Interview with Christoph Brughmans, the Co-Founder of ChameleonAds

Christoph Brughmans is the Co-Founder of ChameleonAds, a premium Global Affiliate Network with truly exclusive campaigns across a range of verticals. Trusted by the most successful advertisers and brands, we generate customers and users on a pay-for-performance pricing model (CPA, CPL, CPI, CPE, CPS). We convert traffic into profit on a global scale.

1. Hello Chris, can you please tell us a little bit about yourself? Where are you from?

I’m from originally from the vibrant city of Antwerp (Belgium) but have been living in sunny Barcelona (Spain) for the last 11 years. Apart from working around the clock on growing ChameleonAds, I also like to go running, hiking in the Pyrenees, spend time with my family, and drink some ice cold beers with my friends!

2. How did you get into the affiliate marketing industry? What inspired you to start an affiliate network?

I basically rolled into it by “accident” (or luck as I may better say). Before working in the online industry I worked in management consulting & finance at KPMG in Belgium. Then came to Barcelona to do an MBA and after the MBA i didn’t want to go back to Belgium yet… but at first I could not find a job in Spain (I would have accepted any job at that time). So I was a bit stuck, until right before giving up on the job hunt in Barcelona, I got hired for an Online Marketing position in the Benelux Team at Vistaprint. That’s where I learned the ropes of online marketing and after a year I decided to start my own affiliate network, which was one of the best decisions of my life. I’ve been doing this now for 10 years and I still love it like it was the first day!

3. Tell us a little bit about ChameleonAds and what you do over there?

ChameleonAds is a global affiliate network focused on providing exclusive offers with high payouts to our affiliates. We focus on high-converting offers with high payouts and we pay our affiliates like clockwork so they can scale up and make the most money out of their traffic & media buys. My role is mainly focused on business development and getting new offers set up on the network.

4. There are already so many affiliate networks out there. What makes ChameleonAds unique from its competitors?

I think success is in the details and in consistency. Getting the payout on an offer a bit higher than the competition, paying the affiliate a few days earlier than another network, answering a client’s email within a few hours rather than a few days, always being on top of the details of all the things and deals you are working on. We believe that makes the difference and makes you stand out. And that’s what we try to do on a consistent basis. Its all about creating value and trust for both our advertisers and affiliates.

5. What verticals does your network specialize in? What kind of offers is performing well on your network?

We are very strong with Sweepstakes and surveys – we have them in +50 geo’s – as well as antivirus and VPN products such as McAfee and Norton. Also Bitcoin/Forex/Cyrpto offers are always going very strong. Apart from that we always try to hunt down the specific offers our (super)affiliates are looking for.

6. Do you have any advice for people who are just starting out with affiliate marketing?

Go big and go fast, don’t be afraid to lose money. It’s all about building up your experience and tradecraft in the online marketing field. Some pubs that start out begin with a budget of 500-1000$ and take weeks to spend that. It’s better to spend that in a day or two, learn from it and try again. In order to find gold you have to dig through a lot of sand, its better to do that fast, rather than slow.

7. What's the difference between a Super Affiliate and an Average Affiliate?

At ChameleonAds we try to treat every affiliate as a Super Affiliate as it’s our goal to help every affiliate ultimately become a Super Affiliate. For us its not only about the amount of money an affiliate can make, but also about the quality of their traffic, and every day we see it as our goal and objective to try to help them to improve on both quantity ($$$) and quality.

8. Which traffic sources prove to be the most effective for your top earning affiliates - Push, Native, Search, Social, Email or any others?

All of them …We see a big uptake in email, search and native in the last months. Social (FB/IG) is quite “unstable” as campaigns go up and down (more volatility); it’s harder than let’s say a year ago to get a campaign to make a consistent 1K$ a day on Facebook and IG.

9. In your experience, what are the three most critical elements of running a successful campaign?

High conversion rate, high eCPM/eCPC, and fast payments. At ChameleonAds we try to help our affiliates with the optimization of these three things on a daily basis.

10. How will the COVID-19 impact the affiliate marketing industry in the long run?

COVID is a global disaster for our healthcare, social relationships and mental happiness, but every downside nearly always has an upside and it’s always important I believe to be positive and optimistic. We have seen a huge uptake in traffic and conversion rates as people are spending more time online due to lockdowns and work-from-home policies. So purely from a business perspective, we are in one of the few industries that has grown during – and because of – COVID.

11. What trends do you think we can expect to see in the affiliate marketing industry in the next 1-2 years? Where ChameleonAds may be going? What advice would you give to affiliates to keep up the pace?

I believe online businesses in general are only going to grow more and more in the future – across the globe – and hence the affiliate marketing industry will grow with this. Prospects are bright. My advice is to keep your knowledge up to date, being successful in affiliate marketing implies you always have to be up to date with the latest tips and tricks to drive millions of clicks to an offer and convert them into conversions. In short: Follow the big AM blogs, attend (online) industry events, talk a lot with your AM at your network, test and scale different traffic sources.

12. For those who are interested in working with you and your affiliate network - What's the best way/time to reach you?

I love email as it keeps track of everything. Feel free to reach out to chris@chameleonads.eu or sign up as Partner on https://chameleonads.hasoffers.com to get full access to all our offers.

13. What's your favorite movie and why?

The Shawshank Redemption, no doubt about it. I’ve seen it +10 times and its still the best movie ever. Why? There are so many life lessons in it: friendship, courage, patience, and perseverance. And Tim Robbins and Morgen Freeman are such amazing actors. On a second place, ill put Goodfellas – an amazing and classic old boys movie!

14. Give us a little glimpse into what a typical day in your life looks like.

Work wise I like to build up a routine and stick to that as it makes life easier, so describing it may make it sound a bit boring – although it isn’t! We are all about putting in the hours and doing the work, but we don’t have a fixed schedule. Affiliate marketing is such a great industry because you can basically work the hours you want and from wherever you want.