Affiliate Program Marketers

Chicago: December 7, Chicago Hilton

Search Training Workshops Around the Globe

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Friday, December 7 | Chicago Hilton

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sign-up for affiliate programs,get approved and go in to hook them up only to find crappy banners.

Crappy banners won’t convert!

So, I thought I’d share a little trick that works sometimes, depending on the merhcnat’s or affiliate program network’s links.

First thing I do is to go find a text version of the link in HTML. It’s going to look something like this:

a href=”http://www.affiliatenetwork.com/traffic_affiliate.php?=youraffiliatecode=” target=”_blank”>
img src=”http://www.affiliatenetwork.com/traffic_record.php?=youraffiliatecode” border=”0″ width=”1″ height=”1″/>
/a>

So, what I do when I have access to the HTML code like this and hate the merchant’s banners, is to make my own banner graphic.

I will design a banner that I feel is far more likely to convert to sales and then, all I have to do is to code it into the merchant’s or network’s code like in the example below.

a href=”http://www.affiliatenetwork.com/traffic_affiliate.php?=youraffiliatecode=” target=”_blank”>
img src=”http://yourdomain.com/images/graphicyoumade.jpg” border=”0″/>
img src=”http://www.affiliatenetwork.com/traffic_record.php?=youraffiliatecode” border=”0″ width=”1″ height=”1″/>
/a>

You need to put the “< " back in front of each line of these code strings. I had to remove it to make sure this posted so you could see the code.

This is far more effective when dealing with a lazy merchant who isn’t helping you to to effectively promote their business offering.

Now, keep in mind that I might be getting you into some trouble too. Many businesses want 100% control over their ads and brand integrity. So, tell the affiliate manager for your affiliate program what you’d like to do, and then show them the finished product to get it approved.

This way it should turn out to be a Win-Win situation … and product some good sales!

It’s not easy to get around the Google filters. All three filters consider the age of your web site to some degree and so, you basically have to wait until Google releases your web site from the Sandbox filter.

Want to get out of the Sandbox quicker? Then, work on the content of your web site by providing lots of unique content to show Google’s web page spider that your web site is a valuable resource for your topic. Make sure the content of your web pages is relevant to the keywords of search terms people would search for to find your topic niche.

In addition, get good inbound links (links from other web sites) to increase the TrustRank of your web site. The better the links to your web site, the higher your TrustRank and the better your web site will rank on Google.

Heads-up for OfferForge Affiliates….

Hi Everyone

Please note that we are experiencing some small technical issues with regards to displaying your Commission earned in the the last month (March). While this may be an irritation, we can assure you that the underlying data regarding your commissions are still intact and correct, and that this is simply a display issue. Payments will still go out at the correct time, but your commission earned for the month may still display $0 for the next day or two while we rectify the issue.

We apologise for the inconvenience, and will have it fixed ASAP.

Regards,
Kelvin Jonck
OfferForge Network Manager

Three Google filters that all take a hard look at the age of your web sites. Most web sites aren’t very old, and so, Google implemented a filter that prevents new web sites from getting high rankings for competitive search terms. Google’s calls that filter the Sandbox.

Google’s TrustRank filter is closely related to the Sandbox filter. Web sites with a high TrustRank get high rankings on Google search. The TrustRank of a web site is determined by the age of the web site, the quality of inbound links and the unique contents of the web site.

The third filter is the Domain Age filter and that filter considers the age of your web site. Web sites with old domain names are far more likely to get higher rankings for competitive keywords on Google.

Affiliate Marketing specialist, Bobbie Grennier, joins the St. Claire’s Organics™ team.

[ClickPress, Tue Feb 13 2007] It might have taken three years for Debra St. Claire, founder and CEO of St. Claire’s Organics™, to patiently wait for an opening in Bobbie Grennier’s work schedule, but it finally happened. Bobbie Grennier will bring her blend of SEO Writing and Affiliate Marketing talents to the powerhouse team at St. Claire’s Organics™.

“I can’t believe that Debra (St. Claire) hung in there all these years waiting for me to join her team,” said Grennier. “It’s a compliment to me and a testimonial to the professional determination Debra has. I’m excited to be working with someone so passionate about the Organics Industry.”

Out of Debra St. Claire’s passion for preserving herbal knowledge and the herbs of the rainforest, emerged the EthnoMedicine Preservation Project™. Ms. St. Claire’s dream was to find a way to support this nonprofit corporation, whose goal is preserving the medicinal plant knowledge of indigenous cultures.

EcoNatural Solutions™ was then created to make great products with 10% of the profits donated to EthnoMedicine Preservation Project™. (www.econaturalsolutions.com)

EcoNatural Solutions™, Inc. was founded by Master Herbalist Debra St. Claire in 1993. Debra also founded St. Claire’s Organics™ because she saw a need for an alternative to Altoids® with out animal by-products or refined sugars.

ABOUT ST. CLAIRE’S ORGANICS™
All St. Claire’s Organics™ products are: Allergen-free! Wheat-free, gluten-free, dairy free, casein-free, genetically-modified-organism-free (GMO), soy-free, corn-free, tree nut and peanut-free, egg-free, fish and shellfish-free, 100% vegetarian, fat-free, low-carb, and low calorie.

