Moose on the Loose

I would personally like to raise a bumper toast to all my fellow friends, peers & brethren in affiliate land by wishing you all a Merry Christmas brimming with cheer… and … Here’s To A Happy, Healthy & Prosperous New Year.

Merry ChristMoose !!!

Brand bidding is a senstive area, but unquestionably responsible for being one of the main contributing factors for the initial growth of the affiliate marketing industry, which wouldn’t be where it is today, however one has to consider whether any networks are sending out mixed messages.

For example if you find time, on Tradedoubler go to the search policy section on a number of merchant’s information pages & scroll down to a particular clause.

4.6 You are allowed to show adverts on trademarks, or variations, of advertiser’s competitors?

The merchant has an option for yes or no. With enough opting to permit affiliates to bid on competitor trademarks & variations.

What is your interpretation of this? Realistically what kind of mixed message does this send out not only to their clients, but may encourage some affiliates to do? Consequently, potentially contributing to allow the affiliate marketing industry to be tarnished.

The phenomenal growth of the industry, from revenues generated, has been mainly in part due to the allowance of brand bidding, and by judging networks at the moment, some are & will still be thriving in 2008 with coffers being filled from the over-ride of closed brand bidding groups. Which in all completely skews the sales figures the affiliate channel is earning/producing.

A solution certainly needs to be found, which prevents the content affiliates cookie being over-written. Whether a seperate link, or the referring keyword (which can easily enough be hidden anyhow) cross referenced against a whitelist of actual trademarks to ascertain who gets credited with the commission from the sale. A technical solution needs to be found.

But going back to clause 4.6 … is this particularly ethical?

I am surpised it hasn’t been addressed for wider debate & can only assume both merchants, affiliates & other networks have been oblivious to it. Or a worse case scenario, people simply don’t care.

Whether you consider it scrupulous or unscrupulous, the decision is yours, but this clause is a licence to print money!

In 2008 I think we need to re-examine this area a whole lot more for each network. The AMC (Affiliate Marketing Council) at the IAB (Internet Advertising Bureau) could certainly contribute by implementing a code of practice for its members on competitor to competitor bidding, with the asssumed weight to clamp down on merchant & non-merchant members on unethical paid search practices, they get the necessaryinches in the publications, and if they are to prove they have any teeth, this one aspect which should be addressed.

Following up to the most excellent read on Revenue Addict, this is just one of a numerous number of instances in the marketplace with competitor to competitor bidding which networks all too often think is just an affiliate affliction.

With the example illustrated below, take note how gimpish the offending merchant is failing to cover their tracks … Blatant & Unethical! … Do they have no shame? … I wonder if the actual client knows what their paid search agency is doing.

The clue is in the highlighted red text.

Especially when there is a conflict of interest when both merchants are on one network, and that is Buy.at. No doubt if they see this they might inform their client & claim it as their own superior client support. But you saw it here first. However if they do, then are they blagging on one of their clients (Play.com) who might not be impressed. But if they have a quiet word first with the culprit (Play.com) to suggest removing it, then wouldn’t Waterstone’s be aggreived that Buy.at didn’t inform them first. To add to the mix if Play.com employ an agency to do their search, does the actual client realise the agency is acting unethically on their behalf?

Reverse psychology? Mind games? No win situation? … Perhaps … A quandary it is though.

Merchants need to get a true perspective, for every affiliate which is inadvertently appearing to or actually breaching a keyword policy, there are multiple times more other merchants & competitors who deliberately are, yet affiliates get tarnished with the poor reputation.

Merchant’s if your network is truly looking after your interests, then insist they point out these other merchant competitors to you, or do networks/merchants not have the integrity to take on the likes of Ebay, Ask & other merchants.

Also if you have trademarks, though the process maybe tedious, register them with the various paid search engines. The initiative is in your own hands.

True to form, from below, you can see Ebay & Ask dominating the space on Waterstone’s brand. What else did you expect?

The cruxes (cruces) of affiliate marketing consist of multiple symbiotic relationships consisting of several synergetic elements, with affiliates pivotal at the core ensuring the wheels stay in motion.

