I have just read this Doug Richards post, the content is easily transferable to merchant selection and promotion.  The 40-40-20 rule states that breaking your time and resource into 40% audience focus, 40% offer selection and 20% promotion is the key to success.

Audience Focus:

I see affiliates that target a very different set to the customers to those that they know visit the site.  In these cases something is out of kilter, so either change the focus of the site and source of traffic or embrace your current audience.  There is no point selling budget products to customers looking for luxury, or vice versa.  Once you have a true understanding of your audience you can select the right merchants to push.

Offer Selection or Deeplink, Deeplink, Deeplink:

Are you customers looking for general information on a merchant?  Yes, then link to the merchant’s homepage.  If the answer is “no”, delve into what are they looking for and prequalify the sale, take them to the relevant product page.

Take a look at the merchants offer page and choose the most appropriate for your content (not just the one at the top).  Put the right products at the right prices in front of the right people and they might just buy it, increasing your conversions, sales and earnings in the meantime.

Placement:

So you have researched your audience, found the right products and the best offers, and then dumped a banner with no text at the very bottom a page.  Use your 20% promotion time wisely and make the space on your site work harder.  An image with text and a call to action will convert stronger than either component on its own.  As Doug mentions in his post, deliver a short, punchy message to sell into customers.

An element of this also sits on the merchant shoulders.  Banner blindness is an issue, so time should be spent on good strong creative and which is useable and sits within the standard banner dimensions.

The 40-40-20 rule doesn’t say anything new; it places the focus on customer research as many models have before it and as common sense dictates, but maybe I am being cynical and it is the genuine secret of marketing success.

advice · affiliate · quality · user experience

As an affiliate management agency we work with many different affiliates genres day in day out: PPC, Cashback, Vouchercodes, etc… But with a large majority of merchants, email is a handsome proportion of the programme makeup in regards to affiliate genre; some are even more dependant when Cashback / Vouchercodes are not permitted on the affiliate programme, adhering to its Terms and Conditions.

If, by some form of data capture you are adding to your broadcast lists, then email may well be worth your while. Essentially, you can quickly benefit from circulating your client’s email creative, thus contributing to your own bottom line through a different revenue stream.

Below, I have highlighted a few points to consider when executing an email campaign:

A / B testing – Refine

If you should be lucky enough to be promoting a merchant with a selection of email creative within the network interface then A / B testing allows you to compare and contrast two forms of campaigns. Obviously the most effective creative for your data set will prevail with the greater number of sales / leads.

Feedback – Communicate

Communication is a two way process; very much a cliché, but it rings true. If you are able to obtain any insightful information as to why the email creative isn’t performing particularly well then let the affiliate manager / merchant contact know. They may be able to help and refine the email creative to best suit your data set.

Subject Line – Attention

Being the first part of the email that your end user will be seeing, it’s integral to get this correct and grab their attention from the outset. Capitals and exclamation marks will ensure the email is deemed as unwanted SPAM; personalisation where possible will improve relevancy. Of course, where possible, the title should relate to its contents, because failure of doing so will only result in a large number of people opting out of your campaigns. Segmentation and targeting is the key.

Of course, this isn’t an exhaustive list, but these are just a few of the many key considerations when undertaking a successful email campaign. As long as you can provide refinement, communicate with the relevant parties and grab the recipients’ attention from the outset, you’re on your way to some effective results.

You can find more on information on email campaigns courtesy of Econsultancy

advice · email campaigns · guide · targeted traffic

Many eBay affiliate sites we work with are built to purely promote the wealth of eBay niches, and do so successfully. One of the primary reasons eBay is so suited to affiliate niches is down to the fact that multiple sellers offer identical or similar items at different price points and with varying features. Because eBay is so suited to niche marketing many publishers sometimes overlook the fact that eBay can work very effectively as part of an integrated affiliate campaign.

eBay affiliate campaigns do not have to be segregated into their own isolated web sites or pages. Affiliates have often asked me the question “is it ok if I show eBay listings alongside other forms of advertising?” almost with the expectation that I will tell them that it is not allowed. In reality there are a synergies that can be gained through integrating eBay to sit alongside other retail programmes, these can include improving the overall user experience and providing a revenue stream for otherwise remnant content.

