The Official Magazine of Affiliate Summit Issue 8 | October 2009

Live from New York ,

IT’s Affiliate
SUmmit Affiliate Summit East
2009 Recap Page 27

Five Minutes with Loren Feldman

By Missy Ward Page 7

$150k a Day on PPC: Lessons Learned

By Scott Richter Page 14

Death of an Affiliate Network

By JB McKee Page 25

www.affiliatesummit.com
¼
 ™

Table of Contents Cover Photos By Brad Crooks: Wil Reynolds

03 Affiliates: Stop Waiting for 12 Pro Digital Video Camera 23 Taking the Leap Across
Overnight Success Formats Explained the Pond
Matt McWilliams Peter Fitzpatrick Jodi Rieger

04 Importance of Auditing Your 13 Serious Content: 24 Making the Most of Your

Affiliate Program The Key to Serious Traffic Show Experience
Stephen Robinson Dylan McDanniel Dina Riccobono

05 Productivity Upgrade: 14 $150k a Day on PPC: 25 Death of an Affiliate Network

The Dash Lessons Learned JB McKee
Aaron Dragushan Scott Richter
26 Lessons from North
06 Affiliate Marketers Give 15 The Power of Guest Posting Carolina’s Affiliate Tax Fight
Back Takes on the Avon Eric Schechter Matt Enders
Walk for Breast Cancer
Missy Ward 16 Affiliate Marketing in the 27 Affiliate Summit East
Regulators’ Cross-Hairs 2009 Recap
Thomas A. Cohn Shawn Collins
07 Five Minutes with
Loren Feldman
Missy Ward
18 The Infotainer.com
Shawn Collins

10 The Coming of Age for 21

Choosing the Right
Affiliate Marketing Email Service Provider
Michael Sprouse Andrew Paul

