The Golden Quarter period, with its grand Black Weekend and beyond, is a make or break time for all kinds of industry. Retail, services or e-commerce, businesses all over the world start preparing long before November comes.

The affiliate world shouldn’t be any different. The fast-paced and dynamic nature of the digital marketing industry requires the affiliate community to provide both publishers and advertisers with effective solutions for meeting the ever-growing demand with the right supply. 

This article is here to help you uncover the best practices and pro-tips for reaching peak campaign performance with Zeropark Push Ads during the Black Friday weekend and the whole Golden Quarter! 

Read on and scale your Black Friday profits using Zeropark like a pro!

Why make money with Zeropark’s push campaigns during the Black Friday craze

An essential step before throwing oneself into the whole Black Friday maze is asking how not to get lost in it.

With November 27th approaching fast, this question bothers both the retailers and consumers alike. This is because the first group has to fight an unimaginably massive competition, while the second is simply overflooded with all the Black Friday deals coming at them from multiple angles. Although people aren’t at all discouraged, they may be a bit confused at times. Why not help them a little? 

Luckily for all humankind currently undergoing a digital Black Friday evolution, Zeropark’s got a solution to aid the consumerist struggle — push notifications. 

Let’s face it, we all like getting comfortable. The more convenient a solution, the more natural it is for us to choose precisely that one. So, if instead of browsing through a multitude of Black Friday deals to find offers that match us best, we get them delivered straight to our phone! How much more convenient is that? Not to mention its beautifully packaged form of an elegant notification and careful targeting to match our buying habits as closely as possible. Hence, users are more likely to click on push offers rather than anything else if caught off guard! 

Also, mobile push notifications delivered straight to users’ phones have a more personal and direct feel to them. Thanks to this immediacy, users perceive such ads as more credible and trustworthy. That also makes push ads more probable to engage with. Therefore, the better we become at making push ads feel personally customized and dedicated, the higher the odds for conversion.
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Pro tips from iAmAttila for smashing push ad campaigns with Zeropark

Starting with the best practices and pro-tips for reaching peak performance of Zerapark push campaigns during Black Friday weekend, we introduce thirteen tips from an industry expert and super affiliate marketer himself — Attila Odri, also known as iAmAttila.

The following rules may not come as a revelation to you, but that’s because this business is built on universal truths. Also, it’s bricked with people who notoriously neglect them. Don’t be one of those people and avoid losing money by not following easy yet proven and effective solutions.

Instead, do as Attila says.

1. Use a tracker to track all the variables available!

Track every parameter of your campaign. This business is all about data — and you know that the better you want to progress in the affiliate industry, the more data you need. 

Trackers like Voluum allow you to modify your spend and get a higher ROI by identifying the elements of your campaign that work best. Affiliate ad tracker is an absolute must-have for you. Why? It’s simple — if you don’t track, you don’t know where you’re making money and where you’re losing it. 

Since Zeropark and Voluum allow complete and fully automated integration, aligning both platforms is fast and effortless. Also, even in the rare case of choosing a different tracker, all the tracking tokens are now generated within one click. 

While on the subject, do make sure all destination URLs are tracked properly so as not to lose on your conversion count in all the Black Friday craze. Zeropark’s Conversion Tracking option allows affiliates to keep their finger on the campaign’s pulse — so should you before November 27th comes! 

2. Run special promotions to announce discounts, e.g. Internal Notice: 50% OFF right now on t-shirts!

To do precisely that, begin with an all-time rule of choosing the right angle and the right way to promote it, especially before November 27th and then during the Golden Quarter period. 

Choosing an offer relevant to Black Friday is a must.

Rings a bell, doesn’t it?

An example of a Black Friday-relevant offer could be an invitation to fill out a form and get a bonus to spend in a promoted shop, which most definitely catches any user’s eye and generates leads needed for an ad to convert. Check out Google Trends to see what angles are worth tackling. For instance, seek what gift recommendations are searched the most and adjust your offers accordingly.

Most importantly, though, remember to use Attila’s suggestions and Zeropark tips when deciding what and how to promote with your Black Friday campaigns before November 27th comes. A sure-fire solution would be going for the Black Friday best-performing, Zeropark-proven verticals — Shopping, Surveys & Sweeps or Lead Generation.

