For ages there has been an inherent disconnect between the promotional method an incentive affiliate uses, and the end goal of every pay-per-lead program — or that of generating “potential sales contacts“. After all, when the chief end-user motivator is cashback, points, virtual currency, or anything of this kind, it is very hard to reap quality leads (read: contacts that are truly interested in your product/service).

Now it looks like we finally have a good solution to the problem. Don’t know if you’ve seen RingRevenue‘s latest press release, which was easy to miss as it came out concurrently with the last day of Affiliate Summit West 2012, but take a look at this before you read the rest: Tapjoy and RingRevenue Partner to Deliver Innovative Call-Based Advertising Program.

Of course, it’s a huge advance for mobile, but it seemed to me there was potential beyond mobile in this. So, I reached out to RingRevenue, and asked Drew Thorne-Thomsen (DT), the company’s VP of Customer Development, three questions:

1. Your new partnership with Tapjoy seems like a tremendous advance for mobile. The path from using a mobile app to placing a call is clearly significantly shorter/easier than that between using a website and placing that call. Are there any other specifics that you’d like to emphasize in connection with this new development of yours?

DT: It’s true, the path from mobile app to placing a call is shorter than that path on the web. One of the things that makes mobile and call-based advertising so perfect together is that the mobile phone at its most core function is a phone. But the really exciting thing here is for advertisers who value phone calls, because it changes the game for them. If you look at industries such as insurance, financial services, and education, the “form-based lead generation” industry was basically created to help them get more prospective customers on the phone. The consumer fills out a form and someone calls them back. But this process has never served the advertiser or the consumer well. Advertisers deal with declining re-contact rates and the consumer deals with having their personal contact data sold off to who knows where (being contacted when they are busy). When all either party wanted to do was talk on the phone. When you add in mobile phones and only 3 inches of screen real-estate… consumers don’t want to fill out forms on their phones. With call-based advertising, we cut all of that out and make the experience seamless for all parties involved. We shorten the time it takes for a consumer to be connected and provide highly-qualified leads direct to the advertiser’s call center. And by using unique phone numbers that tie each caller to the action they are taking, we make it really easy for the loyalty member to get their rewards. Once their qualifying action is taken via the phone, for example an insurance quote, we immediately notify the loyalty program — like Tapjoy’s — so they can issue the rewards.

2. For those not familiar with how exactly pay-per-call programs powered by RingRevenue work, could you specifically elaborate on the different levels of filtering available to merchants (to refine the qualification process)? Naturally, filtering makes a world of difference.

DT: Filtering is certainly the key to making phone calls work with affinity and loyalty programs. The goal is to ensure when a caller hits the advertiser’s call center, they are equally motivated to buy or sign up as someone who comes in via search for example. Starting with the advertiser’s ability to define the profile attributes of their target audience to setting qualifying criteria in a specific campaign, the advertiser is in control of defining their ideal caller. We create transparency between the advertiser and the loyalty publisher to make sure they are aligned with what makes a quality call.

With our platform we provide quality filtering via our technology that includes criteria that automatically filters out callers based on targeting, but also through our highly customizable interactive voice response (IVR) system we can apply virtually any level of filtering a client can imagine. In the case of Allstate for example, they only want to talk to a consumer who is serious about an auto insurance quote, and meets some very basic criteria such as owning a car, possessing a drivers license and living in a state where the offer is valid.

3. Similarly to Tapjoy in mobile, many online affiliates employ similar principles of rewarding the end consumer for the action the affiliate desires to see. However, be it with social games or various incentive affiliates, I’ve always had a problem with making them work for pay-per-lead programs. It seems that this solution is also a big step towards helping an affiliate manager make incentive affiliates work for PPL programs. Have you thought of it in this light too?

DT: You are exactly correct. This problem with PPL programs and affinity programs has been quality. Couponing and loyalty represents a large percentage of traffic across the performance marketing networks. The opportunity for advertisers to get broad distribution is huge. But there is always the question of quality. This is why calls work so well with affinity and loyalty programs. The quality filtering we are able to apply ensures that when the caller gets to the call center agent, they are sufficiently motivated and likely to complete the action. In the case of the Allstate campaign, once the caller makes it through the qualification process, they are staying on the line with agents for an average of 15 minutes or more. So if you look at call duration as a function of call quality, the calls being connected are very, very good and are resulting in quotes for auto insurance.

For other types of advertisers, take a floral delivery company for example, they already know that phone calls are their top converting channel. Now we can help them get additional reach and distribution through their affinity marketing partners without sacrificing quality. For the loyalty publishers, the benefits are pretty significant as well in terms of revenue they are missing out on right now.  All of the performance marketing networks using our platform have high-value offers that loyalty publishers can easily start promoting and earning revenue from today. Plus, our account team is happy to help them get set up and make sure their promotions are optimized for this type of campaign.

So there you have it… Looking forward to trying it first-hand.

We’ve been monitoring what’s been happening in California with affiliate nexus tax over the years, and now that the bill AB155 is signed, and many merchants are re-instating and/or re-inviting California affiliates back into their programs, I thought it’d be interesting to get an affiliate take on these things, and reached out to one of the first U.S. affiliate marketers I met in person (some 5-6 years ago) — a California-based writer and affiliate star Rexanne Mancini (more about her here).

