Week 6

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Week 6

• Promoting Our Web Site

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Promoting Your Web Site

• General Web promotion options
• Evaluate search engines as web site promotion
• Review search engine use and value as promotion
  option
• Evaluate banner advertising as a way to promote
  the web site
• Discuss banner advertising pros and cons
• Affiliate Marketing

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Web site promotion
Banners
Affiliates
Links
Partners
Community
Search Engines
Email
Promotional Materials
Printed Materials
Print Advertising
PR
Broadcast
4
Search Engines
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Search Engine Tips

• Things that are important to search engines are
  titles, page content, metatags, Page popularity
  and design issues.
• Most search engines get primary results from one
  source and secondary results at AOL, Goto,
  Hotbot, Looksmart and MSN.
• More isnt necessarily better.

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• All search engines have the basic parts
  described, but there are differences in how these
  parts are tuned. That is why the same search on
  different search engines often produces different
  results.

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Search engines use software called spiders, which
comb the Internet looking for documents and
their web addresses.
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Indexing Software
The documents and web addresses are collected and
sent to the search engines indexing software.
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The indexing software extracts information from
the documents, storing it in a database. The kind
of information indexed depends on the particular
search engine. Some index every word in a
document others index the document title only.
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When you perform a search by entering keywords,
the database is searched for documents that
match.
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The search engine assembles a web page that lists
the results as hypertext links
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Search Engine Tips

• Develop a strategy.
• How much can I spend?
• What is working now?
• How do I get the biggest bang for my buck?
• Then make a spreadsheet because you are going to
  need one.

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Search Engine Tips

• Your plan of attack starts with checking where
  your site is already listed.
• Choose your category and submit.
• When choosing your category you only have one
  chance to get this right.
• You should try to submit to regional categories.

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Search Engine Tips

• Keywords are very important.
• Make a list of the top 20 keywords or keyword
  phrases you want to be found for in rank order.
  Web design is a keyword, web is a key word
  design is a key word.
• Make sure that your keywords appear in the top 25
  words of your site. They can be in a headline or
  in the body copy.
• Repeat your keywords at the bottom of your site,
  especially if you are in a banner program.

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Search Engine Tips

• Titles are very important.
• Titles should be 8 ish words. You should build
  your titles around your keywords and words in
  title must be repeated on the page.
• Page content is crucial.
• Your page words must match your search words.
  Focus each page to one topic.

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Search Engine Tips

• Meta tags are text elements embedded in the
  header section to specify further/additional
  information about the page.
• Meta description tags gives you control over what
  is said. If you dont make descriptions for your
  pages the search engines will. Design around your
  keywords and keep them to 250 ish
• Here are a couple of actual sample tags
• ltmeta name"description" content"Beginners
  Central is an online tutorial offering step by
  step instruction to the new internet surfer.
  Beginners Central is perfect for the first time
  internet user. Use our free ASK US! service if
  you can't find the answer you need."gt

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Search Engine Tips

• Build a summary paragraph into your web page
  which can be used by the Search Engines which do
  not use the meta tags.

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Search Engine Tips

• Robots Meta tag
• The primary purpose behind the robots meta tag is
  to control which pages get indexed and which do
  not.
• The format for the robots command is as follows
• ltMETA NAME"robots" CONTENT"noindex nofollow"gt
• This tells the spider not to index the page, nor
  follow any links which they might find.
  http//www.northernwebs.com/set/design_notes_0.htm
  ldesignnotes

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Search Engine Tips

• Clickthroughs are important.
• The more people click the higher you move.  
• You will need to pay for some if the sites.
• Goto and About.com do keyword auctions
•  

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Search Engine Tips

• Remember that CGI scripted pages are not visible.
  Also remember that search engines cant read
  graphics. They can only read text. Do not use
  symbols like
• Use links within your site. Adding links to your
  entry page helps. You should also submit the site
  map

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Search Engine Tips

• Know your host.
• If the hosting service is hosting many
  individuals/companies with bad behavior you may
  be associated with that behavior.
• Check to make sure that your domain server allows
  your users to drop the www prefix..
• If you need to attract foreign visitors, you need
  to use foreign keywords.
• Make sure to apply to the international sections
  of the directories and search engines.

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Search Engine Tips

• Do not Spam.
• Submitting too often especially to fine tune a
  position will usually get you in trouble.
• Do not keyword Spam.
• Repeating words sex, money, free, mp3.  
• If for some reason your listing in a search
  engine is incorrect or you just dont like it
  than look for the change forms. They are posted
  on most but not all sites. Do not assume that you
  should resubmit.

