With more than 3,200 in attendance, Affiliate Summit West 2009 in Las Vegas goes down in the record books as a sell out and the largest show to date.

Opening up the conference on Sunday was the Affiliate Meet Market; the room was full of energy. A scaled down version of the exhibit hall (tables instead of booths), the Meet Market was the place to be for networking and continues to be a show highlight.

Concurrent breakout sessions took place on Sunday as well. Hot topics of the day included monetizing chat, automating websites, merchant mindsets, ethical issues, and expected trends.

On Monday morning, Gary Vaynerchuk spoke with vigor and intensity. His excitement and motivational keynote set the tone for the rest of show. You’ve got to love how he said “I think what I’m passionate about, is crushing it every day for making yourself happy. And I think when you talk about, and you build a business around a passion, that’s when you can really knock it out of the park.”
Gary oozed enthusiasm and it was infectious.

Days 2 and 3 also brought a full agenda of breakout sessions via panels and solo presentations. Session themes included anything social media, SEO, PPC, videos and mobile. Audiences were thrilled with the lineup of speakers and the rooms were packed with eager attendees ready to learn.

Traffic and networking in the exhibit hall were awesome on Monday and Tuesday, with attendees visiting over 100 booths. New products and tools in the industry were demonstrated and lots of business cards were exchanged.

One of the culminations of the show was the annual Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards, which were given to affiliate marketing leaders in six categories.

Congratulations to this year’s winners: Affiliate of the Year – Mike Allen, Affiliate Manager of the Year – Angel Djambazov, Exceptional Merchant – CelebrateExpress.com, Affiliate Marketing Advocate – Melanie Seery, Best Blogger – Scott Jangro and Affiliate Marketing Legend – Kellie Stevens.

As the show drew to a close, everyone let loose and had some fun to raise money for the National Breast Cancer Foundation at the Affiliate Summit Triathlon. Dozens made donations to enter the 3 events: adult tricycle, virtual golf and basketball challenge.

Congratulations to the winner, Charlie Calabrese of Buy.at.

Lastly, special thanks to all of our distinguished speakers, exhibitors, general sponsors and metal sponsors: AzoogleAds, ShareASale, OneNetworkDirect and Buy.at. Your contributions helped make Affiliate Summit West 2009 a huge success.

Like folks did at this past show, instead of concentrating on the country’s troubled economy and uncertain future, focus on working smarter and more efficiently. Learn ways to adapt and grow despite the nation’s challenges. This will be pivotal to making it a banner year.

See you in the Big Apple, Affiliate Summit East 2009 – August 9-11, Hilton New York.

Amy Rodriguez is the Conference Director at Affiliate Summit.

Download the entire FeedFront issue 5 here – http://feedfront.com/feedfront-issue5.pdf
FeedFront issue 5 articles can be found here as well: http://feedfront.com/archives/article00category/issue-5

I was recently reading a post that my business partner, Shawn Collins had up on his blog, AffiliateTip.com, entitled “Cynical Marketing.”

In the post, Shawn talks about how there are some marketers out there that simply don’t get the fact that not everything they do has to revolve around making money. They forget that sometimes, it’s more important to just give back.

The content of his post was dead on and the timing in which I read it, couldn’t be more ironic.

You see, earlier that day, I was approached by a marketer who read a post on my blog, MissyWard.com, that discussed me coming out of affiliate management retirement to help support breast cancer research and treatment – a cause that is very close to my heart.

This marketer had the chutzpah to ask me “what my angle was and why on earth would I bust my a** to grow someone else’s company when there was absolutely nothing at stake for me”.

Rather than chastising him for his ludicrous implications, I simply told him how I felt.

Giving is in my DNA and since affiliate marketing is what I do best, it seemed like a natural fit.

He followed up with a “you’re nuts.”

You know what, Mr. Cynical Marketer? Maybe I am.

But I keep very good company.

Aside from the folks that Shawn mentioned in his post that give back to the online marketing community without ever asking for a thing back (Haiko de Poel, Jr. of ABestWeb.com, Scott Jangro of Jangro.com, Jim Kukral of JimKukral.com, Melanie Seery of NYAffiliateVoice.com and Kellie Stevens of AffiliateFairPlay.com), I can think of dozens of marketers, including Shawn, who neglected to name himself) who do the same.

Chris Brogan who takes the time to answer every single questions he’s asked on Twitter; Brian Clark who provides amazing free content on CopyBlogger.com everyday; Brian Littleton of ShareASale who takes the time to educate his merchants and affiliate marketers to both make the affiliate marketing industry better and push it forward.

Also, all of the folks that walked 60 miles with me to raise money for breast cancer research on behalf of AffiliateMarketersGiveBack.com ; Jeremy Schoemaker who provides dozens of case studies and tips to marketers to grow their businesses — the list goes on and on.

Now, it’s not to say that I’m averse to making money. I think I do a pretty good job at it. So do all of the people that I’ve mentioned above.

Maybe I’m just an idealist, but I believe that when one does well, there is an inherent responsibility to give back to the industries that have helped us get to where we are today and to help the less fortunate.

So, to all of the other idealists out there that give so much, with no strings attached – I salute you. Please keep doing what you’re doing. You ARE making a difference.

Luke 12:48 “From everyone who has been given much, much will be required, and from the one who has been entrusted with much, even more will be asked.

Missy Ward is a Co-founder of Affiliate Summit and Co-Editor-in-Chief of FeedFront Magazine. She also manages the ThesisAffiliates.com program in which all of her management fees are donated to the National Breast Cancer Foundation.