Today I’d like to bring you my interview with her:

GP: Rexanne, thank you for agreeing to be interviewed on this important topic.

RM: My pleasure, Geno.

GP: To begin with, how would you summarize what has happened in California with (and around) the affiliate nexus tax law in the course of this year?

RM: CA legislators proposed that the “affiliate nexus bill” would result in an income generation for the state of more than 3 billion dollars, based on he assumption that if a merchant had CA-based affiliates, this represented a “physical presence” for these merchants (in effect, getting around the “taxation without representation” interstate commerce laws currently protecting merchants from the onerous burden of collecting state tax on sales made outside their own state’s borders).

Governor Gerry Brown (CA) was inundated with phone calls, emails and affiliates present in Sacramento trying to educate him on the futility of this law, which didn’t help. When he signed the proposed budget, more than 25 thousand California affiliates were dropped by Amazon.com and hundreds of other online merchants who simply had to drop CA affiliates in order to evade the new law and therefore pay no tax to the state of CA for online purchases anyway. For these merchants, it was business as usual because their affiliate programs were still in tact, still selling to residents in CA but California-based affiliates were denied the ability to sell through their programs. All it did was disrupt the businesses of California-based affiliates and created lost revenue for the constituents of the state.

GP: As a California-based affiliate, I’m sure, you were terminated from multiple affiliate programs as soon as (on July 29) Governor Brown signed the bill into law. Two questions in this regard: first of all, approximately what percentage of merchants you worked with terminated you from their programs because of the law, and, secondly, was it the termination from Amazon’s affiliate program, or something else, that was the worst hit for you?

RM: I’m not sure of percentages, however, I was dropped from about 150 affiliate programs overnight and hundreds more over the following weeks, creating havoc on my web sites and greatly diminishing the user experience for visitors to my pages.

The termination of my Amazon.com affiliate account had the hardest hitting effect. I had several thousand Amazon.com links on my site, across hundreds of pages.  Amazon.com continued to makes sales from the links on my site because the links still landed on the Amazon.com targeted pages. I just wasn’t making any commission on these sales. The other merchant programs that dropped me were through affiliate networks and most of those links were immediately invalid when clicked from my sites. I’m not sure which was worse. lol – That Amazon had no disruption of sales through my efforts on their behalf while I was denied commissions on sales irks me. Granted, my visitor experience was not affected which is a small consolation.

GP: We know that Amazon has recently invited CA affiliates to re-instate themselves in their affiliate program. Have you seen any other major affiliate programs doing the same?

RM: Yes, many other merchants have re-instated California affiliates because of this reprieve.  Ironically, it took Amazon.com the longest time to reinstate CA affiliates, with most merchants reinstating CA affiliates immediately. Amazon.com (conveniently?) waited until the beginning of Q4 to reinstate.

GP: On Sept 8 Amazon.com cut a deal with CA legislators (and on Sept 23 Gov. Brown signed it into a law) which postpones the collection of the tax for one year. What would be your forecast/expectations on where it’s gonna go?

RM: I’m not confident of my opinions about what will happen a year down the line to talk about it with any authority. I believe Amazon.com struck a deal with the state of California to  build warehouses in the state, thus creating a physical presence in CA anyway which will result in Amazon.com having to pay CA sales tax if a federal Internet tax law is not enacted by the end of the year. I’m not sure I understand all the particulars or how this will help Amazon.com in its attempt to avoid paying Ca sales tax. I believe the idea is to wait for a federal Internet tax law to be imposed which will negate the state laws that have been passed. If there is no federal law enacted within a year, my understanding is that online merchants will again be liable for CA sales tax. It all sounds like a crap shoot to me, evidently based on if a federal law is passed within a year.  Again, the Ca-based affiliates are the pawns in the chess game. i.e.: disposable. It could happen and California affiliates need to be on top of any legislature moving forward and be ready for any eventual fallout.

GP: Is there anything that hasn’t been brought up in blogs, speeches and articles that you’d like to draw affiliate community’s attention to (in regards to anything related to the situation in California)?

RM: There are so many issues that this legislature has brought to light for small business owners and affiliates, across all the states that have passed these misguided laws. Most importantly for affiliates of any state, the need for diversification across multiple merchant programs to withstand these attacks on our livelihoods.

Another issue that I think needs to be looked at closely is the viability of affiliate marketing as a business model. It concerns me that individual affiliates have no real power in this industry, or any real value when state legislation can wreak havoc on our livelihoods overnight. The foundation of this business is on unstable ground and I think we need to build a reinforced structure going forward to protect the affiliate business model.

GP: You’ve touched upon the stings that will, undoubtedly, resonate in the hearts of many of my readers, Rexanne. Once again, thank you for your time.

Conference keynote speakers are always great to talk to. So, I decided to reach out to one of the Affiliate Summit East 2011 ones, Marc Ostrofsky (MO below), and interview him, asking questions that my blog readers may have wanted to ask… Today I’d like to bring you this interview:

GP: Marc, thank you for taking the time to give me this interview. Can you tell my blog readers a bit about yourself?

