insights from a blockchain developer, researcher & investor
exploring emerging opportunities in decentralized finance
3 DIFFERENT WAYS I CAN HELP
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Internet Marketers Web Browser of Choice
Here are some stats from Google Analytics for this blog: I thought it was interesting to see how far behind Internet Explorer has fallen for people who know how to use a computer. It was only 5 years ago when they an 85%ish share in the market. In 5 years time I would expect it…
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First Steps in Automation
One of the great things about this industry is the lifestyle flexibility it offers you. The dream is to setup a campaign or website, let it run itself and live off the money tree you’ve made. In reality it rarely works like this but automation can release hours off your daily routines and go some…
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Optimising Nginx in Linux
I found one of the servers was throwing up a 500 error quite regularly. I checked the logs and in /var/log/nginx/error.log I found the following errors: socket() failed (24: Too many open files) while connecting to upstream, client socket() failed (23: Too many open files in system) while connecting to upstream, client Solution was to…
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Lessons learned from writing a bespoke tracking platform
For a recent project I wanted to develop a tracking platform which was specifically designed to suit my needs. It needed to be simple to use, capable of handling seven figure audiences daily and built on technology I understand so it can be customised on the go. I decided to build it arround php /…
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Combining Maxmind GeoIP with Google Maps iFrame
This is a quick script which uses Maxminds geoip location db downloadable for free from here with Google Maps iFrame. I haven’t tested this enough to find out if Google restrict the number of requests by referrer but you could always put a meta refresh page in the iframe to blank the referrer if thats…
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Resizing images and adjusting landing pages based on screen resolution
So many browsers so many different screen resolutions. Here’s a way to modify html code based on the screen resolution of the browser. In this example I have changed an image but there is no reason why you cant change text, font size or even use it to redirect users who have mobile sized screens.…
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Loading a conversion pixel on click through
Mobile campaign optimisation throws up a number of issues in regard to tracking. One thing I’ve found really useful is to load a conversion pixel on click through from the landing page to the offer page. This can be a traffic source pixel which can then be used to give some indication of site/device/carrier quality…
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iframe to a specific div id on a landing page
Below is the code to iframe an offer page but cut out all the stuff you don’t need. This is useful if you just want to iframe the form while using your own images etc. This is setup so you just enter the url and div id you want to jump to at the top…
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Mobile Multivariate Testing with SubID’s
Due to slow page load speeds it is advised to keep tracking software to minimum when running mobile campaigns. This caused me a problem when trying to develop and optimise a mobile landing page. Because I wasn’t using prosper or any other tracking software I couldn’t plug in my custom multivariate testing scripts. I was…
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Neverblue Out of Bounds Whistler 2012
Some photos from the Whistler trip with Neverblue. Top of Whistler Mountain Neverblue Party Crew Ice bar View from ATV ride Victoria home of the Neverblue offices It was a great opportunity to spend time with the Neverblue team, other affiliates and spammers alike. Alot of fun, left handed drinking, good food and all the…
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Simple HTML Cheat Sheet
Rich’s Simple HTML Cheat Sheet <h1>This is a heading</h1> <b>This is bold</b> <i>This is itallic</i> <br /> = New line = Extra Space <a href=”contacts.htm”>Contact Form</a> = Link <img src=”images/picture.jpg” /> = image <font size=”3″>hello world</font> = changes font size Lists <ul> <li>List item1</li> <li>List item2</li> </ul> Tables <table> <tr> <td>top left</td> <td>top…
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Prosper202 Mod – Set preferences before crashing server
Had a bit of an issue with Prosper crashing once the database got too big. I would log out and leave the analysis preferences set to my biggest traffic source and when I logged back in the server would crash as it tries to pull a report before you can modify the search critieria. I…
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Romania Advertising Agency – Oops Media
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Reasons to Love Neverblue in 2012/2013
Looks like Neverblue are taking their affiliates to Phuket Thailand in March 2013! Wow!
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What was that Country Code?
Have problems remembering all the different country codes for geolocation scripts etc? Switzerland gets me everytime! Here’s a handy list you can use to check before you code. I use Maxmind but this will be accurate for any software that uses the ISO 3166 standard. AD = Andorra AE = United Arab Emirates AF =…
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Apache Logs – Disk Space Ubuntu Plesk
One of my servers started groaning early last week and it turned out I had log files accumulating to nearly 1TB. Log rotation was switched on but it still wasn’t ideal. I solved this by ssh’ing into a root shell and running the following command: du -a /var | sort -n -r | head -n…
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Anyone planning on running $15,000,0000 to Clickbooth this Summer?
I know there are other prizes further down the list but really… That works out at $166,666.66 USD a day in revenue. If Mark Zuckerberg is reading stick some 300×250’s on your site and you could keep the new shareholders happy and get yourself an island. For everyone else if you can get their offers…
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Cupid PLC Kildermorie Lodge Scotland
Thank you so much to all the team at Cupid PLC for organising an amazing trip to Kildermorie Lodge, near Inverness, Scotland. I’ve never been so surrounded by forward thinking people and whiskey. Here’s some photos from the trip: Fishing, shooting, Glenmorangie tour, great food and possibly the darkest game of charades ever played! Thanks…
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Googler Helping Affiliates…. in 2012!
