For those who haven’t been following along, I’m about to release a killer new tool for CPA marketing, called Easy Prepop. Check out the video if this is the first you’ve heard about it.
So it’s been fun, but version 1.0 is ALMOST ready to enter the world. I’ve got a release candidate up right now, that I would love some feedback on. I’m letting anyone and everyone try this out, and once I have a 1.0 version then I will deactivate the beta version(s).
Grab the latest version from here.
You can check out some temporary tutorials here:
[cdnvault]mode=videos|autoplay=true|file=easy_prepop/01_ep_install.m4v|title=Easy Prepop Install[/cdnvault]
[cdnvault]mode=videos|autoplay=true|file=easy_prepop/02_EP_Landing_page_creation.m4v|title=Easy Prepop Landing Page Creation[/cdnvault]
[cdnvault]mode=videos|autoplay=true|file=easy_prepop/03_EP_Adding_offers.m4v|title=Easy Prepop Adding Offers[/cdnvault]
[cdnvault]mode=videos|autoplay=true|file=easy_prepop/04_EP_Custom_Coreg.m4v|title=Easy Prepop Custom Coreg[/cdnvault]
[cdnvault]mode=videos|autoplay=true|file=easy_prepop/Real_Example_and_Reporting.m4v|title=Real Example and Reporting[/cdnvault]
(this one was from an earlier version that had a bug in it with lead reporting, that has since been fixed. But if you ever see it not firing a lead when it should, please let me know!)
[cdnvault]mode=videos|autoplay=true|file=easy_prepop/EP_RC_3.1.m4v|title=Easy Prepop RC 3.1[/cdnvault]
(video created as of RC3.1)
Please report any bugs, issues, comments, or anything else to:
https://tooltrainer.com/tools/easy-prepop-known-bugsissues
Whoever gives me the most bugs/feedback will get a free copy of the software along with another special surprise. 
Have at it!
Jonathan
P.S.
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS:
WordPress 3.0 or higher
PHP 5.0 or higher
I think that’s all but I’m sure someone will let me know if not!
Download still appears to be broken – 5/12/2011 11:30pm EST.
I am getting a not redirecting properly error message, I will try again later.
Hey Jonathan: I get a weird error notice saying that this file
located here: http://tooltrainer.com/tools/www.tooltrainer.com/easy-prepop-rc1.zip
cannot be downloaded because an unknown error occurred.
This happens when I right click to “save link as”
if I left click it says that the page cannot be found.
Good grief that was a stubborn link! LOL
Working for me now at long last though… anyone still having issues?
Sorry folks!
Jonathan
It’s not working for me properly.
Can’t find button for add campaign and also can’t see your screenshots:(
Hi Alex,
Have you watched the latest tutorials yet? There is no “add campaign” button, you just create a page like normal.
Also, what screenshots are you referring to?
Thanks,
Jonathan
Alex,
I just realized maybe by “screenshots” you meant the tutorial videos? I had hit my Screencast bandwidth cap earlier since so many people are now watching these videos, so I increased it and you should be able to watch them now. Sorry for any confusion!
Jonathan
Wondering if this Pre Pop Plugin will work for Led Gen or only for email and Zip submit.
In its very first release, it’s intended specifically for use with email submit offers. BUT the truth is, if you’re advanced enough to use the special parameters supported in the shortcode, you can actually make it do just about anything as far as filling out a form on the next page. I also have an ever-growing list of features that I plan to add, but I had to stop it somewhere for 1.0.
This is just the beginning, I’ve got great plans for this… 😉
Jonathan
I am struggling to get this to work as explained in the videos. I understand that you only submit to pages on your own domains (not “live” cpa-offers), but I have problems with the form settings and posting/return url to work.
I have the Profit Theme set up, but have had no luck getting the email-submit sequence to work with Aweber (or other responders).
1) which URL do I specify as return/thank-you; The target offer page, (f.i. the affiliate link w/ em={!email} ), or do I point it back to my wp-page (- to reuse the traffic)?
I have also tried setting it up with the simple form code [ep_form] example used in your video, and that worked OK for populating the opt-in form on the CPA landing page. But when hitting “submit” it went to page 2 of the offer (i.e. did not rotate to the next offer) although I had several offers listed for rotation.
Is there any settings or linking strategies for getting the rotation script to “kick in” on the CPA offer page?
I’m really want to get this working, either with Aweber integrated or just rotating & populating the offers.
Hal
Hey Hal, thanks for kicking the tires for me!
So, first off the 1.0 release of EP isn’t set up to smoothly integrate with autoresponders. Not to say you couldn’t make it work but it’ll take a little hacking of pages. Getting an autoresponder to work with ProfitsTheme should actually be extremely easy, since you just have to paste in your AR code into the optin box while you’re editing your page settings.
