A4uexpo Day 1 A very British affair
If A4uExpo thought it could mussel up against the likes of the big boys like Adtech and compete with their professional shows, not only did they show that they are just as good, but in many ways it was better, just my personal opinion. Slick and professional and polished comes to mind. New business, yes… I don’t think I met anyone that said they had not made any new contacts. What struck me the most from the new merchants coming into the industry is how much research that they had already done.The sessions I attended were very good and I learnt heaps, one in particular stood out for me which was the usability company conversion-rate-Experts – conversion rates and optimisation. If merchants are not trying to understand their customers in terms of what they are doing on their site, where they are going, what do they click on, where are you losing your customer and so on, then its going to be very difficult to understand the weak areas of the merchants site. Affiliates should be doing this too. One of the tools that was mentioned was http://crazyegg.com/. I feel some merchants/affiliates forget about how important this is to measure what is working and what is not, good sound practical advice was to be had here and was the common theme running through out the day.The session that was headed up by
GreasyPalm, Rpoints & TheMutual.net was very interesting. – Embracing and understanding the loyalty sector. There is no doubt that there is an increase in the number of cash back or reward sites out there, so much so, I smiled when I came across a comparison of cash back sites measuring Threshold: How much you have to earn before you can get your cash.Fees: Cost of joining the cashback websiteBonus: Free cash for joiningW3WAD Rating: W3WAD’s rating out of 5User Rating: User’s rating out of 5.What caught my attention in the session was the announcement of a reward site association. Set up as I understand it, in terms of heading off threats to their particular affiliate space whilst working within a code of conduct, to work with and protect “The Brands”. I believe its early days for them and I for one would be quite interested if Quidco.com would join this association, Im honing in on quidco.com as they operate several sites, Quidco.com giving 100% cash back to their members.
What is also interesting is that a group of affiliates within a given specialist area are forming their own association, could this be a clear signal that affiliates are starting to organise themselves? Collaborate?This could be further supported by a discussion that I was privy too (a welcome gate crasher I hasten to add) between three affiliate networks and a group of discount voucher site affiliates talking about how to curb affiliates from using other affiliates unique Coupon/Voucher codes. As yet we don’t know how prolific this is or if indeed there is a problem. Some times its not affiliates using others unique voucher codes but the general public. (How to annoy a merchant, publish an offline coupon / voucher in the press and watch it being populated on the internet by Jo/Joanne Public). It could be argued that if the merchant publishes a generic code and is in the public domain, then this is the problem for the merchant to sort out, but what if an affiliate publishes the code? It’s a tough one for them. We have seen a number of UK networks being very proactive in order to nip, affiliates taking other affiliates voucher codes, in the bud. It’s a discussion that I could happily have listened to all night. Its great when we sit around the table and discuss issues like this, we all get to hear things from the different sides of the fence.
If affiliates beginning to organising themselves is a new trend, its encouraging to see that affiliates are finally seeing the bigger picture and have momentarily stopped thinking about the here and now and are looking to preserve their space. Amen to that and don’t stop now! It’s a tough one as they will need the support of the networks in order for this to work and ultimately the merchants. How ever, if there are too many splinter groups, what will this mean in terms of recognition by the networks? You know what, things have a habit of sorting themselves out and this time, its great to be able to be a spectator. For the first time I feel, there is a real shift in affiliates becoming less tolerant towards rogue affiliates and they appear to be starting to police themselves. I’m so delighted with this as it signals that affiliates are realising that those rouge affiliate practices do impact their own wallets either directly or indirectly.
Zak Edwards of Prezzybox and Chris Bishop of HotelChocolat session was great – Breaking through the noise. All the info a merchant needs in order to run and manage an affiliate program. I think, for me this was by far the most useful session that a new merchant could have attended. Practical, sensible, logical and gems of information. In fact had I known the guys were going to do this, I would not have done a similar one as I felt there was some what of an overlap, but in saying that, what it did do is just reinforce the message to new merchants or existing merchants, is that there is more to running affiliate program then meets the eye.Accents, thea4u expo seemed to have attracted a few people from overseas, I detected.. Australian, American, Spanish, French, German and Dutch. I met a couple of people who had made the trip from France, US and Holland.
