I got an e-mail from a blog reader recently. He really wanted to get some advice on getting a start in affiliate marketing. Like many people who are strongly interested in giving things a go, he’s been having real difficulty working out just what you have to do to get that first precarious toe hold on the affiliate marketing ladder.

I replied to his initial e-mail and asked for more information on what he was trying to achieve and asked if I could publish my reply to help other newbie affiliate marketers.

Here’s what Mark wanted to know: -

Well I have often wondered whether it still is possible to do ok in this field, people say so many different things it’s hard to know what to do, but deep down Im dying to give it a go and see what happens.

Dear Mark,

You are facing what is probably the biggest barrier to entry in this area of marketing, so you’re not alone!

It is still possible for newbies to enter and do well in this field. (more…)

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the alleged affiliate marketing team at Primary Insurance for getting a hold put on my Commission Junction payments recently without even contacting me to explain why.

I’d been sending some brand-related traffic to their programme, which they decided they did not like and reported me to CJ. Until I complained the other day, I’d had no payments since March 15th. After they complained, CJ’s US office promptly put a hold on payments, didn’t tell me or contact me, and didn’t contact the CJ UK account management team to tell them either.

So, I’d like to let Primary Insurance know that it is customary to let affiliates know in the programme terms and conditions that brand bidding is not acceptable. Here is their current programme page: -

Oh, what a surprise! They haven’t actually specified their aversion to brand name bidding. I’ve also just been and re-joined the programme using another account, and there is nothing in the sign-up process to say “Please Don’t Bid On The Primary Insurance Brand Name”. Finally, there is absolutely no mention of brand bidding T’s & C’s in their welcome e-mail. Thats three missed chances guys.

Here’s a clue chaps, affiliates are not psychics. Unless you say there is no brand name bidding, someone else will rapidly fill the shoes of each and every affiliate you inconvenience in the way you’ve inconvenienced me. I’ve just been and checked, and just about every variation of their brand name is being covered by affiliates on Google Adwords.

Another suggestion; the next time you are allocating a bit of staff training to the Primary Insurance affiliate manager, why not go mad and let them know how to identify affiliate ID’s and where the affiliate e-mail section of the CJ interface is. By using these two exciting bits of information, you too can contact your affiliates direct!!

Affiliates are (largely) highly skilled marketing professionals, not dodgy teenagers working out of their bedrooms. Why not treat us as such? I’ve been working in online marketing commercially since many of the affiliate managers I encounter were still learning the “three R’s” at Primary School.

Episodes like this make me think some of them should still be there. >:(

I’ve just read an interesting snippet on ShoeMoney’s blog.

Apparently The Rich Jerk’s infallible money making system has gone so well for him he’s having to sell his business to dig himself out of a massive debt and a looming bankruptcy. He cranked up the debt buying TV advertising, and on places like the Howard Stern show that (obviously) didn’t work well enough for him.

The good news is that it wasn’t his own money he pissed up against the proverbial advertising wall, it was investors money. Well, that’s alright then isn’t it?

You can read the listing to sell his alleged business here. I know a lot of people have met Kelly and said what a plausible guy and clever marketer he was, but I guess in the end he simply couldn’t live up to his own hype.

Guess its time for one jerk to go back to his day job?

Update: Apparently the Rich Jerk Has Read Shoemoney’s post and is not happy! He’s threatening legal action, and in typical style ShoeMoney cares not a jot. I think Jeremy’s “Jerking” you around Kelly, lol.

Does nobody ever learn that sending abusive e-mails to ShoeMoney only ever results in him publishing them immediately?

Sooo excited!

I’ve just started arranging my wedding in Scotland. Thanks to the power of the internet I have already managed to book my venue, locate a caterer, band, and entertainer for the big day from over here in Australia.

OK, this is not entirely on topic in terms of it being directly related to affiliate marketing. BUT! I am going to have a wedding I never in my wildest dreams thought I’d be able to afford. Paid for by affiliate marketing, therefore we are back on topic and you have to sit and listen. Hurahh. It’s every bride’s dream!!