For a successful program to appeal to an affiliate & achieve maximum potential the network & merchant have to be attuned to the affiliate mindset. False sincerity & sycophant tendencies, both of which are less endearing qualities, will eventually get rumbled.

From The Pyramid of Perception below ..

Which one do you believe is most relevant to the affiliate marketing industry from an affiliate, network or merchant/agency perspective & which do you honestly abide by?

Such that for the one you subconsciously know is right may not reflect in your conscious actions.

Putting unrealistic idealism’s of Utopia to one side, which pyramid structure do you feel reflects how the affiliate marketing industry should be?

A = Affiliate … M = Merchant / Agency … N = Network

I am really pleased to announce that Shane Robinson has officially launched his own blog, and about time too. Revenue Addict.

As for The Magic Genie, also known as The Hoff, we can all look forward to him oozing satirical & humorous anecdotes within the affiliate marketing blogosphere, which will without doubt be a welcomed & refreshing approach previously reserved for just the forum, by enlightening us with his pearls of wisdom & spraying you with droplets from his fountain of knowledge, insightful views & opinions with a twist of Jeremy Clarkson mixed with Stephen Fry & a dash of Eddie Izzard, shaken & not stirred.

Don’t expect any fluffing, this is the second coming, a professional to the core with opinions to match, I’m looking forward to a regular read & more than a smidgen of spleen wobbling fun.

So smite me oh mighty smiter, here’s to you Mr Robinson & his all seeing eye!

Click Here for Revenue Addict

P.S. And it’s low fat, zero sugar and cookie stuffed iframe free!

Okay, I said I would make a more contributed effort to complementing the good guys out there rather than bashing the merchants who deserve it in true Punch & Judy fashion.

Well, 24 Studio have have truly shown their recognistion of the value in the affiliate marketing channel with the announcement which can be seen below, illustrating not only how they & Sean Carter at Mediavest are understanding affiliate marketing themselves but they are actually listening to affiliates too.

I think this a real bonus especially for content affiliates, who will see their efforts being duly rewarded & recognisition of the ambiguity of the last click refferrer debate.

For which I can sum up simply by saying “Well Done & Thank You”

“Hi guys,

We all know that the last-click referrer debate has been going on for quite a while (example post), and that the current “best practise” is to remove ANY commissions for sales (based on last-click referrer) which have been allocated to another online source other than Affiliates.

I have been working with 24Studio, Affiliate Window and Commission Junction over the last month to enable us to step outside of the box a little with regard to the above.

History :

The 24Studio affiliate program has been facing an increasing duplication rate on their sales as the program has been increasing its volume in the last couple of months. Some of the performers on the program raised their concerns about this, and I thought it prudent to address the problem before it became any more extreme and threatened your confidence in the program (as has happened so may times before with big-name brands!)

Having completed some tests using our third-party tracking software, we have identified that due to strong PPC brand activity, a large portion of the duplication (in recent months) is based on customers being cookied by affiliates, but having the sale completed at a later date when the customer searches for the brand (PPC) – resulting in the affiliate losing the sale.

Technically speaking, form a best-practise point of view – the scenario above is (arguably) completely acceptable, but having discussed this with the client to highlight the affiliates point of view – we have agreed to pay a % on these sales for the next 3 months as a test.

We believe that the affiliates are a valuable part of 24studio’s marketing mix, and we have used the third-party tracking and the payment system below to help prove this.

How it works :

All standard last-click referrer sales tracked to the affiliates are paid on a 6% commission (standard payment system)

Additionally, when a customer clicks through an affiliate-ad, and goes to the 24Studio site, then leaves the site only to return within 30 days via the PPC brand activity – affiliates will be paid a 3% commission.

The upshot for affiliates :

The upshot of all this is that affiliates on the 24Studio program for the next 3 months will be paid commission on all sales where they have had an tangible involvement! If you have referred a customer from your site, you will be paid commission if the customer returns using brand search!

I know that this is not the usual run of events for this type of situation, but we wanted to acknowledge that the affiliates are an important part of the marketing factor for 24Studio, and that IF an affiliate refers a customer – and they come looking for the brand within the cookie period – the affiliates should reap some of the rewards.

