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As part of the ReveNews 2010 Affiliate Industry Preview Series, I interviewed industry leaders to get a sense of their plans and goals for 2010. Today’s interview is with Shawn Collins, Co-Founder of Affiliate Summit.

How do you feel about the affiliate industry’s current health overall?

It’s a little bit tricky to get a correct gauge on it because we normally don’t see the real numbers from the networks.  But as far as I can see from my own barometer, I think it’s doing very well. I guess my indication is really seeing what happens at Affiliate Summit, in terms of participation, seeing how many people are coming out. The fact is that the show is continually growing. To me that’s a clear sign that the industry is healthy.

In the past there used to be a sort of understanding that the West was the bigger show and that the East was sort of a smaller one. That’s changed. This past summer during the East show we had a big jump from the show in Boston in 2008. A little bit more than 2,300 people were at the Boston show and we got over 3,000 for New York this past summer.  We had some big growth despite all this economic downturn.  Last January, we had about 3,200 in Las Vegas so the New York show almost equaled that so we expect about 4,000 this month which will by far be our biggest Affiliate Summit yet.

How has the affiliate industry evolved?

If you look back maybe as far back as 10 years it used to be that there were lots of one dimensional content sites with a bunch of 468 x 60 banners and some text links. These days people are using every possible method of marketing in affiliate marketing.  Whether it be pay-per-call, a video podcast, micro blogs, social network links or games, just any kind of method affiliates are out there using it to reach the consumer.

Do you think that is indicative of the affiliate industry that there is a lot of early adoption to technology?

Yeah, I do think so.  I think that there are a lot of companies that are slow to move on things; which perhaps explains why video hasn’t come faster with the affiliate marketing.  I think that some affiliates have experimented with it and done some interesting things but a lot of the companies haven’t really picked up on video fast enough.

What about network adoption?  It seems like only just recently, as recently as 2008 that video was the goal for 2009.  I still don’t see a lot of video widgets out there at least with an easy format provided to the affiliates by the networks.

I think part of the issue is that the whole thing is ahead of the consumer.  I’ve seen some widgets out there have some sort of neat functionality like clickable video but I just think the average person doesn’t know that functionality even exists. So until they are aware of the functionality, by some other means like if all of the sudden interaction with video ads become common place with Facebook and YouTube maybe then you will see more adoption in the affiliate space. But I think now people just aren’t trained to even understand that experience, so we still have yet to figure out a way to monetize video.

Has the way advertisers perceive the affiliate industry changed over the years?

It seems like pretty much every big brand that has become involved with affiliate marketing, and several for quite a few years.  But I guess there are hills and valleys for that perception.  I think sometime around 2003 when the CAN-SPAM Act was passed, there was a negative stigma attached to affiliate marketing just because there was a small minority of people that were sending out spam that somehow reflected on the entire industry itself.  I have to wonder if now advertisers will be wary of affiliates that have blogs because  the FTC has new regulations around that.  I think legislation probably has a good deal tie-in to perceptions and it often reflects on what affiliates are doing.

What do you think the biggest lessons were from the affiliate industry learned in the last decade?

The most important thing is if someone wants to build a business out of affiliate marketing as an affiliate that it’s just vital to do something you really care about and you have some kind of vested interest in.  A lot of people try to be sort of mercenaries and go with whatever the trendy issue is or whatever the most lucrative offer is but it’s tough to really stick with. I think the people that succeed in the long term are those that really focus on the areas they care about.

I think it’s the ideal approach is for new affiliate marketers to focus on whatever niche they are passionate about in whatever vertical that maybe. It could be about a breed of dog or sports team or whatever.  It may not have the highest ROI compared to some hot offer but you’re more likely to keep building it two, three or five years later then if it’s something you don’t really care about.

What do you think the biggest changes will be for the affiliate industry in 2010?

One thing I’d love to see is more focus on ethics. I don’t like seeing people in different forums outright bragging about how they are trying to cheat different advertisers or consumers. That kind of behavior is nothing new but I feel somehow people are just more flagrant about these days. That certainly isn’t going to help the reputation of the industry when you have a certain segment of people that think it’s somehow cool thing to use black hat tactics. I would like to see the networks band together and having some sort of uniform blacklist or something for those who are outright disregarding the rules. It really bothers me to see people take pride in cheating.

Recently I’ve had some firsthand experience related to that because one of the speakers who was slated to appear this year had written an article that essentially came off like he was bragging about the ways he had cheated in the past. It was all very sketchy and so ultimately he ended up stepping down from the panel.  It did sort of lead to a tricky discussion because some people were saying we should be doing some kind of due diligence for all the speakers. When you have over 70 speakers it is not practical to be able to research them all thoroughly as if you’re looking at them for an interview for a job position.  Still Affiliate Summit certainly doesn’t want to give a forum to people who are there to brag about how they cheat the system.

In terms of that type of industry clean up, who do you feel the onus is on to lead that clean up?  Do you feel that that is a network issue?  Do you feel that is an advertiser issue?  Or do you feel that that needs to be on the affiliate side?

It’s tough to put it on the affiliate side because ethical affiliates don’t really have and enforcement ability to chase off the bad ones. In the days when I was a merchant I was always frustrated there wasn’t more policing by the networks. I felt it should come down to them if they are going to be this trusted third party in the industry. From the merchant perspective there really should be some sort of real filter of affiliates before I even can consider them for my affiliate program.  It really bothered me that I’d have to go through and catch them sometimes for committing actual fraud or doing different tricky things like bidding on a trademark when it was specifically forbidden in the terms and conditions before the network would do anything.

I always found that to be a little annoying, paying a network that wasn’t doing more in that respect. I want to see more vetting by them.  It would be helpful for the networks, although maybe not practical, to maintain some kind of list of affiliates that have infractions of different stripes across networks, a grading system if you will. If affiliates were somehow graded when they’re applying for an affiliate program it would be much easier for the affiliate manager to consider them.

What impacts did you see recession wise on the affiliate industry?

As far as I can see there wasn’t a considerable impact in our industry.  Like I was mentioning before, the indicator for me is the Affiliate Summit attendance. When things were looking really bad a year ago in the fall I was very concerned with how that might impact us but we ended up continuing to grow.  We had an increasing number of advertisers and exhibitors for Affiliate Summit so maybe by virtue of the fact that the whole industry is based on performance it just wasn’t as touched as some other spaces of online advertising.

I think a lot of people in the industry were worried just because they were assaulted  by the media for for the last eighteen months on how dire the situation was. But I think while people were justifiably concerned and maybe a little bit freaked out, it thankfully didn’t translate into a lack of spending in the industry.

One thing that obviously had a big impact in 2009 and the later part of 2008 was the so-called Amazon Tax or anti-affiliate taxes.  I remember a very memorable  session last Affiliate Summit East in 2008 in Boston with Melanie Seery during the Performance Marketing Alliance’s first coming meet that turned very heated because everyone was so passionate about defending the affiliate industry.  Now we’ve had kind of a year of fighting the proposed legislation in various states: some successful, some not.  How do you feel that the Amazon Tax will play out in 2010?

