We all know that mobile commerce is poised to explode in the next few years. While its adoption has seemed slow when compared to the volume of commerce already taking place on desktop PCs, it’s only a matter of time before mobile devices are the preferred vehicle for online shopping. Carlisle & Gallagher Consulting Group forecast that within fi ve years half of today’s … [Read more...]
The Publisher’s Guide to Affiliate Marketing
In the fall 2012 edition of this magazine I wrote an article, The CMO Guide to Affiliate Marketing, that established the basic principles every marketer needs to launch an effective affiliate marketing program. Now, I’m turning my attention to the entrepreneurial side — the affiliate/publisher. As an affiliate myself for the better part of a decade, I know that none of the … [Read more...]
Avangate Affiliate Network
Europe's Biggest Software Affiliate Network Comes To America Avangate is a network that ranked well in our 2012 BLUE BOOK survey and so deserves a closer look. Judging by what we have seen this year and the early survey results for 2013, that position seems likely to improve. We will see for sure when the new BLUE BOOK rankings are released in January, but in the meantime we … [Read more...]
Retail Publisher Strategy: Making The Leap to CPA & Lead-Gen
Many publishers promoting retail advertisers on a cost-per-sale basis are hesitant to move to the “other side” and promote customer acquisition or lead generation offers. Perhaps they don’t think it fits their model or their type of customer. Yet with demand growing among advertisers for new customers, and more US states looking at taxing affiliate sales, now is the time for … [Read more...]
Why You Should Embrace, Not Fear, Performance Marketing
All too often CMOs and brand managers are slow to adopt performance based marketing approaches. This has the effect of placing them at a real disadvantage in today’s marketplace, running the risk that a competitor will out-distance them by simply adopting performance marketing more quickly. Cost-Per-Action (CPA) is a results-based form of advertising in which you only pay for … [Read more...]
Subscription Commerce Will Eat Your Lunch
The subscription commerce sector is growing fast and is acting as an intensive prototyping lab for what works in selling products online. The benefits of creating a subscription revenue stream are huge with some reports claiming that over half of all US businesses are either already using or are actively exploring recurring revenue offerings. There are essentially three … [Read more...]
Google Profits Down 20% As CPC Plummets 15%
The day's big news of Google's precipitous drop in share price concealed the fact that Google's average CPC is down 15% from a year ago. This decline in one of Google's key performance metrics has potentially far more long-term consequences than a silly printer's mistake. Yesterday’s premature release of Google’s disappointing quarterly earnings caused a major melt … [Read more...]
Forget About Clicks! Facebook Scrambles
If someone asks you how well your ads work, answer a different question. Facebook is facing skepticism on how well Facebook Ads actually work so, rather than showing how many ad clicks their ads generate, they have instead commissioned research showing that - surprise! - clicks aren't important. Reach and frequency are what matters. Facebook teamed up with Datalogix, a data … [Read more...]
Tip-Of-The-Week The Best Content Research Tools
Content marketing is still the preferred method of most online marketers but finding things to write about is a problem for many. Even worse: having decided on a subject, you have to be able to write about it knowledgeably. The horror! We found a great post this week that brings together 12 idea-and-knowledge-generators. There are several in here that we hadn't heard of … [Read more...]
The New Google Webmaster Guidelines Are Killing Affiliates
Affiliates have been complaining for a long time that Google keeps changing the rules of SEO. Most of the time it claims that it is doing it for the benefit of its users, but often it seems Google is just taking care of its own web properties. Recent Google algorithm updates have punished "thin" content sites, yet somehow the scraped content that appears on so many of Google's … [Read more...]
How-To Post of The Week: Building A Niche Website
The first of an ongoing series in which we will pick out one especially good how-to piece from around The Internets. This week a post that is terrific in its simplicity: how to publish a niche Wordpress site that Does Not Suck. It is such a seemingly easy process yet suckitude reigns. Noobs (and really, anybody who wants to be reminded of just what one should trying to do with … [Read more...]
Vibrant Redesigns The Most Annoying Ads In The World
Vibrant Media claims to reach 300 million unique users a month with its remarkably irritating in-text ad units. The good news is that they are redesigning them to reduce the annoyance factor and provide advertisers with more impact. Vibrant CEO Cella Irvine says: the redesign falls into three general areas — moving beyond “highlighted keywords” to “user notification,” … [Read more...]
Facebook FBX Retargeting Ads Worth 3x More
As Facebook's new FBX exchange kicks into gear the networks brokering the inventory are reporting that the market rate for the retargeted ads are significantly higher than Facebook's traditional display rates. That isn't a surprise - retargeted ads convert much better than even highly demo-targeted ads - but what's interesting is the idea that eventually retargeting may … [Read more...]
Achieving ROI With Social Media
At a time when pretty much every organization or affiliate has a social media presence, it's amazing how many don't have any idea how to make it pay for itself. Key performance indicator (KPI) is the term of art for the metrics that matter. Webtrends identifies the most important KPIs: "What are the key performance indicators (KPIs) that will help you evaluate the success of … [Read more...]
11 Keys To Content Marketing Success
Getting your content marketing strategy right is more important than ever. Understanding your audience, your objectives and the landscape in which you are working is critical. Here are 11 simple things to focus on: "Know your reason: Why are you creating content? Your answer certainly doesn’t have to be altruistic, but you have to be able to answer that question." … [Read more...]