Tricia Meyer

Affiliate Marketer, Blogger, and Consultant

Affiliate Marketing Help Being Auctioned (No Bids Yet!)

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If you are an affiliate marketer (and I am assuming you are if you are reading this), there is something for you in the PMA Silent Auction. Besides all of the cool merchandise gift cards and packages, there are some items very specific to those in our industry that you should check out. I want to point out just a few of them so you understand how they might apply to you.

  • Song Written and Sung by Brian Littleton Just for You: It pretty much doesn’t matter who you are in the industry or what you do, this is pretty cool. It’s a little bit of branding because you’ll have Brian singing about you plus just really fun and something that might even go viral if you give it a nudge! Brian is one of the most liked and respected people in our industry (even by me even though he keeps beating me out for all of the awards that I want) and this item is truly priceless.
  • 6-month PREMIUM Publisher Toolkit Subscription: If you are a blogger, you have to bid on this. It’s worth $300 and the minimum bid is only $70. You can read my full Publisher Toolkit review but suffice to say I use it pretty much every single day on my blogs.
  • 3 months of Paid Search Monitoring from BrandVerity: This one is mainly for the merchants and agencies. If you haven’t tried BrandVerity before to monitor for trademark bidding and abuse by affiliates and competitors, now is a great time to try it with this limited offer.
  • $500 for Mobile App Development: EPage Inc. is offering programming/consulting services toward a mobile app development. I’ve known Brad Waller a LONG time and if you are even considering an app for your company, this is something to jump on.
  • Best-In-Class SEO: For as little as $75 you can get an hour of SEO help from Adam Riemer. Even though I have been doing SEO for 12 years, I know I don’t know close to what Adam knows. And even if you think you know SEO, it’s always great to talk to an expert and see what is new and hot that you might be missing.
  • Affiliate program help: There are actually three different company offering affiliate program help of some kind. This is obviously for merchants! If you are a merchant who has been considering hiring and OPM or just needs a boost to your program, these packages are starting at as little as $500.

If none of those apply to you, you might just want a 2-night hotel stay, a new bra, some sporting equipment, or other fun stuff. Check out the full auction because bids are starting to come in and it ends Tuesday!

8 Things You Might Have Missed at #ASW15 (But I Didn’t!)

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I’m just now getting around to writing my wrap-up from Affiliate Summit West because so many exciting things happened there and shortly after! I went into the conference with the goal of treating it like it was my first time, and in many ways I achieved that. I attended sessions, made new friends, and even checked out the entire Exhibit Hall and Meet Market.

Although there were a lot of highlights for me, here are 8 things that I was glad that I didn’t miss but some of you might have.

Affiliate Karaoke: Although it was not an official even this time (anyone want to be a sponsor in New York??), Nathan Smith found us an amazing little dive bar to get cheap drinks, dance, and sing karaoke. We had a fun group of bloggers, merchants, and OPMs. Some of us knew we were looking for it in advance and others just saw us talking about it on Twitter. It pays to follow conference hashtags on Twitter if you are looking for something fun to do!

My session with Eric and Todd: I was lucky enough to give a presentation with Eric Nagel and Todd Farmer about our site WineClubGroup.com. We didn’t hold anything back. We showed our analytics, our revenue, how we find merchants, and everything that has made the site successful. I’m disappointed that more bloggers didn’t show up because we really did share a lot of our tips and tricks. You can still download our Resource Guide if you missed it.

Meeting Kozzi in the Meet Market: I promised myself that I was going to make a real effort to visit all of the Exhibits this time, and I did. Finding friends and current partners is nice, but finding NEW partners is a real bonus. If you didn’t make it to the back of the Meet Market to talk to Kozzi, you missed out. They are a stock photo provider with AMAZING deals for both people buying stock photos and affiliates who want to promote the program. If you have any interest in stock photos at all, you should check out the Kozzi Affiliate program.

Affiliate Legal Issues Session: As an affiliate and a lawyer, this session was totally up my alley. But even if you are not a lawyer, you need to understand things like nexus legislation and FTC disclosure requirements. Sam Engel, Gary Kibel, Carolyn Kmet, and Gerri-Lynn Becker did a great job of giving information about various legal issues that can threaten your business as an affiliate or a merchant. If you are not paying attention to these, you may find yourself on the wrong side of a lawsuit.

Newcomer Program: The Affiliate Summit Newcomer Program “helps connect first time attendees with Affiliate Summit veterans.” I was paired up with the amazing Mindy Marzec of Budget Fairy Tale. Not only did I make a new friend, but it was nice to be a part of something that would help someone else experience Affiliate Summit fully. I used to do it all the time but had stopped because I didn’t think I had time anymore. Remembering back to my first time at Affiliate Summit, I realized that it doesn’t take much to help put someone at ease. Whether you are a veteran or a newcomer, you should be taking advantage of this program if possible. (and thanks to Mindy for some of the photos above!)

PMA CEO & Founder Event: The Performance Marketing Association put on a terrific cocktail party where members and others interested in joining could chat about industry issues and the part that the PMA is playing. It was great seeing so much support for the organization and getting a chance to share the wonderful things that the organization has done this year. If you are reading this and are not a member, you need to find out how to become one.

