On the sidelines of PPC Classroom Live in Vegas last month, I got a chance to talk to affiliate industry veteran Rachel Honoway.
Rachel has been in the industry since 1997, starting as an intern at KowaBunga! Technologies, maker of the MyAffiliateProgram (myAP) affiliate tracking and management platform, and following it’s acquisition by Think Partnershi, was promoted to VP of marketing and client services.
Most recently, Rachel has taken on the portfolio Vice-President, Marketing at Anik Singal’s Affiliate Classroom.
Besides speaking at numerous tradeshows and seminars, Rachel’s an excellent resource for affiliate management.
I invited Rachel to come on the Friday Podcast and got her thoughts on a number of issues that merchants and affiliate networks would need to factor in their affiliate programs.
Some of the issues we discussed included:
- Changes in the affiliate marketing industry
- Key trends to look out for this year, especially in the convergence of affiliate marketing techniques
- Structuring an affiliate program, especially if deciding to go along the affiliate marketing, pay per lead, revenue share or cost per impression route
Most interesting is Affiliate Classroom’s new ACCertified program which Rachel is spearheading and will see a launch of sorts at the upcoming Affiliate Summit West with the Affiliate Classroom Live workshop on Saturday 23rd February.
The event features affiliate industry veterans like Lisa Riolo, Heather Paulson, Schaaf Consulting’s Stephanie Harris and Bryan Rhodes, Ned Farra from Zappos and Steven Lerch, Todd Farmer and John Vehlewald of Think Partnership’s KowaBunga! and PrimaryAds Networks.
You can check out the Friday Podcast below:
To sign up for the free workshop, head over to:
–> Affiliate Classroom Live workshop
If you STILL haven’t got your Affiliate Summit West tickets yet, you should get them now:
–> Affiliate Summit West
This week I had an opportunity to discuss the power of networking at live events with Affiliate Summit co-founder Shawn Collins.
Shawn Collins (left) with new Affiliate Summit intern Jack Collins
Shawn is one of the most experienced and friendliest contacts I have made since getting involved in affiliate marketing and I appreciate the fact that he’s a friend whom I consult over IM and through the email.
It was great to hear how Shawn got started in affiliate marketing in 1997 as an affiliate for Amazon, and how he’s progressed to founding the Affiliate Summit seminar/tradeshow with Missy Ward, manages the Affiliate Tip blog, Authored “Successful Affiliate Marketing for Merchants”, his annual AffStat report, the weekly Affiliate Thing weekly podcast co-hosted with Revenue magazine editor Lisa Picarille, an Affiliate Manager forum and probably 100 other projects, including one which will be launched soon.
Here’re some of the topics we discussed:
- How to get value out of attending seminars and events (as opposed to staying home and reading blogs and forums)
- Important things you should do BEFORE and AFTER attending an event
- How to catch all the conferences free
- How to gain an unfair networking advantage at ASW
- How to get free consulting from industry veterans and experts at the event
The podcast can be accessed below:
46 mins 36 secs : 22 mb
Affiliate Summit West is from Feb 24-26 at the Rio Hotel in Las Vegas. Last year the tickets ran out and scalpers were having a field day on eBay.
And Shawn has given a special Affiliate Summit coupon code for my blog readers “ANDREW10” which will give you a 10% discount off your tickets.
Here’s the registration link: Affiliate Summit West.
Get your tickets early to avoid disappointment, and if you’re headed for ASW, I look forward to seeing you there.
Breaking with the format you’ve been used to, on this week’s edition of the Friday Podcast, I had a guest, NeverBlueAds Lead Affiliate Representative, Samantha Brachat, who shared three niches super affiliate marketers should be taking a lot at, especially with the element of seasonality playing into them.
Sam covers topics like:
- How to select which affiliate/CPA offer to promote, especially if there might be 10 or 15 in the same vertical
- Demographic and conversion data for the offers she mentions on the call
- How to get great value of the your relationship with your affiliate manager
If you’re new or already working with a CPA/affiliate network, you’ll pick up great tips from this episode.
Check out:
–> NeverBlueAds CPA Affiliate Network
The audio recording is accessible below:
32 Mins | 7 MB
In this edition of the Friday Podcast, I go into 5 important considerations if you’re serious about building your web business this year.
