Project 2 Blogging - Dealing with Dodgy Merchants & Affliate Networks

Dealing with Dodgy Merchants & Affliate Networks

Aug. 21st, 2008 at 7:01 PM

Dealing with Dodgy Merchants & Affliate Networks
I’ve been following a thread on Wickedfire closely over the past few days that talks about dodgy affiliate networks...

I’ve been following a thread on Wickedfire closely over the past few days that talks about dodgy affiliate networks. I realised that I’d never really covered this topic in any detail on the blog, so here’s my spin on it all.

Dodgy Merchants

It’s inevitable that if you’re trying out hundreds of merchants every month you’ll eventually run into a few dodgy ones. It’s easy to think that everyone in this industry is nice & “looking out for one another” but if you think that then you need a serious reality check.

You’ve got three types of merchants

Those that manage their affiliate program in house with a dedicated team
Those that outsource the management to a network but still approve the leads/purchases themselves
Those that manage the program by themselves (1 man show)

Speaking from experience I’ve had trouble from all three types. But, most of the time it’s from numbers 2 & 3.

So what are the ways that merchants can cheat you out of your well fought after commissions?

Scrubbing Leads - This is unfortunately very common in our industry (especially in the adult space). It happens at the merchant level & at the Network level. This basically means that the merchant or network won’t credit a certain number of your leads, pocketing the profit for themselves & you won’t even know it’s going on.

How to combat - There’s only one real way to combat this & that’s to generate your leads locally, or get friends to generate leads for you & catch the merchant red handed. Bottom line is, if you suspect your merchant is doing this move on….quickly.

Lead Lag - This is quite common in the financial sector & relates to the processing time of applications for loans or credit cards. Make sure that the merchant is regularly approving or declining the leads that you’re sending through.

How to combat - A quick email to your AM or their manager will usually get the ball rolling on this issue. If the leads lag too long just switch merchants & save yourself the headache, their loss.

High Refund Rates - I’ve come across a number of merchants in my time that have a very high refund rate. This is one to be very wary of, especially in the financial space. If it’s your job to provide someone with a “lead” then the merchant should not be entitled to refund it for a failed application, but some merchants just don’t get what the meaning of a lead really is.

How to combat - There’s no way around this, if there’s a high refund rate then call the merchant & ask for an explanation. If it’s not worthing pursing then just move on.

Test Orders - I also get these ones from time to time, it’s possible that the occasional one or two is fine but any more than that & you should start to get worried. Why on earth are you testing so many orders under my affiliate ID, don’t you have a test ID?

How to combat - Ask the question above.

Bidding on their own Brand with an Affiliate Tracking ID - This is one of the ones that pisses me off the most. I can do all the work & presell to the customer but if they decide to go away, think about it & then come back through typing the brand into Google the merchants Cookie will overwrite mine. This is extremely common & is something that I check for before starting any campaign.

How to combat - If you can, outbid the merchant on their own brand & test how many other affiliates they’re ripping off

Non Payment - Perhaps the worst thing is not getting paid for all of your effort & hard work. Remember from time to time merchants can be late with payments or perhaps forget, but there’s a difference between a late payment & not getting one…ever.

How to combat - Email your account manager or affiliate representative first, if there’s no response then try again. If you’re talking to a brick wall then get in touch with a lawyer, they’ll write you up a letter that may provoke a response. Remember to try & research potential merchants as much as possible before you put any serious volume through them & ALWAYS have a backup incase things go belly up.

Dodgy Affiliate Networks

Running In House Campaigns - If you were an affiliate manager who was paid on the performance of their affiliates & you had access to “what was working” would you run your own campaigns? Well, there’s plenty of AM’s out there that do this & you have to cover your tracks to not give away any secrets.

Keeping your campaigns secret not only protect your profits, but they also protect your niche. Ever been bidding on a keyword with 0 competition then almost overnight you’re up again 1 or 2 competitors?

How to Combat -

Use Redirects: PHP redirects generally pass the referrer string right through so you’ll want to use a redirect that doesn’t. Meta Redirects or Javascript redirects normally do this pretty well (remember that some people do turn Javascript off). When I want to keep stuff really hidden I’ll use double redirects to prevent the AM from back tracing the redirect or seeing the real redirect as a referrer.