We are testing this for the next 3 months so that we have some robust statistics for the duplication rates of both brand and non-brand, and we’ll reassess the situation in February ’08

Hope I’ve explained this well enough!

Please let me know if you have any questions or comments.

Thanks again for all the hard work.

Sean
__________________
Sean
Senior Affiliate Manager
sean.carter@mvmediagroup.co.uk
0161 242 7282″

Related Blogs:

Last Click Commissions – Still Relevant in 2007 / 2008? – by Lee McCoy

Affiliate Marketing – 2008 – The Year Ahead – by Loquax

Positive Action Taken RE: Last-Click Referrer – 24 Studio Have Listened to You

As an addition to my personal network league table which can currently be viewed in the left hand column, I shall soon be introducing a new one, appropiately called “The Naughty Step”, especially for merchants. This is geared towards merchants whom we deem problematic for one reason or another & could be included for a multitude of reasons e.g. continual poor tracking, lack or remuneration from lost tracking, personal conflicts, draconian t&c’s or keyword policies, poor commission rates, short notice program closures, 0% commission rates or the way they may have treated other affiliates who we are supportive of to achieve satisfactory resolution to their problems.

Rather than descending down the fold which often is the case on a blog or more noticeably on a forum, the league table will be a permanent feature. Not only that, the time stamp on the blog entry will be constantly changed so that it will remain on the homepage of the blog as a gentle reminder.

For those of us who have children, though not necessarily practise depending on your perspective, or even was invoked upon yourself when you were a child, you may well be familiar with “The Naughty Step” in relation to it being adopted whether right or wrong as part of the parenting skillset.

A Balance In The Force

By the same token however, and to balance out, we shall be introducing one for merchants we rate highly & would like to bring to the fore, please note though we are not seeking advertisements or complimentary gifts to appear on there, so please may I make that absolutely clear that our opinion cannot be influenced with gold, frankincense, and myrrh!!!

I am still looking for a catchy phrase for this particular league table, whilst my creative juices are suffering from a high viscosity this afternoon, thus they are not particularly flowing as fast as they normally do, the only two options I have tamely conjured up so far are “Fill Your Boots” & “Milk The Fat Cow”. If you have anything more appropriate please comment below.

If you have any suggestions of merchants who should appear on the “The Naughty Step”, then please tell The Moose.

Here are just a few who shall be appearing on “The Naughty Step” and in no particular order.

Dixons, WH Smith, Waitrose Entertaining, BT Broadband, DVD.co.uk, British Airways, Barclaycard, Play.com, Game, Woolworth’s, PC World, Currys,  Toys R Us, eDirectory, John Lewis, Choices UK, Waterstone’s, Virgin Mobile.

Future Blog: This shall be about my personal views on the IAB Affiliate Marketing Council & including a synopsis of comments from other affiliates as well.

Just imagine if consumers were generally knowledgeable about paid search. Now mix this & adopt into a scenario where a consumer and had adequate case for complaints about a particular retailer or service which wasn’t being resolved to their satisfaction. That person(s) maybe had a blog and wanted to get their message out there, which would be more effective than simply commenting on a consumer review site.

Now, just imagine that consumer, knowing about paid search and having some disposable cash, bidded on that retailers brand and pointing the traffic to their own blog. Interesting maybe?

Consumers haven’t yet utilised paid search to their advantage for effective resolution.
Now, just imagine this was taken one stage further, your an affiliate with a strong belief & proof for commissions due which were incorrectly reversed etc … You tried the more diplomatic channels to no avail and the result is not to your satisfaction.

Now, just imagine as an affiliate you had the option of expensive litigation to which you may not see any return or for a fraction of what it would cost, bidded on the merchants brand name, variation & mispellings & pointed these paid search ads to your blog with your issue & personal opinions on an affiliate program. Also inviting reviews from the other affiliates & even consumers.

Well, that is an avenue we are exploring at the moment pertaining to one particular merchant, to bid on their brand name, variation & misspellings & point to an entry on this blog. It wouldn’t take rocket science to ascertain who the merchant is, but this will put a whole new perspective of achieving fair resolution & the necessary leverage which affiliates or consumers generally don’t have, where big brands think they can mistakenly dismiss affiliates or consumers.

