The Inaugural Affiliate Summit Central
[singlepic id=122 w= h= float=left]Another conference down, another Affiliate Summit for the record books. The first ever Affiliate Summit Central has drawn to a close. This time around, I attended as a humble affiliate instead of a vendor. Sessions galore were on my agenda for this show, with my only real goal being to get some tips for my sites and Dominic’s, so mission accomplished! I even got some work done for the good ‘ol day job while I was at it!
The mini conference, just a day and a half long, kicked off Monday night with an official welcome party at Maggie Mae’s. It was a terribly crowded joint with a muggy heat and amped up band, so I didn’t end up staying long. Instead, we wound up in the hotel bar chatting for quite some time and enjoying a glass of one of my favorite wines.
I started out Tuesday morning for a day full of sessions. I hit the second half of a session on optimizing WordPress for speed and sat in on a session for merchants on deals and coupons before a Texas style BBQ brisket lunch. After some grub, I learned more about compliance from Kellie Stevens than I knew existed and got some awesome tips from Jeremy Palmer. The day was rounded out by some great brainstorming with Karen Garcia and others on Pinterest marketing and a surprise balloon artist!
[singlepic id=131 w= h= float=right] The Austin Hilton was a terrific venue for this smaller show. It had the perfect sized conference facilities, while being just a block away from historic 6th St., with many live music venues. If you were so inclined to explore further, the metro station was right outside as well. I stayed after many folks left for ShareASale’s Think Tank at Lake Travis, so I had the pleasure of dining in the Liberty Tavern for lunch and Finn & Porter for dinner. Both great places.
Affiliate Summit would not be complete without an Under the Stars party by ShareASale, of course! Before hand, food was needed! A group of us headed to a nice place called Haddington’s, a gastropub where we were not disappointed with the upscale pub grub. Then we walked over to the party at the Hangar Lounge, a three story venue with a live band on the rooftop area. It was a grat party, complete with a photo booth. Brian Littleton does not disappoint!
All in all, I’d say I got out of Affiliate Summit Central what I wanted. A nice trip to Austin, seeing some good friends, and a lot of great nuggets of information to bring back to my personal affiliate endeavors!
Most are not from the conference itself, but see all of my photos from Austin:
[nggallery id=2]
Read MoreSessions I Want to See at Affiliate Summit East 2010
Have you ever looked at the schedule for a conference and wondered, “How did these sessions get picked?” I know I have. The conference I go to the most, Affiliate Summit, has always had a closed-door process for putting together their agenda from their speaker proposals. Yesterday I told you about how Affiliate Summit has opened up voting for the panels that will be on the agenda for Affiliate Summit East 2010, and implored you to vote for the Podcasting 101 panel I hope to sit on. Today, I’m going to share the love and tell you about the other panels I voted for and hope to see on the agenda.
Any long-term readers of my blog know that one of my favorite things to do is to attend conferences, take copious amounts of notes, and share them here with you. I learn a lot in these sessions, and feel it’s practically my responsibility to pass on that learning to everyone else. Granted, it’s not the same as attending the sessions at the conferences yourself, but it’s close. I vote for 15 panels out of 117 up for voting on the Affiliate Summit Slinkset site.
Bear with me, with 15 panels to explain my vote for, this is going to be a long post. Here’s the ones I voted for, and why.
- Beyond Business Cards: Move beyond passing out stacks of business cards and adding legions of Twitter followers to promote your business. 11 steps to forging relationships to yield results beyond leads and self-promotions. Speakers: Jen Goode, Au-Co Mai, Lisa Picarille, Lisa Riolo, & Karen Garcia. Why This Got My Vote: There are a lot of people in the industry that will tell you that the core of affiliate marketing is building relationships, and I agree. Not enough people will give you advice or actionable items on how to build these all-important relationships though. I know almost all the speakers on the panel, and they’re fantastic at networking and building lasting relationships, so I have no doubt that their 11 actions are going to be dynamite.