It’s hard to say.  To me I feel an annoyance with the industry because  it’s so significant an issue it is frustrating to see only a small group of people are really working on it, even bothering to talk about it and try to fight it.  I’m not sure how to make it more “sexy” or “relevant” to the rest of the industry. If we maintain this level of apathy more and more states are just going to roll over and do what New York did. Then we’ll just be stuck with it and you’ll have a lot of people in the industry asking what happened a year from now. It’s just so urgent for people to get with it and really pay attention in their states and be pro-active.

Why is it important in your view?

I think it’s important just because we can essentially see a lot of affiliates terminated from affiliate programs in different states.  If it were to pass in New Jersey for me, for example, I’ve been an Amazon affiliate for 12 years now and to me it would really have an impact on my income if I was to get booted out of their program. State governments seem to think it’s this great way to grab more money and they are not really looking at the big picture. The fact that all of a  sudden they are going to see all these small business hurt. More people will have to go to the state for unemployment, and the states will collect less tax revenue from those business. I think a lot of these state government officials need to be educated on the implications of such a tax.

We will keep providing educational sessions and avail ourselves to anybody if they want to propose a panel or a session to get the word out. We also have our magazine FeedFront that comes out four times a year where we are able to get the word out to tens of thousands of people so in that respect we’re able to disseminate the information.  We did an event this past summer with that Buy.at in Baltimore where we had a bunch of people get together to speak about the tax issues.  But I’m not sure with the apathy I see in the industry that events alone are enough. We’ll, however, do whatever we can with the strength we have to get the word out there about it.

What are Affiliate Summit’s goals for 2010?

As always we’re going to focus on delivering value and giving people some beneficial tools so they can build their business.  For instance, we are introducing a couple new things this year including the Affiliate Showcase. It is similar to we’ve done in the with the Meet Market were we have tables for different vendors, networks, and merchants but in this case we are going to have a room with 15 tables and they are going to be staffed by well-known affiliates so merchants and networks can come in and have a chance to meet with these select affiliates for a couple minutes. It’s a chance to hit all these really big players in one quick spot. We are also doing a thing where we are providing a session based around different verticals, for example apparel or sports, we will have two dozen of the biggest verticals identified so merchants and affiliates can get together within their respective verticals and try work out some deals. Both of those sessions were born out of feedback we got from past conferences.  Ultimately we are always trying to improve the experience and make it a more worthwhile for attendees.

We are also expanding our brand into print publishing.  We are planning on giving away a copy of a new book we’re putting out as a publishing house basically and as long as everything works out well and it’s published on time we’re going to be giving it away to every attendee at the conference. This book is going to be the first one in our imprint which is called Velocity NYC.  It’ll be a compilation of the first seven or so issues of Feed Front Magazine where we’ll have a 100 or so different articles in there combined and set up in different topical sections so people can have them as sort of this reference book to look at in the future.

More and more I’ve seen Affiliate Summit focus on supporting various charities and non-profits, what drives that?

We started up a few years ago.  Missy Ward and I expressed how we’d love to somehow give back and figured that since we had the attention of thousands of people in the industry we could try and harness that power to do some positive things. So we just started doing it on a small level at first. Just trying to get people to contribute and raise funds for various charities. This year we’re going to be focusing on the National Breast Cancer Foundation, which we’ve done a couple times, but we worked with a lot of other charities like Big Brother, Big Sister for example.  This year we’re doing a charity poker tournament in Las Vegas among other things and our goal is to raise 20 to 30 thousand dollars for the National Breast Cancer Foundation.

Last year several new directly competing conferences sort of sprouted up and I know there have been ones in the past.  How do you feel they will impact Affiliate Summit?

There are so many different conferences out there and they to a degree serve different segments.  For us, even with competition, we just keep growing. When we started there was already CJU, LinkShare and ShareASale all had their events going and were well attended. They all seem to be going strong today, so I think there’s a lot of space for them.  Because our industry seems to be ever-growing I think there’s plenty of space for all of these other events.  It just depends on what people are looking for.

How do you differentiate yourself?

Well part of it is that we have the biggest crowds of any affiliate marketing conference which gives people the biggest opportunity to find others they can do business with.  We have a perspective, well, actually I’m not sure how much Missy shares this, but I felt like some conference bored me to tears. I’ve never been a very good student in that respect. So one of my guiding principles for Affiliate Summit was to create a conference for people who can’t stand conferences. To make it more interactive, more interesting, and more fun instead of just the plain old thing as if you’re in a dry college lecture the whole time.

I want to thank Shawn Collins for taking time out during his busy schedule to take part in our 2010 Affiliate Industry Preview Series. Stay tuned for our next conversation with Kerri Pollard, General Manager of Commission Junction.

See original here:
2010 Affiliate Industry Preview Series: Interview with Shawn Collins of Affiliate Summit

Editor’s Note: Usually we don’t reprint articles from other sites but this one, written by Joe Sousa on his blog What Does Joe Think, was so well done and funny we had to share, with Joe’s permission of course.  Enjoy!

The finalists for the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards which will be presented on Tuesday, January 19, 2010 at Affiliate Summit West 2010, have been announced and it looks like a very good crop of contenders this year. Some of these people I know very well, some I have only briefly met, and some I have heard of but that is about it. I sent in my nominations a couple months ago and it looks like 3 out of my 6 nominations made the cut.

So just for fun I thought I would handicap the finalist and give you some odds on who should win. I will be breaking down the competition, letting you know what I know about the different contenders and I will also give you my picks and let you know who I think should take the awards. Also just so you know I have no say whatsoever in who wins. The people who choose that are much more qualified than me.  And remember, these picks are for entertainment purposes only. Please, no wagering:

Affiliate Of The Year

Nicholas Koscianski – I don’t know too much about Nickycakes. I have read his blog a few times but as far as I know I have never met him. Just from looking at his blog it looks like he does a lot of CPA stuff but other than that he is kind of a wild card in this contest. I do really like his Newbie Guide on his blog and think it is a pretty good place to start. The guide gives a good introduction into CPA and PPC marketing and will give someone just getting into the industry a good place to start.

Odds on winning? I think Nicholas is a longshot for this one. 20-1

Eric Nagel - I might have met Eric briefly before but the first time I really met him or talked to him for any length of time was at ASE09 in New York. Eric seems to strive for excellence in everything he does from his business cards to his Christmas light displays and I would assume that would transfer over to his business as well. This is Eric’s first time being a Pinnacle finalist and either the lack of post-season experience will get to him or he will rise up and show his true brilliance.

Odds on winning? Eric has a good shot here. I think the rookie has a good shot of going all the way. 3-1

Kim Rowley - Like Eric I first really met Kim at ASE09 but got to spend more time with her at the ShareASale ThinkTank09. She had the unfortunate pleasure of sitting next to me while I devoured 2 pounds of chicken wings and a plate of fried pickles. Kim runs many different shopping sites and also does consulting work as well. This is Kim’s second straight finals appearance for Affiliate of the Year. Will she be like the Buffalo Bills and go 4 straight without winning? Will she eventually break Jangro’s mark of 3 nominations before winning on the 4th try? Will she go 0-2 and join other people like Jamie Birch and Stephanie Harris with nothing to show for their multiple nominations?

Odds on winning? Kim is very deserving of this award and I think would be a very good value bet at 4.5-1

So who is gonna win?  Sorry Nick. This isn’t your year. I like Eric’s chances (he was my nomination) but I think Kim will end up taking this one in a close race.

