Development 
9 Comments My A4U Award Entry
After a long time in the making, an idea of mine has finally come to fruition, is downloadable from the Microsoft website, meets all IAB guidelines, and as far as I’m aware is completely new to Affiliate Marketing.
I’m sure in the coming weeks and months, we’ll see a lot of similar inventions appearing, but have I been truly innovative I wonder…
What is it?
It’s a Vista Gadget! Anyone who uses Windows Vista, may already know about the Vista Sidebar and how useful it can be. You can add Gadgets to your desktop that interact and update automatically via the internet such as Weather Forecasts, BBC News and Currency Rates.
What does my gadget do?
The Discount Codes gadget allows people to see the latest discounts, sales and special offers available to the UK consumer. There’s no need to visit any website as the Gadget updates itself every 15 minutes based on an RSS feed. See a video clip here.
Additional functionality
I’ve also built in a search funtion that directs users to my website, with the result of their search term.Built in is a search function, which will direct users to my Discount Codes website.
Finally, there is room for merchants who want an extra push, to appear in a small banner at the bottom. This banner is also controlled dynamically allowing me to push new merchants to people who, for instance, downloaded the gadget months previously. These banners, limited to 6 different merchants, again rotate every 15 minutes.
Where can you get it?
Well, as its been officially accepted by Microsoft, you can actually download it from Microsofts Live website by clicking here.
Does it qualify for an A4U Award?
This gadget was developed over a long period of time, making sure I didn’t break any IAB guidelines and making sure it ran smoothly as anticipated. I’ve already pinged a few people about this asking what they thought at which point Matt Wood asked whether this was being entered into the A4U Awards.
I hadn’t really thought about it, but when Matt pointed out the two categories it could fall under, I am now wondering whether the judges will see it as a possible entry…
Best Use of Technology within Affiliate Marketing
Judges are for this award looking for well executed implementation or use of new technology within Affiliate Marketing, either as an affiliate, merchant, or network.
Innovative Affiliate of the Year
As an affiliate have you developed and published a unique or innovative site, campaign, service, application or tool that fully embraces the concepts behind the many facets of Affiliate Marketing.
Not sure I will be a winner, but certainly think it could be worth an entry. It’s definately something new to the Affiliate Marketing Industry.