Recently I’ve had meetings with several senior agency contacts whose description of last year will be one that I hope we can avoid for some time. “Harrowing” and “terribly ugly” have now turned to “phew” for many, as the light seems to be approaching the end of the tunnel. We’ve all been caught up in one way or another and for many the decisive actions taken throughout 2009 have ensured that we are best placed with the new-year upon us. 2009’s positive performance has now spilled over into 2010 and it has coincided with a noticeable uplift in briefs and pitches, so client’s confidence begins to return.

2010 - A more positive year?

But it’s the deployment of that budget from senior marketers that will demand accountability. Pound for pound, the ROI must stack up and for some the speed of that return will need to be quicker than ever. And so it’s a relief that we’re in online and how we look forward to the plethora of online tracking tools developed throughout the noughties accounting for the seismic shift of consumers from the high street onto our websites and applications. There’s little doubt about it, we’re well placed to deliver strategies for our client base that are tried and tested. With the 10th anniversary of the Dotcom bust in March, online has grown up now and traditional media channels are consequently suffering.

Affiliates remain to be a growth sector in online marketing. It’s been over 5 years now since it was tarnished with the “wild west” brush and how we’ve came on. Education and understanding allow merchants to make the channel profitable and weave it into long term marketing objectives. Networks have grown up too, and for many fraud prevention is only one of the many feathers in the bow of a range of impressive network tools. And affiliates themselves are professional outfits, having reacted to the demands of the corporate purse and thus securing long term meaningful partnerships, moving away from the bedroom image and brand bidding confusion.

A suitable affiliate platform?

So we’re onto the year of the mobile and don’t we know it with our friends over at Apple reporting numbers of handsets sold going through the roof. The imminent roll-out across multiple network providers will create a critical mass that will deliver the numbers to drive a successful new ecommerce platform. Payment method roll-out solutions are still to be championed and applications are to be standardised, but soon we’ll see some of these applications be as important as some of the early noughties’ new websites. Or will we?

innovations · technology

This month we’re preparing for the launch of a new merchant here at R.O.EYE. We will be running this on both a closed and open network, and I got to wondering… what is the general perception of this kind of strategy in the affiliate community? Are the benefits and drawbacks of both widely understood? To throw my two pence worth out there I’ve put together some observations which may help to explain some of the thought processes involved.

In my experience merchants face two very important considerations when deciding on which strategy to employ depending of course on the industry and product, and these are typically reach and control.

For example, a non-premium branded retail merchant will be more concerned with driving sales than brand compliance and have few reservations about allowing affiliates from as many different genres join the programme as possible. In contrast a premium-branded, FSA regulated finance merchant will need considerably more control over the programme as they need to consider compliance as well back-end quality if the programme is paying out per lead for example.

Closed networks offer the merchant a good degree of control because the affiliate manager or agency can keep affiliates close and develop mutually beneficial working relationships with them. Good communication then facilitates effective programme optimisation from a quality perspective and compliance management, ticking two very important boxes.

Another big box to tick is of course volume of sales (or leads) and for this it helps to have access to large numbers of affiliates. Open networks offer considerably more reach in terms of accessing affiliates and depending on the network can attract specialist affiliates in a variety of different verticals. Other benefits include the extremely valuable add-on services such as XML product feeds, widgets, APIs, etc which can be of huge benefit and often integral to making the programme a success.

However it is also true that these add-ons are not always required and in some instances are left completely redundant, which then brings into question the justifiability of the network override. This becomes a very important consideration where for example the programme objectives involve working to a cost-based KPI.

If only a standard tracking solution is required then a closed network is preferable as this eliminates the inflationary impact of network overrides and creates cost efficiencies. This means the programme is not inhibited in its ability to deliver to the cost based KPI and the maximum commissions can be passed on to attract, recruit, and nurture top performing affiliates.

In summary it’s very much ‘horses for courses’ but decisions whether to run an affiliate programme on a closed, open, or mixed strategy often stem from some of the considerations covered in this blog. In all instances however the decisions made must satisfy the merchant objectives and provided that is the case there will always be a successful programme for affiliates to be part of.

networks · programme management · tracking

In the five years that R.O.EYE have been managing affiliate campaigns we have had the pleasure of launching upwards of 30 of our merchant’s programmes to the affiliate community. In our experience we have seen some very slick and effortless programme launches as well as some which have had more than the odd spanner thrown in the works.

So what makes the difference? What are the factors involved? What can be done to ensure a stellar programme launch and avoid a spluttering start?

Well we think we have some answers. Below we’ve put together some bullet point tips and wisdom that will help you identify areas of focus to make sure your affiliate programme gets off the ground and delivering your objectives when you need it to:-

Put your technical team in touch with your affiliate agency or network.
Problems with implementing tracking is possibly the greatest obstacle to a programme launch and direct lines of communication will help ensure this goes smoothly and timely.

Make campaign materials available as early as possible.
It is likely you agreed a launch date with the affiliate agency at the planning stage, and whether this can be achieved depends a lot on when the necessary materials such as; product info, USPs, creatives etc can be made available.

Set and work to realistic and agreed timeframes.
We recommend you assess your internal resources and ability to deliver the required materials and then agree timescales for all parties to work towards. This will facilitate effective time management for all and ensure that momentum is not lost during the launch phase.

Consult your affiliate agency on the design of creatives and landing pages at an early stage.
Creatives that have been designed for a branding or media campaign may not be suitable for an affiliate campaign, if for example there is no strong call to action. Landing pages which are not ‘affiliate friendly’ and contain leakage points such as telephone numbers can affect affiliate take-up and inhibit the programme.

Keep your affiliate agency informed of your other marketing channels’ activity.
There may be some great opportunities if synergies exist to tie the programme launch in with your existing marketing activities. On the other hand there may be potential conflicting messages that can be avoided if spotted early on.

In summary, many of the most common set-backs and issues that delay the launch of affiliate programmes can be avoided. While there are potentially hundreds of variables involved when setting up an affiliate programme depending on many factors, there are some fundamental points which can be applied in most circumstances and it is these we have focused on in this blog.

advice · programme management

R.O.EYE are once again guest bloggers on the eBay Partner Network Blog. This post comes courtesy of yours truly, and gives great insight into the best ways to optimise your search results listings, using negative (and positive) keyword matching, category mapping, and even pooling multiple API calls. If you promote eBay, whatever your technical level, it’s definitely worth a read (if I do say so myself!!)

Check it out here.

advice · eBay Partner Network · guest post · technical