Many of us who are students of this space continue their learning throughout the year and not just at Affiliate Summit.  So it’s important for people like me to remember that just because I didn’t really learn anything new from this panel doesn’t mean there weren’t some newbies that learned volumes.  I can’t speak for them, of course. The panel consisted of:

• Ted Murphy, Founder/CEO, IZEA (Moderator)
• Rob Key, CEO, Converseon
• Stephanie Agresta, InternetGeekGirl.com
• Chris Brogan, VP Strategy & Technology, CrossTech Media

Hopefully you’ll learn some more things than I did.

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• 70% of people online last month watched a video.
• The top rated websites are the social media networks.
• There really are strategies to using social media.
• Seeing how the flow of conversation is going is hard to track, but when cross conversational tracking becomes available it will be exciting.
• This is a marketing channel just like any other; it can work well with other channels to a brand or company’s advantage.
• Tracking is coming soon… and will be immensely valuable.
• A comment on a blog or a good blog post as social value.
• Brands are starting to bring enthusiasts in to help market.
• FriendFeed could be taken more advantage of by affiliates.
  • It allows for more nuanced opportunities.

Points brought up during the Q&A

• Personally I asked if there were any tools to help manage a social media strategy (knowing slightly that there weren’t any I knew of) and the answer was “don’t get caught up in tools”.  Fail.
• Social media may bring rise to a different kind of content.
• There are listening tools like Radian6, BuzzLogic, lots of deep dive listening tools for brands to hear what the conversation is.
• Twitter isn’t a good place to recruit affiliates but it’s good for conversions (no real expansion on that was given).
• Will we see a change in the code of ethics regarding transparency & disclosure?  Not sure but disclosure breeds trust.
• Interesting argument - more and more people are giving kudos to those that disclose affiliate links however no one in television bothers to disclose even blatant product placements so it’s a fine line & unresolved argument.
• Recognize the conversation AS a conversation - treating it like a traditional marketing venue doesn’t work.
• Look at social media like a picnic, says Chris Brogan.  Don’t just run up & start selling your product to people hanging around having a good time.
  • “Turn your stupid bullhorn into a party hat”.
• Give something to the social media community before you take - content + trust (+ conversions).
• Try to think just a hair outside your brand.
• Conversion rates coming through social media sites are 4 times higher than traditional channels.
  • Note: Since there’s no standard of tracking it’s very difficult to isolate this.
  • The social media forerunners are working on an open wiki to open up discussion on how to isolate.
• Many brands are worried about the affiliate channel cannibalizing other in-house channels like search.
• It takes a high level of comfort to let go of the brand & get into social media.
• There’s a big education process for merchants before jumping into the pool.
  • “We’re really afraid of this because we don’t want people pooing on the brand”.
• Listening to the conversations that are out there is the easiest “gateway drug” to get companies hooked on wanting to participate.
• If you’re going to disclose your affiliate links, at least do so on your about page and possibly at the end of every post.
  • At IZEA when they decided to make the disclosure banner mandatory, conversions surprisingly went up 20% - 15% of the clicks were on the “Sponsored by” button itself.

Overall it seemed like a lot of the conversation was “when we get tracking… ooh boy watch out!” and tried to steer away from the fact that there is NO real solid way to track any social media “strategy”.  I had an interesting conversation with Wil Reynolds, another speaker at Affiliate Summit who is an “SEO guy” later in the day about the pannel - tracking really is the KEY to having companies on larger scales start to really dig into social media.  Without it, they’re going to go spend their budget on an SEO firm instead of someone who’s talking to them about Twitter & Facebook.

As I mentioned… this may not have been the best session for me.  They didn’t talk much about just HOW social media is changing affiliate marketing, so name fail.  I’m pretty versed in social media at this point, so a lot of this was the same song & dance - but I really do hope that somewhere in the room there was a newbie who learned a lot.

So, like I said… overall, I only learned of a couple of new tools for “listening to the conversation” from this and I was actually pretty surprised that they didn’t mention Trackur.com, a really great tool touted as an “online reputation management” tool - really other than the name I can’t see how it couldn’t be beneficial for listening in on the online conversation about your brand.  But I hope you learned something from the recap!

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Well, while I’d intended to recap each day… that didn’t exactly happen as you can tell.  I do intend to post the notes I took from the sessions and the impressions to help everyone learn the great stuff I learned.  Some of the more hot button sessions can’t be covered in mere bullet points, so it will take me a day or so longer to get my thoughts together for those.

