Category: Marketing

Performics has released a series of upgrades and usability improvements to its reporting platform, ConnectCommerce this week.

Primarily, the updates focused on an improved links interface, advertiser profile interface, enhanced site description for publisher profiles and more accurate accounting reports.

Here’s a screen shot of the new links interface which is a drastic improvement over the old system. Instead of having to drill down layer by layer, the newest links from the network are shown by default and results can be narrowed by a series of available parameters.

The advertisers tab and interface is also improved in this version and allows for better sorting based on user preferences and categories of offers:

These categories act something like tags and allow for much more fluid and intuitive stat browsing:

As the current dust-up over affiliate network user interfaces has shown, there is a market demand for easier navigation, more options and less need to needlessly drill down for stats, banners or links that should be much easier to find.

At the end of the day, this is all about efficiency. The network that can provide the best offer and the best payout was always the winner in the past. However, that paradigm is slowly changing to include the network that has the best user experience and will continue to do so as networks assert their necessity of place in the market.

The circle is complete and Think Partnership (who acquired Kowabunga!) has rebranded itself as Kowabunga!.

Hi Sam,

I have some very exciting information to share with you about our Company.

We are announcing today that Think Partnership will now be doing business as Kowabunga!.

We decided that we needed a company name that more accurately reflects our leading position in the market and conveys the energy, spirit of innovation and excitement we share as an organization. We believe that Kowabunga!, which many of our participating advertisers and affiliates will also recognize as the name of our popular CPA subsidiary, is the perfect name to express our passion and conviction for performance based marketing solutions. When we say Kowabunga!, we think performance and technology, and we mean it.

Our company’s mission is to be the world’s best performance marketing solutions provider, a goal that we believe can be achieved through our strong mix of brands and innovative products and technologies, a good example of which is our recently launched ValidClick AdExchange. I encourage you to learn more about the many ways we can work with you to meet your marketing and advertising objectives.

Sincerely,

Scott P. Mitchell
President and CEO

There’s also a new website design to go along with the rebranding.

Shawn Collins, Jim Kukral and Sam Harrelson expound on web celebs, affiliate network interfaces, iJustine and Jim's GuyLights (about an hour)

http://www.hipcast.com/playweb?audioid=Pce935ca9e5e04f773c5773d674d6ba6cYl9wRVREYmd9&buffer=5&fc=FFFFFF&pc=CCFF33&kc=FFCC33&bc=FFFFFF&brand=1&player=ap28

Download the MP3 File

Show Notes

– TechCrunch Presidential Endorsements: TechCrunch
– Spammer Sam: CostPerNews
– ShowYourAdHere.com: 45n5
– Shawn in Middle of CJ/Pepperjam Spat: Pepperjam Blog
– Super Affiliates For Sale: Affiliate Summit Blog
– Zac Johnson Doing it Right: Zac Johnson’s Blog
– Jim is a Twitter Hater: Jim Kukral’s Blog
– Affiliate Summit Exhibitors Are Missing Out (By Not Doing Video)

Visit GeekCast.fm for More Great Geek Marketing Podcasts!

Forget the age old CPA networks vs affiliate networks argument.

What about CPA vs CPC? That argument stirs up fun fighting words.

Aaron Goldman has an interesting piece on SearchInsider about this issue and the potential for macroeconomic trends to have a very real impact on the search and direct response industries:

Will CPA Get its Day?

There are a couple macro trends that lead me to believe a move to CPA might be in the cards. The first is consolidation in the space. For the first time, each of the Big 3 owns reputable ad serving technology. Not only does this provide access to conversion activity, but it delivers more reliable data that marketers will accept for billing purposes. The second is a movement toward transparency that’s pervading all facets of the marketing landscape. The inherent conflicts within GoogleClick, MicQuantive, and YahRightMedia demand a level of transparency heretofore unseen in the search space. There is simply no more transparent pricing model than CPA.

My take is that it is clear that marketers across the board have yet to realize the impact that CPA can have on the overall market economy given the reliance of more and more web2.0, mobile, video or social platforms on response instead of click or impression.

Clearly, there’s a need for improved and evolved metrics in online marketing. I think CPA could be hinting at the possible future of all online advertising and marketing.

Thoughts?

With last week’s launch of the pepperjamNETWORK and the discussion that ensued about the role of affiliate networks in the online marketing space, it’s interesting to take note of some of the other networks out there that exist (in size but not necessarily quality) between the CJ/Linkshare/Performics/ShareASale affiliate network model and the more direct response driven CPA networks.