MO: I love to play golf.  I love to Travel – Italy is as good as it gets for me.  I work out and swim.  I was always into sports – like Racquetball, but as I get older, the athletic ability is like my hair – it’s seems to be going away as I age. I have a lovely wife, five beautiful daughters, two dogs and live in a wonderful home in Houston, Texas.

I also love to teach.  My dad was a professor.  My sister was a professor.  I think I just have it in my DNA.   But first, I had to make money and prove something works – and then teach it.    So I always get involved with a project, company or idea so I can say I actually did it… and that is where Get Rich Click! came from.  My own companies played in many of these games… then I set out and researched for years how others make money online.  Maybe that’s why we hit the New York Times Bestseller list… because the data in that book is real… it’s not made up — I’ve done it and show how so many others have done it.

GP: Your 1999 sale of Business.com (for $7.5 million) got you into the Guinness Book of World Records for the most expensive domain name ever sold. Do you still hold that record?

MO: I paid $150,000, the most money ever paid for a single domain name – just the URL, no website, no income stream, no database… nothing but the URL.  Today, money spent on a Domain Name often brings more than just the URL.  For example Sex.com was sold for $13 million; however the buyers got a domain name, a database of clients, an income stream and a website even if they wanted to redo it.

GP: You’re known for coining the notion of domain names as “Internet real estate”. We all understand that whoever was there first, obviously, grabbed the better “real estate”. Are there any good names left for online marketers to acquire today? And if so, what purpose makes more sense: development, reselling, or maybe reselling the developed “property” at a later date?

MO: Sure there are!  But they might be much more expensive than the original $8 to buy them.

This “Internet” based Real Estate is bought, sold, rented or leased out.  You buy an empty piece of land and build on it.

Think about the similarities. You get a domian name and it’s the same as an empty piece of land. You can buy it, sell it, lease it out (for the traffic it gets) or build on it.  You can put a simple house on (a website) or a giant skyscraper on it (like eBay or Facebook).

The big difference is that the speculation in names, like the goldrush in California, is all but gone.  But, you can buy great pieces of real estate on the secondary market.  There are sites that offer tens of thousands of domain names for sale at prices much higher than the original $8.  Some names go for hundreds of thousands if not millons of dollars.

So you can play in this game for as low as $8 or so.  Or as high as $10,000 or $100,000.  I really do not suggest you do any of this without learning the game and the types of prices that some names command. Great deals are harder and harder to find these days.   I call this the “intellectual property” lottery.  It’s up to your brain to think of the next hot piece of real estate and you may win big.  People speculate on movie titles, the next presidential election.. you name it, there are domain name speculatiors that buy a lot of $8. domain names trying to win the next “bit hit”.

GP: Your newest book “Get Rich Click!: The Ultimate Guide to Making Money Online” has already become the New York Times and Wall Street Journal business bestseller. Congratulations! What is the book about, and can it be of any benefit to affiliates? The title certainly presupposes this.

MO: Thank you.  We are thrilled with the way Get Rich Click! has been received.  The book is about how anyone can make money using tools from the Internet.  You will learn:

1. How to make money online using just a photo-requiring no money up front
2. How people care making money using blogs, email, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube
3. How you can buy Internet “traffic” for a few cents per visitor and sell it for 5x, 10x and even 25x the upfront amount
4. How to make a full time living from home creating eBooks that are sold by others
5. How to create simple e-commerce sites that make money the same day they’re live
6. Learn the “Lead Generation” business and make money providing leads to other websites.

…and yes, it can be a benefit to affiliates.  We have over 1,100 affiliates who are benefiting from the sale of Get Rich Click!

GP: And talking about earning from the Internet, if you were to name 3 things that anyone can start doing today to make money online, what would they be?

MO:

1. Sell it then buy it.  All you need is a digital camera – or find a photo online of the item for sale.
2. Learn about affiliate marketing.  That is the biggest secret to wealth online.  As you know, Affiliate Marketing means you sell something and get paid a commission for the sale.   For example, you can sign up to be an affiliate of Amazon.com.   The give you a link to Amazon.com followed by your name.   Each time anyone clicks on that link and buys a book from Amazon, you will be paid a commission!  It’s really brilliant.  So if you have a link for my book, and you tell 200 friends on Facebook or via email and provide them with that link, each time someone buys a book you get paid!
3. Here is a great idea.  Many people like to read books.  If you think you can write up a good summary or review of the book, do that.  Then send that review out to all of your friends and put an Amazon link at the bottom.  If any of them like the review and click on the link, and buy the book, you get a commission.

At that point, your goal is to build your mailing list as large as you can so more people get it and more people click on the link to buy!

