Last month I launched my first true affiliate marketing project, Carbon Fiber Gear. Over that past month I’ve generated 26 sales from eBay and 1 sale from Amazon, which has made me about $50.

In the back of my head I was pretty sure that the majority of sales were going to be for carbon fiber wallets (which I have been promoting pretty pro actively) or something else carbon fiber…but I was very wrong. Of the 26 eBay sales, here’s what was purchased:

• 8 carbon fiber wallets
• 8 coins (same user)
• 1 camera flash kit
• 1 dell laptop battery
• 1 electric guitar
• 1 greddy side-mount intercooler
• 1 harry potter action figure
• 1 motorola jesus faceplate
• 1 mustang wheel adapter plate
• 1 planet earth dvd
• 1 motorola portugal flag faceplate
• 1 turbo charger warning sticker

As you can see here the majority of my commissions have actually come from stuff that has nothing to do with carbon fiber…I’m just the gateway for the user to get to eBay. On top of that, it’s interesting to look at the breakdown of the amount of time it took for the user to buy something from the day they clicked the affiliate link:

• 17/26 (65%) purchased the same day
• 2/26 (7%) purchased after 1 day
• 3/26 (11%) purchased after 2 days
• 1/26 (4%) purchased after 4 days
• 1/26 (4%) purchased after 5 days
• 2/26 (7%) purchased after 7 days

This is where we can really see the power of the cookie drop. 35% of the purchases weren’t made on the same day, but because a cookie was dropped I still generated revenue from that user. I’ll definitely be watching similar stats to this over time (hopefully with a lot more data to work with), so we’ll see if the numbers stay about the same.