11 Getting Noticed Fast 22 Staying Productive

Follow Up on the Road
Mike Buechele Michael Vorel

FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 1

Issue 8 | OCTOBER 2009
™ Another October of Affiliate Marketing
STAFF
Co-Editors in Chief
Missy Ward, Shawn Collins
Co-Publishers
Missy Ward, Shawn Collins
Contributing Writers
Mike Buechele, Thomas A. Cohn, Shawn Collins,
Aaron Dragushan, Matt Enders, Peter Fitzpatrick,
Dylan McDanniel, JB McKee, Matt McWilliams,
Andrew Paul, Dina Riccobono, Scott Richter, Jodi
Rieger, Stephen Robinson, Eric Schechter, Michael
Sprouse, Michael Vorel, Missy Ward
Graphic Design
Lynn Lee Design
Magazine Coordinator
Amy Rodriguez
Affiliate Summit
1253 Springfield Avenue, Suite 327
New Providence, NJ 07974-1935
tel (417) 2SUMMIT (278-6648)
fax (908) 364-4627
Articles in FeedFront Magazine are the opinions
of the author and may not necessarily reflect the
views of the magazine, or its owners. FeedFront
Magazine always welcomes opinions of an
opposite nature..
For more information, visit: www.FeedFront.com
Interested in advertising? Please visit http://
feedfront.com/advertising/ or email us at:
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FeedFront Editors’ Note – 8th Issue
“October, and the trees are stripped bare, of
all they wear, what do I care. October, and
Kingdoms rise, and Kingdoms fall, but you go
on... and on...” (October, U2)
It was a year ago this time that people in the
performance marketing space, and pretty
much every other sector, were freaking out
about the economic future.
Recession. Depression. Obsession.
Would we no longer to be able to call
ourselves affiliate marketers when the dust
settled?
Some people fell off, but just the same, there
were others that entered the industry.
But we didn’t persevere by being an industry
in stasis. We have focused on solving
problems and building social capital - two
concepts that were reinforced by the keynote
speakers at Affiliate Summit East 2009.
Peter Shankman, founder and CEO of The
Geek Factory, confided in his keynote address
that he’s been diagnosed with something
worse than ADHD when it comes to attention.
He suffers from “ADOS... Attention Deficit ooh,
shiny.”
But seriously, folks. One of the hallmarks of a
successful affiliate marketer is their ability to
pay attention, and to capitalize on problems
with solutions.
In one of the early cases for Peter Shankman,
he took notice of the mass popularity of the
Missy Ward & Shawn
Collins, FeedFront
Co-Editors in Chief
movie “Titanic” in the late 90’s and created a
t-shirt that played off the film (“It Sank. Get
Over It.”)
Long story short, he cleared $100,000 with
this limited shelf-life idea and started his
agency with these shirts.
He was paying attention and that attention
paid for his future.
Then there was Chris Brogan and Julien Smith,
co-authors of the New York Times bestseller,
“Trust Agents”.
The duo tag-team keynoted and imparted
how trust is the most valuable online
currency.
They shared how social networks and
personal connections can be leveraged to
build your brand’s influence, reputation, and
profits.
It’s not as easy as it sounds to be in the right
place at the right time, and to gain the trust of
an audience.
As U2 once sang, “Kingdoms rise, and
Kingdoms fall”.
While the others get caught up in reports on
how the sky is falling, you go on... and on.
Because you’re an affiliate marketer, and
you’re not going out like that.
Missy Ward & Shawn Collins
FeedFront Co-Editors-in-Chief
 Affiliates: Stop Waiting for
Overnight Success By Matt McWilliams
“When it comes to getting things
done, we need fewer architects and
more bricklayers.” -Colleen Barrett
Are you an architect or a bricklayer?
Recently I received an interesting
email from an affiliate. I tried my
best to reply in detail and help the
affiliate, but in the back of my mind
I wondered if it would really help.
What this affiliate wanted to know
was how to go from being a newbie
to being a $100,000/month affiliate.
Of course, we all want to know that,
right?
What this affiliate failed to
understand, and it is the harsh
reality of… well, any business,
is that most people don’t jump
directly from a newbie to a
$100,000/month affiliate. They
make $1,000/month, $5,000/month,
$20,000/month, and so on.
This affiliate had a list of
approximately 20 questions. He had
all the best intentions in the world.
He reads all the blogs, gets all the
newsletters, and probably reads all
of the forums, but what I often fear
with affiliates like this is that he will
fail to act!
As the great German writer,
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe says,
“Knowing is not enough; we must
apply!”
I see many affiliates who suffer from
the proverbial “paralysis by analysis”
and it is unfortunate because these
Leave a spot on your to-do list open
for new ideas, too. If you read of a
new idea and want to try it, try it!
Don’t let it sit too long.
The marketing world, and
particularly the affiliate world, is full
of ideas: weird ideas, revolutionary
ideas, and plenty of “why did I
not think of that?” ideas. Many of
them succeed. Still many others
Matt McWilliams fail miserably. The only way to truly
know what works and what doesn’t
is to take action and risk failure.
affiliates really do have a thirst for
Let me be clear, there is a time for
knowledge and a desire to achieve.
planning and brainstorming and
But too often they live by fear. Fear
of failure, fear of losing money, and certainly researching. There is a
often a fear of missing out on the time to be an architect. But Mrs.
latest trend or tip that will make Barrett is right when it comes to
them an instant millionaire. affiliate marketing, we need more
bricklayers.
All the while, they are missing out
What are you waiting for? Be a
on doing. They are failing to act—
bricklayer—take action now!
actually working on their site and
ads, building content, and testing.
When I am asked for advice on
Matt McWilliams is the Affiliate
marketing our program, I usually
Manager for Legacy Learning
limit my suggestions to 3-5 major
Systems’ Learn and Master Courses at
ones based on the affiliate’s areas of
www.learnandmaster.com/affiliates.
expertise and I always end with this
simple piece of advice:
Be sure your to-do list is no
more than five items long. Don’t
allow your to-do list to become
a mountain of tasks that are
impossible to attempt, much
less accomplish. It’s the number
one reason I see so many well-
intentioned and hard-working
affiliates fail.
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 3

