Archives for June 2006

Affiliate Summit has launched the Affiliate Buyer’s Guide, a directory of products and services for affiliate marketers.

You can find products and services in the Affiliate Buyer’s Guide with the search tool or by drilling down through the product and service categories.

The Affiliate Buyer’s Guide was created in an online format after a lot of interest was generated by the print version, which will be distributed at Affiliate Summit (July 9-11 in Orlando).

Since the print version had limited space, it couldn’t fit as many listings as we would have liked, plus some information will inevitably be outdated in the near future.

There are two types of listings in the Affiliate Buyer’s Guide: free and enhanced. Enhanced listings enable companies to provide more details about their products or services, add their logo, as well as include images and documents related to their company.

Both types of listings allow affiliate marketers to submit reviews and rate the listings.

Location: Club Motion, Pleasure Island, Downtown Disney Marketplace
Time: 8:00pm – Midnight
Date: Monday, July 10

Get All Lit Up At The Show’s Hottest Party!

We invite you to trip the light fantastic at the hottest event of this year’s show, The Pure Imagination Party. You’ll be glowing from head to toe as you indulge yourself in a pleasure-trove of sensations. Seduce your taste buds with unusual and delicious hors d’oeuvres… Decorate yourself with all things that GLOW… Replenish your complementary light-up tumbler with exotic drinks at our open bar. Then really let yourself glow as you dance the night away to Tremors and the Earthquake Horns and their electrifying and infectious blend of Top 40, Classic Rock and R&B. Don’t sit out the party of the year… get up and glow!

Get Your Ticket only at Booth #301 and # 303

Register now for Affiliate Summit at www.affiliatesummit.com.

There has been an increasing trend in gaming affiliate programs to recruit affiliates that haven’t previously tried their hand at promoting poker, slots, blackjack, etc.

According to data I collected recently, affiliates are more comfortable promoting gaming affiliate offers than adult sites, alcohol, pharmaceuticals and tobacco.

Here are some candid comments from affiliates on gaming affiliate programs:

“I can’t promote things that encourage people’s bad vices and make money on their misery.”

“Gaming affiliate programs are very lucrative and safe.”

“I would personally stay away from this for my online business. The links you have on your site send a message just like the core content – sometimes “louder” just because of the layout or the content of the banners. Also, I would want to maintain as wide an audience as possible for my site.”

“I am willing to promote anything that is legal that can fit into my content. Obviously I would not promote any of these on a family site, but if the audience is right, I would be happy to promote these to them. Our philosophy has always been to allow what is legal, and not dictate our morals.”

“Nothing moral, but federal law is very gray… and their phone call is something I never want to receive.”

Overall, about 40% of people participating in the survey made comments on the adult, alcohol, gaming, pharmaceutical and tobacco categories. The bulk of comments (many more which will be shared in the near future) tended to be against promoting these types of affiliate programs.

So the people open to these affiliate programs, by and large, didn’t post comments.

zanox, the German-based affiliate network, has been blazing a trail around the U.S. with their zanox PRM (Partner Relationship Management) product, and soon they’ll be rolling out a shopping portal for affiliates.

According to their white paper on zanox-Shop@, it’s all about multi channel sales for affiliates. The zanox-Shop@ shopping portal enables affiliates to point traffic to a turnkey online mall.

I think this could be a good option for affiliates that don’t have the technical prowess to build a shopping site themselves, as well as a good use of traffic hitting parked domains.

Apparently this is big in Europe (then again, so are David Hasselhoff and Jerry Lewis!), so I’ll be curious to see how it goes here. It could be a healthy distribution channel for participating merchants.

See the U.K. version at http://shop.zanox.co.uk/ – the U.S. version is scheduled to launch shortly.

Earlier this week, Performics announced their new OrangeLinks – pre-generated, live links sent via e-mail or FTP to affiliates.

The new OrangeLinks were promoted by Performics as an easy and productive way to receive new links for any or all of your approved advertisers.

Not surprisingly, affiliate marketing blogs and forums couldn’t help comparing OrangeLinks to the recent CJ Link Management Initiative.

