Posts Tagged "christmas"
Can Someone Please Wake Up The Networks?
As many of us affiliates know, today was the Official unveiling of the Top Christmas Toy Predictions for 2009. The announcements, made by British Toy & Hobby Association and Toy Retailers Association every year, are eagerly awaited by many as they form the basis of many marketing plans. Sadly someone forgot to tell the networks, agencies and merchants… Imagine if Santa was late?
I reminded a number of networks of this and even tried to help them further, by pointing them in the direction of the official website, suggesting they may want to prepare for it. As many affiliates have seasonal websites, it would have been both extremely useful, and beneficial to networks and affiliates alike, had someone taken this opportunity to shine. If a network had spared a few people, 2 hours each, an email could have been sent to a huge audience with deep-links to all the top ten toys.
I appreciate it’s not always the networks role, if for example, the merchant is “managed” by an agency… cough cough… But it just seems crazy that such a big annual event still goes almost unmarked, yet all other forms of media (news, print, TV) pickup on it, and report it.
During my own trawling of merchants whilst creating deep-links for all 72 Christmas presents, I was disappointed to see that 95% of merchants still have no Christmas banners in place. In some cases, I’ve had to revert to using some from Christmas 2008 and even bank holiday banners just to get something in place!
Come on networks, agencies and merchants. Christmas is the same every year – get a bit more organised… please!?!?
If you still haven’t got your affiliate pages in place, you may want to take a look at Easy Content Units which takes the hard work of creating your own deep-links. Also available is the Official Press Release and my final observation… Take a look at John Lewis, who this year seem to be VERY competitively priced.
Not a single Argos link was required! Happy Days! 
Preparing For Christmas
OK, so Christmas is once again fast approaching, and most affiliates who have planned correctly, have most things in place for their Christmas websites. Once again, this year I will be offering merchants the chance of taking up tenancy on pages of my Top Christmas Gifts website.
Last year, I offered the sponsorship opportunities in November and all space were snapped up extremely quickly. This year, in line with better planning, I’ve decided to open the opportunity as early as possible meaning everything can be in place before the visitors start arriving in the 1000’s.
I’ve put together an overview document that should help explain and answer all your questions such as pricing, what’s on offer, last years statistics etc. I am in the process of passing this information around networks, and already am in discussions with a number of merchants wanting to reserve places. Please note it is offered purely on a first come first served basis.
The PDF Document is password protected, so if you’re a merchant or network that wants access;
Click here to download it in ZIP format.
Click here to download it in RAR format.
… and if you’re Zak from Prezzybox I’ll print it out and post it to you
Sponsorship Opportunity – #1 Google Christmas Site
It’s that special time of the year again and my Christmas website, xmaselves.co.uk always ranks well in Google with a huge increase in visitors seen in November and December. XmasElves.co.uk is now listed #1 on Google for many a search term such as Top Ten Presents 2008 and has 6 SiteLinks for the popular term TOP CHRISTMAS PRESENTS.
With the 2008 “Dream Toys” having been announced, the site is getting a massive amount of traffic which will only get bigger in the run up to Christmas.
With that in mind I am offering 1 x sponsorship slot on each category page, of which one has already been reserved. The position is on the right of every page and can be up to 300 width – see PrezzyBox example below or on the homepage. The price’s are set at £299 + vat per month or £500 + vat from now until the end of January 2009.
The pages available for tennancy are;
- Homepage
- 2008 Top Christmas Presents
- Christmas Presents For Boys
- Boyfriend Christmas Presents
- Christmas Presents For Girls
- Girlfriend Christmas Presents
- Creative Christmas Presents
- Christmas Games
- Hip n Kool Presents
- Christmas Presents For Pre-school
If you are interested in getting some extra exposure for your toy/gift/gadget site in the “Golden Quarter” then please get in touch quickly.
Read MoreAm I Too Late For Christmas?
Last year I blogged about how important it was to plan and build new websites for different seasons such as Valentines and Christmas. Sadly I forgot to heed my own advice and have left it very late to start planning my Christmas 2008 website and am now in a hurry to get content in place ready for the Christmas rush (hopefully).
Thankfully after checking a few key phrases I am still featuring #1 in Google despite my Christmas website being orientated to 2007 until today. I am therefore hoping that the update should be relatively pain free and still earn me a few £’s here and there considering the number of visitors I am seeing increase over the past 7 days.
Due to time restraints I’ve had to change things around a little and use a different backend. Previously the backend was Affilistore which I use for a number of other websites such as my makeup website, but this year I’m once again relying on a good old Wordpress blog. A tweak here and there to a free wordpress template obtained from BlogOhBlog and an image or two downloaded from iStockPhoto and we are ready to rock and roll!
I plan to make more use of content units this year, opposed to feeds last year just to help get content up and running quickly with the minimum effort and as usual am looking for any links swaps. This year I’ll once again be making use of the BuyAGift Landing Page created by Paul last year just to drive a few additional sales in the hope to win the Affiliate Road Trip incentive they have introduced.
Read MoreKey Affiliate Marketing Dates
After 6 years in Affiliate Marketing, I still find myself rushing round at the last minute, trying to make the most of organic traffic that hits my websites at certain times of the year. The latest one is Sweet Valentines which, even being single, I know is only round the corner, yet I only started playing with the site on 2nd February. Yes, a whole 12 days before the big day!
When I say playing, feeds were broken, images not working yet still it was getting approx 800 uniques a day. Lots of free traffic that was generating £0.00 as the visitors couldn’t spend their money even if they tried! Even now, the site isn’t working 100% but I’ve run out of time and have other things to tend to 
If I was a lecturer, I would be telling my affiliate students to ensure their seasonal website be up, running and fully tested 3 months before the big day, so to allow search engines to pick up and run with it prior to the big day. With that in mind I thought I’d put together a list of key affiliate dates, that in my eyes, are essential to generate maximum income;
- January Sales (26 December -> 15th January usually)
- Think, plan and design during August / September
- Implement and test October -> November
- Valentines Day (14th February)
- TPaD during September / October
- Implement and test November -> December
- Easter (March / April)
- TPaD during October / November
- Implement and test December -> January
- Summer (12 June -> 14 June *England only
)
- TPaD during February / March
- Implement and test April -> May
- Christmas (25 December)
- TPaD during July / August
- Implement and test September -> October
So what’s this TPaD thing?
Think
What is it you want to do? Maybe your goal is to develop a website, add a section to an existing website you currently run, or even a trial a seasonal PPC campaign.
Plan
Depending on what your initial goal is, you may find your planning ranges from a simple keyword list all the way to a completely new interactive website. See what other sites are offering, speak to merchants to find out anything special they have planned and do some research! How do you plan to tell people about your new venture? Are you going to PPC it, send newsletters out, get links from similar websites?
and
Design
If you planned correctly, and most importantly stick to your plan, then you should have pretty much a draft for your design already. Now comes the tailoring part, or putting your plan in to practice. This may mean developing a website or burning your fingers typing out keywords galore. Contact other websites that have similar content and see if they would be willing to swap links with you.
Most importantly, as you can see from the dates above, don’t spend any additional time on one season, rushing things, when really it is already too late. Learn your lesson and move to the next seasonal theme.
What about you?
Do you have different dates, focus on different seasons such as Travel / Holiday? If so, what deadlines do you work to and what other advice can you offer?
Social Stuff