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Search Engine Tips

• Look at the source code of the for the top 10 20
  sites in the category you want to be listed in.
  Examine the code to find out what the common
  elements are. Metatag and meta description,
  layout and keywords.
• Get an intern to submit your web site.

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Search Engine Tips

• Use of a descriptive URL will help boost your
  relevancy in the search engines.
• a web page with the URL of http//www.mysite.com/p
  roduct.html doesn't help as much as making the
  URL of http//www.mysite.com/widgets.html.

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Search Engine Tips

• Naming the file something descriptive, and
  perhaps using a keyword as a file name, help your
  site achieve a higher rating and relevancy with
  the search engines. Below are some valid URLs
  which help influence their ranking because they
  include keywords right into the URL.
•        http//www.homes-fairfax-ounty.com/reston/
  homes.html
•        http//www.homes-mont-county-md.com/kentla
  nds/homes.html
•        http//www.kefco.com/steelpipe.html
•        http//www.bajaseafaris.com/boatcharters.h
  tml

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Search Engine Tips

• Below are some valid file names
• homes-for-sale.html
• miniature_widgets.html
• late_model_used_cars.html
• surgical-instruments-page1.html
• Adding additional directories is also a great way
  of sneaking in a keyword or two. ie.
• www.marylandrealtor.com/baltimore/homes.html
• www.hollywoodstars.com/gossip/tom-hanks/tom-hanks.
  html

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Web Rings

• Web rings link sites with similar content
  together.
• There are a couple of dozen major categories and
  thousands of subcategories.
• Rings are generally started and maintained by one
  person.

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Web Rings

• Rings must obtain a minimum of 5 sites
• The average ring has anywhere from 10 200 sites.
  There are about 100000 rings in existence.
• They are free of charge to both visitors and
  members.
• Seem to be working well.

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Web Rings

• Benefits
• Free
• Most rings have free traffic reports
• Quick and easy to use
• Avoid duplication (Each site is listed once)
• Often more accurate than search engines
• Examples
• www.webring.org
• Looplink.com
• GO TO GOOGLE AND TYPE WEB RING

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Cool Sites

• They are definitely worth submitting to as they
  get lots of traffic and exposure
• www.cool.com
• www.coolsiteoftheday.com
• Yahoo.com/picks

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Online Advertising
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Banners

• Simple Banners
• Animated Banners
• Streaming Banners
• Streaming Audio Banners
• Pop-Ups
• Interstitials

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Banners

• Arent they dead?
• Banners still make up the majority of online ad
  spending
• CTR are lower than low in most consumer
  categories.
• Audience reach often improves regardless of
  whether the banner was clicked or not.

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CPs

• Cost per Click (CPC)
• of times your banner is clicked on
• Cost per Sale (CPS or CPT)
• Usually paid as a percentage of a sales(excluding
  tax and shipping)
• Cost per Action
• Set fee based on the number of times a game was
  played, software downloaded etc.

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Before you buy

• What are your goals
• Generate Inquiries
• Generate Sales
• Branding and Awareness
• Driving Traffic
• Research/Surveying

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Before you buy

• Do a through analysis of Inventory and your
  campaign.
• Which pages will you be on?
• When?
• What is your budget? How does this ad fit in?
• Who else will be advertising at the same time?
• How are you supporting this online? Radio, TV,
  paper?
• Who is serving your ad?
• How will you be tracking the results?

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Plan and Contract

• Plan what you are going to test
• Make sure you have a good contract.
• Outline dates and times
• Costs

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How to Choose

• Referring URLs
• Personal experience
• Good Fit
• Editorial relevance
• Right Market
• Amazing deal
• Because you want to do it.

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Banner Tips

• Someone famous said Nobody reads ads. People
  read what interests them. Sometimes it is an ad
• People dont click on great copy and design
• They click on something that interests them
• Unless you are a fortune 250 company you cant
  afford to be doing banners just to improve image.

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Banner Tips

• Make sure that you drive the traffic from the
  banner directly to the page
• Carefully plan the alt text for each banner as
  well as the text underneath the banner

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Banner Tips

• Develop a campaign not a unit (15 days)
• Using questions can raise CTR by about 15
• Free works best
• Free Information, free white paper, free whatever
• Thank you page banners tend to work best.