The tricky thing with using an autoresponder is that you have no choice but to come back to a page that you control, so that you can once again retrieve the email address from the AR, then reassign the subid (since the AR never returns the address in a subid that will match what you need it to be for the affiliate network), and then redirect the visitor to the offer URL with the correct subid.
As for using the Traffic Recapturing feature, make sure when you’re editing your page, that in the Landing Page Settings box, you have checked Recapture Traffic. If that isn’t checked, then you’ll get just what you saw… going to page 2 of the offer etc.
So give that a shot to start out. I do plan to have smooth integration of EP with autoresponders btw, I just had to decide to push it out past 1.0, in order to get something usable out the door.
Let me know how it goes from here!
Jonathan
Any chance you can do a quick tutorial with a clean wp install? I don’t have, nor have I ever used profits theme. I’m not a complete noob when it comes to coding, but I haven’t used shortcodes before. Is it pulling css, buttons, & templates from the plugin folder or the theme folder.
I’m assuming it’s from the plugin folder, but not sure how I call a button. Does it have to be in the images folder… or a buttons folder within the images folder?
Can you do a basic form build using a clean wp-install? Throw some button images into a folder somewhere and tell me what path the plugin is using?
Sorry if that’s a lot to ask, but I don’t want to change all of my sites to profits them just to effectively use your plugin
Yeah I plan to do an in-depth tutorial on advanced use of the shortcode, but it’s going to be at least a few days while I juggle some other things.
The short answer for you though is that you can reference whetever you want, in any location. For example this would generate a form with a custom button image:
[ep_form img_src=’http://mydomain.com/images/image.jpg’] img_width=’150′ img_height=’50’ img_name=’my-image’]
Everything is technically optional except the src, without that the other parameters won’t do anything.
So you see, you can point to any URL you want in order to pull your image, it can be in a folder on your server, or on another domain or server all together. For css you can do in-line CSS like this:
[ep_form field_style=’font-size:20px;’]
That would generate a default form, but with the text field in a 20px font. You can also add button text like:
[ep_form field_style=’font-size:20px;’ but_text=’Click Me!’]
You can do just about anything you can do with HTML really.
Hope that helps for now, but feel free to keep the questions coming!
Jonathan
thanks… yeah that clears it up quite a bit
Hi Jonathan
Thank you for the explanation.
I have been using your original email-submit setup with Aweber some time back, so I know the process of returning & capturing the data into the landing page to be added to the offer url, before submitting to the offer page. So in theory I could add the required code in the PT Custom Script – Custom Header Script section.
But I see that Aweber warn against using a WP page as thank-you/return path, as the string of data returned might conflict with the WP link / permalink structure (or so is my experience).
But I can live with waiting for the AR functionality in the later version.)
I tried the 20px short-code mentioned in your reply, and checked the “Recapture traffic” option in the Setting. On the first test (with 4 offers) it would still go to page 2 when clicking the Continue button on the CPA LP.
In another test, with the same batch of offers, the email did not transfer to the CPA LP, but after adding it into the email field, it did reload to the next offer, with the email inserted, and shuffled through every offer thereafter. It was so exciting to click and shuffle through offer after offer – with the email entered in 🙂
So yes, it does transfer the email to the landing page, but not on a consistent basis (or it might be something in my setup) and does not rotate & populate the next offer page upon submission.
I am testing on US-only offers, and use a cloaking script to get an US IP address (I’m located outside of US) so this COULD be part of the problem. On the other hand – as the offer page loads and forward to the next pages & offers, this might not be the case?
BTW – I’m using XP and Firefox 3.6.17
One more question:
Do I just enter the email token (f.i. em) – or is any additional code (like &em=) needed in the prepop subid field?
The reason for asking, is that Neverblue use “em”, and all offers display the email OK on the LP when run through easy prepop, while Maxbounty is said to use “x=em”, but the email does not display on the LP, even though all offers tested is labeled “Email Submit” offers.
When a link with http://maxbountyofferlink&x=em=your@email.com is entered into the browser URL field, the email IS entered on the LP.
But when entering x=em in the prepop subid filed, it does not display (at least in my tests).
Keep up the good work:)
Best Regards
Hal
Hey Hal, love to hear that you’ve got it (mostly) working! =)
So here are my thoughts on what you’re seeing so far…
1. Make sure while you’re testing, you are in “Test mode” in the EP settings page. If you’re not in Test mode, then the campaign URLs and some other stuff are stored in a cookie and when you make changes in your campaign (like adding more URLs, changing a subid, etc.) they won’t be picked up when you go through the offer path. Test mode forces the script to check the database on every page request no matter what, so it should always pick up any changes. If you see this problem even when you ARE in test mode, please do let me know!
2. For the subid field, all you enter is the token itself. No = or anything else. So just em or email or whatever the subid is.