- Bloggers Successfully Connecting with Audiences and Advertisers: Advice and tips for bloggers to increase their success in connect with audiences and at the same time making them more appealing to advertisers and increase revenue. Speakers: Murray Newlands, Kristopher B. Jones, Drew Bennett, Tim Jones, & Eric Schechter. Why This Got My Vote: Honestly, this is more a chance for vindication. At the last summit, these same speakers appeared on the Monetizing Blogs for Affiliate Marketing and SEO panel (sub John Carcutt for Eric) and I was let down by the ho-hum content. It took them 30 minutes to even mention the word “monetize”, and it seemed less focused on monetizing and SEO and more focused on general “how to start blogging. I know that the panelists, being bloggers themselves, were all very interested in getting feedback, so I’m really hoping that they take the feedback from the last time and refocus and deliver a really kick-ass panel this time around.
- Trademark Bidding in Affiliate Marketing: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of trademark bidding in affiliate marketing. An in-depth look at the impact trademark bidding has on all players in the affiliate space. Speakers: Paul Schroader, Justin Bowen, Chuck Hamrick, John W. Dozier, & David Naffziger. Why This Got My Vote: This is a seriously confusing area in the PPC arena, and any light that can be shed on it is always good for affiliates. As well, David has a great product with Brand Verity to help, and a lot of insight to be shared. Not the sexiest topic, but an important one.
- Connecting Your Community: Online/Off Social Good: There are opportunities for affiliates and advertisers to support great causes, both online and off to foster a larger online community. This panel will look at examples in social media that helped. Speakers: Dina Riccobono, Sloane Barrent, & Bruce Wang. Why This Got My Vote: So much emphasis in affiliate marketing is about ME, and how can I make a fortune, but people should remember that there’s a world out there that can also benefit from your support. I’m interested in people learning more from Dina and the panel on how they can successfully integrate their work and marketing efforts into also benefiting great causes and making the world a better place.
- Affiliate Program Case Studies: Strategies and Practices: Discussion of what it takes for a retailer to get their affiliate channel to the next level. Merchant case studies reveal and illustrate strategies and practices that attract and keep affiliates. Speakers: Melanie Seery, Madeleine McGregor, Adam Riemer, & Kimberly Salvino. Why This Got My Vote: Case studies are always great, because they show real results. It’s more than just hypothetical tactics, it’s proof positive. All of the speakers are very knowledgeable and represent various angles of a merchant program that really works, from the network, affiliate, and affiliate managers.
- Creating a Stronger, Balanced Affiliate-Merchant Agreement: Can we have a stronger, fairer Affiliate-Merchant Terms of Service agreement to better protect affiliates and merchants? Discussion of the current inadequacies and challenges in creating a better TOS. Speakers: Melanie Seery, Brian Littleon, Adam Riemer, & Kimberly Salvino. Why This Got My Vote: Well, honestly it almost didn’t. This panel has the same panelists as the last one I voted for, except for the substitution of Brian for Madeline. Affiliate Summit has a policy of not allowing people to speak on more than one panel, so theoretically once the advisory board makes the final agenda, one of these panels won’t be on it. But, this is just as valuable as the case studies panel. Many merchants don’t have a good TOS, so any help they can get is helpful!
- Search Marketing Campaign Review: Attendees will apply to have their site and campaigns reviewed before the conference. Our panel of experts, one each in SEO, Link Building, PPC, Social, and Affiliate will choose 4-5 companies. Speakers: Kate Morris, Joanna Lord, Scott Polk, Kristy Bolsinger, Jane Copeland, Carolyn Shelby. Why This Got My Vote: I’m a big fan of interactive panels, and real-life examples. This panel will allow for real-time, off the cuff analysis and can be incredibly helpful to everyone in attendance. My first affiliate summit, I attended a site review similar to this kind of clinic-approach panel and volunteered up the site of the company I worked for at the time. It was an eye opener! In the interest of full disclosure, I briefly worked with Kate Morris during our time at New Edge Media, and I know Kate to be really good at explaining how things can be changed for the better in a constructive way, which is what people need for public critiques!