ASW Speaker Event: Being a speaker has its perks, besides the free pass. This year we were invited to a networking event on the High Roller, which is like a great big enclosed Ferris Wheel. I was incredibly nervous about getting on it and my friends did their best to make me think we were going to fall to our deaths (or at least into the safety net below it). Despite that, it was a nice opportunity to chat with other speakers before the conference started and take in AMAZING views of Las Vegas. Thanks to Shawn and Missy for treating their speakers!

Pinnacle Awards: I was not really looking forward to the Pinnacle Awards because I had become a perennial loser and it is kind of embarrassing to sit there with my friends and lose every year. But it IS an honor to be a finalist even if you don’t win. I was absolutely floored when I found out that I won Affiliate of the Year! It was a moment that I will never forget. And I was incredibly excited for fellow winners Joe Sousa, Brian Littleton, FMTC, and Acceleration Partners.

There’s a lot of other stuff that happened that was important to me but wouldn’t be important to you (including quality time with some of the people that I treasure most in this world–you know who you are!). I’ll spare you the personal details.

Did you attend any of these events? Was there something you did that *I* missed that I need to do next time?

Surprises in Affiliate Marketing

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Surprises in Affiliate MarketingI went away for a two week vacation and came back to find some really interesting things in my inbox and in the networks. I think that the closure of the Google Affiliate Network has really shaken some things up in terms of merchants and affiliate networks (and in a good way). Most of the surprises were good ones! It’s going to make Affiliate Summit in Philadelphia fun because we have just a little bit of time between now and then to watch how everything plays out and then be able to gossip about it.

Here are a few of the things that made me go “hmmmmmm” this week:

  • Hilton all of a sudden popped up in Commission Junction. Up until now, we have had to rely on the Converseon tracking and the program has been HORRIBLE! In fact, we haven’t been paid since about August. Andrew Kardon promised some exciting new things now that he is cleaning up the program, and this is a good indication that they are serious about making the program better.
  • Pandora opened a program on Linkshare. I had been under the impression for years that they were never going to have an affiliate program because of their “brand concerns.” They have always been really picky even with their resellers. Combining this program with the Chamilia program could result in some cool new datafeed sites.
  • Oriental Trading Company announced that they are leaving GAN for Impact Radius. This is a HUGE win for Impact Radius. It actually poses some problems for ME because Oriental Trading Company is a big merchant for me and, honestly, we have not taken the time to integrate fully with Impact Radius yet because they just didn’t have any exclusive merchants that we really needed to integrate with. This is going to change that for us for sure.
  • Gymboree opened a program on ShareASale. I think this is a big win for ShareASale. My mom site visitors have been asking for Gymboree for years. I had come to doubt that we would see a program from them. This one started converted for me pretty much as soon as I posted it!
  • Joe Sousa is moving to Florida to join the Fanatics Affiliate Management team. I can’t say this is a HUGE surprise because I knew he was interviewing, but it was interesting nonetheless. I’ve known Joe a long time and think he is going to be a fantastic addition to the team. He has sports knowledge, affiliate program management experience, and an open mind when it comes to the Steelers. (Well, 2 out of 3 isn’t bad)
  • In the negative news department, a lot of GAN merchants still have not announced where they are going. For those of us who are solo or who have small staffs, we aren’t going to be able to change out hundreds of merchant links in just a month. Even though GAN is supposed to continue tracking for awhile, many of the notices we are getting are only giving us a week or so before the merchants completely close down their GAN program. This is definitely going to cause some chaos in July (and otherwise relatively slow month for affiliate marketers).
  • Also in the “bad surprise” category is news on the Performance Marketing Association’s Facebook page today that Ohio has introduced Affiliate Tax legislation and it is moving quickly. If you are an Ohio affiliate, you need to get the word out about this and get to work. I had not previously seen Ohio on any of the “watch lists” by the PMA and the fact that it happened so fast is scary for all of us.

So what else have I missed besides the normal affiliate marketing buzz? I used to think that June was a slow month for affiliate marketing, but not this year!

Edited: So right after I published this, I got a knock at the door from FedEx. My biggest affiliate marketing surprise this week was apparently that I was a winner in the ShareASale Spring Fling contest! Check it out! Thank you, ShareASale. 🙂

Shareasale Spring Fling Winner

Help Fight the Advertising Tax

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The advertising tax/affiliate tax/Amazon tax is threatening to kill small businesses just like mine, and it is time that I join the fight. I’ll be honest and admit that I am new to this. When the legislation first started popping up, I figured if it wasn’t my state, it didn’t impact me. Then I really started paying attention and listening to what was happening. I listened in to the entire Colorado proceedings and followed along with my friends on Twitter. By the end of the night, I knew that regardless of whether the fight was about Indiana, I needed to be better educated and get involved.

States are attempting to use legislation to get around federal laws that prohibit them from collecting sales tax from out of state businesses unless there is a “nexus” within that state. The states are passing legislation that would make an affiliate a “nexus,” despite the fact that we do not take any money or send out any goods. States think that they will increase their revenue. Conversely, the merchants are just disaffiliating with the affiliates and the affiliates are losing their businesses. How is that good for anyone involved?

Following the advice of the Performance Marketing Association, I made a quick video about how you can get involved in fighting the advertising tax. It doesn’t matter which group you join or if you even join a group. The bottom line is that you need to 1) get educated, 2) get connected with others involved, and 3) spread the word. While big businesses may have the money to fight these fights, we have the voices and the personal stories that can stop states from taking our businesses away from us.

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