Moose on the Loose

As you maybe aware Affiliate Window had a recent coup by capturing the brands of the DSG group which includes Dixons, Currys, The Link & PC World. Now this blog entry isn’t gloating about whether I was pleased or not about DSG changing networks, but about what happened in the aftermath.

Before any notifcation was sent out from Tradedoubler (btw I’ll have to check emails to ascertain if it has yet been sent out), the commissions were lowered and set to a paltry 1% on Tradedoubler with immediate effect. Thus, once again there was inadequate notice to the change in a contract, which left affiliates in the lurch. It doesn’t matter whether they were a large affiliate or affiliate, or to what degree any affiliate had implemented those brands or what proportion of their time it related to. Affiliates would have been out of pocket.

What did Tradedoubler do about it?

Well not a lot it appears on the surface of it all, did they enforce the finer details of a contract on the DSG group or were those finer details not in print in the first instance, conversations may suggest the latter from the awkward & unenviable position they were unfortunately left in. Note: DSG left affiliates in a awkward position to forcibly change links quickly with little regard to them & thus lose money while Affiliate Window could have had trouble in a smooth transition of the programs.

However, though the fault lies squarely at the feet of the DSG Group, this presented an ideal opportunity for the Gauntlet to be picked up for the cause & good spirit of affiliate marketing, for those affiliates which would have beeen left out of pocket.

Now, I’m not suggesting this is the case, though it could be inferred as so, based on the subsequent events & how they unfolded, to the point it could be suggested / interpreted that Tradedoubler washed there hands of the matter or acted distinctly inertly. Whether they did or didnt’ and what ever the politics the result is still remained the same.

Affiliate Window came up with the following statement:

“We have been following the discussion regarding lost commission for sales that occur on TradeDoubler, post commission reduction.

(http://www.a4uforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=58929)

In order to limit the loss of any revenue during this transition from TradeDoubler to Affiliate Window, we are offering to compensate for all verified transactions, including those from existing TradeDoubler cookies.

To clarify, AW will add an extra 2% commission to the existing 1%, to be applied as a manual commission via your Affiliate Window account.

In order to process this quickly and simply, we will require all affected affiliates to supply an export of their TradeDoubler DSGi sales data to cover the period 2nd May to 30th May. This will be verified with each brand so we can calculate the total compensation to apply to your account. A reminder will be posted after the 30th.

DSGi are keen for you to migrate over, and we at AW want this to be as painless as possible, this therefore seems like an equitable solution and we hope you see it that way too.”

Now, blow me down with a feather, what an ideal solution & fantastic offering. Now granted Affiliate Window wanted as smooth-a-transition of the programs to their network possible, but in effect remunerating the affiliates like this and in effect picking up the tab of another network is awesome. A very good PR exercise where the right thing was done.

Hats of to Affiliate Window! Tradeodubler really missed out on a good PR opportunity.

Duncan Says- “Awesome move, other networks should notice the positive PR a move like this generates, goodwill may be intangible, but its value in this instance will (I believe) far outway the absorbed cost of the exercise. “

Now I am no fan of DSG, PC World owe me over £10,000 (maybe circa £13,000 or so, I will have to check reports) in unwarranted reversal of click & collect commissions when the program was on Tradedoubler. Whereby we were let down by both merchant & network. The merchant only offered a poultry* £500. *spelling mistake paltry

Granted, I have maybe been full of praise recently for Affiliate Window and they are maybe one of the current Goldenboys out of the networks, but my advise to them is to make sure they keep their feet firmly on the ground & don’t take their eye of the affiliates’ requirements plus remain squeaky clean in their actions. A previous & phony pretender to the throne will no doubt glance over with an envious eye & jealous rage .. and .. whilst trying to deflect negative attention from themselves, will quite probably try & dig up as much about Affliate Window as possible to tarnish their name. Because, if there is something to hide or ignorantly doing something untoward, they will try and unearth it.

Any Network can fall from grace quite easily as we have already witnessed, but at the “moment” they seem to be going in the right direction.