Affiliate Manager of the Year

Jamie Birch – Jamie is approaching Jangro territory with this being his third nomination and he needs a win here to avoid the dreaded 0-3. I have had the pleasure of having lunch with Jamie, visiting him in his office, and getting to know him more over the past year or so. His office is only about 45 minutes away from here so he does have the home field advantage going in my mind at least. Jamie’s client list is very impressive and he does a great job working with his merchants and affiliate to make them both mutually successful.

Odds on winning? Jamie has the experience edge here having been to the dance before so that can only help. 3-1

Stephanie Harris – This will be Stephanie’s second straight nomination for Affiliate Manager of the Year and while I have never worked with her or really met her other than just saying hello she must be deserving if she can get to the finals two years in a row.  But since I don’t really know her it is hard for me to comment much on her chances. It is kind of like a Heisman candidate that while they might be deserving they just weren’t visable enough to the voters.

Odds on winning? I wish I could give a more educated guess on this one: 8-1

Matt McWilliams – I first met Matt at the ShareASale ThinkTank09 this year. I had exchanged some message with him before but had never met him in person. All I can say is I was VERY impressed. He is very good at what he does and knows how to help out his affiliates. I detailed him more a couple months ago in this post and he hasn’t let up since then. If I ever need anything he is very quick to get it to me. This Pinnacle Awards rookie has made a very strong showing so far.

Odds on winning? Matt has a very good chance here. I don’t think the rookie wall will bother him too much. 4-1

So who is gonna win? It is hard to ignore what Matt has done this year. Jamie has a bigger overall body of work though. I am gonna go with Matt on this one.

Exceptional Merchant

Amazon.com – Not too much to say here. They are like the Yankees in that they have a great chance to win every year and this is their 4th straight finals.

Odds on winning? Just based on their size their odds are pretty good. 2-1

Bowlingshirt.com - It is like David fighting two Goliath’s here. They are like the small market team that puts it all together and makes a run at the title. Wade, Karen, and Joel at GTO Management have done a great job with the Bowlingshirt.com affiliate program.  And they also bribed me by giving me an awesome bowling shirt and taking me bowling in NY. Bribery does wonderful things!

Odds on winning? They are a long shot here. 25-1

eBay Partner Network – If Amazon is like the Yankees then eBay is like the Red Sox. Just based on their payroll and size they are a consistant contender

Odds on winning? Just a step behind Amazon. 3-1

So who is gonna win? You gotta take a chance if you wanna win any money. And I got a bowling shirt and bowling out of the deal. Bowlingshirt.com pulls the upset here.

Affiliate Marketing Advocate

I am gonna be honest here. I don’t keep up on industry issues as much as I really should. Whether it is the affiliate tax issues, parasites, unethical merchants, or whatever I always seem to have the unfortunate mindset of “let someone else deal with it” or “I don’t really know enough about the issues to do anything”. So because of that I am very thankful for all three of the nominees in this category. Angel Djambazov, Karen Garcia, and Rebecca Madigan have all spent many hours working on industry issues so lame people like me don’t have to. And I am very thankful to all three of them and many others as well.

Angel is a 2 time winner but this is Karen and Rebecca’s first time in the finals. Will Angel go 3 for 3 or will one of the rookies take it? I don’t want to give odds on a category as important as this one but I will go ahead and pick a winner:  Gonna go with Karen Garcia on this one.

Best Blogger

Murray Newlands – Sorry Murray. I really know nothing about you. I have seen your picture out there, I am aware of you, I see tweets and the like but I have never really take the time to find out much more. Hopefully you don’t take it personally.

Odds on winning? I am gonna have to take these odds off the board due to my lack of information. N/A

Jeremy Schoemaker – This will be Jeremy’s second Best Blogger nomination. There are a lot of Shoemoney haters out there and a lot of people who really respect him and like what he does. Personally I like his blog and I think he shares a lot of solid information there. I have only met Jeremy briefly a couple times, mostly in passing but I have never had a bad experience dealing with him.

Odds on winning? Will politics get in the way or will the voters be objective? 4-1

Geno Prussakov – From what I can see Geno seems to be the most consistent affiliate blogger out there and his posts almost always contain great information. Geno seems to post something good every day and he never runs out of good stuff. This will be Geno’s first finals apperance but he is a seasoned veteran who should be taken lightly.

Odds on winning? Lots of quality to support him for this award. 3-1

So who is gonna win? Sorry Murray. I wish I knew more. Sorry Jeremy. The politics and drama might hurt you here. Kind of like what happened to Micky Rourke at the Oscars last year. Gonna give this award to Geno.

Wayne Porter Affiliate Marketing Legend Award

Brad Waller – Unfortnately I will have to claim a bit of ignorance on this one again. I have heard of Brad before but have never really met him or dealt with him before. I do know he works with the PMA and from what I can see he likes cars. Other than that I don’t know a whole heck of a lot but if he is a finalist of the Legend award he must be deserving.

Odds on winning? Very tough to properly handicap this one. 8-1

Heather Paulson – Yet another person I have never met that I probably should have by now. Heather is the president of the Paulson Management Group and they currently manage a large number of different affiliate programs. I have seen her name around for years and if she was nominated for this award she must know her stuff when it comes to affiliate management.

Odds on winning? Gonna be tough for a rookie to take this award. 5-1

Scott Jangro – 5 nominations for Scott? That alone shows you why he deserves to be on this list. He has a chance to join Brian Littleton and Angel Djambazov as the only multiple winners of the Pinnacle Award. Scott finally broke through last year with the Best Blogger award and this is his second straight year being a finalist for the Legend award. I have know Scott for years, been golfing with him many times, and there are few (if any) people in this industry I respect as much as Jangro. He knows his stuff when it comes to affiliate marketing but even more important than that he is a great guy and one of the nicest people you will meet.

Odds on winning? Easily the favorite: 1-2

So who is gonna win? Scott Jangro will take home a much deserved Legend award here.

Well, hopefully I didn’t hurt too many feelings here. For those of you I didn’t pick to win? Just use this as motivation to step your game up next year and take home some of the coveted hardware. If you made the finals you should feel very honored since there are so many people who are deserving of these awards. If you were lucky enough to make this list I will even pick up the tab for dinner or drinks at Affiliate Summit West in January. Just hit me up while we are there.

More here:
Joe Handicaps the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards

I turned on my computer yesterday and there was a sale for a personalized penguin Christmas ornament. The next email was from ShareASale: “An affiliate transaction has taken place”.

I wondered if it could be from that person with an obsession for tuxedoed birds, and sure enough: “The affiliate who referred this transaction: Jennifer Goode”.

Jen is a respected peer, friend, as well as owner of a little plushie traveling penguin that has become semi-famous. SAS emails give you the option to “Click to Send Affiliate a Bonus for this Transaction”, but I opted to log into Yahoo Chat to bust her chops… er… congratulate her… instead!

As we were chatting, another penguin sale came in – accompanied with another SAS email. Yep! It was Jen again! Amazingly, a third penguin sale and a third SAS email came as we were chatting. And defying all odds, it was another Jen referral!

In the course of an hour, I made money. Jen, who is the owner of Jen Goode Designs and My Penguin Travels (above me and the penguin in question), made money. My outsourced program manager (OPM), TeamLoxly made money. ShareASale made money. My merchant bank and three customer credit cards made money.