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Banner Tips

• Use 25 of the space for your logo
• Phrases such as click here Now improve
  response

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Banner Tips

• Negotiating
• Tell them what you want to paythey will get to
  it
• Remember that the 80 of space goes unsold
• Start with 10 what they offer

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Banner Tips

• Best times to negotiate
• Timing
• End of Month
• End of quarter
• End of year
• Great deals when you purchase space for an entire
  year (this should be your best buy)
• USA Today.com great site to consider

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• If we are going to sell sport outfits
• We should pay a premium to advertise on a web
  site devoted to sports
• Is this the right way?

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Test

• Testing is Critical
• You should test the following
• Creative
• Offer
• Ad Units
• Sites
• Reach vs. composition
• Targeted content v.s. targeted demographics
• There should be about 20000 impressions behind
  each test cell.

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Ad Networks

• Ad networks offer one stop ad shopping
• Great for testing
• Save time
• Expertise
• Service
• Carry premium properties

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Web Advertising Networks

• Offer single point of access to advertisers that
  want to reach millions of consumers quickly and
  easily.
• They acquire impressions given to them by their
  web site affiliates and sell the aggravated
  inventory.
• This process simplifies the acts of buying and
  selling for both the advertiser and the web
  publisher.

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Zero Based Media Buying

• Testing using RON (Run of Networks)
• Do, no targeting at all.
• Just throw ads out there and see where you get
  responses.
• Within a few days you can figure out where your
  responses are coming from.
• Group your responses by category (sport,
  business, entertainment or people who respond to
  ads about my product.
• You can not do that with any other media

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• He (Flycast President) recommends to his clients
  that begin with advertising on all Flycast sites
  ( close to a thousand) for a week and compare the
  response rates.

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CASIO
It ran a banner ad for a digital camera. The
best category for Casio digital camera ads is
travel. This test can be conducted in a
week sites aimed women, games and sports are
definitely not winners for the product. Would
anyone guessed this without the test? In a week?
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Internet Advertising Bureau

• IAB.net
• Are the new banner sizes successful?
• http//www.iab.net/iab_banner_standards/bannersour
  ce.html

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Next-Generation Banners Rich MediaInteractive/Ani
mated Banners

• Features-
• In-the-banner interactivity
• Deliver live content such as news, daily messages
• Rich media contains for any bandwidths without
  plug-ins such as streaming audio, animations,
  quizes, and games
• Effectiveness-
• Increases (CTR) click-through-ratio
• Improves brand recognition
• http//www.freestyleinteractive.com
• http//www.freestyleinteractive.com/clients/ifuse/
  

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Enliven and Types of Banner Ads

• Enliven.com
• http//www.enliven.com/campaigns/recent_campaigns.
  htm
• Please select from ad goal and see how banners
  change according to your marketing goal.

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Next-Generation AdvertisementsDownloadable and
interactive advertisement

• Forwarding Advertisements
• Effective and free advertisement that is
  guaranteed to reach the targeted audience
• Word of mouth or email promotion reaches a larger
  number of consumers
• Brand name is re-enforced by interacting with the
  ads

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Banner ad presentation methods

• A. Pay per Click - Pay a web site every time
  someone clicks on your banner.
• B. Pay per Lead - Pay a web site every time
  someone signs up for a service or free
  subscription (Sales leads)
• C. Pay per Sale - Pay a web site every time
  someone actually buys the product or service.
• D. Pay to View - Pay a web site to show your ad
  by category or randomly.
• E. Banner Exchange - Display banner/button on
  your site in exchange for displays on others

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Where should you place your banner ads?

• In traditional advertising you use media expert.
• Study demographics
• Figures out which media they pay attention to.
• Places ads based on careful targeting and cost.
• Media targeting has been a science for 30 years
• Should we (modern marketers) use the same
  techniques for the web?

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4 Steps in making a purchase

• Impression The customer clicks on a web site
  that has banners displayed.
• 5 to 40 per thousand impressions
• ResponseThe person clicks on a banner in the web
  site, which transports the clicker to your web
  site
• Lead The prospect views your offering and fills
  out a form
• Sale The clicker buys the product

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Objectives in Web Advertising

• There are two objectives in web advertising
• Image advertisers are trying to create an image
  in the mind of the viewer.
• Response advertisers are trying to get the viewer
  to respond.

Creative should always mirror the program
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How web advertising differs

• On the web you can change your message every hour
  every day
• Expose one customer to many different approaches.
• Rich media ads utilizing high involvement and
  interactive formats, hold the promise of
  increasing the impact and overall effectiveness
  of web advertising.
• You get immediate feedback on what is working and
  what is not.

