One of the foremost tenets of affiliate marketing is know your partners. Monitoring merchants is something every affiliate should do, but how many really do it?
Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) enables you to subscribe for updates on any company name or keyword with Google Alerts.
Google Alerts are e-mail updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic.
In addition to providing you with news updates for any keyword term you select, you can also get e-mails if your keyword is mentioned in a blog, the regular Google results, or Google Groups.
This is a great, free tool to keep an eye on any key announcements for companies you promote, as well as positive and negative opinions on the companies in blogs and Google Groups.
Visit http://www.google.com/alerts for more details.