Press Release MINNEAPOLIS – Dec. 10, 2012 – Digital River, Inc. (NASDAQ: DRIV), the revenue growth experts in global cloud commerce, announced that it signed a global payments agreement with Skullcandy, Inc. (NASDAQ: SKUL), a high-growth performance lifestyle audio brand. Skullcandy is using the Digital River World Payments solution to build a localized European e- payments … [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...]
Let’s Call it ‘Anti-social’ Media
I’m confused why we refer to this world of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Foursquare, Pinterest, YouTube, Google+, MySpace, etc., as "social” media. From everything I’ve experienced, it should really be called “anti-social” media. The sad reality is that social media has devolved into a series of faceless and impersonal interactions through PCs, smartphones and tablets, whereby … [Read more...]
5 Amazing Insights From Forrester: Coupons, Brands, Google and Social
LinkShare is holding its Symposium event here in San Francisco this week and the opening keynote by Forrester senior analyst, Andy Hoar, contained some terrific insights into the state of the performance marketing industry. I picked out five that look at coupons, social marketing, and growth opportunities: 1. Affiliate Marketing Growing 16% p.a. Affiliate marketing in the USA … [Read more...]
Create A Christmas Music Station In Pandora
Create A Christmas Music Station In Pandora Who doesn't like good holiday music? And these days, who doesn't listen to Pandora? Although it's not strictly performance marketing related, this seemed like too good a subject to ignore. And besides, isn't it time you moved on from only listening to Bing Crosby, Louis Armstrong and that Charlie Brown jazz thing? It's only one month … [Read more...]
Affiliates are Bullish
With the U.S. dollar sinking to new lows, oil and gold attaining new heights, and both food and gasoline prices rising quickly: corporate CEO's, the media and government officials finally acknowledged what millions have seen coming for years - the U.S. economy is in BIG trouble - and the future looks bleak. As expected, those hit hardest by the current downturn are working … [Read more...]
ABCs of Online Marketing
With words entering the lexicon constantly, it’s a good idea for performance marketers to study up on some new industry jargon. Because performance marketing encompasses a variety of different disciplines, including affiliate marketing, search, interactive advertising and lead generation – each with its own terminology – it can be difficult to keep up. Just getting a handle on … [Read more...]
Rexanne Mancini: The Free Thinker
Mancini says she thought the Internet was the wave of the future and wanted a way to connect and be part of it. She waited to get on the Internet until after her younger daughter's third birthday because she had the feeling that once she got on it she would never get off. And she was right. Although she knew she wanted to sell something online, she had no idea what. She says … [Read more...]
Marketing Reality: Q & A with Joel Comm
Joel Comm has been building websites for over 12 years. He sold his first business to Yahoo in 1997 and it became Yahoo Games. Comm is the author of several best-selling e-books, as well as The AdSense Code, a New York Times best seller. His next venture is as the creator and producer of the online reality show "The Next Internet Millionaire." The show, which is an … [Read more...]
Kim Rowley: The Marketing Mama
Rowley is a successful affiliate marketer who runs 50 websites and also has her hands full raising four kids. Still, she found time to design her own house from the ground up and manages to shuttle between Nebraska and Denver to see her boyfriend every other weekend.She has an easygoing manner, and carries the enthusiasm of someone just a few years out of high school even … [Read more...]
Home Office Advantage
Many online marketers started out working from home as a way to escape the Dilbert-like cubicle farms of corporate life in favor of a flexible schedule. And while these home-based workers may have managed to avoid rush-hour traffic, endless meetings and the watchful eye of superiors, their work life is hardly about hanging out in pajamas. According to 2000 U.S. Census data, … [Read more...]
The Affiliate Lifestyle
For many aspiring affiliates, the phrase Affiliate Lifestyle conjures up visions of big beautiful homes and shiny new sports cars. Graphic images on affiliate training sites encourage visitors to imagine themselves at their desk, dressed in pajamas and smiling the big happy smile as hundred-dollar bills miraculously fly from their computer monitor. Those images often include a … [Read more...]
The Wealth in Health
A work-at-home marketer complained that he gained 30 pounds in the last few years when his home-run online marketing business became successful. In fact, his wife stopped working, he was doing so well. He published an e-book on how he made it and he moved his family to a bigger house. He loves riding bikes with his kids and happily juggles his work hours and a new 11-month-old … [Read more...]
Harrison Gevirtz: The Yearling
This sounds like any hard worker in the performance marketing space, you think. The only difference is that Gevirtz is a freshman. No, he is not a freshman in college, not the next Shawn Fanning (of Napster fame) working out of a dorm room. Gevirtz is a freshman in high school - a 15- year-old wunderkind. Gevirtz first got exposed to the world of online commerce by selling … [Read more...]
Learning Outside the Box
Many of today's online marketers have unrelated backgrounds and have learned their profession through on-the-job training and supplemental offerings. The situation is similar to the first iteration of marketing on the Web in the 1990s. But unlike 10 years ago, there are more ways to learn and get information such as webinars and online courses; enrichment classes such as … [Read more...]