Encode your SubID’s: If you rely heavily on Sub ID’s don’t go naming them stuff like subid=affiliate_marketing_blog, you may as well give away your top converting keyword list on a plate. It should look something like subid=9954412, if you don’t know how to code then simply put the real subid value in a spreadsheet. If you’re a dab hand at PHP you could create a simple tracking script of your own that will identify the subid with the real search term in your stats.

Stand your Ground: Don’t let the network bully you into revealing your traffic sources once you start killing it with your campaign. If the traffic stands up on the merchants end then they network have nothing to worry about (except you not giving your campaigns away ;)) Bottom line is that they won’t risk losing you if you’re sending a decent amount of leads.

These are just my experiences over the years, I’ve learnt to become much more secretive about how I do things (especially when it’s PPC). I’d love to hear your experiences & what measures you take to protect your IP. Please don’t name any networks in the comments.

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Make your Systems Scalable
Whenever you hit the jackpot on a particular campaign or with a particular method it can be pretty satisfying, especially when the income stream is steady & dependable...

Scaling your Ideas

Whenever you hit the jackpot on a particular campaign or with a particular method it can be pretty satisfying, especially when the income stream is steady & dependable.

When this situation arises there’s normally two types of affiliates, those that move onto the next idea & those that will try to milk the current system for as much profit as they can.

Let me ask you this, is it easier to make more money from something you already know is making money? or is it easier making money trying to find another system that works?

This fine line separates those who make serious money & those who chase money.

Let start with a few definitions:

System: This is a method, tactic or idea that allows you to generate an income.

Scale: The ability to take this system & duplicate it or increase its profitability. Now just because you duplicate a campaign that does not mean you’ve scaled it x2. In doing so you may have a lower ROI therefore you may have only scaled to 1.5 times your current earnings. But that’s still more money than you were making before.

Profitability = System x Scale - Spend

So what determines how well something can be scaled? For example, it’s much harder to automate a piece of software that has been written by someone else than it is to automate something that you’ve written yourself.

Scaling equates to Volume or Tweaking

Scaling upward allows you to push more & more volume through a given offer or merchant. If you push volume then you become more valuable to that merchant. This allows you negotiate much better rates, increasing your net profit. If you had 20 smaller offers you’d never ever be able to do this.

Tweaking allows you to push your campaigns to create more revenue, which in essence is also a form of scaling.

Look at ways that you can Automate

Can you automate creating Adwords Campaigns?
Can you automate checking your Stats?
Can you automate promotion?
Can you automate the creation of Dynamic Landing Pages?
Can you automate the creation of Wordpress Blogs?

Chances are, that if you can think of doing something. Someone else has already thought of how to do it 1000 times faster.

Time = Money

Look at ways to Squeeze Revenue out of Existing Campaigns & Sites

Can you find more relevant offers to your target audience?
Are you capturing opt-in subscribers?
Can you increase traffic to existing sites?
Can you increase traffic through existing PPC Campaigns you know convert?
Can you optimise campaigns for lower CPCs?

Simple Example of Simple Automation & Scaling

Lets take the example of creating Adwords Campaigns & importing a huge amount of keywords. How many of you manage your keywords in Excel then import them into Adwords Editor using the bulk feature?

Adwords Editor allows you to import keywords using this string:

keyword,exact,1.50,http://www.example.com

Recently I ran a few campaigns related to DVD’s. I wanted to quickly create an adgroup around certain stars. I.e. Chuck Norris DVD’s.

I created an Excel Spreadsheet using the following piece of code:

=B3 & " dvd," & "exact" & "," & C3 & "," & E3 & "?aid=" & D3 & "&kw=" & SUBSTITUTE(B3," ","_")

This would then allow me to create a huge list of stars I wanted to target & the spreadsheet would easily create the code needed to copy & paste into adwords editor.