I’m getting married in Ayrshire, Scotland which is where I grew up. I’ve booked out a glorious Edwardian hunting lodge for an entire week. We’re going to party on down with our nearest and dearest for an entire 5 days before the hordes of Jericho, AKA my HUUUUUGGEEE family, descend on our posh pad for the affiliate wedding of the century. The week before the gig will include entertainment for our overseas guests (I’m marrying into a Kiwi family) such as a full on burns supper complete with piper, highland dancers, entertainment from a pipe band, entertainment from a brass band, and guided tours of the local area. Phew!!

The wedding day plan so far: -

Venue: http://www.blackclauchrie.com

If anyone is considering a Scottish wedding, this venue is highly recommended. The owner, Caroline Alcanter, has just gone above and beyond in helping me with the actual arrangements beyond the venue booking. She’s been absolutely wonderful and indespensible in my long-distance efforts.

There will be 80 day guests and things will hot up in the evening as we jam the rest of my cousins into the ballroom and crack the guest list up to a cool 150.

We have a close up magician, comedian, and caricature artist in the frame to keep the guests entertained whilst all those awful boring wedding pictures are being taken.

The food will be a traditional Kiwi BBQ followed by copious amounts of booze served at the bar. The party will kick off with a bang at around the time my family work out I am picking up the bar tab for the entire evening. My hubby to be’s family will no doubt be somewhat aghast, but my family’s brand of party chaos is contagious fun and they’ll soon have a night they just won’t be able to remember, ;).

Bridezilla is alive and well in affiliateland, you have been warned!!

I’ve never used Deal Group Media as an affiliate, so I asked my good friend Steven Marwick of Virtual Cards to give me his thoughts on how DGM perform as a network. After all, who better to review a network than it’s own affiliates?

Network Name: Deal Group Media
URL: http://www.dgm-uk.com

Contact Details:
Unit 800
Highgate Studios
53 - 79 Highgate Road
London NW5 1TL

Telephone: 0207 691 1880

Type of Merchants Available: Deal Group Media have
many high profile clients, particularly in the mobile
phone and broadband internet sectors. They also have a
significant number of well known charities working
exclusively with them. They attract many big name
merchants, despite well documented and ongoing
problems with their DGM Pro software.

Payments: Payments are made monthly in arrears with
Deal Group Media.

2nd Tier Commissions: No.

Support Quality : Poor. It is very difficult to get
answers to email queries with this network. They seem
to prefer to deal with affiliates over the phone,
which is far from an optimal use of time for many
affiliates.

Merchant Performance Metrics Available: No. It is
possible to find out how a merchant is performing for
you but there is not any indication of how a merchant
is performing accross the network.

Keyword tracking: Yes, provided that you are able to
master the poorly documented clickreference system.

Search Term Tracking: No.

Referring URL Tracking: No

Custom Content Units: No

Data Feeds: No.

Type Of Programmes: (i.e per lead, per sale, per click, pay per call etc)

Per Sale: Yes
Per lead: Yes
Per Click: No
Per Call: No

A great search engine institution may soon come to an end after ebay has changed its policy regarding how US affiliates can drive traffic to their affiliate programme.

From June 1st, the US ebay programme will no longer allow affiliates to drive traffic direct to the online auction site via paid search on Google, Yahoo, or MSN. There is no news yet as to when / if these changes will be rolled out to the UK affiliate programme. At the same time, they are also changing the payment structure of the programme to create higher performance tiers.

More information at ebay.com

Yes, you’ve guessed it… no more of those ads we all know and love promoting such highly sought after items as “Blue Bums” or “Fanny Magnets”, which according to ebay affiliates are for sale on the famous auction site.

Joking aside, there will be some fairly big earning affiliates feeling a bit of anguish over this one. It’s well known in the affiliate industry that ebay has some affiliates earning huge amounts of cash from the traffic they drive. Its the old don’t put all your eggs in one basket adage, so here’s hoping these affiliates have another string or two to their bow or their mansions may well be reposessed come July!

