Issue 18 of FeedFront Magazine has reached mailboxes and the attendees of Affiliate Summit Central 2012, and now we’re on to issue 19.

The next issue of FeedFront will be coming out in August 2012, and the deadline for article proposals for issue 19 of FeedFront is May 25, 2012.

If you are interested in writing an article, go to the FeedFront article proposal form to submit a one sentence summary on what you’d like to cover.

No ghost-written articles. We only want content from people writing from their personal industry experience.

If you have previously been accepted to write an article and either failed to meet the deadline or did not adhere to the editorial guidelines, please submit your article proposal elsewhere. We take our deadlines and guidelines seriously.

Do not submit a complete article now – just a one sentence summary.

We will contact everybody who submitted a proposal on whether the article ideas are accepted or denied.

More Info: Click here

The Affiliate Ball, taking place during Affiliate Summit East 2012 in New York City, has announced some details about the upcoming event.

The networking event is being called Neverblue Presents The Affiliate Ball, as Neverblue has been secured as the title sponsor.

The Affiliate Ball has booked legendary DJ of the Beastie Boys, Mix Master Mike, to perform a set.

Many more surprise guests will be announced as the event gets closer. The party last summer, during Affiliate Summit East 2011, was featured on TMZ with hip hop legends Kurtis Blow, Grandmaster Cas and Dougie Fresh performing.

This year they plan to have Ice-T and his wife, Coco, walking around the crowd to shake hands, take pictures with guests, and host the entire night on stage.

RSVP now at http://affiliateball.com/registration.html.

More Info: Click here

Rakuten LinkShare has announced significant growth through their affiliate networks around the world for the first quarter of 2012.

The Rakuten LinkShare network outperformed overall e-commerce by a wide margin in the U.S.

According to Forrester Research Inc., overall e-commerce is expected to grow by 12 percent in 2012, while same store sales in the Rakuten LinkShare Network increased 31 percent year-over-year in the first quarter.

Rakuten LinkShare in the U.K. also saw double-digit gains with overall same-store sales reaching 52 percent year-over-year.

Also, the company signed over 100 brands across their various networks in the first quarter of 2012.

More details on Rakuten LinkShare at linkshare.com.

More Info: Click here

Affiliate Summit Central 2012, the first Affiliate Summit in Austin, TX, kicked off with the official welcome party on May 14, 2012 with live music from The Cody Jasper Band, Sam Sliva and the Good, and FallenAsh.

The first day of the conference started at an early (by Affiliate Summit standards) 7am, when registration opened up.

Full pass holders got a limited edition Affiliate Summit t-shirt.

Emcee Heather Romiti began the day with some announcements before turning things over to Maribel Sierra, Social Media and Communities Director, Listening and Engagement at Dell.

This first day also included a Meet Market, two sets of sessions, and Ask the Experts Roundtables, which were complemented by Nate the Great, a local balloon artist.

The first day finished up with ShareASale.com hosting their traditional Under the Stars party for conference attendees.

The second and final day kicked off with a drum circle, organized by Benjy Portnoy, to wake up attendees.

This was followed by a series of sessions in a new, truncated format where they only lasted 20 minutes each.

The conference finished up with open networking after an intensive day and a half off fun and business.

Big thanks to the sponsors, speaker, and attendees.

I look forward too reading the session feedback and hearing what folks have to say about the conference.

Have you signed up for Affiliate Summit East 2012, yet?

It’s taking place August 12-14, 2012 at the Hilton New York.

This three day conference includes an exhibit hall with affiliate merchants, vendors, and networks, as well as multiple tracks of educational sessions covering the latest trends and information from affiliate marketing experts.

More Info: Click here

This was a conference session titled Building Niche Affiliate Sites That Produce Revenue from Affiliate Summit East 2010, which took place August 15-17, 2010 in New York City.

Speaker:

• Evan Weber, CEO, Experience Advertising, Inc.

Session description: Come learn how to build exciting niche affiliate websites that produce traffic and revenue! Topics covered: site building, content creation, & social bookmarking.

Experience Level: Intermediate
Audience: Affiliate/Publishers
Niche: General

Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/affsum/3c-building-niche-affiliate-sites-that-produce-revenue

More details on Affiliate Summit at http://www.affiliatesummit.com/

Note: the companies and positions listed above were current as of the time of the conference. Some of this information may have changed since then.

Video: Building Niche Affiliate Sites That Produce Revenue

If you liked this video, be sure to register for the next Affiliate Summit. The session videos aren’t made public until a year or more after each conference.

More Info: Click here

This week on the Affiliate Thing podcast, Shawn Collins and Lisa Picarille preview Affiliate Summit Central 2012, talk about the new Dell XPS 13, and how Fort Lee, NJ cracking down on walking texters.

They also talked about Eduardo Saverin being a creep, affiliate nexus tax dead in MN, writing headlines, and the most friendly states for small business.