“You can fool some of the affiliates all of the time, and all of the affiliates some of the time, but you can not fool all of the affiliates all of the time.”

But for the time being, let’s take the postives from this, well done & thank you for demonstrating something good & done well, all in the true spirit of affiliate marketing.

Affiliate Window have proved to be first past the post with their recent re-development of Shop Window.

A long time ago I suggested on the A4UForum that any network that can produce high quality product feeds to allow affiliates to easily create product search sites will be the first past the post. Together with that I had an inkling since last year that Affiliate Window were a Dark Horse running up on the inside rail to pip at the post what some others considered to be the major players.

Well they certainly have come up trumps with their lastest ShopWindow Toolset which was launched on the 27th March, 2007.

I really hope affiliates appreciate this product and that the uptake & usage from them is high, as it has certainly raised the bar for other networks to follow suit, though I do hear that some slightly different but innovative ideas are being developed at Paidonresults too.

Kieron has already implemented ShopWindow Toolset very well it and you can see his comments over at www.here.org.uk We have a few theme ideas we would like to get stuck into, which we will embrace soon after a few current projects are completed, though flexibility will allow you to create some nice little niche sites of your own. But, if we demand innovation from networks, then we also need to use it, especially if it’s of a high enough quality so they will continue to develop further products.

ShopWindow Toolset provides you with product comparison functionality that can be customised and integrated within a website with minimum effort.

You can earn commission through adding ShopWindow functionality in the way that best suits your skill set and website architecture in one of three ways:

1. ShopWindow Direct – sending your web traffic to the shopwindow.com website

2. ShopWindow Client Software – integrating a fully customisable software package within your website, adding product comparison functionality

3. ShopWindow API – using our ShopWindow web-based service which allows you to develop applications based around our product data

ShopWindow Toolset will enable you to provide your users with dynamic content from our managed database of over 3 million products. Your users can search for specific products and review the results from within your website. Those users who click through to a merchant site are now more informed and more motivated to buy than ever before, increasing the likelihood of earning you a commission from their purchases.

Affiliate Window merchant product feeds have been thoroughly reviewed and mapped in recent weeks. The ShopWindow system is designed to recognise and learn behaviour patterns. This will result in your users being able to search for products more accurately and refine the results more thoroughly as each day passes.

Click ShopWindow to access a demonstration website with the Client Software in action (or go to www.shopwindow.com)

Please login to your Affiliate Window Admin Area for further information about the ShopWindow Toolset.

Well Done Affiliate Window !!!

It just gets better by the day.

I set up a Google Adwords Ad and bidded on “www.mooseontheloose.co.uk” and “mooseontheloose.co.uk”. Google Adwords wanted to charge $5.

Inactive for search : Increase quality or bid $5.00 to activate

lol – Go Figure That !

Here is my other thread related to Google Quality Score.

Is Google Quality Score Preposterous? Pretentious? unPardonable? Poppycock?

This is a massive thank you to Buyagift for an absolutely fantastic few days in Las Vegas. We were one of half a dozen lucky affiliates to win an all expenses paid trip to Las Vegas for a promotion they ran during the Christmas Period. Affiliates consisted of Neil, Steve, Romain, Richard, Wardy and myself together with Graham & Dan from Buyagift. It was a really good crowd and we all got on well.

Here is just a brief summary of what we did.

Friday :

Arrive at Las Vegas, 13:40 local time. Transfered to MGM Grand in a super-stratch-Vegas style vehicle! Our rooms were way up on the 28th Floor with a great view.

Afternoon & Evening we immediately hit the casino tables & bars. In the evening we watched the Crazy Horse Paris Topless Cabaret Show in the MGM Grand Hotel.

Saturday:

9am-5pm : Sports car driving tour to Lake Mead at break neck speeds along open roads, Sportscars included the Ferrari 360 Spyder, Ferrari 550 Maranello, Mercedes E55 AMG & a Ford Mustang GT Roush.