I thought about the events that led up to these sales, and if it weren’t for networking, none of them would have occurred. While this article is not a discussion on “the art of networking”, it is a discussion on the importance of networking.

From Networking to Friendships

Four years ago I was posting on ABestWeb (ABW), which is technically networking. At that time I knew Deborah Carney, Owner of TeamLoxly, as a regular poster, but nothing more.

That fall I attended an online convention called eComExpo, for the purpose of, you guessed it, networking. I joined a private chat in a merchant’s booth that happened to include Debbie and a few others. When the merchant left the virtual booth at 5pm, we “trashed the booth” through the middle of the night! Debbie and I became fast friends that day, exchanging IMs, and networking on a daily basis.

The following year Debbie took over the CafePress affiliate program. She brought up a particular CafePress shopkeeper, Jen Goode, frequently. I became familiar with Jen’s work – very talented – but I considered CP shopkeepers artists, not fellow marketers. In an effort to be helpful, an important part of networking, I occasionally gave her marketing advice, and we too became friends.

When Jen first developed her now iconic penguin character, it blew me away! We brainstormed all kinds of different ideas which ranged from the typical to the outright crazy.

The winter of 2006, I finally got to meet Jen in person at Affiliate Summit, which we both attended in order to network (I bet you’re seeing a trend here). I was impressed not only by her artistic talents, but by her passion and intelligence.

My niche is personalized gifts. While the penguins were only “quasi-personalized”, since users could request penguins for all occasions but not necessarily for specific occasions, I told Jen I would add them to my sites where applicable. For example, I have listed her Fishing Penguin in my personalized fishing gifts category.

(Pictured to the left Deborah Carney and Jen Goode at Affiliate Summit West 2009.)

Collaborating with Friends

In the meantime, I had been networking with Loxly, and she had got to know my personalized gift site intimately. As the CafePress affiliate manager, she  knew a lot of shopkeepers whose sites could offer my products. One day she called and asked if I would be willing to develop a merchant site in order to launch an affiliate program. She felt there were affiliates that were a perfect fit for the kind of niche products I had become an expert  at. And we could leverage our mutual contacts from our networking efforts to make it the kind of program we had been  talking about on the forums.

The goal was not to create a Top 10 merchant but rather to create a safe, parasite free, no problem program that could remain on good terms with affiliates in a niche we knew well. I agreed, and we launched the Engraved Crystal Shoppe program.

I hired a second OPM and we all met at Jen’s house in Colorado last June. As happens with creative types, occasionally drama does ensue. What happened with the other OPM has been embarrassingly well documented elsewhere. What I learned is that the ability to meet in person and hash out ideas is an important facet of networking and relationship building often forgot by many online professionals. Why? Well, because they are too busy being online.

Fast forward to last month’s Think Tank in Newport Beach, which was an intimate and intense networking opportunity hosted by ShareASale.

At the event I happened to mention to Jen that I actually carry two personalized penguin items on my merchant site. What I didn’t know is that she had started a site Nothing But Penguins which featured non-Goode original penguin products. But apparently, communicating with Jen paid off and she added my two penguin products to her site, and as I stated above, a lot of people got rich as a direct result (Ok I maybe overexagerating on the rich part – but sales did indeed happen – and without proof to the contrary, I’ll take full credit for their success!).

Moral of the story? Get out there! Network! Mingle! Talk! Good things happen from interacting with your peers.

Read the rest here:
Importance of Networking to Your Bottom Line

The formation of an industry requires the development of a group identity. Often that development is neglected because group members are focused on growing their business. Over the last year the affiliate industry has been experiencing growing pains in the form of legal challenges brought about by such things as the so-called New York Amazon Tax. In the aftermath of that tax being ratified a group of New York affiliates pulled together to provide guidelines to those impacted by the tax. Melanie Seery was part of that group and found herself drawn into the role of advocate on behalf of the affiliate industry. As part of that advocacy effort she recently launched new industry organization Affiliate Voice.

Almost a year after the New York Amazon Tax was passed I sat down with Melanie Seery to discuss her involvement in the affiliate industry, her quick learning curve with political advocacy, and how she sees the tax issues evolving.

How did you get started in affiliate marketing?

I got involved in affiliate marketing about five years ago. Before affiliate marketing I had a business writing employee how-to manuals, which is really, really boring work. I would go into a business, take each and every position and write down step by step everything that employee had to do in the course of the day. Not fascinating and not interesting from a creative perspective. After that I got into multilevel marketing. What I liked about MLM was that I was selling vitamins and health food products. I really enjoyed that aspect of helping people be healthy. But when I started I didn’t realize how big a component recruitment was to MLM. Ultimately it kind of discouraged me. That’s when someone told me about affiliate marketing and sent me off to Commission Junction. After some exploring I found an interesting coffee merchant and that was the beginning of it.

Why is being self-employed and working at home important to you?

I am independent by nature and have been self-employed for the past 12 years. It’s real important for me to be home with my children and my family. My children have neurofibromatosis, so do I. Neurofibromatosis is a neurological disorder that can cause tumors to grow on nerve endings. There are lots of challenges to maintaining health with such a disorder, as you can imagine. I have to keep constantly on top of it with my family. Being self-employed allows me to maintain that balance.

At what point did you feel affiliate marketing was the right business for you?

It was two or three months down the line and all of a sudden I started getting some really good sales. I created sites around my interests. It wasn’t just things I liked to drink like coffee, tea and accessories. After the birth of my children I began reaching out to parents whose children had similar disorders. I would post topics like, “How do I get my child to sleep all the way through the night?” I found myself connecting with other parents and sharing information. The process of creating a support group of sorts became another website.  Before you know it I had several websites going and 10 more ideas.

Affiliate marketing seemed to pull the best of all worlds together for me because I could use my writing to educate while sharing my creativity and connecting to other people. It was like talking with my friends and community; only in this case I’m being creative and making a website. It’s amazing being able to grow a business out of that sharing. It’s very exciting for me.

Everybody seems to start with Commission Junction. At what point did you realize that there were other networks?
Through places like ABestWeb I found networks like ShareASale. The discovery of ShareASale was a major point turning point for me. It was a combination of finding a network that had smaller niche merchants and allowed for real personal contact with the network and with the merchants in the network.

I sort of came out of my shell and found myself becoming part of the industry when I received my first invitation to a ShareASale Think Tank. It was funny but I thought to myself, “They must have me confused with somebody else”. Because even though I was doing well I still didn’t think I was doing as well as everybody else out there. I had never met anyone in the industry prior to that or even spoken with anyone on the phone. The Think Tank showed me the importance of being an affiliate in direct touch with the merchant. It’s all about relationships in this industry.

When did you first hear about the Amazon Tax and how did it affect you?

We had heard rumblings prior to April. But we also heard from New York lawmakers that it would never pass. Suddenly when April came around we learned that Governor Patterson had signed it into law. It took us by surprise because of our “it could never happen here” attitude. I don’t think we ever truly realized how much it would impact our businesses.

Now I see the same process happening in other states like California, Minnesota and, Connecticut. It’s phenomenal how quickly things change.  It’s great to see the industry is actually being proactive and stepping forward to fight these bills before they become law. It’s a lot easier to fix things before they’re broken.

