Keep up the good work.

Raphael

Thank you for taking time to comment.

You know, I’ve been interviewing people in our industry on the problems of present-day affiliate marketing, and among the top 3 problems all of them have pointed out: (i) unethical affiliates (exact phrase used: “parasites and cookie overwriters”), (ii) lack of knowledge on the merchants’ part, and (iii) lack of ethics on the part of select affiliate networks (those that take advantage of the merchant’s ignorance, and allow for unethical affiliates to operate within the merchant’s affiliate programs). My personal views match those of the interviewees with only one difference — that of prioritization of problems to deal with. Just as yourself, I believe that the first priority should be given to education — education of merchants, and affiliates — as only educated people can discern between the right and wrong, the ethical and the unethical; and only educated affiliate marketers can make weighted decisions based on facts.

Once again, thank you for your comment.

Geno

Great points.

I agree on the benefits of manual approval of affiliate applications. It can get “time consuming” but it will save you from major affiliate marketing disasters (including the ones that can be brought to you by such players as ShopAtHome.com, OneCause.com, etc)

Geno

I definitely agree that networks can do a far better job of pre-screening affiliates and providing full disclosure of contact information, but you should never, ever rely on any network to handle your approvals, even one that keeps a fairly clean house. Essentially, you’re hiring a sales team and you need to know who you are working with and the only way to do that is to process applications manually. Time consuming, certainly, but the rewards are far greater down the road.

I would review them all in the light of the toolbar technology. Any affiliate that has a toolbar should have the toolbar tested by the affiliate manager (ideally, prior to accepting them into the affiliate program). If the toolbar intrudes with the end-user’s shopping behavior, making him/her click the toolbar offers (most frequently used ones are those of cashback, and donations to charitable or scholarship organizations), or even forcing a click, thereby overwriting the cookie of an affiliate who at that moment is doing the pre-sale job, the affiliate should not be accepted into the affiliate program.

Geno

I shall commission a review of affiliates registered with programs under our management. Feel free to send me a list of potential offenders and the reasons for their inclusion.

Thank you, Denis. The more of us write (and talk) about this — the sooner the changes will come.

In their recent “Leadership the Outward Bound Way” volume, Raynolds, Carter & Chatfield argued that the process of initiating change starts from “creating readiness” for the change. This readiness for change is created by (a) instilling “a sense of need and urgency,” followed by (b) “building confidence,” and (c) “fostering a culture that seeks continuous improvement.” Speaking of creating a sense of urgency, these researchers explain that it is important to “communicate the need for change and paint a picture of the new vision,” thereby “raising the urgency level,” and cultivating a desire for change (p. 278). In case with the adware/spyware affiliates problem, it is essential to create a sense of urgency among merchants that are being effected by the problem — often not even knowing about it. Once the sense of urgency is created, the merchants will be ready for the next steps: ceasing their partnerships with ShopAtHome.com and other unethical affiliates, filing relevant complaints with the affiliate networks, and rebuilding their affiliates programs through good affiliates.

As I have mentioned elsewhere, I applaud what you are doing at AffiliateTrust.com. Keep up the good work too! Let’s create the sense of urgency about this very real problem!

Geno