During this time period we had a short helicopter ride to Lake Mead, gourmet lunch at Luna Rossa together with a trip around the scenic Lake Las Vegas on an 86ft Supercruiser.

Full of adrenaline and all pumped up, it didn’t stop there!

9pm ’til late (vague recollections of about 5am) : VIP nightclub tour with a cruise of the Strip in stretched limo, with VIP host + Limo (filled with booze!) between each venue which included : Mix Ultralounge (spectacular city views from 55 floors up), Tangerine (outdoor terrace overlooking the Strip & burlesque performances) and back to Studio 54, picking up passengers along the way, where us unrhythmic affiliates strutted our stuff.

How most of us managed to get up for the following day I will never know!

Sunday:

1:30pm – 5:30pm : Helicopter flight to the Grand Canyon, taking in Lake Mead, Boulder City and Hoover Dam on the way – stopped for lunch, posed for pictures. I love flying in helicopters, even with a massive hangover like a few had, in fact a couple hadn’t even reached hangover stage .. it had to be done.

Evening: A delicious dinner at the Top Of The World revolving restaurant at the top of the Stratosphere Tower, over 800 ft up. With fantastic views all round.

For those who could stomache it, rides at the top of the Stratosphere. Unfortunately it was too windy and the ride was stopped when three who had the bottle were on it.

After that we spent some time in Cheetahs until about 3am, before inconspicuously being dropped on in the Pink Cheetahs Transit Van back at the hotel, where some of us played the tables or hit a bar.

Monday Morning:

Simply shopping & getting souveniers for my kids (who I always miss) before getting super stretched white hummer to the airport for the flight home for which I spent most of the time asleep. Arrived back home Tuesday morning in the UK.

Once again many thanks to Buyagift for what was a great prize incentive & will be a hard one to beat.

Many affiliates are what can only be politely referred to as possessing a physique which is considered portly, which is a natural side symptom of what goes with the territory when you are involved with affiliate marketing.

I am in the process of arranging an Affiliate Fat Camp, with a select few friends & business colleagues to spend 7 to 9 days in Portugal to enjoy a healthier lifestyle of exercise, good food and debauchery with the aim of losing a few pounds by the end of excursion, together with discussing new ideas and generally having a great time with friends & colleagues …

Because all of us will be leaving our good ladies at home, we have promised to leave out the debauchery. (Why have hamburger, when you can have steak at home)

The exericise regime is still to be finalised, it will be a mix of activities. However, to earn a beer .. and you cannot deny an affiliate a beer .. they would have to do 20 press ups between each beer to earn just one bottle.

However, we will have CCTV at the villa, with an option which yet to be voted on, whether or not to screen this live online in the form of a Celebrity Affiliate Fat Camp maybe to the extreme of Big Brother style diary room. It will depend what everyone else is up for or whether we wish to keep our flab under wraps.

Whatever is decided, those that have been approached so far are looking forward to it.

Fraser has come up with yet another good idea with reference to his podcasts.

By listening & responding to people who want to know how to get started in affiliate marketing, he is commencing a series of short 5-10 minute podcasts to try & assist those. That important intial step is coming up with the idea for your first site, which Fraser eloquently puts forward.

Getting Started in Affiliate Marketing – The Idea

It’s encouraging that there is a blog with podcasts which is catering for the noob & the next generation of affiliate marketeers whether they are those looking for a small additional income or those who may eventaully evolve into thriving businesses.

If you are serious about affiliate marketing then the a4uexpo at ExCel London 25th & 26th October, 2007 is the place to be. Stick it in your diary & make sure you attend.

This one event I am really looking forward to attending.

The organisation of this event specifically for the UK illustrates how affiliate marketing has progressed in this country, and if it wasn’t for Matt Wood who originally set up the affiliate forum in the early days, the complexion & landscape of affiliate marketing would certainly have taken up a different & less certain direction. Affiliate Marketing still has a considerable way to go before it reaches maturity, but if that utopia is ever achieved, then some of that credit will have to go to Matt Wood, The Affiliates4U Forum and his team for doing such a grand job in maintaining the A4UForum & organising affiliate G2G’s and events.