When the New York law took effect many merchants removed affiliates from their programs. This destroyed a lot of businesses.  But what was worse was the lack of communication between merchants, networks and affiliates. There were a lot of behind the scenes activities with program managers and their CEOs about that never brought the affiliates into the loop. That did a lot of damage. We would get terminations with little or no notice. Once they passed the law we started to receive sudden terminations in the mail.  Even retroactive terminations-it would be June 15 and you’d get this email from a merchant that told you were deactivated as of May 30.

Affiliates were kind of steamrolled and quickly our incomes and businesses were gone.

A group of us got together and said this isn’t right. We felt there had to be a solution we could work out. That’s when Kevin Webster and I started talking about holding a meeting among New York affiliates. When we announced it a lot of people stepped up to help, providing us resources so we could find a good corporate lawyer.

At the time I had set up a personal blog that I put together to help keep people up to date about what was going on. It was called New York Affiliate Voice, which is what many people think the name of the group is, but it’s really the Albany Group because that’s where we first  met. We managed to set a course of action and put together a plan for how New York affiliates and any remaining merchants who wanted to work with us could go from here. In many cases it still wasn’t enough because merchants were still terminating affiliates rather than attempting to comply with the new law.

My income was down 72% last year because of the knee jerk reaction of many businesses. From the affiliates I talk to that’s pretty average.

Were you frustrated with the fact that the industry was slow to respond to this threat?

At the time we were all frustrated because all we saw was a lack of action for New York affiliates. There was a sense of hopelessness or resignation in everybody. At the time when we were going through the horrible effects of this law upon our businesses, I kept thinking why doesn’t anybody care about us?

I think the whole industry was in a state of disbelief. I remember two things were said to me after the New York Affiliate session at Affiliate Summit. They were: 1) We didn’t understand how deeply this would impact your, meaning affiliates, business and livelihoods. People sometimes forget that for many of us this isn’t just a hobby. It is the income that we rely on to pay a mortgage, to pay our bills, to take care of our children and our families and, 2)  everybody felt they “didn’t know what to do”.

I think it had to be the affiliates who took control the situation in New York because that was the group directly affected. It empowered affiliates to take a course of action and pull together. It let everyone know this was a serious challenge to our industry. I am proud of the things the Albany Group put together.

Was that your first involvement with political advocacy?

Yes. (laugh) I learned a lot over this last year. I learned an incredible amount about the legislative process, not only in New York but in other states as well. I found myself thinking, I don’t remember learning the ins and outs of how this works back in school. I think people take so many things for granted, including how their local government works.

At the beginning of this year you won several awards including the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Award for Affiliate Advocate of the Year. How did that impact you?

One thing it showed me was that we made a difference last year. And by “we”, I mean there wasn’t just me, there was a whole group of us that pulled this together. What the recognition also did was start me thinking about advocacy in general because I knew it was important. Basically, the work on the New York Tax Law took over the whole last 10 or 11 months of my life. Over time it became a larger part of my day whether it was answering emails from affiliates or phone call questions from a merchant. I realized that I had to make a choice of whether I wanted to be an advocate or an  affiliate. I came to the conclusion that the advocacy needed to continue and I couldn’t give it up.

How did Affiliate Voice come about?

When I made the choice to focus on advocacy I was simply going to change New York Affiliate Voice into a type of advocacy group. When people found out about my idea they kept asking why just New York? I ended up speaking to Haiko de Poel Jr. and Rhea Tannenbaum and they encouraged me to form a larger organization and call it Affiliate Voice to open it up to everybody. So I took the ball and ran with it so to speak.

After the beginning of the year there seemed to be a lull then suddenly there was a domino effect of new legislation that came out.   How have you perceived the recent changes?

Well, that’s a good way to describe it. There was that little lull and I was just beginning to think that I could go back to focusing on my business. Then legislators in my area that I had gotten close to working with the Albany Group, pointed me towards pending legislation in several states, including California. It seemed to spring up one after another. Equally scary is legislation on the books in some states that includes sales representatives, solicitors and other representatives in the definition of “nexus”. It is so open to interpretation and in my mind it could easily encompass affiliates as well.

What’s the biggest misunderstanding that legislators have about the affiliate industry?

I think it is important to understand both sides of the issue. See the states are faced with incredible economic challenges right now. They have to find new revenue resources. In the Quill Corp. v. North Dakota case it was ruled that in order for an interstate transaction to have sales tax applied to it, as opposed to a use tax, there has to be a substantial presence on behalf of the business providing the goods.

What’s happening is these tax bills you are seeing are not new taxes. The only thing that is changing is the method which the states are using to collecting the tax. That’s a not just something legislators are saying to make it sound better to consumers. That is in fact what is going on.

If you look at how quickly internet shopping and affiliate marketing have grown over the last couple of years it is easy to see why states want to collect this tax. It’s an incredible amount of revenue they’re losing out on.

But by the same token those states that are trying to enact these anti-affiliate laws have to understand how uneven this makes the playing field for affiliates and publishers in their state. In their current form these laws will prompt many merchants to simply avoid paying the tax by cutting loose all their affiliates or moving to a different advertising model. For those reasons it won’t bring the kind of revenues states are hoping for.

Also legislators have to understand the complexity involved for a merchant trying to deal with the more than 7,500 different US tax jurisdictions regarding interstate transactions. It’s not just a matter of installing some software and remitting sales-tax. Each of these 7,500 different tax jurisdictions has a different set of guidelines a merchant must comply with.  Can you imagine 7,500 different filings every quarter?  What business has those resources?

How do you see this playing out long-term?

I believe it will come down to some kind of federal involvement, maybe through the Streamlined Sales Tax Project, which is still gaining momentum. The Streamlined Sales Tax Project is a destination-based sales-tax which allows each state to designate one flat rate. All states that have sales and use tax will have to charge tax on the same items. Because right now items that are taxable in New York may not be taxable in California or vice versa. So the Streamlined Sales Tax Project wants to unify and streamline the process by designating which items are taxable in every state and allow each state to have one flat rate with the tax being paid by the receiving State. That’s the ideal situation. The governors in general are pressing for such a process but to enact it nationwide will be a slow process and require changes to multiple state laws.

Recently Scott Jangro wrote an excellent article posing the question of whether the affiliate industry needs two associations? Are you worried about an us-versus-them mentality creating a split in the industry?

I think having two organizations actually strengthens the industry. I don’t look at the Performance Marketing Alliance and Affiliate Voice as competing. I look at us as two slightly different entities but with the same relative goal which is to help change the direction of our industry, to help spur new growth, and not leave our destinies in the hands of legislators who have no clue what we are all about as a professional industry.

Prior to launching Affiliate Voice I reached out to the PMA to let them know we wanted to work together and complement one another’s strengths. I think Affiliate Voice is well suited to advocate for an Affiliate Bill of Rights and help affiliates maintain their business should these anti-affiliate taxes or other similar legislations be ratified. The PMA can do more with lobbying and organizing challenges to legislation.  They are very well equipped to do this.

I have no interest in wasting energy or time in petty politics or some kind of nonproductive competition.  Every industry has multiple organizations and the affiliate industry shouldn’t be any different.