St. Claire’s Organics™ (www.stclaires.com) are Oregon Tilth and USDA certified organic products, made with certified organic evaporated cane juice and organic cane juice crystals, pure essential oils and/or using natural and organic fruit and vegetable based flavor and color.

St. Claire’s Organics™ contain no artificial colors, flavors, preservatives or animal by-products.

From a natural, organic and yummy taste point-of-view, St. Claire’s Organics™ are simply the best!

ABOUT BOBBIE GRENNIER
Bobbie Grennier is known in the Affiliate Industry as the Affiliate Blogger (www.affiliate-blogger.com), and she is the founder of the Affiliate Guild (www.affiliate-guild.com). She is also an SEO writing expert (www.seo-writing.com) who works with her clients to help them create content-rich websites.

MEDIA CONTACT INFORMATION

Contact for St. Claire’s Organics™/EcoNatural Solutions™/EthnoMedicine Preservation Project™:
Debra St. Claire
6235 Lookout Rd. Suite A
Boulder, CO 80301
toll free: 1-877-684-5195
fax: 1-303-527-3885
e-mail: customerservice@econaturalsolutions.com
web site: www.econaturalsolutions.com

Press Release by:
Bobbie Grennier
www.SEO-Writing.com

LinkWorth is looking for a few good programmers to help them inexpensively develop a plugin for some of the more popular content driven applications. As you might know, LinkWorth is moving into the contextual world while still offering their PR links for rent system. If you’re interested, here’s the letter they send to me:

Dear Bobbie,

We are looking for for a few good developers to help us with a LinkWorth blog plugin. We have the basic description on how to make it work, we just need help making it talk to the certain blogs and/or CMS programs.

If you can help us, we want to contract you to do the work for us. Along with the money made, we’ll give you the publicity that could very well drive lots of additional business your way.

If you are interested, please contact admin @ linkworth.com. Thank you for your time and continued partnership!

LinkWorth Management

Okay, as promised, I have an update for you on the Viral Sales Generator Software.

First of all it’s pretty killer. I finally have it hooked up on AffiliateBestSeller.com … you can join there and then, it will take you inside to see the environment I’ve started. I have real product items waiting for me to finish my eBook, which is in final drafts thanks to a few friends who reviewed it for me.

If you want to see more, then go to this link and join because for a short time they’re going to allow you to see the admin panel operations. http://www.viralsalesgenerator.com/software

They’ve got it set-up there so you can see how to add a member’s only forum into the environment. Really helpful in terms of creating a community.

The software has been beta tested to death. It’s very easy to install once you have your database setup. So, it’s become a very nice and easy process to go through.

They now have templates to chose from and those were easy to update too. You’re either using an HTML editor or editing right inside the Viral Sales Generator. All the email templates are there for you and all you have to do is make a few changes. It’s really a very complete system.

I will say, that someone who doesn’t know how to use an HTML editor is going to need some help getting things the way they want them. But, it’s minimal.

The other update that I know about is that the Viral Sales Generator price is going to be going up soon! Here’s the details:

We’re giving a Christmas VSG Christmas discount - pay just $297 for VSG including the bonus, but only until midnight (EST) on December 31, 2006. The next 79 customers qualify for free installation.

Starting Jan 1, it’s goes up to $347.

What if you don’t want to own a membership site, but are interested in becoming an affiliate for the software?

The affiliate payout is 40% of the sale price. Every sale provides a nice commission check! To become an affiliate, you have to join and then, you can get your personal links to promote it.
JOIN HERE: http://www.viralsalesgenerator.com/software

Okay, that’s the update … remember that I warned you that the price would go up, and now we see that it is. I have no control over the pricing, so if you wanted the software you should grab it before the new year starts.

Also, I’m working with these guys on helping them to network the folks who have the software installed. So, new business relationship are very possible too.

Google gets it’s pixels on!

That’s the word from Matt Cutts (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/pixel-tracking-in-google-checkout/).

The documentation on pixel tracking in Google Checkout also just went live. So, Google has slapped together a quick resolve to their affiliate lack-of-tracking issues and picked an Industry sweetheart … the tracking pixel.

Our thanks to these folks for pushing, urging and down right threatening Google to get a resolve and get it fast:

http://affiliate-blogs.5staraffiliateprograms.com/2006/12/04/google-checkout-affiliate-tracking/ and http://affiliate-blogs.5staraffiliateprograms.com/2006/12/06/google-checkout-affiliate-sales/

http://www.threadwatch.org/node/10494

http://www.webmasterworld.com/ecommerce/3179902.htm#msg3182906

http://www.searchenginejournal.com/?p=4059

Google Goes To Hell In A Shopping Basket
Well, or something like that … don’t much like the way Google treats affiliates.

Good job explaining the whole Google shopping cart screws affiliates “again” boondoggle by Linda Buquet. A well thought out post and picked up by the other affiliates marketers as a result … this is why Linda deserves the Affiliate Marketing Advocate Award !!!

http://blog.affiliateclassroom.com/2006/12/05/google-checkout-negatively-impacting-affiliates/

http://www.revenuesource.com/affiliate-blogs/8501-google-checkout-negatively-impacting-affiliates.html#post9351