The internet is a powerful leveler for advocating the abolition of social inequities within the industry.

Just Imagine!

Sub Note: Whether affiliates are aware of it of it or not, this has been a bad year for the industry for affiliates in particular with respect to being supressed & operational envelopes ever decreasing & the industry fragmenting. I think next year it will get worse before it gets better, with distinct camps which if you are observant enough are plain to see at this moment in time, but there will be affiliates (a new breed, not old hands) who shall be getting considerably tougher & resourceful by tackling issues on a more united & public front, where diplomacy has previously fallen on deaf ears.

Granted there have been some terrific highlights this year mainly on the social & networking calendar like a4uexpo & Affiliate Summit, for myself the trip to Las Vegas with Buyagift, Affiliate Window Vaudeville Experience & Barbados Trip with Holiday Watchdog & Affiliate Future … and of course not forgetting Affiliate Fat Camp.

Tradedoubler look like they are soon rolling out their own version of Affiliate Window’s ShopWindow called with the advancement of their own product search solution called”MyShop”, which will be an API product feed available all affiliates to utilise.

Potentially, I guess this will be warmly received by affiliates. Currently its in Beta trial and Tradedoubler are looking for further feedback from other publishers who are interested.

One thing we did notice about a sample landing page of theirs:

Tradedoubler Page

ShopperUK.com Page

Notice the translucent jelly beans the former has adopted. The wording on the beans, “Buy Now” & “More Info” which increases CTR based on purchase stage of visitor. The logo top right & price bottom right. Interesting layout indeed on the layout & button naming & configurations?! … “Quite brazen & machiavellian”

Essentially with MyShop, you will have the ability to display product based information on your site, without the unnecessary headache of implementing databases or server-side script writing. It’s aim is to be as flexible as possible so it can be integrated in a variety of manners onto an affiliates website.

Benefits Will Include:

• Limited to the advertisers an affiliate wants to work with
• Category & price filtering opportunities
• Various methods of integration
• Price comparison features
• Detailed product information for over 2 million products.

Conclusion:

It looks like it will have the potential to firmly put them on the map with this latest tool development. And if living up to self proclamations it will be a welcome development, but it won’t disguise what we personally feel is woeful affiliate support as communicated on a number of occasions within this blog.

On the whole well done to Tradedoubler on what might be, but they have a long, long journey ahead of them before they ever become attuned. However, I am slightly sceptical whether this tool when released is purely to place them in a better position to be the subject of an acquisition, after the AOL deal fell through and with Affiliate Window’s Shopwindow stealing a lead on them recently, they had no alternative but to develope.

Hey ho .. make hay whilst the sun shines & milk the cow whilst it is fat & all that jazz..

(I have sent an email enquiring about being one of Beta testers & left a general message on the answer phone as we concurrently run a sweepstake here)

Result so far: Tumbleweed

Tradedoubler does have a tendenancy to over complicate new tools they develope, one suggestion I would say and always apply to myself is “keep it simple silly”

If you haven’t had the unfortunate opportunity to do so yet, when you have a moment, take a peruse of the Dixons merchant information page. Whilst gleaning, to your disatisfaction you will then notice a number of products set at 0% (zero) commission as well as those set at 0.5%.

Naturally disapproving of this, I continued to ascertain if these products were appearing in the product feeds, well I’ve just searched one example of the product lines, which was DVD RW … and unfortunately, yes it is.

What the heck? This is quite concerning. The products really should not even be in any product feeds.

In my humble opinion & without a doubt, their commission rates are quite lousy compared to competitors & are exploiting affiliates. There perhaps should be a bar commission rates have to raise to in order to qualify for any product feed feature or as a merchant on a network at all, yet some affiliates, like plums, will still feature them.

The subjest of 0% (zero) and 0.5% commission, should maybe treated separately as they may command slightly differing viewpoints.

The main point I would like to draw attention to is that it was all well & good in principle when commission groups on product ranges were initially introduced acrossed different networks, and it was fairly warmly received by affiliates.