What are the goals for Affiliate Voice in 2009?

We are working on establishing an industry Code of Ethics. We also want to formulate and ratify an Affiliate Bill of Rights to help improve relationships between all parties in the affiliate industry. In terms of keeping up with all the legislative efforts in various states, well, that will be an ongoing challenge throughout the whole year.

Since affiliates by nature seem to be fiercely independent and private.  Do you feel they will join an organization, any organization?

As people get used to the idea that you can be part of an organization without having to open your business model to scrutiny attitudes will change. Especially if we can demonstrate how organizations can achieve good things. Perceptions won’t change overnight but I think people will come to realize that they need organization.

Right now I feel the affiliate industry is a bit demoralized but, as people see two groups out there fighting for change they will become more encouraged at the efforts being taken. Personally I am encouraged with all the effort I’ve seen over the last couple of months with people rallying and stepping up, including the networks, to take a public stance against this type of legislation. I have seen merchants reaching out to their affiliates to help provide advice. All this effort is such a fabulous change compared to what happened in New York. It shows we have learned as an industry. I think this could be a rough year while we battle this legislation but ultimately we’re going to be able to adjust this industry and be all right.

More here:

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I was optimistic all week about fighting these misguided tax bills that make affiliates the losers in the state governments’ quest to tax Internet sales.

We had a great and amazing week in California.  Brook Schaaf, CEO SchaafCo, and Karen Garcia, Co-Owner GTOManagement, organized a lobby day in Sacramento to fight AB 178. All the feedback I got from other lobbyists in Sacramento was that the State legislature was blown away by our story and the education the affiliate lobbying team provided.  Count one for the good guys!

And I was even more pleased as I watched our local community organize politically and fight to protect our businesses as opposes to being steamrolled.

When the critical vote in Sacramento was delayed and our little super surgical strike activist team immediately started trying to figure out how to leverage the delay to put more pressure on legislators.   We were already setting up meetings with press and elected officials.
I was so excited since I truly believe we can win that vote.  California has always led the way for state legislation, and other states look at us for leadership.  I thought if we could win here, it would send a strong message to other states and we could create a model to fight these bills on the state level.

I wanted to try to help facilitate the following

• Create strategies that works
• Draft templates of letters and documents for other states
• Develop leaders and mentors like Brook and Karen to help affiliates and OPM’s in other states.
• Generate network awareness to help – i.e. LinkShare and ShareASale have been great leveraging affiliates throughout the state to help.  They now have all those templates for networks to use in other states.  (Thanks Mark Kirschner and Brian Littleton!)
• And most importantly, help deliver a win! This will help teach this community it can make a difference working together.

The California campaign is working because we put a very, very strong strategy in place.  We developed an effective message and set of lobbying tools. We have executed very well.  I was just so excited on Friday.

But in the back of my head, I kept thinking affiliate tax bills are moving so fast, we might be a little late, but we only have so many resources. Then, my optimistic mood came crashing down when I got this email at 5:00 that day:

“Introduced without warning only days ago, Maryland’s version of the “affiliates tax nexus” legislation likely will be enacted late Monday or early Tuesday, without any hearing in the House. The legislature is set to adjourn within a week and plans to adopt a broad revenue/spending bill Monday/Tuesday.

The affiliates tax nexus is part of this big bill, which almost certainly will get an up/down vote, and the governor does not have a line item veto. The Maryland Senate is unlikely to change course, so it’s crucially important to contact the Speaker of the House over the weekend. Unfortunately, affiliates in Maryland have had almost no opportunity to learn of this proposal and react, so they need to engage within hours, not days.” -AffiliateTip

As the case of Maryland illustrates, the problem is we have no time, now.  I have no doubt other states that we are unaware of are working on this tax and we don’t even know which states are working on it because we have no one monitoring it.

Our greatest strength is our ability to organize and create pressure on elected officials. We have such wonderful stories to tell. And each network has an amazing database where it can identify affiliates in key districts and then help them participate in the political process.

Think what would have happened if all the affiliate networks were working in tandem to fight these bills and they all blasted out emails to their affiliates in Maryland on Saturday asking them to call and write their state Legislature over the weekend.  My guess is that bill would not pass on Monday or would at least be slowed down enough to give us a fighting chance.

We need the PMA, all of the affiliate networks, ABestWeb, grassroots efforts such as – Fight Against the AdvertisingTax and NY Affiliate Voice -  to come together now, not in 6 weeks.  All these stakeholders have the grassroots databases that can match affiliates up by state and assembly district to blast out action alerts to affiliates.  And we can get feelers out in every state to see if an advertising tax bill is coming down the pike.
I know people are working on coming together, but the issue is we have no time now to have all of our differences and politics to fall aside over time. We need action now!

Mature industries understand that you fight it out in the marketplace and work together in a political arena.  Five or six of us are making a huge difference in California.  It’s time the industry comes together to stop these bills.  What we have done in California can be reproduced easily.  We just need leadership and to put our differences aside.

And if you think your segment of affiliate marketing can win this alone, then stop and think about the pressure the states feel to raise revenue due to the economy and the very focused pressure of the booksellers lobby which initiated the legislation in California and several other states.
Political campaigns are won and lost based on how well a coalition works together.

I always think a symphony orchestra is a good analogy.  The lobbyists are the flutes, the media mavens are the violins and all the instruments are the grassroots.  If all the musicians are on a different page of music, the symphony sounds awful, but when everyone is playing in concert that is when everything works.

Let’s just remember what the great Mahatma Gandhi said in India’s fight for independence: United we stand, divided we fall.” Or what a good friend and industry leader said to me this morning via IM “Whatever this is stupid, people just need to work together.”

Go here to see the original:
Affiliates Lobby Against California AB178, While Maryland Piggybacks Similar Legislation onto Larger Bill

“You can’t put the genie back into the bottle” or so says the idiom. The issues surrounding adware have certainly been a “genie” for affiliate marketing.  We may have the opportunity to see if that genie really can be put back into the bottle, at least for a sub-set of adware applications, toolbars.

Yesterday Brian Littleton, CEO of ShareASale, announced a Toolbar Roundtable Discussion for next Tuesday.  The purpose is to receive input from the community for establishing guidelines for toolbar behavior within the ShareASale network.  This is a shift from the historical policy of ShareASale which has not allowed software in the network. Not unexpectedly, there is some heated discussion around the announcement in the ShareASale Forum on ABestWeb.com.

Many people mistakenly think that I am opposed to adware. This isn’t the case. Adware is just technology, which isn’t inherently good or bad. It’s just technology…ultimately a bunch of 1’s and 0’s strung together to elicit preplanned behavior from the computer of the end user.

What I have opposed over the years is the manner in which many adware applications generate revenue in the affiliate marketing channel.
I have been exceedingly frustrated at times by technology being abused to the point of causing schisms within our industry and stigmatizing the technology itself which, in reality, could have been positive for the affiliates, merchants, networks and consumers it was meant to serve.  On more than one occasion I have stated that adware does not have to be an issue within affiliate marketing.  For years now I have worked outline a model for adware behavior. Not once have I been asked the details of that model, at least until now.

My view is broader than just toolbars. I personally feel that it is possible for any adware application to be respectful of the rights of other internet businesses, benefit the consumer, and generate legitimate revenue, directly and/or indirectly, in the affiliate marketing channel. I now have the opportunity to share some of my views and thoughts on how this can be achieved.