Stephen Robinson
In these tough economic times, one of the
challenges affiliate managers constantly
face is ensuring the growth and health of
the affiliate programs they manage.
Perhaps the most important thing is
making sure their programs are financially
prosperous. One of the best ways to do
this is by auditing your affiliate program.
There are two very effective strategies
that an affiliate manager can utilize to
determine if their affiliate programs
are growing and competitive in their
respective space. These key strategies are
competitive analysis and performance
audit.
A competitive analysis is a great way to
identify any strengths or weaknesses
within your affiliate program. This analysis
will also dictate what steps to take to
grow your program. After completing this
analysis, you should be able to answer the
following questions:
• What is the current EPC (earnings
per 100 clicks) for your program?
• What is your conversion rate and is it
on par with your top competitors?
• What is the average order size?
• What creative is available to your
affiliates? Is it outdated? Should it be
refreshed?
• PPC (pay per click) policy – Is search
allowed in the program? If so, who
4 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
Importance of
Auditing Your
Affiliate Program
By Stephen Robinson
is promoting your program using Review each of these affiliate’s sites to
search and what additional tools do determine if they are promoting your
they need? merchant in all relevant categories to
maximize exposure to their site visitors. If
not, reach out to them and provide them
Often times, upon completion of this
with any updated creative, copy or other
exercise, you’ll have a clear and concise
offers to increase your placement.
strategy for taking the necessary steps
to grow your program. Many of these The key to successfully executing these
questions will also create solid content for strategies is to create relationships with
an activation campaign. your affiliates and make them feel like they
are part of the solution.
I’ve found that these are typically the first
questions affiliates ask when I’m pitching While maintaining relationships with
a program to them. Having this data your top performers is important, don’t
available can prove to be invaluable in overlook the “long-tail” affiliates that can
activation efforts. also make a difference in growing your
affiliate program.
Beyond the benefit to affiliates, knowing
this information can also be helpful when
requesting additional resources from the
merchant. This level of analysis indicates Stephen Robinson is the Director of
your investment in the overall success of Affiliate Relations for the affiliate
the affiliate program. management agency JEBCommerce.com,
MyAffiliateCoach.net and
A performance audit is another way of NewsForAffiliates.com.
evaluating the overall success of your
program. The first question to ask is
“who is in my program that should be
performing, but isn’t?”
You can quickly find out by comparing
data year over year (or month over month)
to determine if any affiliates that used to
be top performers are not performing
nearly as well or are no longer promoting
your program at all. This list of declining
performers will become your activation
targets.
PRODUCTIVITY UPGRADE:
THE DASH By Aaron Dragushan
The Problem: No matter what you do
for a living, success involves getting things
done. Unfortunately reality often involves
a lot of trying to get yourself to get things
done.
Procrastination isn’t rational. Even when we Example: “I’m going to clean this room
know we’re procrastinating, and we want for 1 minute” or “I’m going to open the
to be working, getting back on track can be project and write one sentence.”
difficult. Instead we check our email, or our
traffic numbers, or see what’s happening on
Twitter today.
How it works: The longer you avoid
doing something the bigger it gets inside
your mind. Any progress that gets you
Luckily there are a few tricks and tips that
started wipes away that feeling and gives
can jump-start you. This one is called, “The
you a fresh start, and from there it’s easier
Dash”.
to keep moving once you’ve got a little
momentum.
The Secret: Getting started is the real
challenge, not getting the project done.
Aaron Dragushan is the founder of
The Trick: A “dash” is a quick burst of UpgradeMe.org, a site dedicated to helping
effort on whatever you’re avoiding. The entrepreneurs move faster.
idea is to start small; ridiculously small if
necessary.
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 5
 By Missy Ward
Affiliate Marketers Give Back Takes
on the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer
For the third year in a row, Team Affiliate
Marketers Give Back took to the streets with
their feet to do their part to fight breast
cancer; this time during the 39 mile Avon Walk
for Breast Cancer in Los Angeles.
This year’s team consisted of Brook Schaaf
of Schaaf Consulting, Chris Pearson of
DIYThemes, Melissa Salas of Buy.com, Kevin
Strawbridge of DealTaker.com, Lynette
LaPlante a 1-year survivor and Team Captain,
Missy Ward of Affiliate Summit and Founder of
AffiliateMarketersGiveBack.com.
After months of fun and sometimes whacky
fund raising activities, Team Affiliate Marketers
Give Back blew past their goal and raised
nearly $53,000, earning as them the #5 highest
fundraising team spot overall.
Day 1 started at 5:30am for team as they
geared up and headed on the bus for the
Opening Ceremony. After some stretching
and motivational words, we set forth on our
26.2 mile walk for the day which would take
us through panoramic waterfronts, charming
neighborhoods, Pacific Coast Highway and the
tree-lined parks of Long Beach and Seal Beach.
We loaded up on healthy snacks and hydrated
roughly every two miles at the welcoming rest
stops. We were doing great until the blisters
started setting in and spent lunch wrapping all
injured toes with mole skin.
Miles 20-26 were the roughest. All of the
hours of walking were finally taking their
toll. But watching some of the women at the
cheering stations
that were currently
undergoing
treatment
n Strawbr idge, Meli ssa Salas,
6 | Kevi
OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
Missy Ward, Chris Pearson
Missy Ward
for breast cancer along with survivors
encouraging us on gave us the motivation to
keep on trucking.
The first day ended at Wellness Village, located
in El Dorado Park, where many of the 1,800
walkers had dinner and snuggled up in their
tents. Our team however, went directly out for
a victory dinner at the Grill Restaurant in the
Westin Hotel, sans showers. (That could have
been the reason why they kept us away from
the other diners.)
After sitting down for an hour or so for
dinner, it was very difficult to get back up.
We clearly provided entertainment value to
the employees as they laughed at our stiff
waddling leaving the restaurant.
All of us were out cold before 9pm as we knew
that 13 more miles were ahead of us in the
morning.
Day 2 started out rough for us. All of our
muscles were hurting and blisters were oozing,
but we knew that the day was only half as long
as the Day 1 and we were determined to finish.
Chris Pearson, Brook Schaaf, Missy Ward,
Lynette LaPlante, Kevin Strawbridge
We blew past a number of rest-stops out of
fear that if we sat for even just one minute,
we’d never get going again. With the Queen
Mary in sight, our finish line, we drummed up
the final burst of energy to make it to the end.
Amazingly, even with stopping for a relaxing
lunch and a couple of pit-stops, we finished up
today’s half-marathon in less than five hours.
We were all excited to learn that the walk that
we participated in this weekend raised a total
of 4.6 million dollars to support five areas of
the breast cancer cause, including: awareness
and education; screening and diagnosis, access
to treatment; support services and scientific
research.
Missy Ward was recognized as a top
fundraiser during the opening ceremony.
I am proud of my team and I thank them so
much for volunteering their time. I’m also very
grateful to all of our sponsors and supporters
who helped us reach our fundraising goal.
To view our exciting journey or find out more
about participating in the 2010 walk, please
visit www.AffiliateMarketersGiveBack.com
Missy Ward is the Co-Founder of Affiliate Summit,
Co-Editor-in-Chief of FeedFront Magazine and
Founder of AffiliateMarketersGiveBack.com
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Brook Schaaf, Kevin Strawbridge,
Chris Pearson
Photo By Shawn Collins: Missy Ward and Loren Feldman

