Experts Edge with Dasha Nazarova

The Adcash Experts Edge series is back in action! And, this week we got chatting with Dasha Nazarova, the current Head of Marketing & Partnership Communications at RedTrack, one of the ultimate affiliate marketing tracking platforms in the world today. 

We got into topics covering… 

• Tracking tips for affiliates and media buyers
• Optimizing effectively to get the most out of incoming traffic
• The crucial steps needed to measure a successful campaign

So, without further delay, we bring you, Dasha Nazarova 😁

Could you please tell us about yourself?

I’m in charge of marketing and partnership communications at RedTrack.

Having been in digital marketing for five years now, I help different software and service companies succeed by going beyond borders and showcasing their products and services worldwide.

Together with the team and our partners, we drive innovation and make RedTrack a trusted and effective platform on the international market.

Tell us about RedTrack?

In 2017 RedTrack started out as a free to the public platform, but with limited functionality. When 2018 rolled around, we launched RedTrack as it is known today.

An advanced solution with a wide range of features and options. Today we are much more than just a tracking solution.

We cater to the needs of affiliates, media buyers, publishers, agencies, and eCommerce businesses with cutting-edge media buying, tracking, and analytics as well as state-of-the-art affiliate tracking and management.

We call our service a tracking and conversion attribution platform which simply means we give our users real-time insights into the performance of their campaigns and the performance of their traffic.

They’re able to turn these insights into data-driven decisions that maximize return on ad spend whilst unlocking actionable results to use in future campaigns for the same great outcomes.

What are the primary benefits of the RedTrack campaign tracker?

We match each click to the conversions they generate, meaning you always know which traffic brings in money and where you should perhaps be cutting or reducing your ad spend, in order to make the most of the winning combinations. 

We also provide different optimization features like auto-rules and traffic automated redistribution, meaning our system will help you to quickly understand where to put your money in order to get the best results for your campaign. 

In order to drive innovation to the fullest, we automate as many media buying processes as we can. We were the first tracker to implement the integration of different traffic sources via API. 

This feature allows you to start analyzing and running campaigns straight from the RedTrack server and you don’t need to switch between different platforms to manage your incoming traffic. 

To date, we have managed to integrate more than 20 different traffic sources including Google, Facebook, Outbrain, and (🥁 drumroll 🥁) Adcash is on the way too! 

Tech aside, our customer success and support team works tirelessly to ensure the best user experience possible.

Together with our support and product teams, we’re proud to say that we make sophisticated and advanced ad tracking easy to understand and hassle-free. 

How much does a RedTrack subscription cost?

A subscription to RedTrack starts out at $49 per month. The higher ones start from $399 monthly. We also have an early subscription incentive, where an affiliate would only need to pay for ten months, with the rest of the year being free of charge. 

The two first packages (basic and pro) are used for media buying mostly and to track campaign performance. 

The last two packages give you everything the media buying package does, but also includes a white-label panel for affiliate tracking. This panel gives you the power to run your own affiliate network or program with your own logo and brand identity.  

Is RedTrack accessible to newbies and those starting out in affiliate marketing? 

Yup, we’re totally newbie-friendly as well. To this day, we have a low financial barrier to entry. We have support for a basic plan which allows affiliates to start tracking right from the start.

If you’re treating affiliate marketing as a viable and meaningful business venture, you shouldn’t have a problem starting your first campaign and measuring the results for future gains. 

Do you have any advice for affiliate marketers who are first starting out?

If you’re first starting out, I’d advise you not to experiment a lot (just yet). Try to pick one traffic source and master it, whether that be Push, Google Ads, Facebook, etc.

Set out with the traffic source you’re good at, and after you’ve started to get some good returns, start experimenting with other traffic sources, adding more niches, offers, and combinations as you go.

Tie them all together and you’re set to succeed. And don’t forget to track your campaigns. 😁 

When you start out with one traffic source, (say Facebook ads) it makes sense to track through Facebook itself.

However, once you start scaling up your business and adding more elements to your advertising, it pays to have an all in one solution for your tracking and campaign analysis. 

What are the benefits of a quality tracker? 

I’d say the main benefit is Impartial analytics. Trackers aren’t interested in providing deceptive information and will always provide their users with the most up to the minute and exact data. 

Today, trackers really are more than just tracking platforms. They help you optimize your campaigns as well. For example, with RedTrack you can also optimize your campaigns and automatically see which are doing the best. 

This feature also monitors your daily/weekly ad budget, ensuring it doesn’t get eaten up by low performing campaigns and pays special attention to those with the highest success rates and growth potential. 

This last point is more important today than it’s ever been, with the craziness of 2020 decreasing global budgets and impacting what advertisers have been willing to spend on their most recent campaigns. 

What are the first three steps for measuring a successful campaign? 

In terms of reporting and analytics, put all your traffic sources on one dashboard. This will help you get a really good overview of what traffic sources bring in the most money. 

Secondly, dig a little deeper into your analytics and understand what factors influence a campaign’s performance. For example, your campaign might have performed better across the board with mobile traffic, so you might want to do away with desktop altogether. 

Or maybe you have a landing page in English and you realize traffic from China doesn’t convert here, so you can do away with this geo altogether or generate a version of this page into Mandarin and see how it converts. This is where you should give a lot of thought to filtering your traffic and segmenting your sources as you go.  

Thirdly, customize your dashboard. Trackers generate so much data, and this can sometimes lead to information overload. To make it easier, you should pinpoint the most important metrics to optimize with. I.e, make the data work for you and not against you. 

What does a day in your life at RedTrack look like?

I’ll usually start my day off going through my mailbox and skype messages. Then I’ll go through some industry-specific newsletters.

I’ll have a morning catch up call with my team and any partners that I need to speak to. I’ll then go to my task manager and see what important items I need to tick off. In the evening, I’ll have calls with the United States.

I also like to unwind with more creative tasks in the evening and avoid taking too many important decisions if I can help it. 

What industry newsletters do you subscribe to? Resources. 

I go with Stacked Marketer and DigiDay as my go-to sources. DigiDay is all about digital advertising and industry-specific news and updates.

I like attending webinars and, a plus is that lately, some great ones have sprung up. I also enjoy reading the blogs of our partners, i.e. Adcash and other affiliate networks. They always share great tips on how to work with ad traffic.

What skills does every affiliate need?

A budding affiliate who wants to make the most of their journey should be willing to put in the time investment and budget for returns that will appear down the line. 

And lastly, always be curious and willing to learn. Investigate the market and make sure you’re constantly networking with other affiliates. 

Get in touch!

Our team of seasoned experts is always around to help skyrocket your strategy and maximize your returns for bigger and better campaigns. Get in touch with us anytime and we’ll help you on your road to affiliate stardom! 🌟🌟

Also, if you want to put a little optimizing magic to the test and see what the competition might be up to, then check out our Guide to Affiliate Spy Tools and tell us which one works best for you. 

Be sure to check out our blog for more expert interviews and get growth hacks from the best in the business. That’s it for now. A big thank you to Dasha Nazarova and… catch you on the next one.

Bye for now.