Another market I can discuss, should there be time, is to talk about lead generation.  On the internet, firms like Colleges, Universities, Insurance firms and Mortgage Brokers pay for leads or potential clients. Here’s a good idea.  Start a website like “Top 20 Colleges in New York”.   Review the colleges… and at the end, put up their “application to apply” to the college. Many colleges pay up to $25 per application filled out!   You just send them 100 applications and they send you $2500.  This is a great way to make money.  It’s not “overnight” but it’s also not hard.  You start by learning about Lead Generation, how it works and which colleges (or mortage brokers) pay for such leads.

GP: What do you think of monetizing social networking presence in places like Facebook or LinkedIn? If one can make money from it, how exactly would they go about it?

MO: Yes. It’s all about having a database of friends, clients, buyers, former buyers and even lists you rent.  A Facebook or LinkedIn list is a list like any other.  You can sell to them as easily as you can to others.  In fact, they trust you which often makes it easier to sell to them.  But be careful not to push them or much or you will lose those friends …quickly.

GP: And my final question to you: on August 21 you’ll be doing the opening keynote for Affiliate Summit East 2011 in New York City. Taken that many of my blog readers will be there, can you give us a sneak peak (or a teaser) on what to expect?

MO: At this time, I am working on finalizing my thoughts and ideas for the speech. However, I am looking forward to seeing everyone there.  Affiliate Summit East is a great place to meet and learn from a variety of people.

Thank you Geno for this opportunity.  Hope to see you at ASE.

Less than an hour ago HasOffers has announced the launch of Adtribution, its new development called to fix what’s “broken” in present-day “online advertising” [source]. Intrigued I reached out to Peter Hamilton, Partner and CMO at HasOffers, and asked him a few questions about their new development… Here is an exclusive interview on the subject:

GP: First of all, congratulations on the launch of Adtribution! Excellent name idea, by the way. I have three follow-up questions for you.

You’re using some strong language in your today’s press release. Do you really believe the current affiliate marketing model to be “broken” or was that more of a PR technique?

PH: We truly believe that online advertising (especially affiliate marketing) has been operating on old technology that can’t provide enough insight to everyone involved. Otherwise, why wouldn’t every advertiser be pouring money into performance advertising. In theory they should only be paying for real sales and leads right? There should be no end to there budgets, but we know that’s not the case.

Furthermore, if several publishers influenced a user to purchase something, why should only the last one be compensated and the others left out in the cold? Or worse, if each publisher is on a different network (with separate cookies), why should the advertiser pay out 2 or 3 times on top of the pay per click, SEO, and display budgets they’re already shelling out? In order for online advertising budgets to grow, advertisers must be able to compensate publishers based on their contribution to the user’s buying decision. The greatest barrier to moving forward with this idea has always been tracking technology.

GP: I agree with the premise that many more than one affiliate participate in the pre-sale process, and when we compensate just one (be it the one who sent the first click, or the last click), we’re essentially making a judgement saying “ok, you’re the one who influenced the customer most; therefore, you deserve the full remuneration”. Your press release said that the “new cookie-less technology” will actually enable merchants “to see the true influence of multiple affiliate and publisher relationships on a single user.” How exactly? How do you measure “the true influence”?

PH: We can’t really give away our secret sauce yet, but I can tell you that we have developed a way to very accurately track users across publisher/affiliate domains. This serves as the building block for applying our own attribution algorithms, based on a number of criteria. Measuring the “true influence” will certainly be an art and science to be perfected over time, but we are able to get really close already. I can’t wait to see how it continues to develop as we have more data to work with.

GP: Lucas has mentioned the fact that merchants “are often double and triple paying for acquisitions while some of the most valuable publishers are losing out big on commissions”. Let me turn that statement around, and look at it from a different angle. Will your new platform/technology work with merchants’ other channels (e.g.: display, paid search, retargeting efforts, etc)?

PH: Clever you…

In fact yes, this new technology will account for influence from external channels and apply that influence to the compensation model.  Again, you’ll have to wait for more details on that, but I’m really excited about this facet of Adtribution because it allows merchants to better take into account their overall CPA’s and increase their budgets accordingly.

We do not intend to become an aggregation tool to manage all of these external advertising channels, but we do plan to provide analytics and adjustments based on the influence of those additional channels.

Wishing HasOffers luck with this. It’s always good to see progress in our industry.

It’s been over a year since I have given my last two interviews. Both happened in early spring 2010: one was given to the Search Engine Journal, while the other one to the Revenue Performance magazine. After that I dove into the work on my newest book, and only now that the book is finished and released, I have a bit more time for interviews, articles and new conference appearances.

Over the past two days, two new interviews came out, and today I’d like to draw your attention to them.

One was with Janice Scrim of ShareResults:

…and the other interview (which turned into more of an article on “affiliate management nightmares”) was with Linda Bustos of GetElastic:

I thoroughly enjoyed both, and want to thank both Janice and Linda for their initiatives.

Earlier this morning a new RingRevenue press release has hit the wire. It covers how financial services marketers are benefiting from call performance marketing, and also introduces a white paper case study on financial services. The white paper is an interesting read, discussing the challenges facing financial services marketers today and detailing how Progrexion Marketing increased Lexington Law‘s affiliate program performance, improving their distribution and increasing sales with call performance marketing.