- Seven Deadly Sins of Affiliate Marketing 2010: A fast paced multi-media presentation on affiliate danger zones focusing on the latest FTC enforcement priorities and initiatives and plaintiffs’ targets infused with useful tips and humor. Speaker: Bennet Kelley. Why This Got My Vote: With a title like that, how could you NOT vote for it! Actually, I’ve seen Bennet speak before and he’s incredibly knowledgeable and makes sometimes boring topics like law, enforcement, and the FTC actually interesting and relevant. I feel very strongly that it’s in every affiliate’s best interest to know what their limitations are legally with their marketing efforts, so this is important.
- Innovate! New Exciting Applications of Affiliate Marketing: Affiliate marketing is increasingly used in new web start-ups, services and applications. Discover the most exciting new ideas that are helping to grow and highlight affiliate marketing industry. Speaker: Joe Stepniewski. Why This Got My Vote: Affiliates are some of the most creative and innovative marketers out there, online or off. I love to hear what crazy things affiliates are coming up with and what tools and tricks are out there. Working for a vendor of an affiliate tool myself now, I’m excited to see what kind of innovation is out there that might compliment the For Me To Coupon service.
- Feed Powered Affiliate Marketing: A review of how product feeds are playing an ever-increasing role in online marketing and how they can be successfully deployed in affiliate marketing. Using real case studies and examples. Speakers: Lee Brignell-Cash & Robert Durkin. Why This Got My Vote: Again, considering I work with data feeds every day now, I’m interested in the creative things affiliates are doing with various types of data feeds. A lot of affiliates are concerned with how to best optimize their time and marketing efforts, yet not enough use data feeds to help automate their sites. Hopefully more sessions like this can bring data feeds to more affiliates.
- The New Frontier for Infomercials: Affiliate Marketing!: Marketers behind the Snuggie know the power of TV to drive online sales. They have big budgets and are more focused than ever on driving online sales. Discover more about this giant opportunity. Speakers: Rebecca Madigan, Peter Bordes, & Ron C. Pruett, Jr. Why This Got My Vote: I admit it, I have a fascination with informercials and TV pitchmen. So I’m fascinated to see how they’re going to tie this in with affiliate marketing. I’m a bit surprised that someone from Impact Radius isn’t involved in this, given their big focus on integrating traditional media with affiliate offers, but my intrigue has been piqued nonetheless!
- Successful Multiple Network Strategies for Merchants: The arguments for and against launching performance marketing programs in multiple networks–and how to make the strategy you do select successful. Speakers: Lisa Riolo & Durk Price. Why This Got My Vote: I’ve yet to see a merchant that really leverages multiple networks right. Most seem to just throw their program up onto as many networks as possible with no real strategy at all, so I’m exited to see what tips can be shared for these merchants to really leverage multiple networks instead of just casting their nets as wide as possible.
- Demystifying Online Attribution: Real answers on how to track a customer’s searches through all phases of the buying cycle, how to measure cross channel assists, and how to avoid the dangers of only last click attribution. Speakers: Don Batsford & Jonathan Treiber. Why This Got My Vote: A lot of affiliates (and even some merchants) know the basics of cookies and how affiliate links are tracked, but when you start talking to them about click attribution, how to separate affiliate traffic from PPC traffic from organic traffic, eyes start to glaze over. Hopefully this session, aimed mostly at merchants/advertisers, will help new affiliate merchants understand how to better differentiate their traffic sources and become more aware of how tracking really works.
- Conquering The Mega Niches for Mega Profits: Very few affiliate marketers dare to enter the most competitive and profitable niches. They follow the general advice of focusing on the small opportunities. Speaker: Hamlet Batista. Why This Got My Vote: It’s always encouraging for a super affiliate to come to the conference and share some of their secret sauce with smaller affiliates hoping to really crack some opportunities. I’ve met Hamlet and I know he’s been incredibly successful in large niches (hello Viagra!), and he’s a good speaker as well – just the right mix of informative and motivational for those smaller affiliates looking for hope!