By Missy Ward

Five Minutes with Loren Feldman

Loren Feldman is the Founder and President of 1938
Media, which helps companies develop a sound internet
strategy and communicate their messages through videos.
His entertaining and sometimes biting videos razzing on
the tech industry, (often featuring a puppet or two) have
become cult favorites.

FeedFront’s Co-Editor-in-Chief, Missy Ward, recently

talked with Loren about creating compelling videos, what
prompted him to create puppet videos about the tech
industry, and the “shock-jock” persona he portrays on the
internet. Loren Feldman

a year or so in. The name comes from when I started the

Missy: Tell us a little bit about what you were doing before
company. I was 38 and my Creative Director was 19. The
you created 1938Media and how you landed into this crazy
goal of the company is to help companies communicate
industry. What is the story of the 1938Media name and
their message via video and sound Web strategy
what is the goal of the company?

Missy: A lot of people know you for your sometimes

Loren: I was a struggling actor and comedian in Los
acerbic videos mocking the tech industry. Tell us how you
Angeles. I came back to NY and started ‘38. We originally
came up with the idea to do these.
built Web sites, but switched to video production about

FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 7


Photo By Shawn Collins: Loren Feldman and Mike Wayne
Loren: I come from a comic background so it just seemed
natural to me. Plus let’s be honest, there is quite a bit to
mock. The whole thing happened very organically.
Missy: How about the Audience Conference. Tell me a little
more about why you are starting that conference series
and what it’s all about.
Loren: It’s a mixture of my friends from various industries.
Tech, bloggers, the arts, affiliate marketers. We all have
something in common and that is to be able to reach and
engage an audience. So, I figured lets all get together
have some fun and see if we can learn what we all have in
common and how we can take things from each discipline.
Missy: What has been the highlight and lowlight of your
career thus far?
Loren: Highlights would include the friends I’ve made;
lowlights would be people judging me based on a
character I play in videos.
Missy: What are some of your personal goals?
Loren: I’d like to get off the Web one day, but I don’t see
that happening soon. So, I guess I’ll just keep making the
best videos I can to help clients or entertain viewers.
Missy: What do you believe is the largest hurdle that social
media faces?
8 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
Loren: People truly being honest with each other. True
transparency comes at a price that many don’t want to pay.
Missy: Any advice for people that want to get started using
video in their marketing efforts?
Loren: Just try and be as natural as possible, and don’t
underestimate sound. The most important thing is to just
be yourself.
Missy: Complete this sentence: Social Media was
_________ two years ago, but now it is all ________.
Loren: Social Media was innocent two years ago, but now
it is all business.
Missy: What is your favorite Web site today and why?
Loren: I like techmeme.com. It’s quick, current, and gives
me the info I need.
Missy: If your life can be summed up in a song, what
would it be?
Loren: “Misguided Angel” by Cowboy Junkies. It’s about a
nice guy who’s misunderstood. I can relate to that.
Missy Ward is the Co-Editor-In-Chief of FeedFront Magazine
and Co-Founder of Affiliate Summit and GeekCast.fm. She
also blogs on MissyWard.com.
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 9
 The Coming of Age for Affiliate
Marketing By Michael Sprouse
If you are an advertiser or publisher,
ad network or exchange, “super
affiliate” or small blogger, you
can’t deny that affiliate marketing
has changed dramatically since
its earliest days. The industry is
certainly not “new” anymore, but
compared to other traditional
advertising platforms, is probably in
its adolescence.
This is why I think the industry is at
a crucial inflection point now more
than any other time in its history. Why
now, you ask?
As 2009 progressed, the overall
visibility of the industry increased.
We see this on a daily basis from large
advertisers who had not previously
even considered the affiliate channel
to be a major part of their strategy
now considering it - and even staffing
and budgeting for it.
This makes sense when considering
the overall recession and economy,
and the negative impact it has on ad
budgets, but also is a major reason
why performance-based, affiliate
marketing has been somewhat
recession-resistant (since nothing is
truly “recession-proof”).
Before you know it, the calendar will
turn to 2010. What, now, to expect
from our adolescent phase next
year and beyond? How does our
