just did a massive rehaul in December and we’ve been have a we have Three developers on it right now and the We were very very close to getting out The new version probably like two weeks And once that’s out we’re kind of like All in on lasso promotion and we think It’s really gonna be like the thing like We think it’s gonna be the thing that We’ve been like waiting for to really Send it’s really two weeks if you make You did like these folks guess is Literally coming up that’s all I enter I’m like you got two weeks bro But yeah we but really like we need like We have a small core group of customers They need to test it out because it Really is what you see on the website Now it’s going to be very different and It’s it and it does it does all the same Things but it’s gonna look and feel very Differently it’s actually gonna be a lot Easier to use which was the whole goal Of any MOS on your site like it’s like I
Need to see your box I can click on That’s the one yeah yeah and then like We we just started doing theming so now You can choose different themes you can Customize the CSS on all those boxes We’ve done we’re doing grids and we’re Doing single boxes we’re doing the next Phase is the tables because everyone Wants comparison tables for sure Yeah and it’s and it’s not just Amazon You know it’s I mean it has the same Amazon integration as a awp but it also You could you can compare an Amazon Product to an on Amazon product but That’s that’s what I like that’s it’s Like no problem no plugin allows you to Do that out of the box and and it’s Quite interesting because like I know a Lot of niches where we do promote in Multiple areas it’s like oh you have Your Amazon table then you need to Another store it’s not very clean you Know No it’s nothing that’s gonna be quite Interesting actually yeah that’s the Goal Well I think we’re gonna close it up Here people can grow money wrap code They can go check out get Lesotho Hopefully it’s gonna be updated by the Time this podcast is out and if it’s not It should be yes all right so that’s it For this interview with Matt I hope you Enjoyed listening to it as much as I
Enjoyed doing it I think these are Things to pick up from here in the way He does Pinterest and all of that I’m Quite interested in what lasso turns out Like if he can help us make our sites Look like the wire cutter I think is Going to help a lot of people in this Industry and well if you enjoyed this Interview don’t forget there is a Subscribe button below don’t forget to Click it click on the bell drop us a Comment you know like the video it Really helps us with the podcast I hope You enjoyed it next week I’m back with Mark for another episode of the podcast Half of the week and stay safe [Music]