- Are You Kidding Me? Merchant Mistakes: Going over common Merchant Mistakes and why they are bad. Limiting to 100 Affiliates, Not participating in forums, Being on AutoApprove, etc. Speaker: Adam Riemer. Why This Got My Vote: I love Adam on a personal level – he’s a riot to chat with and is super passionate about the industry to boot. So this session promises to at least be entertaining. As well, as a self-taught (former) affiliate manager, I’m always interested to hear other affiliate managers’ opinions on the dos & don’ts of managing merchant programs. Unfortunately, as Adam is listed as a panelist on two other potential panels, as I mentioned before he can only speak on one, so I’m torn as to which I’d rather see him on!
I heartily encourage you to click on the links and vote for these sessions as well. Just click the blue arrow to the left of the session titles to vote. You will have to register for an account, but it’s a great opportunity to get the most out of your money when attending Affiliate Summit. If you haven’t already done so, register for Affiliate Summit today. I will have a pass to give away at the end of this month so stay tuned for contest details!
ASE09 Session: Advertising Tax Impact (Trisha’s Take)
As you noticed, Dominic already posted his notes on the session, but here’s mine! Session Description: Discussion on the Advertising Tax by industry leaders that have played a key role in organizing industry advocates and educating legislators on the impact of state tax nexus legislation. The panel consisted of:
- Brian Littleton, President / CEO, ShareASale.com (Twitter @Brianlittleton) (Moderator)
- Karen Garcia, Partner, GTO Management (Twitter @karengarcia)
- Beth Kirsch, Volunteer, Performance Marketing Association (Twitter @bethkirsch)
- Melanie Seery, President, Affiliate Voice (Twitter @mellies)
I thought it was well done. Unfortunately there weren’t nearly as many people there as should have been. Hopefully they’ll read this and know that they need to get informed before their business is blindsided with these tax issues.
Bullet Point Review!
- The use tax system really doesn’t work right now, hence why states are looking to tax online retailers.
- All this involves Nexus.
- If you make a commission on a sale, you’re affected. Period.
- There’s a lot of misinformation out there – we’re trying to inform reporters enough to make them care about what’s really happening.
- There’s a different between an affiliate company and affiliates, which is somewhat difficult to properly explain to legislators.
- This is putting thousands of individuals out of business.
- We need to keep politics out of it – it’s not a Democrat or a Republican thing.
- SSTP (streamline sales tax project) not going to save us.
- It’s GOING to happen – don’t think you’re safe.
- This year it’s been introduced in 9 states – stopped in 7 of 9 (not RI or NC)
- Be sure to work with like minded people to get things done.
- It helps to have an internal advocate who knows the system’s ins & outs (a lobbyist or lobbying organization).
- The viral-ness worked well to defeat the bills.
- The CA bill would have passed had we not shown up, so it makes a BIG difference to stand up and help and make your voice heard.
- When talking to legislators, there are a few things to remember:
- The term “affiliate” is very confusing, but they understand advertising and small business owner.
- Don’t say you’re going to move out of state – if you do, you’re no longer their problem, so they don’t care.
- Keep your analogies simple – don’t get too technical or use jargon they won’t understand (CPA, PPC, SEO, etc).
- There are ways around it in New York
- First you have to meet the minimum sales threshold, so if you don’t make that you’re not affected.
- You can rebut the nexus.
- They haven’t yet found a way to rebut the nexus in Rhode Island and it’s too early to tell for North Carolina.
- Merchants can just charge tax to keep affiliates – but it is something they have to start working on NOW in the back end to avoid being blindsided.
- Affiliates need to prepare your business for it and keep lines of communication open.
- Solutions: retain a sales and use tax attorney and understand the law as best you can.
- DO NOT: incorporate your business in another state, use a false address, follow advice of someone who’s unlicensed, follow advice of a lawyer for another party, or try to circumvent the law. Working within the law is your best option.
- Being shady brings a bad name to the industry – your rep and the industries rep is under scrutiny
There was no time for a Q&A session because of all the awesome information they jam packed into that session. It was really great and I’m still just sad to see that more people weren’t there.
Please help by spreading the word about what’s being referred to as the Advertising Tax! And for your pleasure, here’s the presentation:
Read MoreASE09 Session: Advertising Tax Impact, Accomplishments and the Future
Guest Post by Dominic Fawver.
