The Love/Hate Relationship

So- this week I decide to visit one of the remote offices of Moss Affiliate Marketing in sunny San Diego. I thought it would be fun to drive- so I went to Expedia and within 5 minutes had the best deal on a rental car, saved $150/night off the Sheraton, and had a majorly discounted 3-for-1 pass for the wild animal park, zoo, and sea world. I love the internet!!

So- this week I went to the rental car company to pick up my car to head to San Diego. They were not familiar with my reservation- and subsequently spent the next 15 minutes trying to find it- to no avail. I figured out that my session timed out while placing the order- when refreshed, the cookie pulled my trip dates for my Arkansas trip a week later. Needless to say- I had all pre-paid reservations for the wrong dates. And, because I had such deep discounts- nothing was transferable without a 1.5 hour phone call!! I hate the internet!!

When I think about Advertiser’s view of Affiliates- it holds consistent with our love/hate relationship with internet/technology.

Advertisers want to love you, get very excited at your successes- but also proceed with such caution. They are guarded, because too many times an affiliate showed promise only to discover later there were issues- and they had to spend extensive time internally and externally fixing the problem. It is not easy to filter the good from the bad.

Sometimes advertisers come off as ‘holier than thou’… and it is a turn off to several good affiliates. Advertiser agreements are full of language top to bottom of what affiliates can not do. It seems it would be much more in the spirit of a partnership to give them encouragement and highlighting what they can do and the opportunity available.

We have to cut them a little slack- as several affiliates can be exceptionally rogue. Current overseas frauders are exceptionally savvy at tricking systems to generate revenue and fictitious customers. Some of these shysters are even hiring American actors to field the phone call from advertisers when they apply for a program. These actors have a script of what websites they ‘will be sending traffic from’, what their marketing efforts will be, etc. When really a bot will be generating all fake traffic/consumers. Outrageous. Knowing this helps you to understand where the Advertisers are coming from when they appear to be less than helpful. They deal with this behavior all day.

So, now I am sitting on my balcony in San Diego. The 11th floor view of Downtown San Diego, the harbor, the USS Ronald Reagan and Midway, planes landing to my left- beautiful. I would have never taken this trip on a whim without the internet. My relationship with technology is definitely love/hate… but far more love than hate. Affiliates- realize sometimes you are catching the Advertisers in a ‘hate’ moment. But ultimately there is far more love.

PS- this is the second draft of this article... when I went to paste it into my blog earlier- it disappeared into cyber space. Isn't it ironic- don't you think?

The Rambunctious Dog Analogy

So, I was sitting here thinking about the state of affiliate marketing. I get so damn frustrated with advertisers sometimes. And, yes, I have been one so I can speak from experience as much from observation. When listening to advertisers talk about affiliates- categorizing them a "rogue", restricting their marketing efforts, viewing them as a necessary evil... I get disappointed. To illustrate my point I am going to use an analogy- sorry affiliates I am going to compare you to a dog. But a really, really great, lovable dog- that is your best friend in the whole world.

Our industry is in the position that can best be explained using a rambunctious dog analogy. A dog aims to please it's 'owner' (or please it's 'parent' if you are a dog lover like me). In this case- the dog is 2 or 3 years old and still uses the carpet as a restroom from time to time, tears through the garbage at every opportunity, and does that fake 'sit' on command where it's butt never quite touches the ground. Around other people the owner is always complaining about the behavior of the dog- when everyone knows it's really the owner's lack of discipline that is the reason for the dog's antics. A dog's whole mission in life is to please the owner- and that is how it gets the most gratification.

Let's carry this over to the advertiser/affiliate relationships. As an advertiser, if you feel like your affiliates are rogue, or if you are limiting their marketing efforts, or if you view them as a necessary evil- then you have not properly trained them. Most affiliates are reliant upon this revenue for survival for themselves and their families. They want stability, comfort- they are looking for your affiliate program to provide several needs within Maslow's hierarchy of needs. They want to be trained. They want the tools. They want the reporting, direction, leadership. They want you to tell them when they have tried a marketing effort that won't work. They want you to be as upfront, proactive, and honest as possible when you have bad news. They want to feel secure that your relationship is going to sustain the good times and the bad.