3. Test multiple verticals, e.g. Dating, Crypto Offers, Shopping, Casino & Gambling, Surveys & Sweeps, etc.

For example, go for Shopping or Surveys & Sweeps Black Friday-themed ad combined with a proposal of winning something (discounts, gift cards or a gift itself), which should work wonders around this time of the year. 

Since the main focus of this article is running Black Friday push campaigns, we’ll focus on the chosen verticals only. Nevertheless, testing various angles is always a good idea, so remember that the tips and tricks presented here may be applied to other campaign types, too. Possibilities are endless, and the profit limit is up to you.

4. Image matters the most — test at least 10 different ads. e.g. 

Testing as many creatives as possible has been proven most effective with campaign optimization. For example, try two different texts and ten different images. Once you find a winning ad/image combo, test similar images to it. Since one ad creative is definitely not enough, don’t focus on a single one.

Have a number of patterns to test, but do make sure you’re able to identify the make-or-break element.

5. Test and use SMILEYS and EMOJIS (emojipedia to the rescue!)

Yes, we’re being deadly serious now. This may be simple, yet crucial for boosting your push ads campaign performance. Using text symbols and visual aids has been proven to increase the overall CTR. Use emojis, engaging graphics, type in special symbols (e.g. @, #, $, %, &, *) or create your own logos to make copy and designs of your push ads look even more professional. Mind the protected branding, though! 

Also, the opening/preview/title line is extremely important! Since you want people to click on your ads, you have to make these ads noticeable enough. Clearly visible and attention-grabbing first liners are the absolute must.

Add straightforward captions, which include key phrases like: 

• Black Friday Discounts
• Best Cyber Monday Deals on Electronics
• Save Up to X% this Black Weekend 
• Best Boyfriend/Girlfriend/Mum/Dad Gift Ideas
• Get Your Christmas Gifts Early for X% less

This is because users acknowledging the sole existence of your push ads and actually viewing them means your campaign is already taken one step closer to users engaging with your ads and clicking the notifications. This leads to users potentially viewing your landing pages, thus engaging with the offers, and subsequently purchasing the products. Such action flow completes the whole affiliate advertising cycle with the desired results.

All starting with a smiley face or a tiny fruit. 

6. Test different landing pages with different looks/copy/authority images.

There are numerous tricks out there to make your landing pages user and conversion-friendly. The rule is simple, image is the bait, copy is the tackle. We’ve analyzed the past years’ best-performing campaigns from the Golden Quarter period and found out the these simple, yet wonders-working patterns:

• BREAKING NEWS! Creating a sense of urgency is much recommended to prompt users into taking the desired action. Hint users they’re running out of time. There are limitless creative options to so do, visual representations include countdowns, promo-end date timers, hourglass, etc.
• IT’S BLACK FRIDAY BABY! Have your designs aligned with the general Black Friday tune. Black themes contrasted with bright colors make instant connotations with the Black Weekend deals, even before a user has time to read that big flashy caption screaming it’s already this time of the year. Banner blindness fighting in its finest form.
• KEEP IT SIMPLE! Don’t elaborate, keep your message simple. Especially in case of push notifications — these are to notify, not to lull to sleep. Keywords and simplicity are your allies.
• THEY’LL DO AS THEY’RE TOLD! A clear and simple Call To Action is everything. For example, Claim your gift NOW sounds like a very clickable call getting you just the right amount of attention you need in this case.

7. Use translation platforms to get high-quality native translations — else your Conversion Ratio will suffer big time!

Since a good campaign is a terrible thing to waste, you shouldn’t let your hard work lie unused. Surely, wherever you come from, you’d be more than happy to spontaneously view an ad saying #$*&$#*&%$@# %, right? Oh, wait … are you having a problem understanding what’s written here? Reusing the same well-working pattern for various GEOs is highly profitable as long as people are able to read and understand your offers.

With the Black Friday craze is taking over the world country by country, year by year, and Western Europe already deeply buried under its influence, running such campaigns in DE, FR, ES or IT should be worth giving it a go.

8. Use GooglePageSpeed to get insight into your lander and what causes slowdowns, then optimize it.

Another problem that may be encountered with the high volumes of online traffic is the page loading speed. Even the biggest online retailers who should be armed to their teeth when it comes to fighting users overload face this issue every Black Weekend. Again, in order for your campaign to work well, this need to fall in place.

