FYI, I’m in LA right now at Yanik’s Underground Seminar, all I can say is that I’m TOTALLY blown away! I’ll give fill you in on the details when I get back.
Anyhow, here’s a letter I recently received from a reader in China :
“Dear Amit,
I kept reading your blog everyday since you started it last March.Your Blog is great.I learned so much from it.Your are my hero.Thank you for sharing your experiences so generously.
After reading your article:When & When NOT to Quit Your Job…,I thought a lot.I am in the same situation,and need your advice.
I am a graduate student in South China Normal University now and would get the Master ’s Degree in June. To find a job or not ,that is a question to me.
This is my situation:
- Income for Clickbank by GG Adwords method:$8000-10000/month
- but the keywords group is small,only include 20 keywords.Only promote one products.So it seems like the income is not stable.Anyway,it last for 5 months till now,and survived after two GG slaps.
- My family expense is about $400/month.I had a boy nearly 2 years old.And my wife is a fulltime mother.
- If I get a job(as a tearcher),the salary is about $500-600/month.Working 5 days/week,8 hours/day.
- If I go to work, it’s hard to get my affiliate income to a new level.If I take affiliate as my full job,maybe I could do better.My next goal is $30000/month if I go full time in affiliate marketing.It is big money in China,as you know.In addition, I have learned so much about affiliate marketing and don’t want to give it up.
But the market is always chanceful, No one can promise the affiliate income would last forever.In the contrast,the job can give me a stable income in the long run.
So,what should I do now? Could you give me some advices? Sorry for my poor English.
Thank you in advance.”
I wrote back to him and told him that he should go full time, considering his affiliate income is OVER 20 times his living expenses. Congrats to your success! 
Think about it, this fellow is in China, his English is not the greatest, and he’s a student – yet he managed to launch a successful ppc affiliate campaign that blows away what the average American makes.
And yet I continue to hear the same excuses from affiliates :
- I don’t have the time
- I don’t have the money
- My English isn’t very good
If you how rigorous the Chinese education system is you know he doesn’t have a ton of free time on his hands. Students in China go to college to actually learn, not binge drink and go to frat parties.
Do you think my reader from China “had the money”? Most newbie affiliates spend $25- $50 testing out a campaign for profitability.
Do you know how much money $25-$50 is in China?!?
His goal is to make $30,000/month. I have no doubt that he will.
Ever wonder why the Chinese economy is growing so fast?
Get off your butt, stop making excuses, and make it happen already!
Sorry what i mean is..
Clickbank is not accepting publisher and affiliate from China as far as I am concerned:
http://www.clickbank.com/affiliateAccountSignup.htm?key=
I’m a Chinese working as an Engineer in Russia and I felt a little bit angry reading that. That letter is soooo unnessary and to me, it sounded almost like ‘bragging’. C’mon, I mean the salary for most working professionals in China is not even close to $2000 let alone $10,000. I work like a dog and I’m still earning less than $10K/month.
And he already said that if he looks for a job the salary would only be around $500/month. That’s 6K per annum. And his current income? 120K per annum. Do the math.
Wow… this post should have gotten alot of people feeling ashamed of themselves.. and that includes me as well…
Well.. time to get fired up and blast my income up the roof!!
$30,000 a month.. That’s my dream income.. I’m only at $5000 a month now… 6 times more to go!
$8000-$10000 from just 20 keywords does seem a little hard to believe. I wonder if he meant gross income by chance.
Amit, do you even have campaigns/ad groups that small that make that kind of profit?
Hi,
Before everyone gets all excited, realize that he said his income (ie gross commissions from clickbank) is in the $8-10k range.
I don’t believe he’s saying his profit is anywhere near that level. (ie Profit = gross comms – traffic gen costs).
We have no idea what his PPC costs are, but assuming the 20 keywords are not of the long tail variety and they’re pretty competitive, i am not sure if his margin is beyond the 20%-50% range, unless he has very established bid history in his account and killer QS on his landing pages.
One other thing I’m wondering about is that in China, a large percentage of the credit cards are “domestic banking credit cards”. meaning they can only be used in China.
Because the forex controls are very severe in China, it’s near impossible to repatriate money into or out of China, so I’m keen to find out how he’s doing it too.
If he was cash rich and had the means to set up a PPC account, and be a baller like he sounds, why would he be considering a $500/month job?
It would be interesting to see some due diligence, and the guy could be real for all i know, though it sounds a little like linkbait to me…
If it’s for real, I don’t know anyone in their right mind who would do teaching instead of affiliate marketing, but it’d be interesting to hear how he managed to transfer enough of the China currency, the renminbi, somehow to the US and then build it up to $8-10k a month (while somehow maintaining US bank accounts – which I’m not aware that China citizens are able to open without a SSN.)
I’ve lived, studied and worked in the US and China and am pretty familiar with the business conditions, and if he’s able to do what he’s been able to, I’d be pretty impressed and amazed.
Hello,
I’m a reporter writing something about the March Google slap. Do you have a few minutes to chat?
Kind regards,
Betsy
Amit,
I agree with your response to your reader. If he set aside half of his affiliate marketing income for one month that would pay over a years worth of living expenses in an emergency.
~Debby
hi guys,
a newly opened google account with daily budget $100 right off the bat can get the kind of traffic needed to do $8k revenue, even with 20 keywords in a much tigher niche with a moderate cash flow activity. i have done that in a much tigher niche, and i did not have a long time performance history, but just my campaign performed well right from the beginning. Does anybody hire a professional market researcher? it helps a lot.
“Income for Clickbank by GG Adwords method:$8000-10000/month”…wow…that’s quite a huge sum of money. i wonder how expense he had spent on the adwords before he can made that kind of income?
Hmm, I’m kinda puzzled as well.
I assume he’s not making $10K from CB and spending $10K on Adwords?
Assuming he’s doing a fairly decent job, he should still be making way more than he would be at a conventional job, so why is he hesitating?
I’m studying as well, and really do hope to achieve a sizable income before I graduate! Current income is still chump change