RingRevenue provides their pay per call solution for nearly every major affiliate network out there (Commission Junction, LinkShare, Google Affiliate Network, ShareASale, to name but a few). The above-quoted press release quoted LinkShare’s Vice President of Lead Generation:

“Financial Services is one of the top performing verticals that we specialize in,” said Russ Pechman VP Lead Generation at LinkShare. “Fully integrated campaigns that combine online lead generation with the ability to let consumers connect live through a phone call far outperform those that only provide consumers one option. This combination gives advertisers the opportunity to really impact their bottom line revenue with incremental sales.”

So, we reached out to Russ to ask him a few questions about call performance marketing in general, as well as its adoption by the financial services industry in particular. Below you may find the interview (where “GP” stands for “Geno Prussakov”, while “RP” for “Russ Pechman”):

GP: First off, how is the LinkShare Lead Advantage network different from the main LinkShare network?

RP: LinkShare Lead Advantage focuses on high-quality customer acquisition, typically for verticals like financial services and education (CPA or CPL). Our platform is multi-channel, and we manage our lead quality closely. The main LinkShare network is open to all affiliates, and lends itself to a rev share of sale commission structure. So, Lead Advantage might promote an offer like Allstate, while the main network would run Macy’s.

GP: Call Performance Marketing is certainly gaining momentum in the affiliate space.  What trends are you seeing around the adoption of pay-per-call?

RP: We’re seeing a more Publishers now that are educated about ppcall than say, a year ago. We spend less time introducing the concept, which I  think is due to the efforts of the affiliate networks and Ring Revenue in getting the word out.  So the rate of application by Publishers into ppcall programs has been growing rapidly. Same goes with the Advertiser side. It’s an easier sell now.

GP: Does the LinkShare Pay-Per-Call publisher base differ from the traditional LinkShare publisher base? If so, how?

RP: We’ve seen a new type of Publisher that promotes Advertisers through new channels. I wouldn’t be surprised if the biggest use of mobile by affiliates right now is with pay-per-call campaigns. But we’re also now seeing more of the “traditional” Publisher, who realizes they can use the same types of banners or text links but will see improved conversions because the call adds a new action.

GP: How does call performance marketing or pay-per-call improve or compliment a financial services firm’s existing online lead generation activities?

RP: One is tracking — an Advertiser can now better identify which inbound calls came from which online sources. So they’ve got transparency into their online sources. It also creates efficiency. Online lead gen used to be mainly about outbound calls and everything that’s entailed with it — lead scrubbing, calling, trying again… But inbound calls typically convert higher and eliminates the resource drain of the outbound process. Plus, conversions are typically higher on inbound.

GP: What types of financial services firms are starting to leverage inbound calls and seeing results?

RP: We’re seeing it across several types — insurance and lending are the two biggies right now. But credit cards and other credit services are also looking at it.

GP: Thank you for your time, Russ.

Yesterday RingRevenue has circulated a press release, which quoted with some truly impressive statistics:

…record mobile campaign growth, with third quarter call volume up more than 500 percent compared with the first quarter of this year. With conversion rates as high as 47 percent and top mobile publishers generating more than $75,000 per month in pay-per-call revenues, mobile has become a significant channel for high-impact call-based campaigns [underlining mine].

So, I reached out to Jason Spievak (JS), CEO of RingRevenue, to see if I (GP) could dig a little deeper into this obviously happy marriage of mobile affiliate marketing and pay per call.

Below you may find my interview with Mr. Spievak:

GP: Jason, first of all, congratulations on the truly impressive growth registered with mobile affiliate campaigns run through RingRevenue. What are the top 3 marketing avenues that work best with mobile affiliate marketing now? My guess would be text, mobile SEO, and paid search. What’s the reality?

JS: Yes.  Search, mobile SEO and text are among the top performing publisher formats on mobile.  With paid search, there’s significant overall lift for both clicks and calls when publishers can include a phone number in a mobile ad placement.  Basically, it lets consumers interact with an advertiser however they choose, and the publisher still gets credit.  On the organic side, we now see publishers including phone numbers in page titles to drive more calls and create more consumer confidence in engaging with that advertiser.

Text messaging is a little different because it depends so heavily on the relevance of the offer to the text message.  The volume is absolutely there, but the quality doesn’t compare to search, for example, where you’ve got an active consumer seeking out a solution.  And that’s where the RingRevenue platform comes in, as we’re able to quality filter those inbound callers from mobile campaigns and make sure that the advertiser’s phone is only ringing with qualified callers.

We also see subscription-based apps like Mobile Posse performing well, as they have an active community open to receiving the content being pushed out to them.  Phone numbers positioned in other mobile apps like gaming are growing but have a ways to go.  Including phone numbers in shopping apps and social media apps is showing early potential as well and will likely grow as a pay-per-call channel.

Whether it’s online or mobile, effective targeting is still an important part of any campaign and has a major impact on volume and conversion rates on mobile just as it does in traditional online marketing.

GP: Without giving away anyone’s secrets, what are some of the top mobile affiliate marketing vehicles that seem to drive fastest now (for example, coupons, demographically-targeted promos, comparison shopping, etc)?