Session Description: Discussion on the Advertising Tax by industry leaders that have played a key role in organizing industry advocates and educating legislators on the impact of state tax nexus legislation. The panel included:
- Brian Littleton, President / CEO, ShareASale.com (Twitter @Brianlittleton) (Moderator)
- Karen Garcia, Partner, GTO Management (Twitter @karengarcia)
- Beth Kirsch, Volunteer, Performance Marketing Association (Twitter @bethkirsch)
- Melanie Seery, President, Affiliate Voice (Twitter @mellies)
This session was very informative and gave a lot of information concerning the current problems affiliate marketers are having with some of the new tax laws, or rather the new interpretations, of the tax laws. One of the most important facts given was that the definition of “Nexus” has been recently changed, or rather updated. For a business to have Nexus, they must by physically present in the state. The change in definition holds that affiliates living in a state count as Nexus in that state. This is important because it requires all of the merchants to charge their customers the state sales tax. The issue is not that the companies should charge this sales tax, but that it is often cheaper for them to drop their affiliates in whichever states are affected, instead of adding the ability to charge the sales tax on their site.
The chief purpose of this session was to bring people up to speed on the legislation that has been put into affect or has been defeated in several states such as New York, Hawaii, and California. This is important because it will soon affect any state that charges sales tax, which is most of them.
From the standpoint of someone new to the industry this was a very important session to attend, as it helped to bring me up to speed, so to speak, with some of the major issues which are currently impacting Affiliate Marketing.
Read MoreAffsum Session: Ethical Issues in Affiliate Marketing
Date: Sunday, January 11th, 2009. Session 3d, 3:00pm.
Session Description: There are two sides to ethical issues in affiliate marketing, and we will entertain audience questions for a panel of industry leaders. The panel consisted of:
- Haiko de Poel Jr., Managing Partner, dp internet services LLC, DBA ABestWeb (Moderator)
- Connie Berg, CEO, FlamingoWorld.com LLC
- Chuck Hamrick, Affiliate Manager, affiliateCREW.com
- Brian Littleton, President/CEO, ShareASale.com
- Alex Butin, Rakuten Rewards (Alex stood in for Paul Nichols from Ebates, who had to bow out last minute)
With Alex on the panel and the latest big issue facing affiliate ethics being toolbars overwriting affiliate cookies, I think that swayed the tide of the questions asked by both Haiko as moderator and Q&A portion. I would have liked to hear more questions asked by audience members, but admittedly, I didn’t have any to ask myself since I’m still learning about all the different issues that eat at the ethics of the industry.
Bullet Point Review!
- Haiko made a good analogy to Las Vegas and asked: is the soul of the industry gone?
- Online marketing is becoming the default medium for high ROI.
- From your unique vantage point, where do you draw the line?
- Chuck, as an OPM, said: Knowingly doing something that’s unethical. Working with adware and parasites knowing that’s wrong. Allowing PPC tactics you know affect other department’s performance. Being an affiliate of your own program. Playing favorites.
- Connie, as a coupon affiliate, said: Coupon sites that have a toolbar that overwrites other cookies. Auto load cookies. Social media apps. Networks owning competing affiliate sites. As new technology comes out there are new ways to cheat.
- Alex, as a technology provider, said: Be clear with your motives, evolve your business models. It’s up to merchants to decide what’s unethical, as a company they don’t want to create a tool that doesn’t do exactly what it says it does, so they’re not interested in shady features that aren’t advertised.
- Brian, as a network, said: They see “interference” to tracking as a problem period, and since parasites, toolbars, etc. interfere with tracking, they’re out. They’ve also seen a total disregard for other company’s policies (affiliates breaking Google rules was his example) and they have no interest working with those people. Don’t turn the other cheek to practices you know are unethical.
- There’s a whole movement of squeaky clean networks and businesses.
- We need to take charge because the networks won’t.
- People are pushing the term “affiliate” under the rug and re-branding as “performance” marketing. Performance is all inclusive and too broad to represent affiliates.
- Network compliance teams are a joke.
- The industry needs more disclosure and transparency, not division and separation that some organizations are actually providing (seemed to hint at the PMA).
