Tricia Meyer

Affiliate Marketer, Blogger, and Consultant

Affiliate Created Video: ASW09 Part 1

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Last month at Affiliate Summit West, I had the pleasure of leading a round table discussion about affiliate created video. At first I worried that I didn’t possibly have enough to say to fill a whole hour. But as I began putting together my notes, I realized that I could have talked for hours!

Because this wasn’t a formal ASW09 presentation, it was not recorded for their site. However, Angie did take some video with her Flip and has been formatting it for me a piece at a time. Here is the first 10 minutes of the round table discussion. In it, we talk about different types of videos that affiliates might want to create including product and merchant reviews, how-to-videos, weekly updates, and viral videos. In addition, we started talking about how we can tell how many people are watching our whole videos and the Shareasale video technology. Lastly, we talked briefly about the use of videos on Facebook.

Thanks to some of my friends for attending and helping keep the discussion interesting. 🙂

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How Many Blogs Should You Have?

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I was reading a mom’s site the other day and she was talking about how people should only have one blog because you can’t focus on too many. I got to thinking about how many different blog sites that I have–lots! Am I sabotaging myself by having too many blogs? I don’t think so. Here’s why…

First, some of my blogs are really websites just running on WordPress as a means of content management. So while it is true they are “blogs,” they are really niche websites where I just add content weekly using WordPress. I would say that most people in affiliate marketing have multiple websites.

Second, one of my blogs is tied directly to my biggest business (Sunshine Rewards). And it is a completely different type of blog than the rest because it is videos only. Plus, I have other employees that help me generate the content for it.

Lastly, and most importantly, I don’t think readers of one of my blogs would be interested in the content from my other blogs. Are you here because you want to read about chocolate? About being a work at home mom? If you were, you would go read those other blogs. Granted, this blog is supposed to be more random….so you never know what you are going to get from me. But that in itself is a niche…it’s a blog about the niche of Tricia Meyer. (Thrilling, I know…but you are still reading, right?)

In the end, I’ve decided that it’s perfectly fine to have multiple blogs as long as you are not just repeating the same content and you are keeping them fresh. It doesn’t hurt to cross-promote your blogs a little bit either. How many blogs do you have?

Affiliate Marketing and Toolbars

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Before I got into affiliate marketing, I have to admit that I really like toolbars. I liked being reminded where to shop and get deals. But after I became an affiliate and started getting educated, I realized that those toolbars were a convenience for me at the expense of people who worked really hard on their websites.

Naturally when I started a cash back site, I didn’t even contemplate a toolbar. I knew from a few different sources that the rewards sites with toolbars were looked at as “evil” and parasitic. It became the “good guys” versus the “bad guys.” But has that all changed?

Shareasale (one of my favorite networks) is having a series of discussions regarding changing its terms of service regarding toolbars. A number of merchants and affiliates (who I consider to be clean and ethical) have stepped up to say that they think the time is right to evaluate new technologies. Others are EXTREMELY opposed to the mere suggestion.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out, and I hope to have a seat in the front row because it will impact my business heavily. If you would like to read more information straight from the source, check out the ShareASale Blog.

Thesis WordPress Theme

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So why did I decide to use a Thesis WordPress Theme for this blog? I’ve tried lots of different themes, some free and some not. I’ve done some customizing of various themes. The site of mine that I love the most (although it gets the least traffic and attention) is my chocolate site, www.chocolatepicnic.com. Why do I love it? Because it’s pretty! Compared to all of my other sites, I think it came together the best. I used Revolution on some other sites, as well as Cutlines. But Thesis was the easiest to customized and sharpest looking.

Because I already had one Thesis license, I could upgrade to the “developer” license for only $77 and be able to use Thesis on as many of my sites as I want going forward. What a bargain!

I still have a lot to customize on here, but it looks 100 times better than it did 10 minutes ago. And by the end of the week, it will be beautiful (although maybe not as beautiful as Chocolate Picnic).

You can check out the Thesis Theme for yourself.

My New Business Blog

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The time has come for me to start taking my business (affiliate marketing) seriously and write about all that is business related. I’ve been in affiliate marketing for four years and have been dabbling in all kinds of niche sites and a rewards/coupon site. The further in I get, the more that I realize that affiliate marketing really is my career–my calling. It took a political science degree, a law degree, and 7 years in corporate America to finally get me to this point. But now that I am here, I cannot imagine doing anything else!!

As I write this, my new blog has no theme and no plugins. But that will all change in the next several days. Once I get all of the “pretty” stuff done, I will start adding content, including a recap of my recent trip to Vegas for Affiliate Summit. If you happen across this site between now and the “pretty,” just bookmark me and come back in about a week.