This particular code above creates something like:

chuck norris dvd,exact,0.50,http://www.example.com/?aid=999&kw=chuck_norris_dvd

Using this syntax I’m able to grab a list of the top 2000 stars, fire them into this spreadsheet & have 2000 keywords all ready to roll within a matter of seconds. All I need to do is write the ad & use Dynamic Keyword Insertion & we’re rolling.

This small example not only allows me to automate the process of creating keyword lists, but it allows me to scale campaigns much quicker.

So if you’re one of those affiliates who likes to chase new ideas without really focusing on the ones that are working for you, take a step back & think about how you can make the most of what you have.

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Link Building Tip: Sneaky RSS Deep Links
I wrote a while ago how to use RSS to get links to your blog...

I wrote a while ago how to use RSS to get links to your blog. If you’re a blogger you’ve no doubt noticed there’s quite a few blogs that scrape your RSS feed & republish the content.

We all know that Duplicate content is a bad thing, however I’ve never seen any negative effects from Scraper blogs republishing my original content. I’d normally get about 2-3 blogs trackbacking me everyday republishing my articles.

If you use Wordpress it’s very easy to take full advantage of these sites linking to you, all you need to do is create links back to your content within your feed.

What you’ll need for this:

These plugins simply show your entire post in your feed & also add some related posts in your feed only (which will also increase the amount of people in your feed reading more than 1 post).
Now, everytime anyone scrapes your blog via your RSS feed & republishes it they’ll be deep linking to 5 or more of your existing posts. Bingo.

I always make sure to try & deep link to old posts from within the body text of my posts using varying Anchor Text too.

Never underestimate the power of good internal linking & natural anchor text.

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$50 Adwords & YSM Vouchers for Australians
I came across both of these vouchers in a magazine yesterday, they’re only for people living in Australia. Enjoy...

I came across both of these vouchers in a magazine yesterday, they’re only for people living in Australia. Enjoy.

$50 Adwords Voucher for new Advertisers

$100 YSM Voucher for new Advertisers

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Get your hands on Google’s Top Search Terms, Free!
Wordze is giving away a free downloadable excel spreadsheet featuring all of Google’s top traffic driving search terms since 8th Jan 08...

Wordze

Wordze is giving away a free downloadable excel spreadsheet featuring all of Google’s top traffic driving search terms since 8th Jan 08.

I use Wordze combined with Google’s Keyword Tool for a large bulk of my keyword research for PPC & Organic SEO so I definitely rate what they’re doing very highly.

Wordze Trends

I’m pretty sure that most of this data is pulled from Google Trends, which updates daily with the top terms.

Simply visit the Gtrends Section of the Site & enter your information to get the Excel Spreadsheet

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How to Upgrade to an Adwords My Client Center
Thanks for your emails & concern, yes I am still alive I’ve been taking a bit of a break recently, focusing on work & getting stuck into some of my own projects including finalising my Australian Residency...

Thanks for your emails & concern, yes I am still alive I’ve been taking a bit of a break recently, focusing on work & getting stuck into some of my own projects including finalising my Australian Residency. I try to answer all emails so just shoot me one if you have any questions.

Here’s a question from Jared:

Do you use an Adwords My Client Center? & if so what are the advantages?

If you’re managing multiple Adwords Accounts upgrading to a Google MCC Account makes perfect sense. You don’t have to log in & out to switch between them & also creating new accounts is a breeze.

I highly recommend making the jump across regardless of whether you have 1 account or several & also especially if you’re spending more than $500 a month.

There’s a few perks to having an Adwords MCC Account:

You can manage multiple accounts from 1 interface
You can split things up much better & assign budgets
You can bill each account seperately
If you spend more than $500 consistently you can take the Adwords Professional Exam
Get your own dedicated Adwords Professional Page
You can qualify for vouchers (only once you’ve completed the Professional Exam)
If you decide to take on clients you’re already set up

If you decide to take the GAP exam (which is valid for 2 years) you’ll be able to show it off on your sites. Not only that but I guarantee it’ll get you a much larger foot in the door if you apply for any SEM related jobs.

GAP Exam

Upgrading your account is pretty simple:

Join as a Google Advertising Professional
Input one of your existing Adwords Account
Create a new Google Account to use for the login & you’re done

Now just log in & link any other existing accounts.

