Shawn Collins' Blog

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

Archives for February 2008

Florida AG Makes a Collect Call to AT&T

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The Florida Attorney General’s CyberFraud Task Force juggernaut against “free” ringtones has notched another victory in a settlement with AT&T Mobility.

Pay per callAttorney General Bill McCollum announced today that his office reached a settlement with AT&T Mobility.

In a significant step toward protecting consumers throughout the nation from unauthorized charges on cell phone bills, Attorney General Bill McCollum today announced that AT&T Mobility will be the first wireless company in the nation to police representations made in internet advertising for cell phone content to ensure fair and full disclosure. The company will also make full restitution to Florida consumers who were unknowingly billed for free cell phone content. The cooperative agreement reached by the Attorney General’s CyberFraud Task Force with AT&T Mobility will establish a new model for the advertising and billing of cell phone content. Additionally, AT&T Mobility will pay $2.5 million to the Attorney General’s Office to fund the efforts of the task force as it continues to press for similar reform across the industry and will contribute an additional $500,000 toward consumer education on safe internet use.

Consumers should never be billed for services they thought were free of charge, said Attorney General Bill McCollum. Today’s agreement establishes a precedent for wireless companies accepting responsibility for the way cell phone content is advertised on the internet and the manner in which charges are passed along to consumers. AT&T should be commended for being the first wireless company in the industry to offer this reform.

Some examples of the misleading advertisements were made available by the Florida Attorney General’s CyberFraud Task Force:

The effort from the Florida Attorney General’s office is a little more than a year old. Last year, they started knocking on doors and searching for information on affiliate marketers that were promoting deceptive ringtone offers.

Segway at Affiliate Summit

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I was chatting with one of the folks from the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino on final morning of Affiliate Summit and she asked if everything was OK.

iJustine riding a Segway at Affiliate Summit West 2008

I told her all was good, except my feet were hurting. So she asked if I’d like a Segway for the day.

Of course, the answer was a yes. I’ve wanted to try one of these things since they came out, but I never saw one in the wild.

So she brought it on over and the adventures started.

Lot’s of folks at Affiliate Summit took the Segway for a ride. Here are the characters I managed to catch on video…

  • Stephanie Agresta (InternetGeekGirl)
  • Jamie Birch (Converseon)
  • Tim Carter (Ask The Builder)
  • John Chow (JohnChow.com)
  • Justine Ezarik (iJustine)
  • Ian Fernando (IanFernando.com)
  • Sam Harrelson (ReveNews)
  • Margaret Hearne (The Home Depot)
  • Tris Hussey (MapleLeaf 2.0)
  • Scott Jangro (Jangro.com)
  • Zac Johnson (ZacJohnson.com)
  • Chris Kelly (Google)
  • Amit Mehta (Super Affiliate Mindset)
  • James Omdahl (InsureMe)
  • Lisa Riolo (Hammock Ventures)
  • Steve Rosenbaum (Magnify.net)
  • Stephanie Schwab (Converseon)
  • Michael Vorel (Vastplanet)
  • Andrew Wee (Who is Andrew Wee)
  • Mark Wielgus (45n5.com)

Check out the video people at Affiliate Summit West 2008 on the Segway.

You’re Not the Boss of Me

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I was flying home from Affiliate Summit West 2008 last night when “Boss of Me” by They Might Be Giants came on and I started thinking about the keynote from Jason Calacanis.

“Let’s talk about the brutal truth here. The truth is, you guys, I am talking to thin affiliate people. I am assuming nobody in here is a thin affiliate. OK, good.

You guys really think small. Holding up a six figure check is frankly pathetic. It’s desperate. The industry I’m in, like the Internet industry, like Web 2.0 industry elitist, you know. Kevin Rose, whatever.

They would laugh at that. It’s sad. It’s embarrassing.

Jason included pictures of ShoeMoney and Zac Johnson holding up six-figure commission checks.

I think there are some important distinctions to be made here. First, Jason states that he is addressing thin affiliates, not all affiliates.

