Many of you reading this post are likely already familiar with Click-Track-Profit (CTP) and the “CTP Teams” tournaments happening there. Have the CTP games been helpful to you in building your business?
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I have used the CTP games to promote two services that have been essential to the success of my Paid-To-Click project. They are:
- Trck.me — Excellent tool for tracking hits and conversions, and (until recently) the best tool for comparing ALL Sources of advertising traffic.
- RocketResponder — The “really-easy-to-use” autoresponder for sending scheduled messages to my email list.
(Click that thumbnail image to see my Tame Bear video for these two essential online marketing tools.)
WELCOME TO SEASON 8 OF THE CTP GAMES!
My view is probably anti-game, and may not be very popular…
I do not join Traffic Exchanges (TEs) just to be able to qualify and participate in the CTP games. I do not join every TE that advertises at CTP. Consequently there are many (most) days I am not able to qualify at all because I am not already a member of this or that TE and don’t want to join simply to qualify. I do most of my traffic surfing at quality sites that are not participating (advertising) in the CTP games. Why? Because they are demonstrably BETTER places for me to get leads and conversions from my own advertising.
Teams are good, but I do think the emphasis on competition itself has become a distraction from the real purpose of Traffic Exchanges — to help us advertise, build businesses and make money.
COMPARING ALL TRAFFIC RESOURCES
How do I know which TEs are provably BETTER places to advertise? Because I track everything. I compare how ALL my advertising is performing across ALL the Traffic Resources (not just TEs), and I focus on the ones with the best conversion rates. None of these traffic/conversion sites are advertising in the CTP games. Some of them don’t do CTP badges either.
I have to wonder if the “Sources” page in Trck.me was removed so we can no longer make those kinds of QUALITY comparisons. (This is now a ripe opportunity for other tracker services that do allow these types of traffic resource comparisons.)
ARE THE CTP GAMES HELPING YOUR BUSINESS?
It seems clear enough that the games help TE owners get more members. Do they get and retain membership upgrades sufficient to keep growing their businesses? If so, then the games serve a useful purpose.
But for the vast majority of us who are not TE owners and who surf to build our own non-TE businesses by promoting tools, training, products, and services, how effective have the CTP games been in helping us earn more money? Are these games helping to take our businesses to the next level?
Some clarification on the “Sources” page that has been removed from Trck.me…
The page was a very useful list of ALL the places where ALL a member’s ads are shown, and it ranked them by total hits or total conversions. So you could easily see where your ads were being seen the most (Hits) and where surfers were actually clicking the most (Conversions). The very best places for advertising appeared at the top of the conversions list, and that’s where I focused most of my surf time and ad budget.
When the “Sources” page disappeared (in June 2016) I thought it was a mistake. So I wrote to TimTech asking them to fix the problem. Turns out it was a deliberate choice to remove that page. Tim Linden replied:
Now there’s no way anymore in Trck.me to compare ALL Traffic Resources, and that’s a sorry situation. I wonder, if the page was removed because not many members were using it, then it could not have been using a lot of resources.
My own personal take on this is TimTech has a vested interest in NOT showing that comparison, because they own half a dozen of the listed TEs and compared to others the TimTech TEs may not have been performing well for many users. They did not get exceptionally good conversion rates with my advertising, compared to the other sources of traffic that I’ve been focusing on.
If you used the “Sources” page before it was removed, how would you compare TimTech’s TEs with other traffic resources?
Mr Bear,
I think you have hit some key points right on the head when it comes to using games.
Point 1: It seems clear enough that the games help TE owners get more members.
The Question: Do they get and retain membership upgrades sufficient to keep growing their businesses?
As a non-TE owner, you are more concerned with conversions and growing your online business. Completely understandable.
Myself, as a TE Co-owner, try to look at the complete picture. We do offer some games to our members as we want to appeal to every type of member using traffic exchanges. We want to appeal to the serious marketer, the casual marketer, and the hobby marketer.
Trust me when I say, there are many variable we look at when deciding what to offer our members. Will the game bring in new members? Will the game retain new members? Will the game enhance the surfing experience for those members who surf a lot? Will the game bring in new subscriptions? Does the game give our members something of value? Do the benefits of offering the game offset the cost?
The constantly changing environment of the TE Industry has us continually analyzing what to offer our members.
I greatly enjoyed this post. Thank you.
Thanks Catherine for these insights into all the variables a TE owner needs to keep reviewing in order to determine if the Games are helping their membership and their business.
The biggest thing we tried to get across with CTP Teams is….Your relationship and ability to build networks with like minded people.
Take a look at SurfAholics, Lucky13, CSN etc…These people are more than a team now, most of them are family. Some have started businesses together. Some have gone through a lot. Some are jut getting started.
It’s about the journey.
And that’s why we started it. The daily competitions are just to get your attention and compete together.
The main point is the relationship.
So we arent trying to build ‘leads’ we are trying to build networks.
I Agree with TameBear!
Games Increase My Surfing.
Look at SmileyTraffic, did MASSIVE without games.
OK, we had Sickers!
My Best Friend at Hit2hit Never Had Games!
156,550 Members!
TrafficG, Easyhits4u, SOAR in Memberbase, with
Not Playing Your Games.
Jon, with you paying Members, $0.01 on Every $1.00
spent, how can that help me?
Please Respond Jon, on how my Site Surfing won’t SOAR
and waste My Paying customers credits by money or
the Massive hours they surfed.
My Members Views must be wanted views, not chasing
a Donkey Carrot in front of face to move or to click.
You Must Agree, Jon, CTP, lessens the Credibility
of the Owner and NOT YOU, buy offering CTP at a site.
People Click to Get Something, Don’t give a F
about the page, YOU Know I’m Right, Jon.
Vern
Ready or not, the Season 8 CTP Games begin tomorrow! September 19,2016 at 12pm EST. There are a lot of changes in how the game is played this season, so here are the rules…
Link: Season 8
“CTP Teams is a funny beast. We’re going onto our 8th season and while there has been some less than memorable experiences, we are striving each and every season to create the most fun and excitement for you. Because of this goal, we tried really hard this season to put the power back into the surfers hands… “