My campaign setup checklist

While setting up my few first campaigns for the follow along here I came up with a following checklist to follow.

I (still) have a day job so Monday-Friday time is very limited and I need clear tasks to complete ASAP in the few hours that I have. I created this checklist so I don’t have to think about what to do and just follow the steps and set up that campaigns. It’s been designed for Decisive and sub $1 payouts, so adjust the Smart CPM and daily spend accordingly.

Hopefully it will be useful for someone else. Fell free to suggest changes and improvements.

Pre-conditions: offer and traffic source are selected, only one creative size is used

Milestone 1: Research product

• Use similarweb.com and record the target demographics, traffic sources and overall traffic
• Use alexa.com and record the target demographics, traffic sources and overall traffic
• Use compete.com and record the target demographics, traffic sources and overall traffic
• Use sitedossier.com, ipinfo.io and builtwith.com to find the hosting location, domains in the IP range neighbourhood and technology
• Use semrush.com to find their AdWords ads (if any), top competitor domains and top ranking keywords
• Use ahrefs.com to find their top competitor domain, top ranking keywords and top domains that are direct linking to them
• Follow the conversion path (download app, sign up for a service).
• Check if the offer is direct or brokered. Find out the actual supplier.
• Check the offer on OfferVault for a higher payout (for future scaling)
• Using all of the above, wild guess the potential customer avatar (sex, age, location and timezone, occupation, income, problems they have that offer solves)
• Search Google for product reviews and testimonials. Write down positive and negative qualities that stand out.
• Find one or more backup offers to switch the traffic over in case of offer caps or shutdown

Milestone 2: Competitor research (using proxy in target country)

• Wild guess a few keywords that potential customer may be using (or use ones found in milestone one)
• Use wild guessed keyword above and product name keywords to search Google images for the creatives
• Save all creatives that are directly related to the offer an ...