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Ad Performance Evaluation

• Lycos and Yahoo Spreadsheets.
• Please take a look at those sheets.
• We will discuss the dynamics during our Thursday
  chat.
• I am using these worksheets with permission from
  BMG Direct.

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Affiliate Programs
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Affiliates

• Partners help drive revenues

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Banner Ads
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• In an effort to simplify the production of
  multimedia banner ads, Enliven has developed a
  set of preassembled ads it calls "Enliven Effect"
  that offer opportunities ranging from driving
  traffic to conducting transactions within the
  banner.

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Affiliate Marketing

• Affiliate marketing may be the fastest-growing
  form of online marketing today. Driving about 13
  of the current online sales market, it's forecast
  to reach 21 by 2003, according to a report by
  Forrester Research Inc.
• Behind that growth is affiliate marketing's
  ability to leverage the power of the Web and
  direct customers to partners on a
  pay-for-performance basis, said Robert Levitan,
  CEO of Flooz.com, New York, an online gift
  currency provider with an extensive affiliate
  network.

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Vocabulary

• Affiliate An individual who contracts with a
  merchant in order to help sell that merchants
  product.
• Associate Another word for an affiliate.
• Merchant An individual or business who has a
  product and, in this case, uses affiliate
  programs to sell this product.

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What type of merchandise can I sellthrough
affiliate marketing?

• The product may be anything someone
• will pay for
• Tangible (such as clothing),
• Virtual (such as electronic books or
• Downloadable software), or
• Information (such as expert advice).

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Where do I get the merchandise?Where do I store
it?

• In most cases, the merchant handles
• the merchandise,
• actual purchase,
• packing, and
• shipping,
• so you usually never see the actual merchandise.

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What are my responsibilities as anaffiliate?

• 1. Represent a product or service
• Represent the merchants product or service on
  your site through the use of links.
• These links may take the form of
• a banner,
• a text link,
• a search box, or even
• a JAVA applet.

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What are my responsibilities as anaffiliate?

• 2. Drive traffic (get visitors) to your site.
• Establish a steady flow of targeted traffic to
  your site in order to increase your potential to
  earn commissions. Different merchants specify
  what constitutes an action worthy of
  compensation, and these can range from a
• Customer just seeing the ad
• Actually purchasing the product.
• How much you get paid will also differ from
  merchant to merchant.

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What are my responsibilities as anaffiliate?

• 3. Read the contract
• Information should be stated clearly in a
  contract. It is your responsibility to read the
  contract, even if it is
• long,
• convoluted, or
• boring.

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What are my responsibilities as anaffiliate?

• 4. Monitor your site and links.
• You must check your site and links regularly to
• make sure everything works properly.

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What are my responsibilities as anaffiliate?

• 5. Monitor your statistics.
• The merchant should provide you with statistics.
• You need to monitor your statistics to make sure
  you are being credited properly.
• Your statistics reflect the success of your
  merchandising plan and allow you to tweak your
  selling process to increase your profit.

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How Do I Choose a Merchant?

• Stand-Alone Affiliate Program (independent)
• An affiliate program run "in house" by a
  particular merchant. This merchant handles the
  contracting, sale, record keeping, and payment
  process.
• Solution Provider
• A company, such as Commission Junction or BeFree,
  that assists merchants in the affiliate marketing
  process.
• Usually, the solution provider acts as an
  intermediary between the merchant and affiliate,
  and handles most business matters such as
  regulating contracts and cutting checks.

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Reasons to use a stand-alone affiliateprogram

• 1. Access to unique items.
• Artists and craftspeople frequently cannot
  generate the volume of product to support a
  large affiliate program. However, these merchants
  can benefit from highly targeted affiliate sales
  made by a select group of affiliates.
• If you have a site dedicated to Shaker
  craftsmanship, for example, and want to sell
  hand-made Shaker-style chairs, then you should
  consider finding a quality artisan with a highly
  selective group of affiliates.

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Reasons to use a stand-alone affiliateprogram

• 2. Access to non-traditional items.
• Some items, while mass-produced, do not always
  appeal to the majority of Web surfers.
• However, if your highly targeted niche site
  focuses on a sub-culture, such as role playing
  gamers, then you should work with a merchant who
  caters to this community.

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Reasons to use a stand-alone affiliateprogram

• 3. Ability to work more closely with a merchant.
• Independent merchants, especially those with
• highly selective affiliate programs, work with
• fewer affiliates, and are therefore often more
• accessible than the large solution providers.