I got a sneak preview of affiliatefuture.co.uk new reporting interface and all I can say, its been a long time coming (Pete, just had a flash back to our conversation, lol) and from what I can see, it is an ahhhhhhh Bistow moment. This has just brought you into 2007/8 with a back end reporting system that will hit a lot of buttons with affiliates and merchants, well done!I was asked about how this stacked up against the AffiliateSummit.com, in fact this was probably one of the most frequently asked question, to me. The two events, I knew were going to be different. AffiliateSummit.com is more established and attracts a global audience, mainly US as this is where their primary target market is, their expertise is the US with a potential to attract a bigger global audience. There is and should be a place for both and collaboration between the two should be encouraged. Both events depend on the attendees and what they want to get out of it. For me the AffiliateSummit is about seeking knowledge about the US market so I can better understand it and in order to achieve a goal of moving some of the obstructions that get in the way of Merchants being able to ship their products world wide, in turn, making the term “The super global highway of ecommerce”become a reality for some the knock on effect from this would be Affiliates being able to expand their own reach and for affiliate networks to make their platform cross border affiliate friendl, win win. For me this is what the affiliatesummit.com can and going forwards I hope will part facilitate as they already have a growing global audience. A4uExpo is a truly British affair and should remain so, its desperately needed, focussed and relevant for the UK specifically.There are no doubts, Im sure, in anyone’s mind that the
a4uExpo was a huge success and and today put down the official roots which will catapult Exsistem into the forefront of UK Affiliate Marketing in terms of UK events, we know they have already been doing this, but just needed that public seal of approval, which not only did they get, but left many wanting more and discussing where the next one should be held.The A4uAwards
It is not surprising then that the A4u Award went to Matthew Wood of Exsistem and organiser of a4uexpo.com who won the industry Champion Award, that Exsitem won best publisher agency. Many congrats to both from me and every one here, it was your day, your night and I rather suspect it has made your year!Well done to Zak Edwards of Prezzybox, Publishers Manager of 2007 – Merchant Award & Publisher Choice of Merchant 2007
Well done to Hero of Webgains.com best network account manager.
Well done to AffiliateWindow.com, they scooped two awards, one for innovation and publishers choice of network.Well done to
Amazon for Innovation in Affiliate Marketing – Merchant AwardWell done to Kieron Donoghue for best blog.Well done
Next for best new merchantWell done to e-conversions for best new international affiliate.Im afraid I couldn’t hear the others as it was pretty noisy, but Im sure the other award winners will be blogged about.
As a side note, Id like to thank the tall guy in the stripy shirt, that offered to put me on his shoulders, being the short ass that I am and standing at the back of the pub, my view was not the best, never is. Im sure there is a whole chunk of the world that people over a certain height can see and I have yet to experience, like is the air cleaner up there. But I was quite touched by the consideration he showed, who ever you were, thank you :0)
I would also like to thank Julie Hegarty for attending my presentation, Im not a public speaker, never have been, they scare me to death. It was so good to focus on a familiar face :0) Clarke, Graeme, Joe… cheers, and James Avery..”Bay of pigs in affiliate marketing, completely threw me” lol you rebel! I really did not want to be at mine, I wanted to be at the SEO one, this was the one session I wanted to go to the most :0(
I want to tell the world about Graeme of PaidOnresults.com I can confirm that he does exist and I caught the rare and elusive man on camera, no longer will he be synonymous with the likes of Big Foot, Yetti, Loch Ness monster, Lord Lucan or the Bermuda triangle. Finally, I have the evidence that the Wizard of PaidOnResults.com not only exists, but goes to show that being young does not mean you get no respect from your elders. One of the highlights of my day was meeting a real genius, innovator, technical guru.
I doubt if I could do half the things I can without you. You make technology seem like child’s play.
Stuart apologies for blinding you with my flash:0),
Carol, ma wee friend from glasgee…was so great to see you again. Ill be heading to bonnie scotland soon :0)
Keiron thanks for fixing my camera but it gave up the ghost four pictures later :0(
I travelled back on the tube with Chris (no 13) from buy.at and 
Kieth Budden (left), we all agreed that the day was not only productive but was the start of something we had all wanted to achieve for so many years, UK Affiliate Marketing, as a serious advertising channel that ROCKS!
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Comments
Nice one Jess, pretty much agree with all of that and great to catch up with you again all too briefly. I finally updated my own blog too!
It was a pleasure Jess, shame we didn’t have time for a longer chat. I must also say I went to Graham Keen’s seminar and he was fantastic, really bigging up us ‘grubby’ affiliates lol.
Just one thing to point out though, my surname’s not Wheatley it’s Hegarty, done some stupid things in my time but never been that stupid (only joking Paul if you’re reading this).