Show Links

• Parties at Affiliate Summit Central 2012
• How to Ask Questions in Sessions at Affiliate Summit Central 2012
• Affiliate Summit Central 2012 Exhibitor Guide and Agenda at a Glance
• #ASC12 is the Twitter Hashtag for Affiliate Summit Central 2012
• Don’t Miss the Affiliate Summit Central 2012 Sessions
• Unboxing the Dell XPS 13
• New Jersey town bans texting while walking; gum chewing still allowed
• Facebook Co-Founder Saverin Gives Up U.S. Citizenship Before IPO
• Affiliate Nexus Tax DEAD in Minnesota!
• Scamworld: ‘Get rich quick’ schemes mutate into an online monster
• Attribution Part 5: How It Impacts the Perception of Performance Marketing
• Dear Affiliates – We Need You!
• Friendliest States for Small Business

Subscribe to the Affiliate Thing RSS feed or listen on iTunes. You can also send a blank e-mail to affiliatething@aweber.com to get each podcast delivered by e-mail.

More Info: Click here

I’ve been on a long journey with Dell products that began back in the mid-1990s. I have continued buying Dell machines for my business and family, because they’ve been reliable, easy, and fast.

My latest computer is the Dell XPS 13 Ultrabook, which is just a gorgeous, light, and speedy laptop. I was excited to get this one as a gift from Dell to share my candid views of it.

I got a chance to meet a bunch of the folks at Dell in 2010 when I was selected to sit on their inaugural Customer Advisory Panel, so thank you to them for sending the XPS 13 my way.

Anyhow, on to the XPS 13 – it’s amazing to see how Dell has evolved from some of those back-breaking laptops I used to haul around years ago.

This beauty weighs less than 3 pounds and it’s less than a quarter inch thick, which is not so much more than an iPad.

I think this is significant, because I’ve been hearing from lots of people that they travel with their iPad over a laptop these days. Personally, I want and need the power that comes with a laptop over a tablet.

Some other specs I like are the backlit keyboard, nearly 9 hours of battery time, and the HD display (Corning Gorilla Glass – nice when it encounters my rough travel and my 4 rough kids).

It’s also got a machined aluminum body and carbon fiber base. Now that doesn’t really mean anything to me, but I like the way it looks, and the fact that this enables it to be light and cool to the touch.

Now for the guts of it – the XPS 13 boots super fast with it’s SSD (solid state drive) and Intel Rapid Start Technology. They’re available with 2nd generation Intel Core i7 processors.

The base model runs $999 with 4 GB of memory, a 128 GB solid state drive, and it runs on Windows 7.

As far as ports, it’s got two USB ports and one Mini DisplayPort.

I was going to say my one issue with the XPS 13 is that I often take my laptop to use for presentations with my projector, and the projector uses a VGA connector.

But I just searched and found that I can just grab an adapter for pretty cheap to run the XPS 13 to my projector. Nice.

I’m excited to make this my everyday laptop.

More Info: Click here

This was a conference session titled More Money, Same Traffic, List Building & Paths from Affiliate Summit East 2010, which took place August 15-17, 2010 in New York City.

Speaker:

• Jason Akatiff, President, Coleadium Inc. dba Ads4Dough

Session description: Want to make more money for the same traffic? Learn about ideas on how to gather data before, increase sales and show multiple offers after you make the sale.

Experience level: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced
Target audience: Affiliates/Publishers
Niche/vertical: Monetization

Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/affsum/3b-more-money-same-traffic-list-building-and-paths

More details on Affiliate Summit at http://www.affiliatesummit.com/

Note: the companies and positions listed above were current as of the time of the conference. Some of this information may have changed since then.

Video: More Money, Same Traffic, List Building & Paths

If you liked this video, be sure to register for the next Affiliate Summit. The session videos aren’t made public until a year or more after each conference.

More Info: Click here

The 10th annual AffStat survey of affiliate marketing statistics is open through May 31, 2012, and we’re trying to get as much input as possible.

This AffStat survey is focused on affiliates, so please do not complete the survey unless you are an affiliate.

Affiliate managers and networks – that would be really cool if you would spread the word.

Data from the AffStat survey will be published in future editions of FeedFront Magazine (get a free subscription), and the full report will be available for free.

Take the survey now.

If you’re interested in the 2011 edition of the AffStat report, it is available to download or read online.

More Info: Click here

This was a conference session titled More Money, Same Traffic, List Building & Paths from Affiliate Summit East 2010, which took place August 15-17, 2010 in New York City.

Speaker:

• Jason Akatiff, President, Coleadium Inc. dba Ads4Dough

Session description: Want to make more money for the same traffic? Learn about ideas on how to gather data before, increase sales and show multiple offers after you make the sale.

Experience level: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced
Target audience: Affiliates/Publishers
Niche/vertical: Monetization

Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/affsum/3b-more-money-same-traffic-list-building-and-paths

More details on Affiliate Summit at http://www.affiliatesummit.com/

Note: the companies and positions listed above were current as of the time of the conference. Some of this information may have changed since then.

Video: More Money, Same Traffic, List Building & Paths

If you liked this video, be sure to register for the next Affiliate Summit. The session videos aren’t made public until a year or more after each conference.

More Info: Click here