Points brought up during the Q&A
One question asker made the statement that “cookies are dead”, referencing the new browser technology recently coming out that has been blocking affiliate ad displays and blocking cookies. Brian respectfully disagreed with the statement that cookies are dead, but said his network is looking at ways to track without cookies, but couldn’t get into specifics for obvious reasons. Other panelists agreed that the cookie issue isn’t too big yet.- Brook Schaaf asked about the negative thoughts associated with coupon sites, and Connie and the other panelists agreed that “one bad apple spoils the bunch”, so to speak. There are shady coupon sites running toolbars that overwrite cookies, stealing non-affiliate coupon codes from the merchant’s website, and stealing exclusive codes from other affiliates that have given legitimate coupon sites a bad name.
Based solely on the description of this session, I was hoping for more of a discussion, but despite the room being packed, the panel was over 20 minutes early with just two questions asked. I’m glad that it seems they took the feedback from Boston and toned the emotion of the session down a bit, and I hope to see further discussion at future Summits, or perhaps even a jam session type event to just address ethics. It seems like a discussion bigger than an hour long panel can accommodate.
There’s also a recap from Michael Buechele’s point of view on the Affiliate Summit Blog: Affiliate Summit West 2009 Session Recap – Ethical Issues in Affiliate Marketing. Check out a different perspective.
Read MoreWhen a microblog stands in for a real blog…
Anyone who follows me on Twitter (if you don’t yet – what’s your excuse?) could see that I was more than making up for my lack of internet on my laptop by tweeting notes from the sessions I was in. I strained one of my fingers on my dominant right hand Sunday night bowling with the folks from GTO Management, and even taking traditional written notes was a challenge.
So before I kick off all the notes I took at the sessions (it was lighter this conference than I have in the past), here’s all the tidbits of knowledge I tweeted while attending sessions at Affiliate Summit West 09.
From the Buy.at Party at Moon:
- http://twitpic.com/11sw2 – Tear the roof off at Moon buy.at party
- http://twitpic.com/11t7v – From the roof of the palms
From The Ultimate Pitching Guide Session:
- @skydiver just said re pitches on twitter “if u can’t pitch in 140 char u need 2 work on brevity anyway”
- Twitter has replaced focus groups- @skydiver
From the ShareASale Under the Star’s 80’s themed party:
- http://twitpic.com/1243s – Jon levine @ sas party
- http://twitpic.com/124e8 – Gettin’ down at SAS party
From Affiliate Videos: Where do they work best? Session:
- Video session: Youtube is larger than Microsoft in search engines- 77mil uniques
- u don’t have to have a professional prod studio to develop video
- .tv traffic increasing but still nowhere near as high as .com
- very brand & vertical specific video creative is the most requested
- People buy from people – at the end of the day video is the most effective medium for that. Amen!
- I love @andrewwee for bringing up ShamWOW in his question!
- get out there & try it!
From the Pinnacle Awards Gala:
- Nice touch on the tux & beer @shawncollins
- Right on for Train Signals donating $10k for Breast Cancer Research- squish a boob save a life!
- Mike Allen – Affiliate of the Year
- AM of the yr- @djambazov Angel
- pinnacle award exceptional merchant CelebrateExpress.com
- pinnacle award Affiliate Mktg Advocate @mellies! Melanie Seery
- pinnacle award Best Blogger @jangro! Scott Jangro
- affiliate marketing legend – congrats to Kellie Stevens!
- congrats to thew winners!
From Advanced Optimization for Landing Pages Session:
- 2% avg conversion rate: 2009 year of conversion optimization
- test everything assume nothing
- Lisa Crossly Hunter: what are your affiliates doing that your search team can borrow from?
- start now, but don’t start without a plan. And test.
- gen rule of thumb- at least 100 conversions for at least a week (per element you change, I forgot to include that in the tweet)
From the Affiliate Triathalon:
- http://twitpic.com/12mj4 – #asw09 Brian Littleton of SAS @ Affiliate Triathalon
Of course if you’re REALLY bored you can just go to Twitter Search and enter in “#asw09 trishalyn” and see EVERYTHING I tweeted while at the conference 😀
Read More
