Web Affiliate Marketing Blog

In the past, I’ve kept track as to the amount of sales I done on behalf of merchants purely out of interest. 2008 has been a good year mainly due to the introduction and focus on new sites, especially niche and seasonal ones, helping to bump up sales throughout the year.

Sadly the huge increase in sales, isn’t reflected in the same way when it comes to commissions. Trust me, I would be jumping for joy if I could say an average 10% commission was paid for each sale, and certainly would be giving up the day job!

Even so, it goes to show that us small affiliates (the ones that do it along side fulltime jobs, in our bedrooms) can still help companies achieve growths and profits.

So why the changes? Well once again a lot of it is down to my relationships with networks. CJ, who in the past I’ve found to be a bit of a faceless company, have made contact with me. Just having a contact on MSN (thanks Hildegunn) has driven me to look at and push their merchants a little more, resulting in a 426% increase.

Another possible reason is the introduction of a bi-weekly newsletter. After collecting email addresses since I care to remember, I never did a single thing with them. Now my newsletters are sent out every 2 weeks, pushing merchants who in turn offer me and my visitors something special.

All in all a good year, but I’m not holding out much hope for this year with the credit crunch, yet think Eco Friendly stuff maybe worth a punt.

How often do you find a site you like and then Google it to see if there’s an affiliate programme? Personally I do it maybe once a week, and in the lead up to seasonal sales, possibly twice a week! After using Marks new website, Affiliate Merchants for a number of days, I think it’s something all us affiliates should offer our support to.

It’s not a completely new idea, infact it WebAffiliate started off listing merchants way back in 2001. Due to the manual update required it was scrapped pretty quickly. Affiliate Bounty then emerged as a solution, but again over recent months, has been pulled. Now we have Affiliate Merchants, the latest attempt at informing affiliates of all the programmes in the UK, available on all networks.

The site makes use of feeds from networks, meaning the updating should be a breeze (in theory). Mark’s website is new, and so modifications and additions will take place over time. Currently Affiliate Merchants doesn’t list ever merchant, due to not all networks supplying him with the information, but as a starting point, it’s definately one to have in your favourites or bookmarks.

The site is very easy to navigate and allows you to search for a merchant by name or category, something Kieron could have used only a few days ago when Figleaves pulled the plug and he asked the question about alternatives lingerie merchants.

Currently the information provided on each merchant is minimal, which in one respect is a refreshing change. I don’t want to know the merchants history as I can often find this out from their network signup page. Straight to the point info such as which network their with, the category, whether they have a feed or allow PPC is whats relayed currently. I have fed back to Mark that it maybe useful to include the commission levels offered by the merchant too.

I know DGM are actively seeking representation on the Affiliate Merchant Directory website, and hope the remaining networks such TD, CJ, Paid on Results and Affiliate Future are quick to follow. This could prove to be an invaluable resource if all networks contribute.

Take a look at http://www.affiliatemerchants.org.uk

Merchant pays Network late = Network pays Affiliate late = :(

We’ve all been there and we know this is the business model adopted by some of the larger networks, the ones who can afford not to adopt this model surprisingly. But what options are available to us affiliates who month in, month out, get let down?

Incase you hadn’t guessed, I am grumbling about TradeDoubler. For starters they pay monthly despite saying for a very long time, that they will be introducing bi-monthly payments and improving their payment process. I appreciate TradeDoubler aren’t only UK based, and any changes to payment processes may affect other countries and regions and therefore take time. However, since TradeDoubler have been saying they are improving their payment process (over 2 years to me), we have seen other networks introduce bi-monthly or even weekly payments, some of which operate in more than one country, so that excuse no longer stands.

What about the merchant? Should the merchants who constantly pay invoices late be penalised? To them it makes sense to keep hold of the money as long as possible, and if TradeDoubler don’t implement any penalties then what incentives is there for a merchant to pay on time?

There is no denying it that when it comes to linking to a merchant, payment does influence my decision. Wherever possible I move links to a network who pays bi-monthly, visibly and successfuly chases payment and pays affiliates whether or not the merchant has paid. However this isn’t always possible as some merchants are with a single network and therefore you have to sit and wait to be paid.

What can we do? Can we start charging interest on invoices that are outstanding where we should have received the monies owed? I don’t mind if it’s £10 here or there, but when you are talking over £1500, to a sole trader like myself, this is quite a sum of money that could have been heading off for re-investment in time for Christmas.

Would appreciate comments from those in the know, as to which networks offer what;

• Network Name
  (i.e. GoodNetwork)
• Payment
  (i.e. Bi-Monthly £50 minimum threshold)
• Invoicing
  (i.e. Payment not dependant on merchant paying invoices)

Yesterday Purple posted a comment against one of my blog entries that got me thinking. He’d done a mid year analysis of his affiliate activities, and found that his sales generated (or maybe its commission?) is up by 199% on two major networks and another has seen an increase of over 2000%! Those figures are brilliant to hear as I’m aware he’s been busier this year than ever before, and it’s always good to hear about other peoples success when they make the effort.

Purples effort and reward shows that given a bit of concentration and hard graft, increase can be achieved despite the ‘credit crunch’ no matter what size an affiliate you are :)

In the comments, Purple asked how my stats were shaping up. After a few simple calculations later, I was happy to find that for 7 out of the 8 major networks, my sales for the first 6 months of 2008 have already surpassed my TOTAL for 2007.

My projected 2008 increase is a simple x2 formula and doesn’t take into account Christmas which should hopefully push the increase higher still!