Category: Affiliates

Back in my more idealistic days of using only open source operating systems and devices, I wrote a piece about what I thought was going to be a game changer… the OpenMoko. I was wrong on that one.

However, there are still some keeping the open source device dream alive.

One of my favorite blogs these days has a great scoop on a potential device in the works from the people at OpenMoko that leverages Google’s open source Android operating system. This could really be something to get excited about:

OpenMoko at Work on Android Handset | AndroidGuys: “OpenMoko is working with the Android platform as we speak and look to have something soon. Soon like maybe November.

You know who OpenMoko is, right? The Neo1973 and FreeRunner guys. Thanks to one of our readers, we’ve got some nice gems to share with the class. Our source for this information has already proven themselves with previous tips that have panned out rather big so we feel pretty good about this one.”

Why am I so interested in this when we’ve already had the second (3G) coming of the JesusPhone? A couple of reasons:

1) As elegant as the iPhone is, we need competition. Steve Jobs and company will make better products if Google / Nokia / etc is breathing down his back.
2) The current system of mobile economics in the US is downright terrible. Not many people enjoy dealing with their mobile carrier, the rates are insanely high (a megabyte of text data is more expensive than gold…we’re talking printer ink numbers) and the choices offered by the mobile carriers here is stifling adoption of smarter phones. A popular open device could help push the mobile carriers towards needed reform.
3) I still believe in the open movement.

What do you think? Could a device like this work in the States?

From the funnybLaugh site

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There are lots of hands being wringed as large advertising agencies figure out what to do with declining advertising budgets. One meme that keeps popping up is “targeting” or “drilling down” to find the most pre-qualified traffic.

One thing is clear…smart affiliate marketers have known not to clutter their pages with irrelevant or poor performing ads for years. What affiliates have learned is that clutter itself isn’t necessarily the problem. The problem are the offers or sites being linked to and diluting the overall responsiveness of the site and its visitors. Choose wisely when placing ads.

As the CPM market continues to tank, look for more “revelations” from the Madison Ave types as they “uncover” the types of methods that affiliates have been successfully using in the direct cost per action or rev share market for a while now.

A new piece in AdAge today lays out some of the resulting brush clearing around ad cluttering on the web:

Some Respite for Consumers as Ad Clutter Clears on Web – Advertising Age – Digital: “Yes, the land of aggravating pop-ups and automatically expanding rich media is cleaning up its act. In aggregate, web surfers are exposed to 12% fewer display-ad impressions per page view than they were a year ago, according to ComScore AdMetrix data. Whether it’s a purposeful improvement or by default, one thing is clear: For consumers and advertisers, it’s a good thing.

Dynamic Logic has been looking at clutter for a while and has found it reduces the likelihood of a message getting through. Last year, a study conducted with Dynamic Logic, Starcom and DoubleClick found that a 15% increase in ads on a page results in about a 10% decline in click-through rate. The study took into account how much video or rich media was on a page since it can also be perceived as clutter. Additionally, Starcom figured in quality, as bad ads can create a perception of higher clutter. “

Again, I’m not sure how this is surprising. Of course, I don’t work in the branding world either, so common sense is a big part of my success metric. Surely, clutter can kill. But don’t mistake options and aesthetics for performance.

I saw, via FriendFeed, that Garry Conn had done a very informal “test” of how Google ranks its own Blogger blogging product over competitors such as WordPress.com by doing a simple search for “blog.”

Here are his results:

Does Google Hate WordPress and Other Blog Platforms?: “I don’t know why I did it, I guess I was just bored, but for some reason I decided to Google the term: blog to see what kind of results I would get. WordPress, TypePad or any other blog publishing platform is not mentioned on the first page results. In fact, the top ten results for the term blog have three instances that promote or have an direct affiliation with Google.”

The problem with this approach is that when I search for “blogs” using the same methodology as Garry, I get this:

Sure, you can draw the assumption that Google “hates” WordPress, Typepad (even though Seth Godin’s Typepad blog appears in Garry’s image), etc from doing a search for “blog” but does that really mean that Google puts its own Blogger product ahead of other blogging platforms in its results? Of course not. WordPress.com (or .org) blogs are incredibly popular and easily to rank high in Google as are Typepad blogs, MovableType blogs, Tumblr blogs, Twitter micro-blogs, etc.

Yes, it’s 2008, but content is still king. Make good content yada yada. Stop worrying and learn to love the bomb.

People in the online marketing world like to pound their chest and declare their independence from Google’s firm grasp over the online marketing landscape.

However, that’s just not a realistic business plan unless you have a boatload of venture capital as backup (or a trust fund).

I’m guessing most affiliate marketers have neither.

Pop!Tech: Is Larry Page the Ben Bernake of the Internet? | Design of the Times | Fast Company: “‘Google measures somebody’s reputational assets, turns it into a page rank, and determines search traffic,’ says Anderson. That traffic can then be converted to money. Think of the conversion this way: Links to page rank to search to traffic to ads to money. Like currency conversion rates in international banking, the conversion rate for reputation is now getting quite formal.

‘We now have a central banker for the internet economy,’ Anderson says. ‘Larry page is the Ben Bernake of the Google economy, since he controls page rank.’ “

In other words, (to paraphrase Willie Nelson) if you’re gonna dance at the affiliate marketing prom, you gotta pay the (Google) band.

Stay clean, stay away from paid links and paid posts and don’t rely too heavily on the tea leaves. In other words, make good use of Google’s WebMaster Central if you want to be successful.

This weekend, I found a nifty new domain registering search engine called Domainr.

If you’re looking for a more fun “web2.0” themed name for your next affiliate site, definitely check this out…

Give your domain search a happy ending.

There’s a whole world of domains out there—hundreds at the top-level and even more beyond—Domainr helps you explore them all. Some of our favorites are burri.to, fortuito.us and gu.st.

I’ve grabbed a couple of coupon themed sites using the service. Now, if I only had the time to build them all.

Domainr