Free Subscription To Affiliate Summit Magazine
May 22nd, 2008
The gurus at Affiliate Summit have done it again. The brains behind Affiliate Summit, Shawn Collins and Missy Ward, are releasing a magazine called Feed Front. I am proud to be a part of this launch, having contributed an article comparing Affiliate Programs with Ad Networks and Vertical Ad Networks.
You can sign-up here for a free subscription.
Here is a full list of authors and articles:
Issues will be mailed in June 2008. Here are the articles in the first issue:
- Editors Note: Missy Ward & Shawn Collins
- Five Ways to Evaluate a Merchant’s Landing Page: Dan Murray
- Pros & Cons of Utilizing Multiple Networks: Brian Littleton
- Twitter Grabs Attention: Lisa Picarille
- GTD in Affiliate Marketing with Web 2.0: Sam Harrelson
- Affiliate Marketers Give Back: Missy Ward
- Online Video Advertising: Tim Carter
- Nobody Would Use a Search Engine with Paid Results: Dan Gray
- Building Profitable Customer Relationships by Following These Simple Email Axioms: Tom Kulzer
- Are You the Next Super Affiliate Blogger?: Zac Johnson
- Ad Networks, Vertical Ad Networks, and Affiliate Networks: Peter Figueredo
- Affiliate Manager Compensation: Shawn Collins
- My 3 Favorite Blogs You May Not Visit: Wil Reynolds
- My 3 Favorite Tools You May Not be Using: Wil Reynolds
- Get Off Your Butt and Start Making Videos: Jim Kukral
Posted in Affiliate Marketing by Peter Figueredo | | 0 Comments
Social Network Bandwagon…All Aboard!!
May 14th, 2008
Google is slowly unveiling their version of social networking. It’s a little bit different than MySpace, FaceBook, etc but makes it easy to connect your favorite sites with your friends and makes it really easy for brands to create a community on their site.
Google Friend Connect also integrates contact lists from other social networks and users can login using their existing Google, Yahoo, AIM, or OpenID account. Basically if you see Google Friend Connect on a site, log in and you’ll see your friends popup and then you’ll have the ability to invite them to join the site.
This is a really interesting, traffic driving technique although the aesthetics aren’t very pleasing. We’ll just have to wait and see if/how Google will make money from it.
Check it out! - or - See it in Action!
Posted in Search Marketing by Erin M. | | 2 Comments
Something every SEM Manager should know about AdWords Editor
May 12th, 2008
The other day, I ran an AdWords keyword report for one of my clients, and the report indicated that some keywords were inactive. So I went into AdWords Editor to check the keywords and saw that all the keywords were active. So then I thought, “OK, I need to download recent changes in editor.” I downloaded the changes and the keywords still said “active.” Weird, right?
Don’t pigeon-hole these sorts of problems, should they arise. To achieve search marketing greatness, attention to detail is crucial (..and thus spoke Zarathustra). I removed the client’s account from my editor and re-downloaded the account. Then and only then did I see the TRUE status of the keywords.
Moral: Periodically remove and re-download your accounts to see true stats. Hitting the “Get Recent Changes” isn’t enough. Of course, I know the prospect of doing this doesn’t sound fun, not to mention that it’s time-consuming for large accounts. (My best advice: go out and buy one of those paddle balls. Use it while your accounts download each time. Eventually, you will become a master at paddle ball, the coolest guy in the room, the life of the party, everyone will like you, etc.) Without doing this, who knows how long it’ll be before you realize some of your most important terms received zero traffic all due to a simple software glitch. By the way, the same goes for min. bids. These won’t update either unless you re-download the account.
Posted in Search Marketing by Dani Shalmone | | 0 Comments
The importance of your call-to-action
May 9th, 2008
A while back a bunch of us sat in on a landing page optimization webinar, where one of the key points we learned was that calls to action should be more more targeted to the actual action/product. So for example, instead of just a ‘click here’ or a ‘join today’, you use something like ‘Upload Videos Now’ or ‘Listen Today.’
The article addresses the importance of calls-to-action as the “heart and soul of your marketing effort.” I think there are some key ideas on how we can re-think the importance of using and testing the call-to-action as a true conversion driver. I also liked the section on providing additional text links in landing page messaging to provide additional paths to conversion.
http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/19245.asp
Enjoy!
Posted in Affiliate Marketing, Search Marketing by Guest | | 0 Comments
MSN over Yahoo and taking on Google
May 9th, 2008
Now that MSN has withdrawn their bid to take over Yahoo, they’ve switched their focus to search and the opportunity to capitalize on the increasingly popular arena of display advertising. MSN also claims to have developed new ad technology that will prove to be a better alternative to Google. It will be quite interesting to watch this strategy pan out. Stay tuned!
BusinessWeek has a great article covering the ins and outs of MSN’s strategy. Check it out here.
Posted in Search Marketing by Erin M. | | 0 Comments