One of those networks is North Carolina based LinkConnector. LinkConnector has been active in the industry since 2004, but it looks as if they are picking up steam and advertisers according to a new press release.

LinkConnector kicked off 2008 with nine merchants from the Internet Retailer’s Top 500 Guide, tripling its market share reach, and closing the gap between itself and other large networks, such as Commission Junction. LinkConnector has redefined for many merchants and affiliates what it is they want from an affiliate marketing network. Many merchants from the Top 500 Guide selected LinkConnector for its exclusive technologies, not found in other networks, and for its notable list of high quality affiliates.

“Many top Internet retailers took notice of LinkConnector in 2007, seeking new and better solutions in affiliate marketing,” said Choots Humphries, LinkConnector Co-President. “Internet Retailer’s independent survey affirms that we are rapidly capturing market share. We believe this is due in part to our exclusive technologies and unique approaches, differentiating us from the crowd. We expect to again grow by more than 100 percent in 2008, providing affiliate marketing solutions to a growing number of merchants from the Top 500 List.”

So, the important question here is how networks such as LinkConnector, or the new pepperjamNETWORK or even the increasingly important CPA networks like AzoogleAds (not to mention agencies like MediaWhiz or the budding widget ad networks) will impact both the affiliate market and the more mentioned “Big 4” networks?

Is there even a “Big 4” anymore?

2008 should be fun as we find out.

Breaking Bad is a new movie TV show coming out about a high school chemistry teacher who creates his own meth lab business. Sounds like a silly movie, but the viral marketing campaign is tremendous.

Here’s one I just sent over to Jim Kurkal:

http://www.waltswisdom.com/flash/waltsplayer_ext.swf?_id=2001jsfyw1

You can waste some of your own time by freely contributing to the marketing of the movie here.

Looks like this will be a hit viral campaign along the lines of that stupid “put-your-face-on-a-dancing-elf” thing from this past holiday season.

Heading to Affiliate Summit on Feb 24-26 at the Rio Hotel (as you should be)?  Have a Mac?  Still haven’t booked a hotel room?

Then this little desktop widget is for you:

Las Vegas Travel Widget… Get travel deals on Las Vegas, Reno Nevada and Lake Tahoe. Select on back which feed you want to display. Travel deals from HotelsOnTheStrip.com which searches 28 sites using the Travelocity search engine.

Las Vegas Travel Widget: Mac Update 

Brian Chappell over at MarketingPilgrim has a list of 75 or so internet marketing professionals actively using Twitter. If you’re new or old to Twitter this is a nice resource:

Many underground conversations go on within Twitter that never make it to the blogosphere or news sites. It can be a dynamite location for link bait ideas, breaking stories, and general topics you might not think about on a daily basis. You might even find yourself obtaining clientèle through it. I really could go on and on with what you could do with Twitter.

As an aside, over on my personal blog (?), I made some remarks about how Twitter has changed since the “good old days.”

Marketing Pilgrim – 75+ Internet Marketing Gurus on Twitter

Just heard from ShareASale’s piano man Brian Littleton on Twitter that the “Under the Stars” party for Affiliate Summit West will be held at the Palms (btw, that’s the 100th post for the ShareASale blog… congrats to the SaS team on that):

ShareASale will be hosting a cocktail party Sunday night February 24th in Las Vegas, in celebration of the Affiliate Summit which is being held in Las Vegas Feb 24-26.

If you’re going to be at the Summit, this is a can’t miss event.  Hopefully, no one will thrown into the pool with all of their clothes on again.

Not to continually beat up on CJ, Linkshare, Performics, ShareASale, LinkConnector and now pepperjamNETWORK but why aren’t affiliate networks doing this??

Overlay.tv is an upcoming video network that lets you add hyperlinks and image overlays to video content in order to monetize the clips. The Overlay technology and network won’t be launched until Valentine’s Day, but the service is getting some early press thanks to its funding news. $4.6 million in Series A financing has been provided by Celtic House Venture Partners, EdgeStone Capital Partners and Tech Capital Partners.

Seriously.

There’s a ton of money and traction to be made in the video space. The tech doesn’t look that difficult considering the amount of money that the affiliate networks are making.

Lead us to the promised land of innovation, oh great networks. Please.