JS: Happy to share some secrets, but you’ll have to come to Santa Barbara with your fishing gear to get them.  What we can share is that — like with online marketing — it’s all about reaching a consumer at the right time with the right offer.  Coupon and comparison sites work well online, but those types of publishers haven’t quite yet figured out how to reproduce that consumer experience on the smaller screen.  Pay-per-call is a very natural fit in that environment because all of us have a phone in our hands at the moment we’re engaging with their media, and the most intuitive consumer action then is to click to make a call.  And the conversion rates are much higher as well for two reasons.  The first is that the consumer who calls in is more committed to the process than one who clicks.  And the second is that a trained sales agent is converting those callers to customers 30%-50% of the time, compared to a much lower conversion rate through an application or mobile web interface.

GP: What, in your opinion, are the most underutilized (yet highly promising) methods of mobile marketing (e.g.: location-based marketing, video, etc)?

JS: Even though search is one of the top ways affiliates are leveraging pay-per-call, it is still probably one of the most underutilized.  There are a lot of online search affiliates who haven’t invested in this space yet.  They know from their traditional online marketing that mobile doesn’t convert very well on clicks.  Consumers who search on their mobile and are driven to websites or landing pages typically have a high abandonment rate because the experience isn’t easy on the smaller screen.  They plan to come back to it later when they get to their computer.  But the downside is they don’t go back through the affiliate link.  They go directly to the advertiser, and the publisher doesn’t get the credit for the lead even though they paid for the click.  By including a phone number in the mobile search results, not only are publishers seeing higher click-through rates as a result, but they’re also driving high-value calls directly from the mobile.  And in many cases the call-based EPCs are higher than click-based EPCs.

Local marketing on mobile is also in its very early days, but we’re seeing it begin to take hold on our platform.  Advertisers can set their payouts based on targeted regions, and we’re seeing more affiliates on the platform now who are interested in promoting local businesses with pay-per-call campaigns.  Most local businesses aren’t looking to conduct an e-commerce transaction.  They’re looking to get you on the phone or in the door.  And having the phone number right there in the ad or the search results drives that direct connection between the consumer and the local advertiser.  The challenge here is that certain types of local service providers will pay tens of dollars per call whereas restaurants and other local business typically can afford to pay much less.  So, targeted local websites and regionally focused apps can outperform the much broader local directory sites.

GP: Mobile is undoubtedly a great marketing opportunity, but what about privacy issues (e.g.: people possibly being spammed by mobile affiliates), and does RingRevenue have any mechanisms set in place to address this?

JP: Yes. We take privacy very seriously, and we provide advertisers with all the controls they need to monitor their calls from individual publisher sources and the ability to instantly shut down publishers who may not be engaging in acceptable practices based on the terms the advertiser has outlined.

When applying to campaigns, publishers are asked about their promotional methods and their profile information is shared with the advertisers.  And advertisers have the ability to accept or reject applications based on that information.  Advertisers also have the ability to reverse any transactions for publishers who may have engaged in unacceptable practices.  So the incentive for publishers to engage in that kind of activity is low.  Our network partners also have network quality teams that are continuously monitoring applications and publisher behavior to ensure privacy guidelines are met and adhered to.

GP: Thank you for your time, Jason. It is always a pleasure chatting with you.

Not too long ago I have found out about 2Performant, developers of “a CPA ad server” which is essentially another platform for in-house affiliate programs and affiliate networks. One of their newest products (not even launched yet), Graffly, is an interesting idea. So, I got together with Radu Spineanu of 2Performant who kindly agreed to walk me through Graffly.

Here is the full interview I did with him:

GP: Radu,  in  a  few words could you please tell my readers a bit more about yourself, where you work, and what you do?

RS: I am the Founder/CEO of 2Performant. 2Performant is a platform for affiliate networks, similar to HasOffers or Post Affiliate Pro.

I started 2Performant because I believe Cost per Action, affiliates and links are the future of online advertising. No matter how big CJ, LinkShare, Shareasale are right now, there is still room for CPA to create billion dollar companies. Zynga is an amazing example of the looming opportunities.

I’m constantly amazed of what great things affiliate marketers are doing. We want to give them incredible tools and access to new markets.

GP: Not too long ago, I’ve come across one of your developments, Graffly, which seems like an interesitng one. From a couple of our previous talks I know that you’re calling it “the Woot or Groupon for affiliate marketing”. Could you please elaborate on this parallel a little further?

RS: Graffly is our first project based on 2Performant.

Graffly is a short-term affiliate network with one running campaign each month. That campaign has a payout that’s significantly increased from the standard one for that one month.

For merchants it’s a way to advertise their regular affiliate program. They join Graffly and provide affiliates a huge payout for 30 days. If they get accepted, their campaign will be the only one affiliates can promote for that one month.

Affiliates will know that Graffly always has the best payout. And they’ll get introduced to great new merchants that otherwise they might have not known about.

Graffly doesn’t take 20% fee or anything like that. Our fee with Graffly is $89 fixed for that one month. We ask advertisers to give the extra amount to the affiliates.

