I hate to say it, but I feel like I’ve been slacking on this blog for some time now.  Ever since the beginning of October after my whirlwind trips to CJU, BlogWorldExpo, and then the Social Media Marketing Summit and the notes I was able to post from there, I’ve kinda let things go into auto-pilot, with only a few really good posts that were original content.

I also tried to work on a new blog, Beach Front Office, a chronicle of working at home and telecommuting.  However, I’m not so sure if I should be separating that information into a new blog or including it into this one.  My original intent for TrishaLyn.com was to be a whimsical look at marketing and my career as a young woman.  I feel like I really do have a unique take on most things as I am learning as I go and don’t have a marketing degree – just a theatre arts dramatic writing one.  So, I ask of those kind readers – which would you prefer?  I keep my work at home stuff separate at BFO, or integrate it here into my whole experience as a young woman in Affiliate Marketing who telecommutes?  Any opinions are welcome!

All that said, I feel better!  And here’s a recap of some of the more interesting articles around the blogosphere that I read this week.

• Lisa Barone live blogged the Effective Affiliate Strategies session at PubCon this week.  Good notes!
• Another take on PubCon from an affiliate standpoint was the faithful Shawn Collins with his PubCon 2008 Recap. I’m sure either Manda or Brandy will post a recap of their PubCon experience once they get back to Texas next week.
• For my blogger buddies out there, DailyBlogTips posted a handy article 50 Simple Ways to Gain RSS Subscribers.  I need to work on this myself, I admit.
• Black Ink Project 2.0 is now available for the low price of $97.
• Back to Lisa Barone, she also posted a recap of her entire PubCon Liveblogging Coverage.

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As the first course of the conference yesterday, I’m sure there was a lot of pressure for this hour and fifteen minutes to really set the tone for the three days of Commission Junction University.  Titled “Affiliate Marketing 101: Back to the Basics”, I attended hoping to maybe pick up some things I didn’t actually know considering I taught a lot of the basics to myself a couple years back.  The speaker was:

• Jeremy Palmer, President, QuitYourDayJob.com

I converse with & follow him on twitter and I’ve heard great things about his last projects The Black Ink Projects and Black Ink 2, although haven’t had a chance to check it out myself.  I won’t know until Thursday if this session really did set the appropriate tone for the conference or not, but it was definitely worth my attendance!

Bullet Point Review!

• Choose Your Niche
  • The niche you choose should be your passion – it’s the easiest foundation to build upon.
  • Know a lot about your niche to be successful.
• Develop a Business Plan
  • Put together a SWOT analysis for you AND your closest competitors – their weaknesses can be your opportunities.
  • Just make it a simple spreadsheet.
  • Have a unique selling proposition.  It’s not enough to just copy someone else, you have to see what they’re doing and how you can do it better.
  • Learn about the customer persona.
  • Inventory your own skills objectively – what can you do yourself and what would you be best served by outsourcing?
• Write Value Added Content
  • Start writing content before you design your site.
  • Content is the key to the site.
  • Have 10-15 pages of content before you launch to improve Quality Score.
• Design Your Site
  • You must have professional tools to create a professional site.
  • Be objective about your experience and consider outsourcing.
  • TOOL: 99Designs for design contests – you only pay for the winner, and you pay much less.
• Develop Your Site
  • Outsourcing programming can be done on Elance or oDesk quite effectively.
  • Be sure to write extremely detailed specifications on what you want the site to do and how it should be done when using outsourced talent.
  • With these services you can escrow your payment so that no money is released until certain milestones are done – and done to your satisfaction.
• Test the Waters with PPC
  • Google hates “rich pages” (also referred to as “thin landing pages”) where the only intent is a conversion.
  • Google recently updated their algorithms and human QC when assigning Quality Scores, so be sure to read up.
  • Essentially Google wants you to develop your own content: they want independent reviews, content not found directly on the merchant’s website, and the comparison of several merchants.
  • Many affiliates have had good success with video reviews because they resonate more with consumers.
  • Remember that Google isn’t the only game in town – test on Yahoo & MSN to discover what works in terms of keywords and ad copy.
• Test & Optimize
  • Look at conversions using keywords.
  • TOOLS: Tracking 202 (free), Prosper 202 (free), Optimize My Site (paid), Google Website Optimizer (free).
  • Pay equal attention to conversion rate and click through rate.
  • Don’t use vague or hype laden copy – it won’t convert well.
  • Split test your landing pages.
• Build a Sustainable Business.
  • Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
  • You want to thrive without Google just in case.
  • Facebook Ads are growing with better ROI.
  • Remember the viral marketing element (what can you do that people will pass on?)
  • You want to be who people will think of when they think of your niche.
  • Create a brand for yourself.
• Random Tips
  • Some books to check out: Unleashing the Ideavirus by Seth Godin & Malcolm Gladwell and The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual by Christopher Locke, Rick Levine, Doc Searls, & David Weinberger.
  • When doing product comparisons, try throwing in a weaker competitor to enhance the value of the better products.
  • DO NOT use the standard Wordpress template when adding a blog to your site – make sure it looks like the rest of your site.
  • Comparison pages only need to be very simple tables.

Points brought up during the Q&A

• Mobile has great opportunities for merchants and advertisers, but it’s hard for affiliates.  People are not (yet) likely to use mobile devices to make purchases.
• Outsourcing content?  Elance is ok but Jeremy expressed some displeasure with what he’s got from that site.  An audience member suggested PR Newswire and searching for keywords to find experts.
  • My own suggestion is to try going to LinkedIn & looking for experts to approach for writing.
• Go where the good designers and writers hang out to find them – when you go to freelancing sites you’re getting the people who might be hard up for work and not that great of results.
• In regards to CJ, pay a lot of attention to the Network Earnings bar.
• Once your site’s Quality Score tanks, you’re done.  You have to start over with a new site because there’s no way to get that back.

Jeremy did an excellent job mixing up the experience level of the information he put forth, knowing instinctively that most people attending wouldn’t quite be at the 101 education level in regards to affiliate marketing.

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