Just when you think everyone working under advertising at Facebook and Google has been treated to a common sense bypass I get a lovely message like this. Hello James, Thank you for writing in. Hope you’re doing well! I’m Jaya, from the Google AdWords Support Team and I’ll be assisting you with your queries today.…
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Script.aculo.us – Interactive Landing Pages
Interaction is key in modern web design and one of the tools I’ve found to be very helpful in making a more interactive environment is script.aculo.us It is basically a javascript inlcude which can provide you with a whole load of effects and functions to use on your landing pages. Check out a simple example…
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Virgin Media Blocks Piratebay.se
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Internet World London 2012
Earls Court, London was home to Internet World 2012 and on a wet Wednesday morning in April I jumped on a train to check it out. It was my first visit to this show and I came away with mixed feelings. I was hoping it was going to be like ad-tech but there was only…
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15 Tools I Couldn’t Live Without
Everyone has their own set of tools that makes their day to day working life easier. Below I have made a list of the tools I use regularly and recommend to others. Notepad ++ – A great little text editor for windows (I use Kate in Linux). I pretty much hand code everything now so…
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Affiliate Marketing 101 | A Timeline for Success
Time Frame: 3 Years Day 1 – The Study Period Read, read, read. You’ve probably heard from a friend, colleague or just through the grapevine that people are making alot of money promoting affiliate products online and want a piece of the action. It’s time to start soaking up knowledge to give yourself an idea…
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Direct Response Marketing Pushing CPC Prices Up – The Future for Google Adwords
I was asked to setup a little campaign for an offline electrical company on “The Google”. The business they operate in is electrical testing or PAT testing as it is known here in the UK. It’s the kind of industry where I wouldn’t expect to find much competition when it comes to online marketing. That…
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The Neverblue Velo Bankruptcy Saga
On April 3rd Velo Holdings the parent company of Vertrue which in turn is the parent company of Neverblue (have I got that right?) filed for bankruptcy. Performer insider released an “affiliate marketing is dead” post and I’m sure alot of affiliates, myself included, panicked. A generic email followed which stated “we intend to make…
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Ruby & Selenium Script to Check Google SERP ranks
Haven’t used this in a while but it used to work really well untill google would throw a captcha at you after the first 5000 queries. Might be of use to someone. It’s designed for linux and you’ll need selenium up and running to work it. #!/usr/bin/env ruby require ‘rubygems’ gem ‘selenium-client’ require ‘selenium/client’ system(‘java…
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Engage BDR – Self-serve RTB
Have you seen these ads all over the internet? Chances are pretty high it was probably served by Engage BDR. Up until now their minimum deposit just to test a campaign was $25,000 USD. Which for most affiliates is completely out of reach but now they have released a new real time bidding platform which…
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Handling large volumes of data with Prosper202
IMO the default version of prosper202 isn’t really designed to handle large volume media buys. The latest version 1.7.2 does make it easier with a simple click to clear click data button but it can still prove difficult to pull off reports once the ammount of data you are analysising exceeds a certain limit. The…
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Captcha Cracker For PHPBB written in Ruby
It’s been a while since I’ve done much in SEO so I am going to start publishing some of my old scripts. This is a captcha cracker which uses gocr and image magick to decipher phpbb captchas. It’s written in ruby and was designed as part of a backlink building module. You’ll need linux, gocr,…
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Rotating Offer Pages and Landing Pages in Prosper202
It is really easy to setup rotation of urls in Prosper but if you actually want to track which url is doing better or you want to test different landing pages it can be a little more challenging. One way to do this is to set each url or landing page up separately and then…
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SiteScout RTB – A Walk Through
Update 23/08/12 – If you are interested in working with Sitescout make sure you check out their superb knowedge base. Sitescout is a great traffic source for display advertising. They basically act as a reseller for remnant traffic from some of the biggest ad exchanges in the world. There is needless to say massive volume…
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Jim.am Acquired
With more than just a slight nod of the head to my favourite online marketing blog MrGreen.am I have moved the blog away from the business website to jim.am OK 3rd best might be a little bit of an exageration but if I can get the content flowing and get some interest I think it…
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In-Text Advertising | Ultimate Guide
Updated April 2020 In-text advertising is a form of digital advertising that replaces words on a website with links paid for by advertisers. An advertiser bids for keywords and provides a destination URL. These keywords are replaced with links using a Javascript snippet on the publishers website. In 2020 the leading in-text advertising networks are:…
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Tracking CPS Networks With Prosper202 and CPV Lab
In the UK alot of affiliate marketing is done through cost per sale networks. The big ones being Tradedoubler and Affiliate Window. Here is how to integrate their backend systems with a performance based tracking system such as prosper202. TradeDoubler add &epi=[[subid]] Affiliate Window add &clickref=[[subid]] Affiliate Future add &tracking=[[subid]] Commission Junction add &sid=[[subid]] nb.it…
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Prosper 202 Mods 2012
Prosper202 mods 1) increase session life – stops it logging you out every five minutes when you are trying to work add the following line just before session_start(); in 202-config/connect.php ini_set(‘session.gc_maxlifetime’,99999); 2) bypass adverts on first page – bit naughty but I prefer to jump straight into the spy section to see whats been going…
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Big Thank You To Neverblue for Out of Bounds Dominican Republic
Just like to say a big thank you to Neverblue for organising Out of Bounds Dominican Republic. It was an amazing experience to be surrounded by like minded people and have all the luxuries the Neverblue team laid on. Sun Rise Punta Canna 2012 My main takeaways from the trip were:- Mobile advertising is expanding…
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Translation Options When Advertising Globally
When scaling successful campaigns to different countries the biggest stumbling block can be the language barrier. Unless you are a fluent or have a babelfish at hand the chances are that you are going to need some help to translate your ad copy. There are a number of options and we have outlined each below…
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Using Adsense Section Targeting
If you are getting lots of Groupon and Three ads on your adsense niche site the chances are it isn’t optimised correctly. By simply writing a short, keyword rich, snippet of what your site is about and surrounding it in the following tags you can manipulate which ads are shown. <!– google_ad_section_start –> Jet internet…