There is a glaring reality that we cannot afford to overlook: the technology is here and it’s not going to suddenly go away. The genie isn’t going to just disappear. My contentions have been with the policy, both written and how acted upon in reality, for how adware is allowed to behave in the affiliate marketing channel. My mantra is behavior, behavior, behavior (to the point I get tired of hearing it myself!) not toolbar, widget or desktop app. I don’t have a problem with Google’s toolbar, but I do have a problem with most software generating revenue through the affiliate channel.

To this point, there has been two primary types of policy by networks and merchants regarding how affiliates can use software in the affiliate channel: not allowed at all (the parasite-free policy) or allowed under a set of conditions that are far less restrictive for affiliates than marketing through other means (the COC/Addendum policy). I have always been opposed to the COC/Addendum policy because I feel it allowed revenue generation that facilitated unfair competition and diminished the overall value of the affiliate channel. I have longed for a working policy (policy that is actually being used) that would address how software can be legitimately used within the affiliate channel sans all the controversy. Indeed, I strongly believe it is critical that our industry be able to produce such a working policy.

Why? So we can demonstrate our ability to self-regulate and foster the healthy growth of our industry. All established industries need to demonstrate this ability for long-term success. To this point, I don’t think we have been able to demonstrate an ability to effectively self-regulate the very technologies our industry depends upon. Affiliate marketing is a technology business after all.

There are currently various technologies used by affiliates in their marketing efforts.  Web sites, email, video, widgets and many other forms of technology are common.  Guidelines for acceptable use have been established for promotion though most of these technologies. Granted, there may be an occasional debate regarding a new way these technologies are used, but none have been as problematic as downloaded software. Nor has a policy of all or nothing been applied to defining their use by affiliates.

Any and all of the technologies used by affiliates can be potentially abused. Questionable revenue generation tactics as well as more malicious behavior can occur through any promotional method. We certainly don’t say that affiliates cannot use web sites, email, and video or social media technology as promotion mechanisms because the technology can, and at times is, abused. Of course we don’t! We set guidelines and then we work towards enforcing those guidelines.

Enforcing a policy for toolbars will not be without its own challenges. But all monitoring of promotion comes with unique challenges. There are millions of web pages, owned by the affiliate or by someone else, where bad behavior can occur. However, once policy is established for promotion through a web site, protocols for monitoring are developed.

While practices may not always be policed by some companies to the degree some desire, we all understand that ultimately it’s a matter of survival for our livelihoods to have a certain degree of self-regulation within these technologies.

The landscape has changed dramatically since 2002 when the COC/Addendum policy was released by the major networks of the time. There is no longer a huge cost barrier for any affiliate having downloadable software and there are several sources for acquiring your own toolbar for free or at a very low cost. Distribution channels are available that do not require bundling, especially for toolbars. This has resulted in literally tens of thousands of toolbars available for download.

Of course, not all of these operate within the affiliate channel, but there is an increasing number which do. Toolbars can engage in a very wide range of behaviors. I don’t feel that a global policy of   “X is not allowed” to be an adequate manner with which to address issues facing our industry in regards to a technology that is not going away.

Brian Littleton has outlined a starting point  on the ShareASale blog for this policy discussion. As someone who has always focused on how adware can behave with regards to revenue generation, I am intrigued by his initial points. He appears to be envisioning toolbar technology used as a marketing vehicle versus a customer service vehicle. Marketing practices would use the toolbar for direct revenue generation, which is the most common use seen to date. Customer service would involve behaviors focused on the consumer experience, thus building branding, loyalty, and visitor retention for the affiliate’s own business. This form is a more passive marketing of the affiliate’s own business and does not tie the toolbar directly to  the affiliate link for tracking a commissionable sale. While I still believe software can behave “nicely” and be used for more direct revenue generation, I find Brian’s outside of the box thinking on this issue very interesting.

We need to show that we are up to the challenges of regulating the very technologies used to enhance and bring value to the affiliate channel. I’m excited to see a company with a track record and reputation as established as ShareASale’s stepping up to the plate to undertake the task of presenting meaningful policy in regards to toolbars. I look forward to having a policy in use that I can point to as an example of how software technology can be used in a harmonious and productive manner.

Will ShareASale be able to put the genie back into the bottle? I don’t think the technology can go back into the bottle. But can we have the benevolent genie? I think so. The real challenge will be whether or not ShareASale can overcome the stigma that has become attached with downloaded software, turning what has been somewhat of a black eye for affiliate marketing into a positive.

I will definitely be at this Roundtable that Brian has facilitated. I encourage any and all who care about the policies driving our industry to attend as well. I’m hoping to see as many merchants as affiliates in attendance as this is not an affiliate issue but an industry issue which impacts all parties in the equation.

Read more from the original source:
Putting the Genie Back Into the Bottle

Logging on to ABW this afternoon I was greated by a thread that burst into life and racked up a mass of interest in the blink of an eye. The attention grabbing thread had the title “ShareASale and Toolbars / Call for Participation on Guidelines” . Yes Oh My indeed, the bastion of BHO free marketing is considering its’ stance.

I highly recommend reading the thread and joining the discussion.

My thoughts :

A major concern I have with this idea, is that, all “BHO affiliate” tool bars, at the end of the day, do far more than just influence/decide which “BHO affiliate” gets the sale. They also canabilize merchants other sales channels, especially the ones based on loyalty, organic (direct to site/seo) and PPC. The bigger the brand the greater the the impact.

When I talk to merchants about tool bars I usually discuss the effect on the affiliate channel along side the impact to the above channels, large brand merchants (the ones that toolbars target) tend to get the majority of their traffic through the above (Toolbar targeted) channels, which ads no value and simply steals sales from the merchant.

How does SAS plan / propose to prevent toolbars that they allow on to Shareasale from cannabilizing a merchants other sales channels? If their plan is not all encompassing then they will simply be enabling tool bars to go to town on Shareasale merchants just like they do on LS, CJ and so forth, adding no value, but certainly adding to the BHO Affiliates revenue.

Here is the original:
Lions Tigers and BHOs. Oh My!

It was a rumour and now it’s fact. And rather than repeat what’s already posted in the ShareaSale forum, click here and read about the great new tool that allows affiliates to create and generate their own video creatives, and link them to multiple merchants throughout the video through the use of cue points. Meaning an affiliate can create a niche focused video covering five related products and promote five different merchants all in one video, darned cool!

See the original post here:
Shareasale launches “Affiliate Create a video”

While affiliates continue to look for ways to ad value to a merchants marketing campaign, they are often hampered by a networks limitations on what linking and tracking options are available. Most affiliates find they can only innovate as fast as their network partners allow. While video has been hot for a while and some merchants have had click trackable video available for a couple of years, it’s still not easy to support directly within most networks. Most solutions to date have used a work around system to avoid the complications or added expense of using an affiliate networks options.

So it’s great to see Shareasale once again step into the breach and release a video tool set to help merchants create and deploy videos for their affiliates to use.

The present system provides a way for merchants to set up videos in Shareasale, but it looks like there will be a system to support affiliate created videos too!

Check out a demo of the system on the SAS Blog.

