Shawn Collins' Blog

Affiliate marketing and other stuff from Shawn Collins, co-founder of Affiliate Summit.

Archives for January 2006

There are No Entitlements in Affiliate Marketing

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The new AffStat 2006 Report includes a section where affiliate managers were able to anonymously speak out on any issue in affiliate marketing.

Below is a sample from that section with one affiliate manager’s opinion on affiliates:

Affiliates need to behave more like salespeople. The good ones have ideas of their own to help build sales for a merchant. They have no “god-given” right to commissions, they must earn them. Then they become a valued partner for the merchant. Affiliates must drop the attitude that you are owed something. Sell and you will be paid.

See more candid comments from affiliate managers and the latest statistics on the industry in the AffStat 2006 Report, available at http://www.affstat.com/

Some Pay Per Sale Affiliate Programs are Accepting Risky Affiliates

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Back in the days before the dot com bubble burst, one of the big indicators of a successful affiliate program was the number of affiliates in the program.

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Not the number of affiliates driving traffic or the affiliates generating transactions, just sheer numbers of people joining the affiliate program. For those around back then, you probably recall the frequent press releases by affiliate programs to tout their new milestones… 50,000 affiliates in a program was great, 100,000 affiliates or more brought smiles to the faces of CEOs.

And then everybody fell back to Earth.

These days, affiliate managers are taking a more prudent approach to their affiliate recruiting efforts. It’s no longer a case of open borders – many affiliate programs in 2006 are applying strict criteria to decide whether or not to accept an affiliate into their affiliate program.

Each year, the percent of affiliate programs that manually approve affiliate applications is growing, according to data I’ve collected for the annual AffStat Reports.

In 2003, 64% of affiliate managers reported that they manually approved applications. Two years later, 77% of affiliate managers were manually approving their affiliates.

With the release of the AffStat 2006 Report, we see another rise in the number of affiliate programs that manually approve.

This year, the statistics are broken out by affiliate program model, and the most risk averse affiliate programs are those that pay a bounty. 100% of the affiliate managers with bounty programs in the survey are manually approving their affiliate applications.

The pay per lead affiliate programs are right behind them with 96% on manual approval. The retail affiliate programs show a rise in the percent of manually approved applications from last year, but a good bit less than the other models. 83% of pay per sale affiliate programs manually approve their affiliates.

This information is not surprising, as bounty and pay per lead affiliate programs that accept leads without credit cards are exposed to greater risk than retail affiliate programs with only credit card based affiliate programs.

However, I think the shift also indicates that more affiliate managers are becoming picky about which affiliates will represent their brand. Additionally, when all affiliates are accepted into an affiliate program, there are legal liabilities to consider, such as risks that a rogue affiliate will violate the CAN-SPAM law.

One has to wonder if the affiliate networks are concerned about the shift from quantity to quality. Smaller affiliate programs could mean less reliance on the networks and their pools of affiliates.

Affiliates Should Have a DMCA Notice Posted

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Linda Goodman, founder of The Goodman Law Firm, has written an article with helpful information for any affiliate marketer with a content site.

According to Ms. Goodman, under Title II of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. Section 512 (“DMCA”), the DMCA provides a legal procedure by which any holder of a copyright may request any Online Service Provider to disable access to a website where the copyrighted work appears without the permission of such person.

There are two parts to the legal procedure: (1) Writing a Proper DMCA Notice, and (2) Sending the Notice to a Designated Agent.

Full article at http://affiliatetip.com/news/article00460.php

New Year’s Resolutions from Affiliate Marketers

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Another year is in the books for affiliate marketing. Time again to make some resolutions for work and non-work.

Happy New Year from Affiliate Summit

I’ve got the regular go to resolutions: exercise more, eat better, spend less time behind this keyboard and more time in front of the wife and kids, etc.

But how about the plans for work. I had a handful of professional resolutions last year, and if I recall correctly, I lived up to them. I wanted to start up a wiki (see Affilipedia, blog consistently (once or more a day, every day), staff up on my consulting business, and double the size of Affiliate Summit from 2004 to 2005 (it went from 230 to 550).

What to plan for 2006?

  1. For starters, I wanted to again grow Affiliate Summit significantly, though most of the work was performed in 2005. Anyhow, the January 2006 show is double what it was last June, and I think that may well make it the biggest affiliate marketing event, yet.
  2. Also on the resolution docket is the plan to start running Affiliate Summit twice a year – one in the west and the other in the east.
  3. I’d also like to start pressing the limits of technology more. Blogging via text is a great way to get a message out, but I plan to try my hand at video blogging and podcasting.
  4. There have been attempts at a trade group for affiliate marketing, along the lines of IAFMA. But nothing has stuck – bad timing, wrong people or whatever – it just hasn’t worked. I’d like to see that change this year, and I plan to help whomever is willing to steer this project.
  5. As we all know, reading is fundamental, but I rarely carve out time to consume the latest business books. This year will be different – I’m going to devour an average of one book a month. I’ve already got three lined up: The Big Moo, Getting Things Done, and How to Win Friends & Influence People.
  6. And finally, I want to have more human interaction with affiliates, affiliate managers, etc. 2006 will be the year of the BBQ at my place, plus I will attend more shows, workshops, etc.

Here are some resolutions from a few other affiliate marketers:

“First, build the best affiliate program on the web (That part is the same every year), second spend more time mentoring up and coming managers in the industry, and third, educate the online community more about the complexities of the channel.”

– Beth Kirsch, Group Manager at Lowermybills.com

“In 2006 I want to make every CafePress.com shopkeeper see the value of being both a merchant and an affiliate, and to see a CafePress product link in every blog on the internet. We have products to fit every topic imaginable and great, creative artists making more unique products every day. I love empowering people to make money and my goal is to make many, many people able to quit their day jobs in 2006.”

– Deborah Carney, Affiliate Program Manager at CafePress.com

“Mine is simple, in the new year I would like to connect with more of our affiliates in our program. To build relationships and provide them with the best service possible.”

Mary Melian, Affiliate Manager at Lillian Vernon and Time Life

Happy New Year – here’s to a great 2006 in affiliate marketing.

Dr. AdSense Launches the Free AdSense Buddy

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Joel “Dr. AdSense” Comm, author of Google AdSense Secrets, has created a tool to help you keep track of your AdSense statistics without having to login to Google’s site. It’s called the AdSense Buddy.

You can check stats by day, site, channel and many other options, as well as create visual representations of your earning, impressions, clicks and more with a special graphing system.

The AdSense Journal included helps you to keep track of changes to your site, and the icon on your taskbar allows you to see your stats at a glance.

Download your FREE AdSense Buddy now at http://www.adsensechat.com/adsensebuddy.zip

If you are going to be at Affiliate Summit, Joel is giving a two hour workshop on Multiplying Your Google AdSense Income. Spots are still available for this session, which is taking place Sunday, January 8.