I covered Saturday & Sunday (mostly… the ShareASale party was nice although I didn’t stay long), so let’s jump right into Monday & Tuesday, the busiest days of the conference.

Day  2 - Divide & Conquer

1. In many ways this is the day that the summit starts.  In the past the breakout sessions have only been on Monday & Tuesday, however this year they were extended to Sunday.  Regardless, the keynote was given on Monday by Newark, NJ Mayor Cory Booker.  If you didn’t want to jump up ready to go, you didn’t listen to what Mayor Booker had to say.  It was a great speech, and I already posted my thoughts about it.
2. The blogger’s lounge helped save my sanity.  It was nice to be able to go in there in the 30 minute breaks between sessions & chat with people and do a little bit of work.  Had the wifi worked out better for me (not sure if it was my ancient laptop or the actual connection that was the issue) I would have been able to get more posts up during the actual conference.  I hope to have a better laptop by the next show I go to so I can just live blog it!
3. Of the 3 sessions I attended, the best was Content That Kills.  It was informative, had great tips and information, and there were good questions asked by the audience.  I may be biased being a writer by heart, but it was good stuff.
4. The other sessions I attended that day were the Performance Marketing Alliance Q&A, which turned more into a witch hunt filled with personal issues unfortunately, and How is Social Media Changing Affiliate Marketing, which apparently it isn’t because that question was never really answered.  More on those in their own posts.
5. The Great Affiliate Road Rally was a slaughterhouse win!  With just three cars in it this time, the first place car took off like a shot and left the others in their dust!  Congrats to them & to the others?  Well remember the entry fee went to charity & you won’t feel so bad
6. Monday night I had dinner with a lovely group of new friends & colleagues and then headed over to the LinkShare event at Tia’s.  The event was a whole new group of people to talk to and had a great time talking some shop and reminiscing over Police Academy flicks with Wil Reynolds & Jim Kukral.
7. Oh no, that wasn’t the end!  After that we headed back to the hotel where we shut down the bar there and moved across the street to a small bar by the water & had a great time chatting with people and generally schmoozing before rolling into bed.

Day 3 - Epic Games

1. It was a matter of sleep vs. sessions I wasn’t overly excited about attending, so I missed the Ask the Experts table discussions & The Future of Affiliate Marketing to sleep in & get refreshed for the Copywriting Clinic, which I very much wanted to attend.  I hear I didn’t miss much.
2. Speaking of the Copywriting Clinic, Lisa Riolo did an excellent job moderating and the panelists were excellent.  I took 3 full pages of notes on this session, so you’re in for a huge post later on!
3. The Ethical Issues in Affiliate Marketing session turned into the biggest fail session of the conference for me.  The moderator Haiko de Poel Jr was doing a pretty bad job… usually when you’re the moderator of a panel of “experts” your job is to pass questions to the best suited panel member, not challenge the question back to the audience member who asked it.  I have much more to say, so I’ll save it for later.
4. The un-keynote was very relaxed and I actually got up & talked…which was big for me knowing that it was being video taped!  I just hope when I look back at it that I don’t look like a fool lol.
5. Luckily I was able to attend the Red Sox vs. Rangers game at Fenway with some fellow baseball loving conference attendees.  Being a moderate baseball fan I was really thrilled to be there & the game was crazy!  The Red Sox almost blew a 10-0 lead in the 1st but came back in the last inning to tie it up and then ultimately overtake the Rangers with an epic score of 17-19 Red Sox.  We only spent a few innings in the stands before the rain started, but I got some great pictures and we continued watching the game from inside near the concessions so it wasn’t a waste.
6. More bar shenanigans, then some piano playing until late kept me up long enough to decide not to go to bed before my early flight out of town.  Overall what a great end to a great conference.

Final Thought - Springer Style

Overall I had the best time at this conference - not just because it was fun and I met a lot of terrific people who I’ve had the chance to get to know online and now have had the opportunity to meet in person - but because I just learned so much that I “get it” now.  I remember back in February going to the Affiliate Summit West and having a conversation with my husband that I was actually starting to understand more and more about the industry and that I really felt like this was an industry I could get excited about.

And I have… and this reinforced so much for me how much I really like this industry!  I’m back to the “real world” here and ready to conquer it!

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