Note: The notes are pretty detailed, though the podcast itself contains even more content.
Enjoy!
Duration: 18 minutes | Filesize:Â 4.5 mb
Notes:
I get many questions about the tactical aspects of internet marketing, like what’s the best webhost, which is the best CPA network, how to configure a xml datafeed, how to use an autoresponder, which is the best ebook.
If you’re interested, I mention a number of these in the course of my blogging and i’ve listed a couple in my recommendations tabs.
But here’s the kicker, although these ‘technical’ questions represent about 90% of the questions that get asked, it’s the 10% of other questions that will help you grow your business and explode your profits!
The other questions deal with building your business, and positioning it for long term growth.
At the root of it,
Succeeding in internet marketing is simple and fundamental
1) Find a need.
2) Match it with a solution (could be a product/service)
Macro Issues in Internet Marketing
Most important than the ‘how do i learn HTML’ type questions are the macro or higher level considerations of your business strategy.
Your business strategy works as a business plan or blueprint to help you identify what you should or should not be doing.
It also goes into how you should be doing it.
If done correctly, your business plan will give you the answers to the questions you might be wondering about – like how do I select a partner, how much should i budget for my expenses and how much you should charge for your products, which offers or products should i promote.
Your business blueprint will drive what you do and when you’re stuck or you’re wondering about the next action you should take, it determines which of the tiny pieces of blog or affiliate or seo or ppc tools and software you will need.
I want to give you 5 important factors to take note of as you’re building your business this year.
————————-
1) TRUST
If you’ve dealt with a bank, insurance provider, realtor or another service provider who’s serious about building a long term relationship, you’ll notice that they will spend time to get to know you and what you’re about. If they were to try to force you to buy something the first time you met, it would seriously damage or even kill the relationship.
A significant part of the success I experienced in my business last year was due to the network i built up and the relationships and contacts i had made.
Spend a moment to think about the people you consider your good friends, and the people you do business with.
what is it that makes you trust them?
How would you bring those values and attitudes into your business?
Consciously or unconsciously, we buy from people we like and we trust.
As an internet marketer and as an affiliate,
promotion doesn’t always need to be something that you’re an affiliate or something you own. Might be a free resource.
You may not benefit from it, but your audience could stand to benefit greatly from.
Take a look at the products that prominent marketers like Wil Reynolds, Shawn Collins, Geordie Carswell, Sam Harrelson talk about and mention on their blogs.
Aaron Wall provides a number of free equivalents for products which other marketers are charging hundreds of dollars for, in a list of resources in his SEO Book. His intention is to help you grow your business and that builds trust.
Build trust.
You might recommend something free today, but if you build up your social goodwill bank (refer to blog post), you will reap the rewards later.
*** on a strong, reliable and trusted recommendation, conversions can be higher than 50%.
(more…)
Would you rather be a smart Internet Marketer? Or a rich one?
You might say you’ve chosen one path, but your behavior might be leading you down the other.
Check out this week’s Friday Podcast for details.
Rich Guy Or Smart Guy: The Internet Marketing Truth
And the audio download:
Notes follow after the “more” tab:
(more…)
Whether you’re a merchant/product owner or an affiliate, you’ll inevitably break into a new niche at some point.
So one of the questions you’ll need to answer in order to succeed is: “How can niche sites tackle the challenge of content creation, especially if they are in a new area? More importantly, how do they monetize effectively?”
We tackle this quesiton in the Friday Podcast.
Here’re the notes:
Tackling fear of the unknown.
Understanding the problems (also known as opportunities) in any new market is key.
-Cost/performance – fees are based on amount of weight lost. program to lose 10lbs might cost a thousand dollars. that’s $100 per lb. lucrative?
-Weight management sites are the one of the best examples of membership sites. friend Rachel Rofe has a great site and has been profiled by magazines.
-Long term effects
-Mood swings, depression – biochemical balance
Visit forums, blogs and content sites in your chosen area and figure out the burning questions people are facing. Compile a list of the top 50 problems/questions and answer them – that will form the basis of your search engine AND human friendly content.
-Document the process
-Buy weight loss for dummies or atkins diet for dummies, visit wiki, head to google news.
As internet marketer, information is your most significant weapon.
Use it to your advantage.