Download the entire FeedFront issue 5 here – http://feedfront.com/feedfront-issue5.pdf
FeedFront issue 5 articles can be found here as well: http://feedfront.com/archives/article00category/issue-5

Product Datafeeds go with affiliate marketing like peas and carrots. They first entered the scene almost ten years ago when merchants and the affiliate networks began to make this information available.

Back in the “good old days”, it was easy to build a gigantic website based on the products provided by one or more merchants, using their category structure that would rank very well, very quickly. Eventually search engines became effective at eliminating “Datafeed sites” from their search results. Literally overnight, high-traffic, high-earning datafeed-based affiliate websites fell off the map, closing another chapter in the long, twisted relationship between affiliate marketers and search engines.

Over the years, we’ve had a lot of successes and failures using product datafeeds. As such, we learned a lot about what works and doesn’t work with using retail product data, and being successful comes down to a few simple rules.

Don’t be tempted by “store builder” type scripts and approaches that build a big store out of merchants’ data with “buy now” and “add to cart” buttons that redirect to the merchant. A sure way to get a site de-valued or outright banned from the search engines is to simply republish product datafeeds. Search engines have become very good at identifying duplicate data. When it comes to datafeeds, if it’s too easy, then it’s probably not going to work. There is no (longer) a free lunch.

Do data cleanup – merchants have their own way of naming products and formatting product descriptions. Use tools that will clean up the language that merchants use consistently in their feeds. For example, a merchant may put the same sentence in the beginning of each description. Clean that up. Better yet, write your own descriptions. We never use merchant product descriptions anymore.

Do Automate – It is critical to keep product data fresh. Products change prices and go in and out of stock every day. Write automated scripts that will update product data on a daily basis. Learn some PHP and MySQL skills or hire a programmer on one of the many freelance websites to create tools that will keep your product data clean and up-to-date.

Don’t make a mess – Datafeeds fall squarely into the “enough rope to hang yourself” category. So much easily accessible data allows webmasters to push out vast amounts of product information, provide bad user experiences, publish outdated information, and otherwise pollute the Interwebs. This is the right way to a smacked bottom.

Do something different and valuable – Most importantly, be creative. Mix up product information in a way that’s never been done before. General price comparison Web sites are a dime a dozen. But has anybody ever created a website organizing sports jerseys by number? Get niche and do something awesome! People will use it, love it, link to it, and search engines will reward you with high quality scores and low minimum bids for paid traffic, and even with good natural rankings.

Scott Jangro is a long-time affiliate marketer and a publisher of niche retail community shopping websites. Read his blog at http://www.jangro.com.

Download the entire FeedFront issue 5 here – http://feedfront.com/feedfront-issue5.pdf
FeedFront issue 5 articles can be found here as well: http://feedfront.com/archives/article00category/issue-5

Everybody loves a coupon. Consumers love a deal. Affiliates love to offer their visitors something extra to help close the sale. Merchants may see higher conversion from those with a promotion and can also use the codes to track activity channels.

But these little codes can cause problems. The big empty coupon code field in the checkout process screams to a buyer who is without a coupon and ready to buy, “Hey, you’re paying too much!”

What was likely a conversion has potentially resulted in a lost sale as the consumer seeks a coupon code.

If the buyer comes back with a coupon, the merchant got a sale but just gave away money. If the coupon search was unsuccessful, the consumer is annoyed by the perception of overpaying or they simply move on to a competitor.

Each scenario likely results in a lost commission for the initial affiliate. Whether the buyer found a coupon or not, that search sent them through other affiliate sites where the user likely clicked a link.

Last in wins. The coupon affiliate gets a quick sale. The first affiliate gets nothing.

I’ve heard the argument, “offer your users a coupon”. We do that sometimes, but we have visitors who aren’t necessarily interested in using a coupon, so why give away money? And once they recognize that there’s a deal to be had, what’s to stop the buyer from looking for a better one? 

 So what is the solution? 

First understand the situation. Monitor and measure your visitor behavior. One merchant used analytics to figure out what percentage of their visitors were leaving to find a coupon code and return through a different affiliate URL.

More than 10% of their visitors were going away and coming back though a different affiliate link or through an affiliate link when they hadn’t come through one in the first place.

A solution is to eliminate the empty coupon field. However, a merchant who offers coupons obviously needs a way for redemption. Technologies exist that allow the code to be embedded in the link, so the discount is automatic.

Alternatively, language that doesn’t leave the visitor feeling like they’re missing out can lower the rate at which users go off chasing down coupons. A big empty field labeled “Coupon Code?” or “Discount?” begs the user to go hunting.

A field labeled “Referral code” or “Promotion” is more ambiguous and less likely to leave a coupon-less visitor feeling like they’re missing out.

The merchant above couldn’t eliminate the coupon field because other groups need it to track promotions. They got creative and customized the tracking and commission structures in their program to more equitably compensate their affiliates.

This isn’t to say that “coupon affiliates” are bad. Clearly there’s a huge audience of consumers who love to get a deal. But not every shopper is a coupon user and not every affiliate wants to promote coupons.  

What value are you getting from your affiliates and are they getting compensated equitably?

Scott Jangro is a long-time online publisher and affiliate marketer.  Learn more about him at his blog at jangro.com.

Download issue 2 of FeedFront at http://feedfront.com/feedfront-issue2.pdf.

Articles from issue 2 of FeedFront will also be posted at http://feedfront.com/archives/category/issue-2/.