There’s a fair bit of speculation around regarding ebays reasoning over this change. Perhaps the Google display url changes which took place a while ago has driven ebay to examine whether their PPC costs have been driven up by affiliates competing for the display URL. In addition to this, ebay then had to renumerate affiliates for the leads and sales they created.

This is the kind of decision that many merchants are increasingly taking as they seek to protect themselves from paying commission on traffic they feel they could have generated themselves at a much cheaper rate. I wonder if ebay will keep up the fine blue bum and fanny magnet tradition of its affiliates? If nothing else, its sometimes good for a laugh as I wind my way round the affiliate highways and byways of the internet.

I have saved these images for posterity lest they become a thing of the past!

Update: Rob Of MarketingDrome sent over these images he has collected of similar weird e-bay searches. Thanks Rob!

I’d recently started promoting a commercial insurance site, Premierline Direct. I’ve only sent 4 leads to them, and each and every one has been declined. OK, a small number of leads. However, the decline reason on the last 2 was “No Response From Lead”. First two were “invalid contact details”. Now, fair enough on the incorrect contact details (If that’s the real decline reason)… but the second decline reason implies they couldn’t get through to the person in question and have declined the lead for that reason. Sorry guys, but that’s not actually the definition of a lead.

I contacted Affiliate Future support and said I had grave concerns regarding the criteria for lead acceptance being applied under this programme. As I said in my network review they got back to me within a matter of hours saying they would ask the merchant about it. Two days later they responded. The only information that Premierline Direct had provided was “No, all the leads are valid” and when I asked for clarification on this vague statement, Affiliate Future told me that they are having real problems getting Premierline Direct to clarify how they are dealing with leads and what their lead criteria are.

I won’t be promoting this company again, I feel that there is either something wrong with their lead verification process, or that there is an issue with the lead submission form. The other possibility is that Premierline Direct are taking the piss, and declining perfectly good leads because they think they can get away with doing that to affiliates. Their lack of communication with the affiliate network does rather back this one up.

I have been told Premierline Direct have a high overall decline rate, so if you have commercial insurance traffic do yourself a favour and don’t waste it on these guys.

Want to find out what kind of affiliate you are? Find out by taking my affiliate personality test!

It’s only designed to be a bit of fun, there’ll be no need to consult a psychiatrist if you don’t like what you find out

Take The Test Now!

Teenage boys all over the world are breathing a sigh of relief today after Google won a copyright infringement lawsuit brought by Perfect Ten. The lawsuit was taking Google to task over naughty images from their site being displayed in response to image searches.

Perfect Ten were apparently seeking to protect the images because they feared they would undermine their attempts to sell self same nudie pics to people using mobile phones.

Now, as I’ve mentioned in a previous post, it would be a very simple task for Perfect Ten to add a robots.txt command preventing content being indexed from their site.

However, it seems that Perfect Ten were also contending that Google were responsible for results being returned from other websites using Perfect Ten’s images without permission.

How exactly did numpties expect Google to police that one? I know they’re good technically, but how could they possibly comply with any court ruling ordering them to stop showing these images? The only way I can think of is shutting down the service altogether, which I assume would have been the possible result of a successful case.

This would no doubt result in several hundred thousand teenagers reporting drastically improved eyesight

More Information at BBC News.

I’d like to take the opportunity to berate Matt of Affiliates4U for his new site format. Their failure to add an affiliate health warning to their new offering resulted in me wasting a good 3 or 4 hours fiddling around with all the wonderful new toys they have added.

So if you are in danger of becoming an affiliate-o-holic, and are of the disposition for procrastination (as I am), you may have to watch your addiction levels with this great new site.

I was a bit disorientated at first (Scottish people respond poorly to change), but was soon immersed in their new social networking options and blog section complete with digg and bumpzee-like tags which let people show their appreciation for posts they have enjoyed.

I’m really pleased with the new look, and think its a great contribution and resource for the future of UK affiliate marketing. Lets not make the mistake of taking Matt and team’s investment in this for granted.

Affiliates4U

PS - Hey, how about some blog widgets guys? I imagine you’re already on the case there!