I vividly remember my first internet marketing industry event that I attended and really appreciated the sponsoring company who helped me get there. As I won’t be attending Affiliate Summit West 2008, I held a blog contest to help 2 deserving affiliates make it to the event. The results of Ian’s Blog Contest are in!

Congratulations to our winners Gyutae Park and Scott Gray. Gyutae and Scott both won a full conference pass to attend the next Affiliate Summit. Each full pass (worth $1,449) will not only get our hard working winners into all seminars, the exhibit hall, breakfasts and lunches, but more importantly, it will allow them to network with and meet some of the industry’s top internet marketing experts. Good luck to both our winners and enjoy attending Affiliate Summit. Going to this conference with the right attitude will help you build those important business relationships.

I look forward to reading Gyutae and Scott’s event review after they return from Affiliate Summit 2008.

Thanks to all who participated in Ian’s Blog Contest.

Tweet This Post

There is just a little over 2 weeks until the deadline for the Free Affiliate Summit Pass Contest. If you have never attended an Affiliate Summit, here is your chance to go for free. Prizes for the contest are 2 full passes to Affiliate Summit West 2008 to be held in Las Vegas. Each full pass is worth $949 and will increase to $1,449 after Dec 21. If you purchase the same ticket at the door, it will cost a whopping $1,949. That is, if the show has not already been sold not – which by the way has for the last few years that I have attended.

Not only will a full pass get you access to all speaking sessions, networking events and the exhibit hall, it will also cover breakfast and lunch for the duration of the event. Wouldn’t a full Affiliate Summit pass be a great Christmas gift this year? For details on how you can get a free Affiliate Summit West full pass, visit the Free Affiliate Summit Pass Contest page.

Tweet This Post

If you are an internet marketer and have never attended an Affiliate Summit, you are missing out! Simply put, Affiliate Summit is the most attended and largest affiliate marketing event of the year. It’s where top affiliate and internet marketers go to learn from one another. More importantly, it’s also a place to make initial contact with business partners and to strengthen existing relationships. If you have attended a previous event, you will know exactly what I am talking about. Here is a fantastic opportunity for any affiliate to receive a free full pass to Affiliate Summit West 2008!

Blog Contest Giving Away 2 Free Affiliate Summit Passes

The next Affiliate Summit is scheduled for February 24-26, 2008 to be held in Las Vegas. A Full Affiliate Summit Pass costs $949 – after Dec 21, 2007, each pass will go up to $1,449. A full pass includes all sessions, breakfasts, lunches, and exhibit hall.

But now as an affiliate, you can simply enter Ian’s Blog Contest for a chance to win 1 of 2 full passes to Affiliate Summit West 2008. These 2 passes are worth a total value of $1898.

As a past speaker of previous Affiliate Summits, I am a little sad that I will not be able to attend the next event. In addition, I also know how hard affiliates work to make their business a success. I vividly remember and absolutely appreciated that my first conference was sponsored by a company from the industry. So, as I am unable to attend this time around, I convinced Shawn Collins, Co-Founder of Affiliate Summit, to give away full passes to help 2 deserving affiliates attend the next Affiliate Summit. It’s as simple as that. How do you enter the blog contest to win a free Affiliate Summit pass? Here are the rules.

Ian’s Blog Contest Rules for a Free Affiliate Summit Pass

1. You have to be a hard working affiliate – if you work 4 hours a week, you do not qualify. 2. Write a post on your blog about what you hope to gain from attending the next Affiliate Summit (either personally or for your business) and link back to this post. 3. Link to this blog’s home page (http://www.ads-links.com) – use appropriate anchor text when doing so. For example, Ian Lee or Internet Marketing Blog would be appropriate. 4. Use the contact form on this blog to send me an email containing: Your Name and Email Address How you heard about this contest At least 1 affiliate website (URL) that you own URL of your blog post from Rule #2 Note – your website(s) will not be shared with anyone else; it is for the purpose of this contest only.

Only genuine affiliate entries will be accepted so do not use someone else’s website or throw up a new domain and think you will qualify for the contest. The website(s) shared will need to be verifiable ie. that you are indeed the owner. A Trackback link must be recorded by this blog post to qualify your entry.

All above criteria must be met or your entry will not qualify for the contest. Contest closes on Dec 21, 2007 at 5PM PST. Entries made after this time will not be eligible. The two winners will be notified by email and announced on this blog.

With a prize value of $949 and a chance to network with some of the industry’s top affiliate and internet marketers, a little extra effort to enter this contest can get you a long way – hopefully all the way to Vegas!

The prizes would surely make a great Christmas gift for any affiliate wanting to attend Affiliate Summit West 2008. So what are you waiting for? Get blogging!

Tweet This Post

Last weekend, James Martell invited me out to his annual horse racing lunch party held at the Private Skybox At Hastings Park. Not only did I meet some new people but I also had a great time catching up with affiliate marketers who attended the last Affiliate Marketers Alliance Networking dinner. The picture on the right is of James & I. At this point, I think James was up a few dollars betting on the horse races. Notice all the monitors behind us simulcasting horse racing from all over North America? Wow!