Graffly will be launching on the 1st of November with David’s Cookies. They will be offering a 25% premium on all commissions. In December affiliates will be able to promote UncommonGoods.com which will double their regular commission! That means 20% from all sales instead of 10%.

GP: Can you tell my readers a little more about Graffly’s App Store you were telling me about?

RS: Yes. Graffly will introduce affiliates and advertisers to our Apps Store. The App Store is filled with 3rd party apps that add functionality to Graffly like:

• behavioral targeting
• funnel analysis
• social ad units
• dynamic banners based on product feeds
• lead per call

We want to give affiliates access to technology that was inaccessible until now.

Affiliates don’t have to pay up-front for most apps. Most of them take a percent from commissions if they send a valid lead. So if an affiliate agrees to use the Dynamic Banner app, any commission coming from that app will be split amongst the developer and the affiliate (eg. 20% – 80%).

Any developer can write an App and add it to the Apps Store.

GP: Sounds very interesting. Can advertisers use these Apps outside Graffly?

RS: Yes, the platform behind Graffly is offered as SaaS or remote-hosted solution. Details about pricing here.

GP: I appreciate your time, Radu. Best of luck, and looking forward to the launch of Graffly.

Not too long ago I’ve learned of a Los Angeles-based company called uCubd, and got really interested in it because of two things: (i) cool technology, and (ii) the fact that their technology is already integrated with at least one affiliate program, the Amazon’s one.

So, I sat down with one of the company’s co-founders, Marat Galperin — interestingly enough, just as myself, he also happened to be Russian, and also born in Kishinev, Moldova (small world!) — and asked him a number of questions about mashups in general, uCubd in particular, and how his tool could be of help to affiliates. Here is the interview:

GP: Marat, please tell us a few words about yourself, and what you do?

MG: In 2008, I became one of the founding members of uCubd Inc.  At uCubd I get to wear many hats, but primarily focus on software development and marketing.  My goal is to help build uCubd into an influential company in the social media space.  Prior to uCubd I have worked for leading financial services, technology, and entertainment companies as an application developer and technology consultant.

GP: I’ll be honest with you, you are the first person I have heard use the word “mashup” in the online marketing context. What exactly is an Internet mashup?

MG: Mashups allow you to combine content from a variety of different sources into a new presentation.

uCubd mashup is an exciting new way for internet users to create compelling and useful web experiences.  Our users can take existing content from social network services such as YouTube, Twitter, Amazon and others and combine them into new media presentations.

In other words, grab a YouTube video and we’ll pair it with a related Twitter feed and display them side by side in our mashup.  Want to monetize that YouTube video?  Our mashup can display an Amazon widget with related products right next to the video.

Just give us a YouTube embed code or a topic of interest and we’ll instantly create a multimedia mashup that you can share on social networks or embed on your site/blog.  Those users without a site or a blog will be happy to know that we also host all of the mashups on uCubd.com as standalone SEO optimized mini-sites.

GP: Do you have any stats on how mashups perform (CTR, dwell time, conversion data, etc) when compared to video, banners, text links, widgets and other types of creatives?

MG: We track and record a variety of statistics (including CTR and “dwell time”) for each mashup and are in the process of completing a tracking dashboard which will enable our users to get a clear view of how their campaign is performing.

One of the biggest benefits of using our mashups is going to be the ability to get information for social media campaigns that is commonplace for banners, video, and links.  This will give our users an easy way to measure the effectiveness of social media campaigns.  Stay tuned!

GP: How can uCubd be benefical/work for affiliates?

MG: uCubd provides affiliates with an easy and effective way to leverage the power of social media in their affiliate campaigns.  One of our popular mashup templates features built-in support for the Amazon affiliate program.  Check out a few samples below.

One of the advantages of using multimedia mashups over traditional affiliate marketing is the potential to make money outside of your blog or website. As readers embed your mashup on other websites/blogs and social networks, your affiliate code travels along with it. The mashup that started on your blog can now generate sales on other websites and help you get more value out of your affiliate marketing.  Individuals and businesses now have a great incentive to leverage viral content by attaching their affiliate campaign to it. If your mashup goes viral that means your affiliate campaign just went viral as well.

Our newest mashup template provides affiliate marketers with a powerful way to inject their affiliate ads into online conversations.  Our Comments2Go mashup allows users to combine social media content with a customized chatroom.  The creator of the mashup can easily manage the chatroom with a single password.  Creator’s comments are highlighted to give them more focus and are also allowed to include HTML elements including affiliate images and links.  The unique advantages of the Comments2Go mashup enable users to carry on a conversation across multiple domains without having to register.  No matter where the mashup is embedded the users will see the same comment thread and can get involved in the conversation with out having to first sign up or register.  Below is an example of a Comments2Go mashup.

In addition to Amazon we also offer support for other affiliate programs.  Users can merge social media with the affiliate campaign of their choice.  Below is an example that features a YouTube video next to a related promotion.  The main advantage is the focused and relevant user experience that provides more value than a traditional banner ad.

GP: What is unique about uCubd technology?