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Reasons to choose a solution provider

• 1. Variety
• Solution providers offer access to a wide range
  of programs and an extensive array of products.
• 2. Time management
• Solution providers consolidate the tracking and
  payment for a number of merchants, making
  tracking a one-stop experience for the affiliate.
• 3. Reliability
• Reputable solution providers have the experience
  and funding to reliably serve their affiliates.
• 4. Grievance and mediation
• Solution providers sometimes act as mediators
  between merchants and affiliates, providing a
  more impartial way to settle grievances.

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Reasons to avoid solution providers

• 1. All of your eggs are in one basket.
• In the unlikely event that your solution provider
  would shut down, your entire affiliate marketing
  framework will crumble.
• 2. Merchants are less accessible.
• In a large solution provider organization, the
  individual merchants and affiliates can remain at
  a distance.

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Qualities of a good affiliate program

• 1. The affiliates responsibilities.
• A clear description of what you, the affiliate,
  must do and what you are prohibited from doing.
  These are the program rules and will dictate what
  youll have to live with during your relationship
  with this merchant.
• 2. What designates an action worthy of
  compensation.
• As an affiliate, you must understand what must
  happen in order for you to get a
  commissionwhether you must deliver impressions,
  clicks, leads, or sales.
• 3. How the compensation will be rendered.
• As an affiliate, you must understand the
  merchants plan for compensation. Make sure that
  the merchant will pay you in money, and that you
  can use the particular currency in your country
  of residence.

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Qualities of a good affiliate program

• 4. When will you be paid?
• Merchants payment schedules vary.
• A few merchants pay every two weeks,
• many pay every month, and a few pay quarterly.
• Others only pay when you reach a minimum amount.
• If you have not reached that amount, then the
  payment is rolled over into the next pay period.
• Also, be aware that a significant lag time for
  processing will almost always delay your payment.

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Some guidelines

• 1- Merchant logos.
• As an affiliate, you should not be required to
  display a merchants logo on your site.Merchants
  who force affiliates to display their logo often
  use that logo as branding or free advertising.
• 2-Sign-up fees.
• As an affiliate, you should never have to pay a
  fee to join an affiliate program. You should
  recognize that merchants who require you to pay
  any kind of start-up fees operate on the edge of
  the legal definition of pyramid schemes.
• 3-Confidentiality.
• As an affiliate, you must ensure your customers
  confidentiality. Make certain that the merchant
  has a privacy policy in place that will
  sufficiently protect both you and your customers.

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5. Affiliate agreement.

• As an affiliate, you need to be able to access a
  merchants affiliate agreement easily.
• The full agreement must be
• posted on the merchants site, and
• you should have access to it, for free, and
  without having to give out personal information.

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Parts of a good contract include

• How the merchant will approach contract changes.
• A good merchant should inform the affiliate of
  any upcoming changes, both on the site and by
  email.
• Legality.
• You should be assured that the merchant operates
  within the law, is permitted to sell its product,
  and does not violate the pyramid scheme laws.
• Contact information.
• A good merchant will provide multiple, reliable
  methods by which it can be reached. These include
  email, postal address, and telephone numbers, and
  they should be displayed on the merchants
  website.
• Contact permission.
• A good merchant will ask your permission to
  contact you via email with promotional messages,
  newsletters, and the like, on An opt-in basis.

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6. Grievance policy

• As an affiliate, you need to be clear on a
• merchants grievance policy. The merchant must
  clearly state how grievances and disputes are to
  be handled. This disclosure includes
• Who is tracking your results? Many merchants use
  third-party companies to track performance. You,
  the affiliate, must be clear on this issue.
• Who handles disputes? Merchants must inform
  affiliates how to register a complaint, and how
  this dispute will be arbitrated.

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7. Termination

• As an affiliate, you need to understand the
  program rules, and recognize that violation of
  these rules could lead to termination of the
  contract. A good merchant will spell out all the
  reasons that you can be terminated for cause.
  Usually, these reasons have to do with illegal
  activity or with cheating to improve your
  statistics.

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8. Tracking statistics

• A good contract will provide you, the
  affiliate,with information regarding how your
  account will be tracked, as well as how you can
  access your statistics. This contract should also
  explain how frequently the statistics will be
  updated.

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9. Clarity

• A good contract should be written clearly and
  with limited legalese, in order to facilitate
  communication between you and the merchant.