Because we were in the VIP Skybox, there was a private teller taking bets in the suite itself. In fact, there was even a personal betting instructor on-hand providing rules and instructions. I finally know the difference between Win, Place and Show! I have heard all the terminology before but did not really understand them. Now, I know the difference between an exactor and a triactor and what it means when you box them!

Betting on horse racing is really all about statistics. After learning all the different possible betting methods, I now see why loyal customers return to the track every weekend.

Thanks to James for the invite and to Todd for all the prizes! Here are a few photos I took from the day. Do enjoy!

Todd Taylor, Senior Marketing Manager Consumer, from Real Networks Drawing Prizes


Number 4 Flying Down the Back Stretch


Number 10 Finishing the Race


Race to the Finish Line


One of the Fly-in Guests

Tweet This Post

I just received a call from a client desperately looking for help with one of their affiliate programs. After some quick investigative work with Commission Junction (CJ) support, it looks like Waterfront Media is almost 6 months behind on payments. So why have they not been kicked out of CJ yet after all these months of missed payments?

I guess the best case scenario is that eventually, owed money will be paid in full and locked affiliate commissions can then be released to their rightful owners. <Start rhetorical question> In the meantime, is it really fair to allow hard working affiliates (current & new) to continue spending more time and money in promoting programs that currently do not pay out commissions? <End rhetorical question>.

The best case scenario would have been for Waterfront Media to send out some sort of delay-of-payment notice to all affiliates. My client only discovered owed commissions after noticing that their internal records did not balance and was never notified by either Waterfront or CJ. At the very least, CJ should have disabled this advertiser and warned all affected affiliates until payment was caught up. After all, it has been almost 6 months since the first commissions were locked.

The way I see it, the longer the wait for owed payments to come in, the more difficult it will be for all parties (including CJ & affiliates) to get paid. This scenario is worsened by the fact that affiliates are still allowed to generate sales (& commissions) and the amount owing is only going to grow. This makes it even more difficult to catch up on missed payments.

Being an eternal optimist, I am still hopeful that things can be worked out and all Waterfront Media affiliates will see owed commissions. I guess CJ feels the same way as well since this advertiser is still active in their network. At this point though, the only thing we can really do is wait.

Here are sites listed on Waterfrontmedia.com – some of which are running affiliate programs through CJ:

Everydayhealth.com
The South Beach Diet
Fit Forever with Denise Austin
The Sonoma Diet
Jillian Michaels Online
What to Expect™ Pregnancy Club
The Duke Diet
Bikini Bootcamp
Dr. Andrew Weil’s My Optimum Health Plan
Dr. Laura Berman’s Passion Prescription
The Diabetic Living Diet
The Winsor Diet
My Calorie Counter
Psych Central
5 Factor Diet

Anyone else seeing locked payments for Waterfront Media properties in your CJ account or have recently pulled their offers?

Tweet This Post

Today, I received a package from Avanquest. Inside were 4 pieces of software titles that I had won at the last eComXpo. There was also a 5th title that was available as a download from the vendor. Here are the titles that I won from the booth prize.

MyLogo Maker – logo designer
Partition Commander 10 – hard drive utility
Ringtone Media Studio – mobile phone ringtone, music & wallpaper creator
SystemSuite 7 – PC optimization & management utilities
WebEasy 6 – website design tool

Thanks to Avanquest for the free software. Now I just have to wait for my notebook to come back from the shop to test them out! I hear Ringtone Media Studio can be addictive.

Tweet This Post

As companies like 24/7 Real Media and Tacoda begin to serve more behavioral targeted ad campaigns, I wonder when the affiliate marketing industry will consider this approach as part of its lead & sales generation process. I briefly talked about a seminar that I had attended where behavioral targeting was the hot topic. In a nutshell, behavioral targeting is serving an ad based on web properties (websites that are part of a predefined advertising network) where users have previously visited.

Behavioral Targeting in Affiliate Marketing
Currently, I am not aware of behavioral targeting taking place in the affiliate marketing industry. Effectively, I see affiliate websites as web properties within the predefined network similar to that of the CPM world. If an end user does visit affiliated websites, there could be a possibility of presenting targeted offers based on past behavior. For instance, if after a few website hops and no click was generated, the offer may be rotated and a more enticing ad is served to try and garner a click. Secondarily, if clicks are happening but no sale has resulted, an enhanced offer could be presented within the sales tunnel to try and close that opportunity.