3. For Maxbounty, I’m 99% certain what they’re telling you (probably without realizing it) is that their subid field is just plan em. A query string like this:
http://maxbountyofferlink?x=em=your@email.com
is just going to assign a null (empty) value to the ‘x’ subid, and the email address to the ’em’ subid. I’ve had users of my prepop method contact me before with this same confusion, because MaxBounty insists that’s their subid code… but it can’t actually be. It will work however, because the x= just doesn’t do anything. My guess is someone at MB saw it work once and said “OK that must be the code” without understanding it.
So try just using em with max bounty, it should work. If it DOESN’T work… I’ll need to look more deeply at their links, but I would be shocked if that were the case.
Keep the feedback coming!
Jonathan
Hi Jonathan,
This is a great tool and thanks for the beta access.
I have a couple of questions:
– Is a lead capture system (aweber, icontact, mailchimp) requiered (or recommended) in order to capture the emails?
– Does the version 1.0 have a prepopped exit function in case people click the exit button?
Thanks!
Hi Mike,
1) It’s not required in order to use it as a device to prepop the offer pages. However Easy Prepop itself does not capture the emails in a way for you to be able to contact those people. Sure you could copy/paste the addresses, or pull them out of the database directly, but it’s not really meant for that in 1.0. Definitely on the top of the list to add after 1.0 ships though.
2) No exit function built in currently, though you could certainly add one easily to your landing page in WP. I’ll see if I can think of a good way to add code to the offer pages, I have an idea of how that could be done fairly easily but I don’t think it will make 1.0.
Keep the feedback coming! =)
Jonathan
Hi Jonathan
I did a new test with different offers.
“Test mode” checked in EP Settings and “Reuse traffic” checked on page setting.
Email transfer OK to most Neverblue & Epic offers, but clicking the Continue button on page 1 goes to page 2, not the next offer/LP.
One other thing that struck me after the last run where the offers rotated when “Continue” was clicked. None of the hits show up in my stats as conversion, as it (probably) just rotated to the next, without really submitting the email to page2.
The MaxBounty email id (em) does not work on the MB offers I tried.
The naming convention may not be consistent, as some LP just have “email” as label in the LP form.
Looking forward to the next release, where (if I understand correctly) more options (to test 🙂 will be added.
Hal
Great feedback Hal, thanks! Very interesting results. Here are my thoughts…
1) Make sure these offers can be framed. After you submit from the EP lander, make sure you are still located in the EP frame at a page called ‘rotator.php’. It’s possible the offers you’ve selected have frame busters on them, which would cause the behavior you’re seeing and break EP. If you’re sure frame busters aren’t the issue, then I’m really curious to see this for myself. Can you send me the offer links in a ticket to support@tooltrainer please?
2) If you actually clicked continue on the offer, and you were still located in the EP frame, then the conversions should definitely have registered, as that’s not just rotating. If you were simply hitting refresh, then yes it would merely rotate to the next offer. But submitting the offer should count as a conversion. Make sure you’re viewing the conversion report and not the lander report maybe? Again if I could see this first hand it would really help!
3) For the MB subids, make sure they work without EP in the mix at all first. Just append the em or email or whatever to the raw affiliate link, and make sure it prepops. If it doesn’t, then that’s not the right code. And if it works as x=em=whatever then you can go ahead and put x=em= in the EP subid field, I just wouldn’t understand WHY that works if the simple em= doesn’t.
Keep me posted, let’s see if we can’t get this working 100% for you!
Jonathan
Hi Jonathan,
I have definitely clicked the “Continue” button on the landing page. And I was checking on my network account if anything was registered as conversion. Only those where I did go to page 2 was counted as conversion.
I’ve sent you more details to your support email.
Looking forward to what you can find 🙂
Regards
Hal
Aha! I may have overlooked the obvious. It sounds like this offer doesn’t pay until page 2. Right now, the Traffic Recapture feature of Easy Prepop automatically kicks in after page 1.
After 1.0 is finalized I’ll be adding the ability to choose what page each offer recaptures on, so it will be able to handle offers that pay out on another page, or simply allow you to not always recapture on page 1, but allow some visitors to convert further down the path.
I’ll check the details you sent in support, but if you could find out if that offer pays on page 1 submit or page 2, that could definitely tell us the answer!
Jonathan
All offers on that page is “Email Submit” i.e. only requirement to be paid is a valid email entered on page 1. No one require a submission of page 2.
But it might be that reaching (i.e. “passing through to -) page 2 is necessary for the “Pixle to fire” – or the conversion to be counted. Bun none offer require submission of anything from page 2.
So yes – it might be that “landing” on page 2 is needed in any case – before rotating to the next offer, or it will not be registered.
I have sent a list of the offers and networks on the page, all listed as “Email Submit” – and all with the “em” entered as the Prepop Subid.