MG: uCubd technology enables everyday internet users as well as professionals to take advantage of social media in new ways.  In short, our technology makes social media work for you.  If you are seeking effective ways to engage your audience, monetize your content, and improve your affiliate campaigns then our mashups will help you leverage social media to accomplish that.

Today, social media presence has become one of the primary ways businesses and marketers promote their brands and reach out to potential customers.   It is however difficult to measure a return on your social media investment as compared to a traditional marketing campaign.  The common CPM, CPC and other models cannot be easily applied to Twitter, Facebook, or YouTube social media campaigns.

At uCubd we wanted to solve that problem.  Our users leverage the compelling power of social media and yet have the ability to track it and measure it in the same way as a traditional marketing campaign.  We believe that our technology will open up new opportunities to bloggers, businesses, and marketers to connect with their audiences.

Finally, creating mashups in uCubd is very easy.  No specialized knowledge or training is needed.  The process takes seconds and no registration is required.  We are in the process of developing several new and exciting mashup templates, which will fundamentally change the way users interact with and create social media, so check back with us often! We also want to know what you think. If you or your readers have some feedback or an idea for a mashup template you’d like to see, we’d love to hear about it.

GP: Sounds like a tool well-worth playing with. Thank you for your time, Marat, and best of luck!

A couple of days ago  (September  21, 2010) LinkShare affiliate network has announced its completely new advertiser dashboard. To find out a merchant opinion on it, and get a little in-depth here, we chatted with one of LinkShare’s top advertisers — that also made the 2009 Internet Retailer’s 2009 Hot 100 Best Retail Websites and got listed among the top 300 online retailers on the 2010 Top 500 list — Gaiam, Inc.

Kristen Fox (KF), Gaiam‘s Manager of New Business Development has replied to my questions:

GP: First off, what was your very first reaction to the new interface?

KF: My first reaction was absolute glee over the new look and feel. We’ve been an advertiser with LinkShare for many years and in that time they’ve added new functionality to their advertiser interface but they’ve keep the same look and feel. The refreshed UI is a very welcome change.

GP: Out of the new functionalities that you have the time to play with, which do you like best, and why?

KF: We were part of the beta launch so we’ve had a little time to play around with the new interface. The Dashboard or Performance Overview report is a key piece of functionality we use to quickly gain insight into the program’s performance. The dashboard provides top level KPIs including sales, orders, conversion rates, AOV and commissions that are trended for year-over-year (YOY) performance analysis.  The dashboard’s sales trending charts are also helpful to visually represent YOY sales. Prior to the release of the new Advertiser interface we were creating these reports manually — we’ve already seen a reduction in time spent generating reports and we’re now able to spend that time recruiting new publishers and deepening our relationships with existing publishers. The new design is wonderful, but I’m glad that the new features are enabling us to respond more quickly to changes and continue to grow our program.

I’m also a big fan of the export functions for all reports, publisher queries, and creative schedules. We’re also just starting to take advantage of the publisher notes feature which allows us to document meeting notes and action items per publisher and export notes on the fly.

GP: I’m hearing that finding new affiliates has become easier, as the newly-introduced filters now allow merchants to look at parameters they haven’t had access to before? What do you think of this affiliate recruitment function (pros, cons), and does it cost merchants anything to use it?

KF: You’ve heard right; it’s much easier to find qualified publishers with the newly introduced filters. We can now pre-select publishers for the types of campaigns we’re launching. For example, we’ve had tremendous success selling the new Mari Winsor Slimming Pilates Kit and now we can model those publishers that are doing well with the product and filter to find similar publishers within the network. It doesn’t cost us anything additional which is great because I know some networks charge extra.

GP: This sounds great. You’ve already touched on the reports, but what are the major reporting changes that you believe deserve highlighting?

KF: In the new interface nearly all reports are more actionable and having access to actionable data is one of the key drivers to a successful program. The old advertiser interface provided great data but most of it was still in a raw format — we were always exporting reports and overlaying it with additional data. But now all the data we were appending is included in the reports. I can quickly see YOY comparisons and % change data right in the interface. It’s been a tremendous time savings and we can quickly identify which publishers, offers, links or products need attention.

GP: Are there any things that LinkShare hasn’t yet covered, which you would love to see in the next update of their advertiser dashboard?

KF: In the future, (1) I would like the ability to find new publishers based on third-party data rather than publisher’s self reported data. For example, filtering by keywords driving traffic to the publisher or visitor profile data including; age, gender, and state. (2) Creative reporting still needs a little TLC. I’m hoping that as they continue to tweak functionality they will enable a roll up report for all creative by campaign and comparison data across multiple campaigns. (3) The notes attached to publishers would be more actionable if we could assign deadlines and then have reminders display on the Dashboard under ‘Things-to do’.

GP: Thank you for your time, Kristen. All of this has been very insightful. I highly appreciate you taking the time to give us a better sneak peak into LinkShare’s new advertiser dashboard. All the best to you, and Gaiam’s affiliate program.

I wish I could show my readers some screenshots to illustrate the above points and tools, but “for competitive reasons” LinkShare couldn’t approve my usage of any. Oh, well… Still sounds like good improvements.