As a rule of thumb I normally create 1 account per website that I’m working with, I normally find that this helps me manage spends & budgets much easier.

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Platform-A’s Goowy widget-based advertising tool, AdSense ads and User Interactivity

Perhaps all of you got this news: AOL’s Platform-A announces Goowy widget-based advertising tool.

That is undoubtedly a cool idea and perhaps a major shift in online advertising. Time will say if this concept will survive or not, but the idea is cool. You can find a widget here.

If you take a closer look at the pattern or the core idea, you will see that to a high extent it is the next step to Goggle AdSense ads.

A few days back I wrote a post titled “How do you use Google AdSense?” where I was talking about the use of two arrows in the AdSense ads. This step actually started the trend of direct user interactivity with the advertisement content. Thus in this pattern, the target audience is supposed to click on the link for more related ads.

I missed one point out there: Google does not declare what those arrows (they could simply add some text like - ‘click for more related ads’ beside those arrows)! Does Google think that general people are web-educated enough to understand what those arrows are? I do not think that general people are educated enough - I would rather say that general people discover the function by clicking on them.

Anyways, it actually started a new era in the advertiser and audience interaction pattern. Platform-A’s “Goowy widget-based advertising tool” is just the next generation advertisement, developed on that simple pattern, where the audience is invited to interact with the advertisement.

However, why should I copy such a widget into my website or blog even after knowing that it is an advertisement that would generate money for somebody else?

To add to it, if I do it unknowingly, I am actually cheated by a well-reputed company named AOL.

Perhaps all of you got this news: AOL’s Platform-A announces Goowy widget-based advertising tool.

That is undoubtedly a cool idea and perhaps a major shift in online advertising. Time will say if this concept will survive or not, but the idea is cool. You can find a widget here.

If you take a closer look at the pattern or the core idea, you will see that to a high extent it is the next step to Goggle AdSense ads.

However, why should I copy such a widget into my website or blog even after knowing that it is an advertisement that would generate money for somebody else?

To add to it, if I do it unknowingly, I am actually cheated by a well-reputed company named AOL.

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Ebay ditches Commission Junction
If you’re familiar with the eBay affiliate program you’ll also be very familiar with Commission Junction...

Ebay Partner Network

If you’re familiar with the eBay affiliate program you’ll also be very familiar with Commission Junction. These two have gone hand in hand with each other like Strawberry’s & Cream for as long as I can remember. The program has also been a very very consistent earner for me over the years.

But in a move that really didn’t take me by surprise, eBay have decided now to take the Affiliate Management & Reporting in house with the creation of the eBay Partner Network, a global affiliate management network encompassing all of the eBay sites into one manageable interface:

Easy global registration to multiple countries simultaneously
New, targeted banners and rich media creatives
New landing page optimization and geo-targeting capabilities
More detailed reporting capabilities for eBay’s programs

Now you’ll be able to promote every eBay localisation without having to go through the sign up process for each, which will allow for much more diversification in who you target & also allow you to Geo Target regions you may not have been able to before. The network also takes out the middleman when it comes to support & affiliate issues.

I’m keen to see the new reporting features, as the current ones provided over at CJ are extremely limited, unless you download the daily report via .csv. I’m also interested to see if they provide Geo Targeted ad blocks (similar to what Auctionads was doing).

My heart goes out to Commission Junction, I can’t imagine how much of a hit losing eBay will have on their bottom line, but the move makes sense. eBay’s Tradera AB, ProStores, Inc, Reseller Marketplace, Media Marketplace, eBay Stores & StubHub will however continue with CJ as normal so all is not lost.

The network opens on April 1st 2008 & all links must be migrated over by May 1st 2008. If you migrate over in April you’ll get a 5% bonus to all traffic for that month only.I’ll report more info when I get it & expect a full review of the new interface & reporting when I get access.

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Link Building Guide Part 1 - Thank You Mr Yahoo
I’ve had a large number of emails from people who are frustrated with building links to their newly created PhpBay Pro Websites...

