Shawn Collins' Blog

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

Archives for August 2008

eBay Advanced Creatives for Affiliates

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The eBay Partner Network has responded to requests from affiliates for more rich media ads.

They have a new Creatives Generator tool in the “Tools” tab of the eBay Partner Network to help affiliates dynamically filter the creatives by size and program and whether it is geo-targeted.

Example of new eBay affiliate creative

According to eBay, they have found rich media banners like this have averaged up to a forty percent higher click-through rate over static banners.

More details on the affiliate program at http://www.ebaypartnernetwork.com/.

Seth Godin Advocates Click Fraud

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Seth Godin posted a message to his blog today, “Ads are the new online tip jar,” where he encourages site visitors to click on ads when they enjoy content on a site.

If every time you read a blog post or bit of online content you enjoyed you clicked on an ad to say thanks, the economics of the web would change immediately. You don’t have to buy anything (though it’s fine if you do). You just have to honor the writer by giving them a click.

That’s all fine and good, except that it screws the advertisers who end up paying for empty clicks and get a poor ROI.

Ultimately, those advertisers get priced out of PPC advertising and there is less demand to run ads on the sites with great content that are getting all the thank you clicks.

Yes, “the economics of the web would change immediately,” as Godin states. We’d go from a system that works to one where everybody would lose.

BlogWorld Expo Discount – Ends 8/22

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BlogWorld Expo is coming up September 21-22 in Las Vegas, and I’ll be speaking on a panel.

I’ll be speaking about “Affiliate Marketing Secrets for Bloggers” with Mike Allen (Shopping Bargains), Sam Harrelson (Cost Per News), and Tim Jones (The Real Tim Jones) in the Monetization Track.

Register by August 22 to get the early bird price. Hope to see you in Las Vegas.

If you miss the early bird, you can still get 20% through September 1 with this code: SWNV1PN

Cory Booker Keynote Address at Affiliate Summit

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The complete video from the keynote address by Cory Booker at Affiliate Summit is now available.

Cory Booker is the Mayor of Newark, NJ, as well as the subject of the Academy Award nominated documentary, Street Fight, a Rhodes Scholar, graduate of Yale University School of Law, blogger at HuffingtonPost.com, and he played tight end at Stanford University.

Mayor Booker spoke at Affiliate Summit 2008 East on August 11, 2008 in Boston.

Taking the Marketing Out of Affiliate Marketing

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Q: I was having a conversation with a colleague about being successful in affiliate marketing. He made a statement that took me back a bit. He stated he isn’t interested in marketing at all, he simply wants to be an affiliate marketer… hinting that strong PPC is all that is really needed. So, is there a difference? Are we not marketers first, or is there a clear distinction?

A: It’s sort of silly for him to say he’s not a marketer. Even if he’s strictly doing PPC, it’s PPC marketing.

There are certainly marketing tactics and techniques being used in this work. I think it’s certainly beneficial for you to have a grasp on marketing principles.

It doesn’t really make sense for him to state that he’s not a marketer when he’s engaging in affiliate marketing.

I’d encourage you to read up on marketing trends and ideas and endeavor to learn new things constantly.

Email Affiliate Marketing

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Q: How can I get started in email affiliate marketing? And can I make money with it?

Shawn CollinsA: I’ll answer your second question first. Yes, you can certainly make money with it if done correctly.

As far as getting into email as an affiliate, it depends on what you’re willing to invest into it.

My first suggest is to sign on with an email service provider or email solution provider (ESP). The one I use is AWeber.

These ESP’s will provide you with the tools you need to build and maintain email lists, as well as analytics to help determine whether you get more response on certain days and at certain times.

In the case of AWeber, you can also perform split testing and set up lists where the emails automatically mail at specified dates and times from content in your RSS feed.

There are many options out there, so just search on Google for email providers.

You also have the option to rent lists from third parties for your mailings. Personally, I prefer to build lists organically, as I’ve found them to be more responsive.

So basically, once you have your email list established, just join up with the various affiliate and CPA networks and promote offers that are relevant to your audience.

Getting a Blog Indexed in Google

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Q: What is the procedure to get your blog indexed in search? If I want to ensure that my blog will be indexed in search, besides using good content over a long period, what other steps should I take so Google can find it? In Yahoo, there is a site feed area that is for the blog, but Google doesn’t seem to have one. I am not sure about MSN – can you give me some specific advice?