collective industry enter “responsible
adulthood” stage? Ready to
blossom further as a major platform
10 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
Michael Sprouse
underneath the broader online
marketing umbrella?
We must first realize that we still
collectively account for a small
percentage of online advertising
spending at large. Amazing, right?
There are major advertisers who just
started thinking about performance
marketing in 2009, but who will be
doing more in 2010.
It’s this reason that we really need
to have a hard look at what we can
collectively do together to ensure
affiliate marketing rises even higher
to keep up with potential demand.
Think of some of the major trends
that have occurred recently: a huge
influx of ad networks (all types), more
and more active affiliates than ever
before worldwide, and more money
being spent on performance-based
marketing than ever before.
These facts have all been publicly
documented and validate what
we do. The demand isn’t waning
and what energizes so many of us
that work in online performance
marketing is that we see light bulbs
going off for some, or companies
coming out with a great new tool
or application, or a single affiliate
registering success that they hadn’t
yet seen.
It’s really how we collectively react
to the demand – and adjust to new
challenges that a broadened universe
of advertisers brings - that will chart
our future.
I’ve often said that we work in the
most innovative of industries and it’s
that innovation that will help sustain
us in the months ahead ushering in
our next phase of growth.
Michael Sprouse is the Chief Marketing
Officer for Epic Advertising, and is
based at the company’s headquarters
in New York, NY.
 From left to right: Lisa Picarille, Stephanie Lichtenstein, Jen Goode, Mike Buechele, Trisha Lyn Fawver
Getting Noticed Fast Follow Up
By Mike Buechele
I’ve heard some great responses since
my panel, Getting Noticed FAST, at
Affiliate Summit East 09, and I wanted to
share some of the major points.
Getting Noticed Fast is about effective
networking using your personal brand,
social media, and face-to-face. My
fellow panelists were Trisha Lyn Fawver
(@trishalyn), Jen Goode (@JGoode),
Stephanie Lichtenstein (@StephARC),
and the panel was moderated by Lisa
Picarille (@lisap).
Personal Brand
Be consistent with the photos and
avatars you use. Avatars appear in blog
comments, your Twitter profile, your
Facebook page, MySpace, FriendFeed,
Disqus, and other social network
platforms. Update them when necessary,
but remain consistent. If your goal is to
look professional, then present yourself
that way.
Social Media
Retweet (RT) Tweets you like or mention
and credit Tweeters in your Tweets. Join
a Twitter directory like WeFollow.com or
use it to search for others in your favorite
topics and follow them.
Sharing your experiences and expertise
will make others want to follow and
engage with you. Giving before you get
will get you a lot in return.
For Facebook, get your name, brand,
or something easy to remember in the
URL of your profile. You can find me at
Facebook.com/mikebuechele. If your
friend lists starts getting out of hand,
you can organize them into groups.
Some of my groups are Old Friends,
Business Contacts, and Co-workers. Use
search to view topics your friends are
posting and then comment and share
your ideas. Stay at the “top of people’s
mind” by wishing your friends a happy
birthday from the list on your home
page (thanks to Peter Shankman for the
idea). Other ideas are to start a fan page
and link your blog’s RSS into your profile.
Face-to-Face Networking
I don’t think anything is better than
in-person networking. It leaves the
best impression on people. Have
unique business cards, or give swag like
thumbnail drives, stickers, and buttons.
Wear a T-shirt with your blog URL or
Facebook/Twitter name on it and give
some out to people. There’s a good
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 11
chance they will blog about you.
Make an impression. Nothing beats a
handshake.
Bonus Tips
Always say yes to an interview or guest
blog post. Stay on top of your niche
and blog or share links over Twitter and
Facebook.
Follow people already known within
your niche and comment on their blogs.
There are other social communities like
LinkedIn, Blip.fm, Ning, and many more,
so find the ones right for you.
Create content in different media. You
can use text, audio, and video. Some
helpful resources are TubeMogul,
Seesmic, and 12seconds for video;
and TweetDeck, Seesmic Desktop, and
HootSuite for Twitter.
Mike Buechele is an affiliate marketer, and
he can be found at MikeBuechele.com and
on Twitter at @mikebuechele.
 PRO DIGITAL VIDEO CAMERA
FORMATS EXPLAINED
By Peter Fitzpatrick
cameras. The video has great quality, but is compressed more and
has a lesser quality picture than higher end HD formats.