I’ve had a large number of emails from people who are frustrated with building links to their newly created PhpBay Pro Websites. Rightly so, when you’re starting from scratch it can often be disheartening to see traffic trickle through. But don’t worry, the more you build the more you’ll have to leverage off eventually.

Over the coming weeks I’m going to create a series of posts that outlines varying ways of generating & getting links to your sites. You may want to read a few of my other posts on this topic before this one to get some background:

Now that you’ve digested those posts lets start with the first technique.

Technique 1 - Yahoo Site Explorer & Yahoo Search

To use this technique you’ll need Firefox & the SEO for Firefox Tool.

Yahoo updates their backlinks much more frequently than Google (pretty much daily). It’s the most up to date information you can get on a sites backlink profile.

Therefore the basic theory behind this technique is that it allows us to see where other sites are getting their links from & thus why they are ranking higher than we are. Thus allowing us to get those links too & then some.

This is technique is useful for three reasons:

Enables us to see how difficult it is to outrank a particular website
Opens the doors to new methods of link promotion we might not have thought of
Allows us to scan the backlink profile of whichever sites we want (this is important)

With the SEO for firefox tool there’s 2 main settings that we’re interested in. The Y! Links & Y! Page Links.

Y! Links: This shows the total inbound links to the entire site
Y! Page Links: This shows the total inbound links to a specific page

I mentioned this technique a few weeks ago in the Al Gore Hacked Post. It’s useful to see what Blackhat’s are doing to get links & also what your competitors are doing that’s different from your Link Building Campaign.

I’ll let you in on a secret, this technique is pretty much how I stumble upon any other techniques I’ll be outlining later in this guide. With careful analysis you’ll be able to find plenty of nice places to drop links.

This post is part of the Link Building 2008 Series.

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Link Building Guide Part 5 - Wordpress MU
I’m not entirely sure when I’ll be back to my normal posting schedule (i.e. earnosphere etc), probably whenever I finish this Link Building Guide...

I’m not entirely sure when I’ll be back to my normal posting schedule (i.e. earnosphere etc), probably whenever I finish this Link Building Guide. That way all the posts are in a complete series.

This technique takes a bit of work (no-one ever said link building was easy), but if you put some real time & effort in here it really help you achieve some superb rankings for your deep pages.

Wordpress MU is a multi-user version of Wordpress. When installed on your server you can create an unlimited number of blogs or even let public users create blogs. Each blog is hosted on a subdomain (i.e. yourblogname.domain.com).

The beauty of Wordpress MU is that thousands of people have installed it on their own server, meaning there’s hundreds of potential places to create blogs on varying C-Class IP addresses. You can create a blog about whatever you want & you can easily create a nice powerful link network without having to do any of your own setup or even have your own server. Pretty sweet.

I’ve seen sites singlehandedly dominate the SERPS for specific keyword phrases using this technique alone. I’m guessing it’s due to a number of factors:

The links appear naturally over time
The links are deep within content which also appears to be natural
The links are coming from multiple sources

A simple query in google allows you to find about 1600+ Wordpress MU hosts to ~~exploit~~ set up your own blogs in:

inurl:wp-signup.php "fill out this one step form and you"

Now all you need to do is create 25 blogs (I recommend checking out Roboform to autofill the forms if you’re doing this manually, I also use this program to save time with Directory Submissions & Forum Signups.) or more & start populating them with content. This can be achieved with a piece of news from Google News or a Press Release (as these are the types of content that’s syndicated the most).

Interlink the blogs together & use some of the 4 previous techniques I mentioned to get them indexed & spidered.

Now you can start using these blogs to Deeplink into your affiliate websites.

But what if I was to tell you that there’s a way to automate this entire process?

A way for you to automatically:

Create the blogs
Post the Content
Interlink the Blogs
Insert keywords of your specified anchor text into the articles
Socially bookmark each individual post
Track if any blogs/posts have been deleted
And much more…..

Stay tuned, all will be revealed very soon. If you’re not signed up to my mailing list I suggest that you sign up, as those readers will get first preference.

This post is part of the Mass Link Building 2008 Series.

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Dealing with Dodgy Merchants & Affliate Networks

Never underestimate the power of good internal linking & natural anchor text.

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