And second, I’d like to know how Jason determined that Jeremy and Zac are thin affiliates? For anybody not familiar with the term, it’s essentially an affiliate site that offers no unique value proposition.

Anyhow, back to the “Boss of Me” angle. I get that Jason made bank in the past, and there is all sorts of money to be had in the Valley. But not everybody wants to live that life.

I know I sure don’t.

As a bookend to the conference, we wound it up with an “un-keynote” where attendees could step up to the microphone and share their opinions about the industry.

Zac took this opportunity to give a rebuttal of sorts to Jason, where he talked about how he’s quite happy bringing in the meager six-figure checks and living a fun, flexible lifestyle where he plays basketball and does whatever he wants for a good part of the day.

That is the affiliate way to me. Work hard, play hard, make your own rules, and smile.

I’m sure I could earn more if I were to play the game of flying around and wearing suits. I’d rather be a non-thin affiliate, working out of my house with my family and dog around. Wearing shorts and a t-shirt as my uniform and having Jerry Springer on in the background.

Maybe that sounds close to torture to Jason, but I love it. The high flying, suit wearing, fancy restaurant life isn’t in my DNA.

Why Invite Jason Calacanis as the Keynote?

I had a lot of people ask me that question for months leading up to Affiliate Summit and over the past few days. There were two reasons I wanted to have Jason there:

  1. He can teach us.
  2. We can teach him.

The reality is that I agreed with pretty much everything Jason had to say. We, as affiliate marketers, do need to clean up our own backyard.

While there are a great many people with virtue and integrity in this space, there are also scumbags that exploit it.

That’s something we don’t talk about enough, but now it’s happening. It shouldn’t have been necessary, but I think Jason’s talk may have served as a catalyst for change and internal policing in affiliate marketing.

And then there is the part of it where we can teach Jason. He is an outsider and he shared his impression of affiliate marketing.

Instead of castigating him, we should further engage him. I’ve noticed that he’s interacting on a number of blogs over the past few days about his keynote.

Understand that Jason is a smart and influential guy, and he has this view of our space. He is certainly not alone.

One snippet from his talk that I haven’t seen quoted much by those who are lashing out at him was this one: “The other truth is that SEO and affiliate people I’ve met are some of the smartest frickin’ people I’ve ever met. They’re really brilliant.”

He wasn’t slamming all of affiliate marketing, just the parts that reflect poorly on us from the outside.

Boss of Me

Life is a test, and I confess
I like this mess I’ve made so far
Grade on a curve and you’ll observe
I’m right below the horizon

Yes, no, maybe, I don’t know
Can you repeat the question?

You’re not the boss of me now
You’re not the boss of me now
You’re not the boss of me now, and you’re not so big
You’re not the boss of me now
You’re not the boss of me now
You’re not the boss of me now, and you’re not so big

So go create unique and valuable content, live the affiliate life (without a boss), and let’s figure out a way to throw out the garbage.

Should I Launch an Affiliate Program?

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Q: I have an online yellow and white page directory and I’d like to know if affiliate marketing would be right for my company. I am trying to sell keyword drive ad space to local businesses around the country. My thinking is that if I have an affiliate ad and affiliates drive business to my site and they purchase an ad, then I will share in proceeds or pay per click. Is affiliate marketing right for me?

Shawn CollinsA: I think there are a couple different things getting mixed up here.

You could affiliates driving ads to the opportunity where people can buy ads from you, and you could give them a revenue share from the sale of ads, or you could pay affiliates on a per click basis for referring traffic to your ads.

So, you’ve got to decide if you want affiliates to sell ads for you or drive traffic to you. You could have the two offers, as well.

Affiliate Summit 2008 West – Day 3

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Affiliate Summit 2008 West is all done now, and I’ll probably catch my breath on the plane today.

This was the biggest and most exciting Affiliate Summit we’ve had to date, and I am still marveling at stuff I learned and the people I met.