Scott Jangro commented, “Unfortunately, the timing of this coincides with Commission Junction�s Link Management Initiative, and people will undoubtedly compare the two when there’s really no relation whatsoever. This is an optional new feature for Performics, not a required technology or infrastructure change. I must say, it is nice to see innovative functionality coming out of a network, rather than headaches.”

Jeff Molander didn’t mince words as he stated, “This is the Link Management Initiative all over again but done correctly.”

As far as the functionality of the OrangeLinks, affiliates will receive their first OrangeLinks delivery within 24 hours of setup. The first delivery can be configured to retroactively create all active links for an affiliate’s advertisers or they can choose to receive only new future links. They will receive one file containing any new links for their advertisers each day.

With OrangeLinks, affiliates can:

• Choose to receive OrangeLinks feeds from a specific set of advertisers
• Choose to receive the most recent links for specific creative sizes
• Choose to receive the most recent links for specific promotion types
• Temporarily pause delivery of your OrangeLinks
• Have your advertisers latest links in your inbox every morning
• Have the latest links delivered daily to your FTP server

The interface is intuitive with the options to select all advertisers in an affiliate account or specific advertisers, as well as whether affiliates prefer to receive their links by e-mail or FTP.

Affiliates can also select which banner sizes and promo types (i.e. free shipping, coupons, etc.) they prefer to receive.

I got an e-mail today with the subject: Shari’s Berries Termination. I think I joined the affiliate program just to research their communications a while back, so I wasn’t surprised that they’d be dumping me for inactivity.

I was surprised when I read the e-mail, though. They are closing the program in two days for a problem that’s apparently been in place for two quarters:

Due to a major website change in December 2005, which affected our ability to efficiently track business from affiliates, Shari’s Berries International is terminating its affiliate program effective June 15, 2006. We truly appreciate your past support.

If you anticipate you are eligible for any unpaid commission, please respond appropriately to affiliates@berries.com by June 30, 2006. If we do not hear from you by this date, we will consider the matter closed.

Sincerely,
Shari’s Berries Affiliate Program

I’ve got to wonder a couple of things here. If the tracking was not working correctly during this time, how should I know if they owe me commissions? Surely if their reporting did capture the information, they would pay my balance.

Also, if this problem has lingered since late last year, why are they just fessing up now, and giving a mere 48 hours to get those links down?

There is an article at Startup Nation that’s helpful for affiliate marketing newbies.

The piece covers some issues facing affiliate managers, including how many affiliates to have in an affiliate program, commission rates, and affiliate recruitment.

Some off base verbiage though. Referencing “multi-tier affiliations” should have been two-tiers, as affiliate programs don’t go past two-tiers. An ” affiliate marketing measurement system”? Using affiliate solution provider would have been more clear.

Otherwise a helpful primer.

Read the Startup Nation article at http://www.startupnation.com/pages/articles/affiliate-marketing-basics.asp.

I’ve had a handful of people ask why the speed networking session was dropped from the Affiliate Summit agenda.

Back in 2003 when I came up with the idea to have speed networking (hybrid of speed dating and networking) at the conference, we had a comparably small crowd.

As we’ve scaled up, the speed networking concept has become more problematic. The more people that sign up, the more difficult it is for everybody to get the arranged matches the request.

Combine that with no shows and the occasional glitch in the matchmaking process, and you’ve got an idea that has seen better days.

So anyway, the next Affiliate Summit (taking place July 9-11) will feature a new method for networking magic – Bingo Networking.

The way this will work is that as you enter the General Session room, you will drop your business card in the Bingo Networking box. You will then be given a bingo card where you will write your name in the center square.

Next, you circulate with everyone throughout the room. To complete the bingo card, you will need to meet 24 other people, collect their business cards and have them write their names in the open squares.

Then, we will call off the names on the business cards that everyone dropped in the Bingo Networking box when they arrived. Regular bingo rules apply thereafter. The winner is the first person with five names in a row, either across, down or diagonally.

In addition to the prize for the winner of Bingo Networking, everybody that participates will walk away a winner, because everyone will be making new contacts while playing the game.

We’ve got some other unique networking events on each day of the conference – see the Affiliate Summit agenda for more details.

This will enable you to run queries for different types of attendees (affiliates, merchants, etc.) and initiate conversations. You can also get your own blog going, post in the forum, post shared bookmarks and more.

Start making your networking matches now.