Shawn CollinsA: I have a good track record for having my blogs indexed pretty quick with Google and other search engines.

One thing I always do, and I don’t know that there is a direct benefit with the search engines, is to claim my blogs at Technorati.

Also, I’ll go to Google Reader and subscribe to my RSS feed. I do this, so I can see how my blogs are displayed there, since my stats reveal that many subscribers access me through Google Reader, but presumably this also gets my feed into the Google system.

I also run my RSS feeds through FeedBurner, which is owned by Google. Another potential reason why my blogs get indexed.

I can’t say whether these actions are mutually exclusive from getting indexed, but I’m taking these steps, and I’m getting indexed.

Ticketmaster Affiliate Case Study

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Advertising.com’s buy.at Affiliate Network has released a case study from the Ticketmaster affiliate program focused on their customized “EventEngine” campaign widget.

The challenge in this case study was to branching out from traditional sponsorship efforts.

So the buy.at team partnered with Ticketmaster to build a customized “EventEngine” widget solution.

This application enables affiliates to promote specific Ticketmaster events on their sites and blogs to focus on events that are going to perform best for their niche.

Also, affiliates are able to use EventEngine to customize the color and style of the banners to best match the design of their site.

The effort was considered a success as they accomplished Ticketmaster’s goal of creating a widget to extend their reach in the affiliate marketplace.

Without active recruitment (while in beta), affiliate applications increased at an average rate of 10% each week.

Of the affiliates currently signed up for the program, over 20% are actively driving sales.

More details on the Ticketmaster affiliate program and Advertising.com’s buy.at Affiliate Network at http://www.advertising.com/buyat/.

Ethical Issues in Affiliate Marketing

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One of the final sessions of Affiliate Summit 2008 East was an important discussion on ethics in the industry, and I couldn’t help but think about the irony of the topic given some things that went on behind the scenes during the conference.

You see, there were a number of folks that decided to use a variety of methods to scam their way into the conference.

It’s simple… people who are not registered and manage to make their way into the conference are cheats and thieves.

These are the skells of the industry who most needed to be in the session on ethics. But they’ll have to settle for the video.

This session and the others will be available for free on video in the near future.

Here is a shot before the panel of a few of the speakers: Michael Jones (Chief Operating Officer, Pepperjam), Haiko de Poel, Jr. (Managing Partner, dp internet services, LLC DBA ABestWeb), and Paul Nichols (Director of Sales, Ebates.com).

Michael Jones (Chief Operating Officer, Pepperjam), Haiko de Poel, Jr. (Managing Partner, dp internet services, LLC DBA ABestWeb), and Paul Nichols (Director of Sales, Ebates.com)

I’d like to express my gratitude to the majority of folks that go about business in a legitimate fashion in affiliate marketing.

And for the cheats and thieves, I’d highly recommend watching the keynote address from Cory Booker when it comes available on video.

But don’t expect to return to Affiliate Summit. Any of you who had their name and company written down by security are not welcome back, and we’ll be taking measures to thwart those who managed to go undetected this time.

Shawn Collins Talks Twitter: News at 11

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I wrote a post a couple months back about how Comcast was using Twitter for customer service and made me a happy customer.

A few weeks later, I was contacted about doing a TV news segment about companies using the Internet for customer service, and the crew came over to my office for an interview.

Now the piece is starting to play in markets around the U.S. on 11 o’clock news broadcasts. It was on the ABC affiliate in Los Angeles last night: watch the video (they didn’t have an embed option).

Those with attention to detail will notice the strategically placed WLTV wristband on the front of my desk.

Shawn Collins pretends to work for the camera.

I’m not sure if different markets will show more or less footage, but there were some dramatic moments captured that weren’t in this version, such as when I turned on the TV in my living room and walked across my yard.

The pictures behind me are from past Affiliate Summits, so squint hard as you watch the footage and you might be up there.

Shawn Collins waxing poetic about Twitter and Comcast.

Please send me a link if you see the Twitter customer service story in your area. I’m not sure if I missed it in New York (it’s supposed to be on CBS here).