The day started with the “Ask the Experts” session, where attendees had a choice of a dozen topics and experts presided over round tables to answer questions and provide insight.

ASW08 022608 002

The folks at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino were kind enough to loan me a Segway on the final day, and that led to a whole lot of folks taking test drives (I’ll put up a video of affiliate marketers speeding around on this thing later in the week).

iJustine on a Segway

After a bunch of packed sessions, the day and conference wound down with an “un-keynote”, where anybody had the chance to get on a soap box and share their thoughts about the industry.

ASW08 022608 007

Then, we had the Great Affiliate Road Rally, where a dozen or so cars raced. Well, a few of them raced. The others were in a big pileup shortly after the starting line.

But it was all in good fun, as the entry fees for each racer went to the Starlight Starbright Children’s Foundation.

Great Affiliate Road Rally

The winners of a booth at Affiliate Summit 2008 East, taking place August 10-12 in Boston, were Affspy. Share Results came in second, which gets them a full conference pass for the next Affiliate Summit, and Affilisites captured third place for an exhibit hall pass at the Boston show.

Thanks too everybody who came out to Affiliate Summit, as well as Emcee Jim Kukral, Amy Rodriguez all of the hardworking staff, speakers, sponsors, bloggers, and of course, my co-founder of this whole thing, Missy Ward.

Affiliate Bloggers

It’s always great to meet up and learn from each other, and I look forward to seeing everybody later this year.

Affiliate Summit 2008 West – Day 2

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The second day of Affiliate Summit 2008 West started off with a keynote address from Jason Calacanis of Mahalo.com.

Jason’s talk touched on his impression of affiliate marketing, and stirred up lots of folks in the audience. Take a look at the blog coverage of Affiliate Summit.

Missy Ward, Jason Calacanis and Shawn Collins

The exhibit hall was packed throughout the day as attendees of Affiliate Summit visited the 120 booths.

ASW08 022508 021

In addition to a number of educational sessions, the day also featured Moniker’s Live Domain Auction (one of my domains sold .

It was a busy day of making connections with old friends, learning, cutting deals, and meeting with interesting new characters. While making my way down the hallway towards the end of the day, I ran into “Mystery” of the VH1 show, the Pick Up Artist.

Mystery and Shawn Collins

The day culminated with the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards. These awards recognize exceptional performance in affiliate marketing.

The winners of the annual awards are in bold:

Affiliate of the Year
Mike Allen
Connie Berg
Tim Storm

Affiliate Manager of the Year
Stephanie Harris
Melissa Salas
Carolyn Tang

Exceptional Merchant
Amazon.com
CSN Stores
Sierra Trading Post

Affiliate Marketing Advocate Award
Haiko de Poel, Jr.
Scott Jangro
Revenue Magazine

Best Blogger
Carsten Cumbrowski
Sam Harrelson
Jeremy “ShoeMoney” Schoemaker

Wayne Porter Affiliate Marketing Legend
Connie Berg
Haiko de Poel, Jr.
Brian Littleton

Congratulations to all of the finalists and winners.

Check out all the pictures tagged ASW08 from Affiliate Summit 2008 West.

Limited Time Deal for Affiliate Summit Boston

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There is a special deal for passes to Affiliate Summit 2008 East, taking place August 10-12 in Boston.

Registrations are open from now through the end of Affiliate Summit 2008 West for a special rate of $759.

Go to http://www.affiliatesummit.com/08e_conference.php to register at this rate.

On Wednesday, February 27, the price goes to $949.

Exhibitor booths are also available at reduced prices during the conference this week.

Booths are $3,695 for a 10′ x 10′ booth, which also includes eight conference passes, a contact list of attendees, and a company description in the exhibit hall directory.

The price goes to $3,995 after next Tuesday.

Booth locations are selected in the order that they are booked.

More details at http://www.affiliatesummit.com/08e_exhibitors.php.