Benefits of Behavioral Targeting

Advertisers: Increase efficiency of ad serving – i.e. serving ads only to targeted users who are in a segment of the predefined network can lead to a lower cost of acquisition; network segmentation also allow ads to be more targeted when running brand marketing campaigns
Publishers: Earn more for serving targeted ads within relevant websites (or sections within a website); ability to serve more relevant ads to users
Networks: Offer an effective method for advertisers & publishers to work together at generating leads & sales or marketing a brand
Users: Receive more relevant & perhaps better offers during online experience

As with offline direct and multi-level marketing, success of affiliate marketing is due in part to a trusted source when referrals for products or services are made. The way I see it, behavioral targeting can play a positive role in this type of one-to-one marketing. Affiliate marketers are adaptive and will find a way to deliver more relevant ads so I think it will only be a matter of time before behavioral targeting becomes a norm in this marketing space. Of course, only time will truly tell.

There is increasing evidence that behavioral targeting can work for advertisers. As a reference, Ari Bluman from 24/7 Real Media shares how behavioral targeting positively affects click-through rates. Here is a behavioral segmentation case study showing how behavioral targeting can lower cost of acquisition.

Tweet This Post

Here is a video from the largest affiliate networking event in Canada. The 2007 Affiliate Marketers Alliance Networking Dinner took place in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Feb 21, 2007.

Here is a full recap of the 2007 networking event.

Here are some photos.

Tweet This Post

Here is a full recap of the event.

Here is the video for the event.

Now for some photos of the Feb 21, 2007 affiliate networking event in Vancouver. Enjoy!

Below are some photos courtesy of Stephun Fung.

Tweet This Post

Another year, another great event! Attendees for the 2007 Affiliate Marketers Alliance Networking Dinner almost doubled from the previous year. Over 100 participants took part in this 4th Annual Networking Dinner in Vancouver on Feb 21, 2007. Many flew in from out-of-town to join us. There was good representation from not only the local Vancouver area, but from other parts of British Columbia and Canada as well. There were even more US attendees this year than last and AMWSO from Thailand was also able to join us for the networking dinner. This power house get together has grown to be the most attended affiliate marketing related networking event in Canada.

Guests began showing up at 5:30pm even though registration was officially to be opened at 6:30pm. Historically, attendees to this event have always been an enthusiastic crowd. Event staff registered the early goers so they could avoid the later line up. Many simply headed down the hall to Zin Restaurant & Lounge to begin their networking.

The evening began with a quick welcome note from me and then Sponsors were brought up to the podium to speak. All intros were kept short & sweet and dinner began shortly after. Since the event was at capacity, I had to find the most efficient way to bring tables up to the buffet line. Coming from an analytics background, efficiency is definitely high on the agenda. So I asked a few questions and the first person to answer correctly got to bring up 2 tables of hungry people to grab dinner. Here are the questions and answers.

Q: How many years has the Affiliate Marketers Alliance been putting on this event?
A: 4

Q: What city will be hosting the next Winter Olympics in 2010?
A: Vancouver

Q: Who calls themselves the A-Team of affiliate marketing?
A: Millnic Media

Q: I recently spoke at the Affiliate Summit West 2007, what was the title of that presentation?
A: How ad serving technology can maximize revenue

Once everyone was seated and eating, 2 bottles of Ice Wine courtesy of our Silver Sponsor Tourism Vancouver, was raffled off as door prizes. Winners were James Martell & Sarah Villeneuve. Shortly after, Jason Bailey from Millnic Media gave away a Microsoft Zune. The lucky winner of this prize was John Chow.

Networking was plentiful before, during and after dinner. As host for the event, I only had a brief chance to meet most people before the actual meal but it was only during and after dinner that I was able to speak more in-depth with others. In between mouthfuls of good food, I had a chance to speak with David To, a consultant web developer getting into the affiliate marketing scene. David & I sat next to each other at dinner and while I personally thought the short ribs were pretty darn good, David preferred the chicken dish more. I actually also equally enjoyed the grilled mushrooms as well as the polenta.

As more and more people began losing their voices, the crowd slowly dispersed at around 10pm. By 11pm or so, the remaining 25 or so attendees decided to head over to Odouls’ Restaurant & Bar to continue the chatting. It was only after midnight when Odouls closed did attendees headed home, returned to their hotels or were forced to find another venue.

In summary, it was another successful event. Met a lot of new people and connected with some old friends. Good food, great people. What more can you ask for? Perhaps a few videos and more photos of the event. I am sure Stephen Fung will have many great photos for us. Stay tuned.

Who has talked about this event:

• John Chow – 2007 Affiliate Networking Dinner
• Dave To – My night hanging out with Affiliates
• Stephen Fung – Affiliating with Affiliate Marketers
• Brook Schaaf – Recap: Ian Lee Vancouver Dinner
• Geordie Carswell – We’re Back! Vancouver Event Wrap-Up

Tweet This Post

The 4th Annual Vancouver Networking Dinner hosted by the Affiliate Marketers Alliance has officially sold out. To be put on the waiting list, use this contact form.

Based on the confirmed attendee list, looks like it’s going to be another fun & productive event! Attendees are flying in from all over Canada & the US. There are even attendees coming in from Thailand! I can’t wait to see some old friends and make new ones. Also looking forward to trying the buffet dinner of course! Good food & great people. Can’t get any better than that.

See everyone there!

Tweet This Post