Here is the original post:
Shareasale ads Video Support

Changes happen fast in the affiliate industry. It is the nature of being online. So when Rakuten snapped up LinkShare back in September 2005 many expected the acquisitions of other affiliate networks to soon follow. Perhaps the only surprise is how long it took.

A brief history of how the Google Affiliate Network began

On Monday, June 30th it was announced that Performics was becoming the Google Affiliate Network. The announcement came as part of a series of changes that have been taking place ever since Google acquired DoubleClick, Performics’ parent company, for 3.1 billion dollars in April 2007. After an extended review both the FTC (November, 2007) and the European Commission (March, 2008) approved the acquisition. With deal finally closed the question became what to do with the assets the Performics brought to the table. Not only was Performics one of the longest running and successful affiliate marketing networks but its search business had blossomed as well. The decision was made to sell off the search portion of the business, a smart move considering the inherent conflict of interest in Google owning a search firm.

“Google could have easily sold the affiliate business as well but they specifically made the decision to keep it because of the opportunity it provided,” said Chris Henger, former VP of Marketing & Product Development at Performics and current Group Product Manager at Google Affiliate Network. “We are now in the midst of full integration into Google, organizationally, technologically, and infrastructure wise. Members of our team on the Advertiser and Publisher side have been meeting with their counter parts to make sure we have a complete understanding of how Google is structured and organized to support advertisers. Google has been very welcoming in immersing us into the business.”

How will Google impact the affiliate marketing industry?

Industry insiders have long known that affiliate marketing works. It drives sales for advertisers while providing excellent ROAS. But sometimes it takes a mainstream player to buy into the practices of a niche industry before it is widely accepted. Chris feels that the acquisition by Google heralds such acceptance, “Google’s participation lends credibility to our industry. It raises the industry’s profile and cements affiliate marketing as an effective marketing tactic.”

What Changes Can Publishers and Advertisers expect?

With any integration users, accustomed to a particular system, are concerned how new changes will impact them. Google has chosen to keep the existing Performics’ business intact, allowing advertisers to work with the same account teams that have been supporting them all along. In the short term users will see a rebranding of the Performics’ interface as well as basic interface functionality improvements.

Other improvements long term Performics’ customers can expect include better billing and payment systems that will leverage Google’s global footprint and improve the speed in which publishers are paid helping overcome the challenge of multiple languages and multiple currencies. Google’s current ad systems also have a great algorithm to predict which ad unit will convert better, improving the way publisher’s monetize. Relationships, something Performics was known for, will remain core to the business.

“Matchmaking will continue to be important to our roadmap,” explained Chris. “We display contact information in a very transparent manner that we think is crucial for both advertisers and publishers. It facilitates matchmaking. We have a VIP designation in our interface which makes it very easy for advertisers to identify key publishers.”

“We are working on expanding our tools to make matchmaking even more conducive,” he continued, “to make our system a little more Web 2.0 like in terms of communication. Google has those technologies internally. Our biggest challenge is how to integrate into their system. As this integration relates to our competitors we are excited to compete with the resources and technology that Google brings. We think we have a really compelling offer for advertisers and publishers to work with us.”

What innovations will Google bring to the table?

When people focus on Google the conversation ultimately turns to the technology they have at their fingertips. Many in the affiliate industry are curious to see how that technology will be used.

“We believe that Google defines innovation,” Chris responded. “They are constantly pushing the envelope on new products and new product ideas. There is a whiteboard full of things we can do to improve publisher monetization of advertisements and expand distribution opportunities for our advertisers. Google’s technology opens the door for new types of distribution and widens the different ad units we can develop. ”

“Think about all the things they are doing in video with YouTube,” he went on excitedly, “When you project out two years from now what is the affiliate industry going to do with video? What is going to happen in mobile? Personally, I am not convinced yet that consumer adoption of these technologies will move product. However, if it does, we are uniquely positioned to take advantage of that on behalf of our advertisers. We are excited to explore those opportunities.”

Will trademark bidding be policed?

Recently ShareASale has been lauded for steps it has taken to better define how affiliates are allowed to utilize search tactics especially when it comes to trademark bidding. Google seems to be in a particularly good position to have an impact on how the industry deals with trademark bidding. Is that something they intend to take on?

“I think that trademark monitoring really comes down to an advertiser’s decision,” responded Chris. “There are many examples of business models where marketers will want or have to permit other parties to be able to participate in the search market related to or around a trademarked term. It is a very tricky one to have a blanket statement on it because what may be the right policy and decision for one advertiser is not right for another. So as a network we have always felt, regardless of being part of Google, that it is the advertiser’s decision.”

The annual Performics’ Client Summit was postponed, will we see it again?

The announcement that the affiliate portion of Performics’ Client Summit was to be postponed was met with disappointment on many forums. Chris said that the decision was made due to the pending sale of the search business and to hold a search client focused event to help with the transition. As for the affiliate portion of the event, it will occur this fall most likely in early October. Dates and the Chicago venue are being finalized and should be announced this month.

What response would you like to see about the launch of Google Affiliate Network?

A far cry from the negative coverage when the initial purchase of DoubleClick was announced the overall response to the launch of the Google Affiliate Network has been positive. Of course, speculation has run rampant including some suggesting that this means doom for the competition.

Although Chris is looking forward to competing with LinkShare, CJ and ShareASale he brushes aside such speculation stating, “I want to focus on how, as an industry, we can take this as a positive rather than having these various conspiracy theories out there around Google.”

“Google has a philosophy that everything they do is best for the end user,” he continued. “It is their core principle. If decisions are made that are always the best for the end user then good things overall will happen. If doing what’s best for the end user is everyone’s focus then products will get bought, advertisers will be happy, and publishers will get paid. Google’s philosophy is a watershed positive force within our industry.”

And I have to agree with Chris. Healthy competition is a sign of a healthy industry. Google, indeed, makes for some healthy competition. But I can’t resist speculating, does this mean MSN will come knocking on a network’s door? I can almost see CJ laying out the welcome mat now.

Credit:

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In Part 2 of ShareASales Pledges and Expectations blog series, Brian posted a very detailed explanation of how SAS will be handling Affiliate PPC Search issues, such as trademark bidding.

My post isn’t about the policy per se. Although, I think it is fair approach to the concerns surrounding affiliates doing PPCSE marketing. Overall, I personally like the policy.

What I like even more is the approach Brian has taken addressing those issues. While it is a policy change to some extent, he has outlined expectations (of both affiliates and merchants) as well as set in place a system for affiliates to formally pledge to good behavior and be rewarded for such.

Along with that, Brian has been very specific in what will not be allowed. Yeah…..clear cut rules. Always a bonus when it comes to QA. But he goes an extra step in specifically spelling out the consequences for breaking the rules. That is the part I’m really loving. It’s very transparent. Both merchants and affiliates now know..if you do X, Y will happen. This is often the critical element I see missing when it comes to Network and/or Merchant compliance efforts. Granted there may be internal policies (I know for a fact those internal polices are there and know what they are in some instances),  but those policies aren’t know to affiliates. A neblous consequence doesn’t carry as much weight as a known consequence as a deterrent. 

The way Brian has approached the issue also smells of….dare I say it….transparency.

So I, for one, was glad to see tonight’s post on the ShareASale blog. Hats off to SAS once again.

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