But, a few merchants … how can I put it politely .. are taking liberties. When the margins are small they squeeze as much cheese as possible to affiliates to lower commissions, where instances 0% commission are simply intolerable.

Will the merchant or network be yielding? It’s unlikely, and both parties will try to dispate any decent discussion until after the christmas period, at least. i wonder if The Sun would be too happy to hear they are listing 0% commission items & whether any of teh cashback sites receive flat rates to offset these.

However wasn’t the purpose of these commission structures to be reflective of the profit margins?

So, where are the juicy commissions on products with higher profit margins, nowhere to be seen of course! What? Did you actually believe some merchants would play ball? I remember it was not too long ago that LCD & Plasma TV’s were at least double the price they are now .. where were the proportional increases to be seen then?

Look there it is .. and once again there goes the oinky sonic boom of another pig flying past the window (cheers again Kirsty)

Big Brand does not equate to big conversions. My EPC with Dixons isn’t even 1 pence though most of that is attributed to Wii’s being in the Shopwindow feed which has since been removed, though when the program was on Tradedoubler it was still a lackluster performer from our perspective. I don’t know how Shopwindow weights merchants in their feed, but with commission levels like that .. hmm .. the term bottom feeders comes to mind (referring to merchant).

Don’t me wrong Shopwindow is a terrific product & I urge more merchants to join or add their products to it … & … more affiliates to utilise it. As we personally look forward to further development of sites incorporating Shopwindow.

I would like to quote Renegade in response to Keith’s blog post

Given the nature of our sites we’re not going to drop stores BUT we can and do structure our page layouts to encourage our visitors towards merchants which make us the best commissions. Case in point this week has been the first Bennetts discount code which co-incided with Dixons removing some of theirs. It won’t surprise anyone to learn we sold more Bennetts stuff than we ever have and those sales were are the expense of DSG stores. So as some stores squeeze commission opportunities for other stores become available and it’s up the other stores and affiliates to take advantage of the opportunites this presents. Any store which takes its affiliates for granted or squeezes commissions can’t expect to get away with it for long. We’ve been affiliates a lot longer than the stores which make most of our income and we’ve seen them come and seen them go but we’re still here, and happy to work with any merchant that treats us as partners rather than a resource to be exploited.

The Silver Lining

The biggest merchant we have indentified is 24 Studio, their website may look like some old fashioned arbitrage site when you initially look at the homepage, but it does convert fairly well and is on our recommended list at the moment. And their affiliate manager seems a nice chap.

Remember : “Use Affiliate Window links not Commission Junction.”

It would also be appropiate to point to to Lee’s Blog : Wii Wars – It’s Only A Game To Some, But Livelihoods To Others.

I anticipate I shall be blogging about a Wooly merchant in the near future pertaining to Wii’s, as it maybe some while before the dust settles on this Dixons saga with more chapters unfolding.

My Top Tip Merchants for Today :

24 Studio on Affiliate Window & Children’s Rooms on Paid On Results.

My Merchants to Avoid for Today : Waitrose Entertaining (Tradedoubler), PC World (Tradedoubler) , Play.com (Buy.at) & Dixons (Affiliate Window)

The Phoenix Rises from the Ashes

On a positive note, I think there is the potential for Affiliate Window to turn this around to their good advantage, though my concerns are directly aimed at Dixons. Affiliate Window have a very good tool continuously being developed in ShopWindow, imagine the potential if this tool could allow affiliates to predetermine the commission levels on any given category, knowing the ranges on offer. That way perhaps feedback could fed to a merchant knowing they were not included in a product range by X% of affiliates because their offering was too low, it might actually make merchants appreciate the value of the affiliate marketing channel & increase commissions appropiately (within an affordable level) in order to be included on a wider number of websites. That way the commission structure for any category might find it’s natural equilibrium / level. Not the complete answer but maybe something to consider & expand upon in future discussions.

Unfortunately, I will suspect that neither will truly address the 0% question until the bulk of the christmas trade has ker-ching’d in the merchant’s cash tills & network’s over-ride coffers.