9. Check and make sure your landing page looks great on different devices.

While on it, make sure you don’t forget to include the above tip as well! There are many free tools available that allow you to test website performance on mobile devices, e.g. https://ready.mobiso.

10. Use the targeting features available on Zeropark to run offers specific to the device type, e.g. if you sell cool smartphone cases, run push ads on mobile only.

This has never been truer than now — looking at Zeropark data, September 2019 alone shows approximately 85% of user clicks came from mobile devices as opposed to desktop. With the predominant adoption of mobile devices and data clearly showing where all the users are, the need to target mobile OS during Black Weekend is indisputable. 

Zeropark is able to track the proportion of clicks performed on mobile and desktop devices, going even further down to the carrier or OS type. The chance to use such filters during the campaign setup and targeting process is priceless for affiliates who decide to run very specific campaigns. 

For example, narrowing down your audience only to the users with the newest versions of mobile OS lets affiliates reach a strictly targeted niche, skipping the old, thus irrelevant, device versions.

Also, as obvious as it sounds, using mobile Android devices is generally a cheaper and much more common option worldwide than desktop. When, if at all, push ads will come to iOS depends solely on Apple and their wish to launch web push notifications on their products. As a result, opting for mobile Android targeting means reaching many more users and much higher chances for conversion, which is worth noting especially with other ad formats.

11. Send personalized discount codes using push ads and targeting countries or cities where most of your sales come from.

Remember what affiliates say about trying to reinvent the wheel? Just don’t. Focus on what’s already working well. The same principle can be applied for choosing where to target your Black Friday affiliate ad campaigns — proven GEOs work best in such cases. 

That’s why there’s no need to rack one’s brain. Think where the Black Weekend and the whole Golden Quarter hit the hardest. Obviously, the answer is to go where the rich people are, meaning Tier 1 countries (e.g. US, GB, AU, CA, DE). 

Naturally, getting even more granular than country targeting is highly recommended. Zeropark gives you the possibility to narrow down the scope of your campaign to a given region or city. Since the success of your Black Friday affiliate marketing ad campaigns depends on the correct alignment of the offers with their target audience, this might come in as quite a nifty trick.

12. Run special CITY ONLY specials to make people feel like you are talking to them personally.

Since the peak of the shopping craze is visibly higher in the bigger cities rather than in less populated areas, use the Region and City optimization to target precisely those. If we take the example of US, Zeropark data proves cities like Los Angeles, New York, Miami or Chicago to be the top places to hit as opposed to smaller towns of Kentucky or Alabama. 

However, if your offer is more relatable to online-only rather than brick-and-mortar audience, focusing on the broader spectrum is suggested. That’s why depending on who you want to address, as in simply talk to, opting for broader or more precise geo-location may be crucial to the success of your affiliate efforts.

Last but not least is the simplest of them all, the lucky …

13. Once you find a winner, don’t wait and scale up!

How to do exactly that while enjoying your autumn drinks and watching the money rolling in? Identifying best-performing targets and sources by running RON campaigns is always much recommended. 

After all that hard work is done and you’ve gone all the way from the broad and general to narrow and precise targeting, it’s time for Zeropark automation solutions to lift some weight off your shoulders. Use Rule-Based Optimization feature or Custom Bidding to optimize and scale up your campaigns by adjusting the automatic set-up of best-performing targeting. This ensures a blink of an eye reaction to any traffic fluctuations, which no human is capable of doing.

Scale Black Friday Profits Using Zeropark Like a Pro

Think, ask, research, and draw your own conclusions — there is no golden mean, only golden pieces of advice that other super-affiliates and industry experts can help you with. Now your job, as a clever affiliate, is to put it all together depending on what you want to achieve with a particular type of an affiliate ad campaign you’re about to run during the upcoming Black Friday craze.

Just to remind you of the scope of the phenomenon we’re talking about, Black Friday deals pops more than 2,5 billion searches on Google. And it’s only the tip of the wave of money that’s about to flow into the business. Ride it like a pro or miss out and let others make money from it — it’s your choice.

Don’t wait, act. With November becoming the prime month of retail sales in the affiliate channel, taking over the past decades’ December peak, there’s no time to waste. Demand for affiliate advertising will be strong with online users this month. May the force of conversion be with you.

Run Your Black Friday Campaigns With Zeropark Now!

Kinga Gawron