“a4uexpo is the first conference and exhibition dedicated to affiliate marketing to be held in Europe.

Designed to bring together the entire affiliate marketing industry in the same place, at the same time. a4uexpo will give affiliates, merchants, networks, agencies and in fact, everyone working in this fast-growth channel a full two days to focus on networking and relationship building.

a4uexpo will also have a strong educational focus enabling delegates to share their experiences & knowledge, learn about the latest exciting developments and hear from the experts through topical speakers, Q & A panels, workshops and networking sessions.”

The blog title is not my own heading but extracted from a quote I read on the A4UForum.

I have just returned from yet another family holiday in Portugal, hence why there has been a shortage of blog entries recently. (Who said thank goodness for that in the background?) So to catch up on things, one of my first ports of call is naturally the A4U Affiliate Forum along with blogs from some friends.

Upon reading the forum, Keith Budden, a respected affiliate, pointed out the terms & conditions of a particular merchant, Ocean Finance on one of the networks.

“ZERO TOLERANCE for any web pages appearing in natural listings via the Ocean brand or derivates thereof “

Basically meaning you cannot mention the name “Ocean Finance” in any html on your site, whether copy or meta tags or allow that page to be indexed in a search engine.

As Duncan quite rightly says & suggests “Insane policy – absolutely insane – one of the craziest things I’ve ever heard … this isn’t a merchant, its a paronoid delusionist. Personally I’d like to see the merchant suspended until this is resolved, its unenforceable, short-sighted and shows a complete lack of understanding as to how the internet works.”

Unfortunately, this has a whiff of the old Interflora program all over again, which some may recall. However, it’s also indicative to the extreme how more & more restrictive terms & conditions are generally being applied & imposed upon affiliates and how networks tolerate it to appease the merchant rather than the affiliate.

Here is the old Interflora thread

That Interflora thread is over 3 years old, yet similar problems are still happening & lessons are not being learned.

I had always thought that affiliate marketing was meant to be a synergy between affiliate, network & merchant & that the affiliate in some aspects was an extension of a merchants online sales force … and not to obstruct an affiliate with unnecessary hurdles to jump over & hoops to jump through.
Anyhow, If we looked closely enough at all programs on all networks, more will probably surface, whereby some of the legal jargon used in additional T&C’s would require a solictor to interpret. Therefore these type of programs tend to be automatically dumped in the bin along with any others who adopt a draconian attitude.

Now, when searching “ocean finance” on Google UK, yields about 298,000 results. Somehow, this will be a difficult one to enforce.By the way have you viewed their site via a firefox browser, talk about compatibility problems. Very amateur.

A forum member amusingly wrote “I was sitting by the Ocean thinking about a homeowner loan and wondering which finance company to go with … I chose this one – Get enough links to the page and you’ll be no.1 for Ocean Finance Homeowner Loans”

All in all this clearly demonstrates, by the merchant (or a party which is considered to giving them poor advice), a fine blend of arrogance & ignorance of how the internet & search engines work or how to run an effective affiliate program.

Their so called updated policy wasn’t really any different.

“ZERO TOLERANCE for any web pages appearing in natural listings via the Ocean brand or derivates thereof (logo images are available and must be used).”

Ocean Finance has probably made a rod for it’s own back and if blogged enough, well, you can guess may get indexed well in search engines & unless the policy is changed, the program will close in due course.

Last months Donkey of the Month Award definitely went to ASOS www.asos.com . This month definitely goes to Ocean Finance www.oceanfinance.co.uk

Congratulations … Eeyore … The Fools.

Suggestion: Avoid the program & move on. There are alternative programs to choose from.

Sometimes it seems networks and merchants are too keen in getting a program launched, I realise that some networks are careful but maybe not enough. Before a program is launched perhaps all merchant programs should go through / undergo some form of gestation or incubation period. This is not simply about ensuring that the merchants website is of suitable quality in design & functionality, though this can be subjective (beauty is in the eye of the beholder) or about prominent telephone numbers (potentially causing leakage) are not too visible & ensuring tracking is correctly inserted … But, about conversion! Now this might be outside the remit of the network, however before a program is launched perhaps the network (not the affiliate) should run two ppc campaigns obo of the merchant without any commission involved.