If you don't give them these tools- they are on an island and don't know quite how to make you happy. All they know is that they need to make money- so they send traffic any possible way they know how. Hoping that something will work and you will reward them with more money. Often times this tactic just leads to unnecessary noise and negative attention.

If you take the time to establish this relationship with your affiliates- I guarantee you the results- and your attitude towards affiliates will change. Your affiliates will temper their rogue advertising ways. They actually can become an extension of your company. Testing new verticals for you, expanding your breadth of presence in a positive way.

So, advertisers- next time you are about to make a semi-derogatory comment about affiliates- ask yourself if you have truly done your job to train them to behave as you want/need them to.

Robust, profitable affiliate programs are all about relationships

Initially I was going to use this particular post to talk about what advertisers need to do to get a better affiliate program with affiliates acting as agents on their behalf and extensions of their company. Given the early stages of this blog I decided to go in a different direction and talk about 'relationships' which are the foundation of every business decision I make. Then we can expand into the nitty gritty about affiliate marketing over the next few weeks. Affiliate marketing is nothing without relationships.

There are several different styles of business- my primary goal when creating any new business venture is to make it sustainable and scalable. I am not looking for a flash in the pan or to manufacture value or money. I look to create a business that can sustain long after I have touched it.

In order to do this you need to set a really solid foundation, which means understanding your business partners, their goals and perspective. You need to view the world through their eyes before opening your mouth and especially before making a proposal. If you build this relationship properly- not only will you understand what they are trying to achieve out of the gate- but as the dynamics of the market and business change (which is inevitable) they will keep you in the loop so you can continually respond accordingly.

Shifting the paradigm to constantly looking at the world from a perspective other than your own- and communicating accordingly is not easy. You need to fully immerse yourself in it and make a conscientious decision to work on it for several months.

If you are interested, I suggest you start the process by reading Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People. I have read that book 10 times- and reread a chapter every month just to keep it top of mind.

Ultimately you can get business deals going without good relationships- but I find these are the deals that disappear on a whim and are minimizing to your professional and personal network. Most importantly- they never reach their potential and leave dollars on the table. In the day and age of technology and instant gratification- don't underestimate the power of people and spending the time to show them you care about them.

Obviously you have to achieve your goals as well- so I am not saying you need to 'give up the farm' for the partnership- being honest and forthright about your objectives and business realities is just as critical as understanding theirs. What I want you to understand is the implementation and presentation of accomplishing this is equally important to content.

Please post a comment if you disagree/agree/ or want to share a story/situation.

PS. Welcome CMU!

Inaugural blog.. affiliate marketing

Everyone keeps saying, Paul you need to write a blog about affiliate marketing so, after 10 years of working in online marketing here goes my first blog.

The first comments would be a huge thank you to the consumers. Consumers are getting it. With a poor economy they are starting to realize the value of shopping in a global marketplace. So, it's exciting to be in a vertical that is actually booming while the rest are busting.

Now- a huge thank you to the affiliates. You are responsible for pioneering online marketing and corporate America is starting to realize this is a viable channel and one they better embrace or they are foolish. You, the affiliate, stuck your neck out there for so many years, committing marketing dollars without a guarantee of return. You took the risk corporate America didn't and hopefully you stashed a lot of money and are now able to invest it with the housing markets and stock markets at such low price points.

Advertisers are crawling cautiously... and I want to thank them for dipping the toe in the water. It is, however, becoming a lot more apparent that they are ready to take the plunge. But shifting paradigms takes time and we need to be patient.

As well as things are now, we are still in our infancy. Which means one thing to me... potential. Keep on striving, investing, biting, scratching, clawing to get good quality traffic and grow your business. Show the advertisers that the investment for better tracking tools, more dynamic affiliate programs, higher payouts, more technical resource will be well worth spending.

We are just scratching the surface here everyone. Keep on keeping on.