Hey Julie :0) I have corrected.
Im sure we will catch up at the next one, hope so :0)
Thanks again…
Mr Peanut Butter, Im taking time off next week, I cant promise that I wont work, but I will work less 🙂
Joe, always too brief and always a pleasure to see you, next time drink your coffee while it is still hot… next time Ill tell you u have coffee :0)
I was at your presentation, can affiliates really be trusted with promoting my business? I was listening to a merchant who said they had problems from the beginning, affiliates sending fraudulent leads. The affiliate network that was talking to him said that it was because he was in the wrong affiliate network and that network could not doing anything about it. This is a concern as we have a site that would be a lead program. Are there any networks to avoid in this case?
You also said that merchants needed to factor in resources to run their affiliate program. How many hours per week would you recommend? We are thinking about getting an in-house affiliate manager and we need to know what kind of resources we will need, can you remind me what you were talking about. Also what was the commission floating, surely we don’t pay affiliates in advance?
Best regards – John Evelyn
Hi John
Yes you can trust most affiliates to promote your products and or services. Just make sure you have clear guidelines and tell affiliates how to promote you, take the guess work out :0) The next bit is quite relevant to the next part of your question. Affiliates are in the business of making money, if they are not playing by reasonable rules, you simply don’t pay them. This is how you get rid of rogue affiliates, in the same way you would sack a bad employee.
Pay Per lead programs are a bit tricky, but most affiliate networks have loads anti fraud features and I cant believe that any affiliate network would not care if their clients are having high volumes of fraudulent leads, would leave a bitter taste in every ones mouth. Where by there is a program which has a potential loop hole, go back and look at the structure of the program and work with the network to close the whole. Please do remember, the merchant has the final call on if a lead is legitimate or not. Either way work with your chosen aff network and plug those holes. Prevention is better then the cure.
Without knowing you or your company or what products and or services you provide, I can’t really give you an accurate answer. I would always say you can never spend too many hours on your affiliate program. The resources needed, ideally, will be for your affiliate manager to have access to your website analytics, other marketing personnel, access to technical resources and graphics. Make sure the left hand knows what the right hand is doing before passing information over to the affiliates. You get out what you put in.
Re commission funding float, its like an escrow account. Some networks prefer that you can show that you have the funds to pay an affiliate before they start working for you and whist they are working for you. Most networks now have this option. It’s a clear signal to affiliates that you are serious. You need to also understand that in the past, there have been occasions where by the merchant had absconded without paying their affiliates. As affiliate marketing has a huge emphasis upon trust between all parties concerned, having an escrow account, of which you are in total control of, bridges this particular trust issue. I think it’s a very positive signal to have this. How ever there are some merchants that really can’t do this. Usually it’s the bigger brands and to be honest, the big brands would not welcome the publicity if they did not pay their invoices ;0)
Have a great weekend
Sorry Jess, but I thought you would get the Swiss neutrality reference. I’m taking the train to Zug on November 14th to start flat hunting ;).
Sorry, hunting is a word with potentially violent connotations – I am going to search for an accommodation solution ;).
Ha ha ha… James, bay of pigs, really threw me, Im thinking what has Cuba got to do with how to avoid conflict, I was trying to make the connection. Too funny, and quite surreal if you think about it, having just had barney giving every one a group hug ;0)
But I get you now.
James… are you going to live in Switzerland? Or just buying a place to rent out? Shout if you need help and when you get there, don’t mention the war ;0P There is neutral and then there is perhaps not as neutral as some would like to remember. Ohhhh controversial!
Jess, I think I mentioned the war once and got away with it, but doesn’t the Swiss version feature Basel Failte, an Irish publican?
Seriously though, there’s always at least 3 sides to any argument – see:
http://www.jamesavery.co.uk/2007/09/10/a-few-of-the-things-i-like-about-switzerland/
James: Ha ha ha… yes indeed!!!
You really are going then! Well Littau is not far so we will have to climb a big hill, one with a great Irish pub at the top.
Ill send you some contacts, just in case. Being stuck in the middle of somewhere with nothing but edelweiss for food can drive your cuckoo clock quite mad. James if u get stuck just yodel! And keep Mid Nov free, I feel an affy French trip coming on. Ohhhh hows your Swiss German? Tooo exciting. You going on your own?
Well done, Jess. You must have been very tired near the end of this blog but I commend your follow-through! -Mr Peanut Butter