The first one based on brand keywords, hydrid keywords (brand+generic) and brand mispellings .. The second based on the merchants top 25 (for example) products. To ascertain the CR (conversion rates) & EPCs of these. The network bidding on brand is purely a litmus test to ascertain how well a merchant can convert on its own brand .. if it cannot, it’s more often than not unlikely to be able to convert on product terms, however this is not “always” (though most often it is) the case, as well as the fact that the merchant may not be a large enough brand to receive a large volume of traffic to quantify the data to form CR’s & EPC’s. Hence, the need for testing the product terms too. Once these have been run say over an initial experimental period of a month, then the network could suggest changes which can be implemented to improve the CR & EPC which are comparible or better than programs within the same vertical sector. Once the changes have been made, then test again over another suggested period of one month until satisfactory results are acheived … then … and only then release the program by making it live.

Summary

The reason for this is simple, too often programs are unleashed on the affiliate community before they are even ready, the affiliates can be the victim of being the unfortunate Guinea Pigs to ascertain whether these programs convert or not .. potentially wasting time and money (whether it be via seo, ppc, email marketing etc). This could also prevent some affiliates abandoning programs if results are poor and spreading the word with negative vibes to the affiliate community that a particular program is a poor convertor. Therefore if affiliate programs were prepped & tested correctly before launch, then the uptake & confidence from affiliates in a particular program maybe higher and assist in ski-ramping any new program onto the scene.

Finally, there may also be a space / void in the consultancy field for an affiliate to earn an additional income by offering their services based on their experience & knowledge of the industry pertaining to what is suggested above. The frustation sometimes aired by affiliates is when merchants take too long to make necessary changes, usually larger brands are slow & sluggish like dinosaurs (maybe due to bureaucratic authorisation procedures & long chains of approval to implement the slighest thing), whereby affiliates can implement necessary changes more vigorously. Thus, this is why it’s so important to ensure everything is tickety-boo right from outset.

I am fairly new to the world of blogging so maybe after a period of time, I will gradually learn how to write a decent blog, however typo errors & erractic grammar shall still be an inherent trait. If anything it’s more of a diary simply expressing / airing my views & keeping any rants off the forums. I am just your bog standard affiliate who simply calls it how he see it, any opinions I have, I would direct at any party concerned in person. It’s not an ego, but just being upfront, middle aged & stuck in some of my ways, and if anything I dislike any form of limelight. Blogging shouldn’t be about winning favour with networks or merchants with sugar coated pleasantries or trying to win a popularity contest, but commenting on the industry as you see it.

I have been an affiliate probably for about 9 years now and am still on the learning curve, learning something new every week. In fact, I am taking myself back to primary education in many aspects taking my own style refresher courses & starting from scratch to see if there is anything I have neglected on the journey to consildate foundations we have previously laid.

But, I have two ears, two eyes & one mouth & I always try to use them in those proportions. Some of you may think that “The Moose” is a gobby sod, well perhaps I listen a whole bloomin lot more.

I have bookmarked this link

Affiliate Marketing Blogs on MyBlogLog

The time it takes to peruse & digest a number of these blogs could easily quite distract me 24 /7, so getting to them all will take some time.

However, I have been impressed with the number of really good affiliate marketing blogs out there, with various views, opinions & insights. Sometimes I may have a predetermined perspective on a topic and another blogger may throw another angle that makes you think. Reading some of these terrific blog entries & listening to to what other affiliates have to say, allows me to make my own inferences of the marketplace either reaffirming my own thoughts or offering well balanced different opinion. Also, the amount of industry related news you can catch up on, I would otherwise have missed.

There is certainly a solid community out there & as & when I read decent blog entries, I would certainly link / point to their articles.