User Experience

One of the most common misperceptions of integrating eBay is that the items on offer will not match or fit in with the products or brands that the affiliate is promoting. I was discussing listing options with a publisher promoting satellite navigation systems, and while his site did feature eBay, the eBay integration was simply a collection of text links to a broad “GPS” search query. The conversions, revenue and resulting EPC’s were very poor as the site traffic was qualified for customers looking to purchase brand new systems. Visitors were clicking the eBay link, being directed to listings “muddied” by irrelevant or unwanted items and were quickly hitting the browser back button. The though of using eBay listings as direct comparisons against other advertisers was totally overlooked.

While second hand auctions no doubt provide some bargains, eBay also have a number of Power Sellers who offer brand new units at competitive prices which would provide more relevant listings. The publisher went on to add dedicated eBay pages for each model, using the Custom Banner and adding filter options to align the listing with the offerings from other merchants. The results were quite dramatic with Revenues and EPCs nearly doubling within a few days of the changes going live. This goes to show that if you dedicate a little time to refine the eBay results (whether it be Custom Banner, RSS or API) to directly compare rather than provide an alternative sales option, you could potentially see the benefits in the form of higher commissions.

Maximising your revenue streams

I know there may be some affiliate reading this post thinking “Well, in some cases I rather not promote eBay because other advertises offer higher commission and I don’t want to cannibalise them”. This is a fair point, and while in many cases QCP has helped eBay make commissions competitive across a much broader spectrum of verticals, some advertisers will undoubtedly offer some higher CPA’s. There are a few things to bear in mind though; firstly while CPA’s may appear to be more attractive on other advertisers programmes if you factor in metrics like click through rate (CTR%) and conversion rate (CR%) more often than not eBay converts at a higher rate, bringing the overall earnings in line with the higher CPA programmes.

eBay has its place as a viable revenue stream in almost any retail affiliate campaign, it is just a case of finding the balance on where to fit it in. If you are cautious about cannibalisation, start at a low level and use eBay to monetise areas of your site that are devoid of viable revenue streams. For review sites this is a great place to start as they often have a huge archive of content written about discontinued products that are no longer available to buy new. eBay can fill that gap and give a good base EPC for rolling listings out onto newer product pages where the advertiser revenues are more competitive.

I have worked with a number of publishers who have added eBay to some of their price comparison listings, initially sceptical about the negative impact it would have on the revenue from other merchants. In most cases there was no significant decline, or certainly not enough to outweigh the additional commissions generated from eBay. If you have some established campaigns why not add eBay and maximise your revenue.

advice · eBay Partner Network · user experience

After a total of 5 interesting months, in the hub of the affiliate marketing industry, I thought it was about time I gathered my thoughts and decipher exactly what I think of it.

Coming from an offline background specialising in press and television campaigns, digital advertising called to me like a beacon, tantalising me with the promise of a better understanding of the full marketing mix. The jury is still out whether I’m there yet? Despite my colleague’s best efforts to educate me on the tricks of this ever expanding trade.

My first two weeks began with a hard and fast induction to key themes and phrases like aggregator, merchant, cash-back and my adoption of an extensive list of notes and a dumbstruck expression. As time has worn on the expression has reverted back to its usual smiley disposition but I’m still adding to my masses of scribbled notes. As it turns out the rumours are true, and you guys in the digital world really do keep changing, and constantly evolving! At first, yes I found this to be mildly irritating for a novice like me, as sometimes it can be difficult to keep up with you, although now I think I’m slowly but surely starting to catch up. With my affiliate glossary in hand, I think slow and steady could possibly win the race.

From my experience so far I’ve learnt that this industry is about building strong relationships, and that this is especially true for those of us that are working within agencies. It’s important to be vocal and pro-active, and ask questions, questions, and more questions. Whether that be to my amazing talented colleagues (brownie points please) or to the many helpful affiliates that I have encountered. I’ve also leant that this works both ways too, and that we as an agency should strive to give back to affiliates. By making ourselves as attainable as possible, offering help and guidance to those that need it, and coordinating communication from merchant to affiliate. Enabling innovative opportunities to be indentified and most importantly executed. Distribution of key information from account managers is what builds a successful affiliate programme.

Plus it’s become apparent that there’s some great opportunities to build these relationships through networking events such as the A4U Expos which I had the pleasure of attending this year. Initially I felt like I was sinking in to the murky waters of the affiliate world, but then left feeling I had soaked up lots of useful tips and tricks, perfect for a new starter such as myself. So my advice to anyone new to the affiliate world is use those around you get yourself a very large note book.

advice · expo · R.O.EYE