Her Media » Affiliate Training

Affiliate Training Webinar – September 2011

Her Media — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 17:31:49 +0000

September’s Free Affiliate Training Webinar – Affiliate Training – How website design can reduce or increase ad performance

9/15/2011 10:30 AM (UTC-08:00) Pacific Time

Click here to register

Affiliate or Ad revenue – either way your ads have to click and convert. Learn some of the basics on how to keep your advertisers happy with higher CTR (Click thru rates)by monetizing your site or blog design for ad performance.

20 minute presentation followed by the opportunity to have your site or blog reviewed.

Affiliate Banners Need a Call To Action

Her Media — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 17:55:23 +0000

Lets look at affiliate banners. Most of us want to monotize our blogs or website publications and affiliate or cpa programs are a great way to do that. Running affiliate banners that stink are a BAD way to ‘attempt’ to monetize your blog.

Take a look at the affiliate banners on your site. Do they have a call to action ?

The 125 banners to the right all have NO call to action. I found these on a blog which is interesting as I often here from bloggers that they won’t run affiliate programs because they don’t earn revenue.

You will find many small affiliate merchants that offer in house affiliate programs do not have hours of experience monitoring large volumes of ad impressions, clicks, and sales that a dedicated affiliate manager has. So their creative goals are usually to brand their business and look great. Or they simply don’t have the expereince to create the banners you need. The same holds true for some graphic artists, they design based on design not sales.

This will NOT help you as an affiliate drive converting (purchasing) visitors through your affiliate links.

I have watched a campaign receiving over 20 000 US only impressions a day go from a click through rate of .05 % to 1.1% simply by changing the creative to include a clear call to action and offer statement.

So how could these banners generate more qualifying clicks ? By including a simple clear call to action such as:

1. Click here
2. Shop Now
3. Buy Now
4. Go
5. Click for free shipping <- call to action & incentive or offer statement
6. Get info here
7. Check it out
8. Go Shopping
9. Subscribe now
10. Join now

I made this banner in about 3 minutes (so pardon the unfinished look) I want to show how just a simple question and call to action can increase your affiliate programs performance. So which of these would you click?

OR this one:

Call to action Call to Action Call to Action. Yes, it’s an affiliate marketing mantra. If your affiliate programs aren’t converting – check your banners.

Your affiliate merchant should be providing you with full sets of IAB Universal Package banner sets for a variety of offers and landing pages that allow you to target your affiliate offers to send them better qualified visitors.

If they aren’t it’s time to send them an email and let them know your sales would increase if they provided better and MORE creative.

One more disclaimer, this post is titled affiliate banners need a call to action. Really ALL banners need a call to action.

What’s an IAB creative standard ?

Her Media — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 00:31:37 +0000

Learning about online advertising standards is important for any blogger or website publisher hoping to earn revenue through advertising. Just as print advertising publishers have standard ad sizes and requirements, the same applies to online advertising.

Online advertising is not new, though the idea of blogs is relatively new, website publishers have been selling ad space long before the days of WordPress.

Account managers have tracked and monitored ads and know what works so don’t try to invent something that will push the big advertisers away from your website.

The guidelines were updated in November 2009 based on the input of leaders from creative agencies, media agencies, and publishers.

If you are hoping to work with large networks and advertisers you need to be able to support the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau)’s Universal Ad Package. The sizes are:

300 x 250 – (Medium Rectangle)
180 x 150 – (Rectangle)
160 x 600 – (Wide Skyscraper)
728 x 90 – (Leaderboard)

Additional sizes can be found on their wesbite however, the sizes above are standard to all large media buys.

When creating your own banners be sure to follow the guidelines. Banners should have a file size of no larger then 40K and animations should be 15 seconds.

Be a great publisher – keep your layout clean and make sure your template or theme accommodates the Universal ad package.

Kay McFarlane is an outsourced affiliate manager specializing in products and services for parents and women. Become a partner at http://www.HerAffiliateManager.com and receive free affiliate coaching and opportunities.

Affiliate Parasites and why you need to know what they are

Her Media — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 05:09:06 +0000

As an affiliate you need to learn about affiliate parasites to protect your commissions. You work hard to bring quality visitors to your website. An affiliate parasite will write over the cookies set on your website with their own cookies to steal your hard earned affiliate commissions. Hiding your affiliate links will not necessarily prevent the theft of your affiliate commissions by an affiliate parasite. Hiding your affiliate links may help but to prevent affiliate commission theft you need to ensure you only promote parasite free programs,

So how do these parasites work ? You can watch an example HERE.

Pop ups (adware) and toolbars are the two most common affiliate commission predators.

If you haven’t already you should subscribe to Benjamin Edelman’s feed to learn what providers and companies you should be keeping an eye on.

As a Merchant, establishing your company as a reputable affiliate merchant to your potential affiliates is critical. The risk you take by using a network that is not parasite free may easily result in the failure of your affiliate program and the tarnishing of yoru company;s reputation. If you plan to generate a reliable consistent revenue stream based on affiliate partner sales you need to know the concerns your affiliate’s have with affiliate parasites and take the steps needed to protect their commissions.

Share a Sale is a parasite free Affiliate Network and if you are considering an affiliate program, its the first network you should be checking out.

Additional Information on affialite parasites:

AMWSO

Affilaite Marketing Forums