Hal
Just an update to my previous post: I have on several occasions that checking the “Recapture Traffic” in the Easy Prepop Lander Setting does not “stick”.
After checking this option and updating the page, going out and returning for a new edit, the check-mark is gone in the Setting.
Hal
Thank you for the “not sticking” feedback! I saw that at one point too but then couldn’t make it happen anymore. If you can ever figure out a way to reproduce it I would really appreciate the help in nailing that one down. Hasn’t happened to me for some time now but obviously can still happen!
Jonathan
“Recapture Traffic” seemed only to not stick when I edited the short code trying to change my optin box
Aha! That’s a great observation Chris! Will go see if I can reproduce it now with that note. Thanks!
Jonathan
Rats… no dice for me, still can’t reproduce it. Can you get it to be repeatable? If so could you make a video of it happening and send it to me? Can use Jing to record under 5 minutes for free.
Thanks!
Jonathan
I have a question …
In theory this tool is a killer and there’s no doubt it can produce results. What I worry about though it’s the advertisers…
They make their money off the coreg leads that follow after the visitor have submitted their email and as far as I’ve seen this tool cuts them off.
It’s cool that it makes them hop from CPA offer to CPA offer .. but that’s a concern .. the fact they all of them bounce off to other offers before they get a chance to get exposed to the coreg offer won’t trigger advertisers be upset with your leads quality .. and even maybe a ban from the network?
Thank you,
Gabriel
Hi Gabriel,
Yes you’re right, it’s a concern. This is why I mentioned in another comment where someone asked a similar question, that this really needs to not be overused/abused. Sure it’s a neat trick, but ultimately it probably shouldn’t be used on the first page like this.
In the near future it’s going to allow you to specify the page where the recapture should happen, and I would generally suggest making it at least page 2. Yes it means you’ll get a lot fewer cycles through the process, but you’ll be allowing the people to at least fill out their mailing information, which is quite valuable to the advertiser.
I debated even releasing this at all actually… but decided that I didn’t want to hold back and it would be up to the users what they do with it. Advertisers can actually defeat this very easily by just not allowing their offers to be framed anyway so, maybe in time that will happen more. I guess time will tell!
Jonathan
I’m gathering once I read your report I’ll learn how to prepop without having an Aweber autoresponder. At least I hope so! Thank you much.
Hi Nikki! Yep you can absolutely use prepop without any autoresponder at all. That’s actually how I originally developed my technique, and is still what I do to this day. I’m just not an email marketer when it comes to CPA and I had such problems with spam complaints and being kicked off my autoresponder system when I *did* do it, that I decided it wasn’t for me.
I have users/customers however who have done very well with emailing their lists so, to each their own! 🙂
Good luck!
JVC
I have seen some pre pop offers that have people answer maybe one or two questions before the page with the email submitt page appears. Does easy prepop work with those types of pages?
Hey Kelvin,
Really it depends a bit on how the offer is constructed. If the affiliate link you use supports prepop, then it should work just fine I would expect. I haven’t tested it with those kinds of offers yet though.
JVC
Hey there,
I seen what you wrote to Hal and may not fully understand what you were explaining.
So I’ll just ask. Will I be able to forward the prosects information to my auto responder such as aweber?
I watched all your videos and didn’t see where you’d provide your auto responder html code.
Thanks so much
The last public beta version does not have this ability integrated. I was working on it and then got pulled off of this onto other more pressing projects, and have never returned to this project. I still hope to at some point, but it has not been a priority for me.
JVC
Is there a way to put your html code into Profits Theme and have easy prepop work like shown in your videos while having profits theme send the prospects email to an auto responder?
Not directly since they would both have to submit their respective forms to different places. This is a feature I’m going to have to add if at some point I actually finish and release the plugin.
JVC
Hi JVC…
I know this is an old thread, but are you still developing this plugin? Was wondering if you have a version compatible with WP 3.81?
Also, would like to be able to preop other fields, like first name, last name, email, address, zip, etc. Any way to have dropdown options or custom options to be able to pass whatever the network requires in the correct format?
I think this would be a great Gravity Forms addon. You could build your forms with GF, then use this for passing the variables, managing offers, and stats.
Please email me if you have updates. Thank you.
Hey William, great to hear from you. Sadly for Easy Prepop, it was never formally released. I was close to done with it when the idea for how to do WPGen came along, so I did that but never got back to EP. There were just a couple of features left to put in, but by that point I wasn’t doing Prepop CPA offers anymore anyway and that whole “super simple method” didn’t really work well enough anymore. So that was that I’m afraid.
I have recently been considering a revisit to EP and some other plugins I got partially done with but never released. So if you’ve got specific features (beyond what you mentioned here) that you’d like to see supported, send me an email with what would be useful, and I’ll definitely consider them!
JVC