The Age of Affiliate Marketing

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Q: I was wondering how old you were when you started in affiliate marketing? I am currently 16 and I have been pursuing affiliate marketing for over a year now. I started a blog with a focus on selling computer protection software, but I haven’t been successful and it is getting a bit frustrating. I’ve decided to explore some other options and I am launching a new site soon. Any tips?

Shawn CollinsA: First of all, don’t be discouraged. When I was 16 (I’m going on 38 now), there was no Internet available to me. I didn’t get started in affiliate marketing until I was 27.

Back when I was 16, I had just had a job as a dishwasher at Friendly’s and I left there for the prestigious position of lottery ticket seller at a drugstore for $3.35 an hour.

I realize the commissions may seem low right now, but if you apply more time and resources to it, you will see the numbers rise.

The trick is to focus on a topic you really care about and combine that with some unique value proposition.

It’s not easy, and the growth of a site can come slow, but if you stay with it, you will see that it does happen.

Whenever you get down about your earnings, take solace in the fact that it most definitely beats standing in some store at the mall and earning minimum wage.

Believe me, I did plenty of those minimum wage deals where you’re on your feet all day. I put some time in during the Christmas season at a KB toy store, worked as a movie theater usher (somebody actually changed their baby in the movie theater and left a dirty diaper on the floor – jerks!), and I had a job at a Sam Goody record store (I’m still haunted by that summer when they played the Dirty Dancing soundtrack over and over).

Anyhow, you have a fantastic opportunity in front of you. You just need to apply yourself more.

Paying to Apply to an Affiliate Program

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Q: I was looking at an affiliate program that I would like to promote, and I see that they will charge £5 to review my affiliate application. If I am accepted, they will return the funds, but if I am rejected, they keep the money. I have never seen anything like this before. Is it normal? Is it ethical? Should I pay the £5 or look elsewhere?

Shawn CollinsA: This is something I have never heard of in affiliate marketing. Quite frankly, I am sort of floored by it.

I understand that it can be onerous for affiliate managers to go through all of the applications and perform due diligence. But I think this is ridiculous to tell affiliates the have to pay for the privilege of applying.

And affiliates deemed to not be worthy are out the money. That’s a bad joke to me.

In my opinion, you should not even consider paying them. Just go and promote the competition. Then you and their competition will have the last laugh over this ridiculous policy.

After I initially wrote this response, I came to find out that this wasn’t the policy if an individual merchant, but rather part of the application process to be an affiliate of the Affiliate Window network in the UK.

Perhaps this is new from Affiliate Window? I’d never heard of it before, and I’m not sure how it played in the UK when it was instituted.

As an affiliate, I find it to be hostile to newbie affiliates and affiliates overall.

Forget the long tail, I’d think this will ensure the cropped tail that shall never grow.

Oops!… Spitzer Did It Again

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Back in November 2007, I wrote about how New York Governor Eliot Spitzer wanted all collect taxes for all Internet transactions by residents of New York.

At the time, he was widely lambasted about the issue and backed down.

But it looks like he wants to give it another go around, according to the Associated Press.

In November, Spitzer chucked a plan to collect the sales tax because he thought it was “not the right time” to increase the tax burden.

The state Department of Taxation and Finance quietly issued a memo last year that would have targeted companies that do online business in New York, but don’t have brick-and-mortar presences. The agency dropped the idea within days after news organizations began reporting on the issue.

But now it’s made its way into the state budget.

“He included it in the budget so the legislature would be able to weigh in on it,” spokesman Jeffrey Gordon said. “He determined that was a better process to go through.”

As I mentioned back then, it could have a negative impact on affiliates.

I could see this having negative ramifications on a company like Amazon – all of a sudden it’s less attractive to customers to purchase from them. So Amazon might decide to stop working with affiliates in New York if that’s what it takes.

Net result: tens of thousands (or more) of affiliates in New York with less money in their pockets.

Or maybe the affiliates could get hosting in other states (if they don’t have it already)? If their Web site doesn’t reside in New York, perhaps this would be null and void?!

Amazon.com is currently fighting the Spitzer effort. Stay tuned.