HD: High Definition is the highest quality digital video format

available. There are three leading HD camera formats that include
DVCPro100, XDCAM HD and AVCHD that are all spectacular. HD
cameras can shoot at 1920 x 1080 pixels (full HD) which may be
overkill for some online video purposes that require much smaller
video sizes.

Before selecting a video production company, make sure they can

shoot with the camera format you need and remember no video
will look professional without proper lighting and sound.
Peter Fitzpatrick

Thinking about having some online videos professionally Peter Fitzpatrick is the Founder/Executive Producer of RippleKey LLC –
produced? It can be confusing trying to figure out which format Creative Media & Productions (www.ripplekey.com).
will work best for your needs. Here’s some helpful information on
the most popular professional digital video camera formats:

DV (Digital Video): A good, but lower quality, standard definition

format used with both prosumer and professional cameras. You
get a lot of bang for your buck, but don’t think you’ll get the same WHERE
image quality using your handheld camcorder as you will with a
full or medium sized camera that has a pro lens. These cameras
shoot to MiniDV (or DVC) tapes and are very popular in the
Internet video world.
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DVCPro & DVCPro50: DVCPro is a medium quality format that is 25 True Exclusive’s
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DVCam: A small step up from DV – similar to DVCPro but used
with Sony camera products. 24/7 Customer Support
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HDV: This is a high definition format that records on DV cassette
tapes and hard disks. Many prosumer Sony cameras use HDV
and they can be a solid value compared to more expensive HD

Search Marketing Bloggers Email Marketing Websites

12 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE

Serious Content:
In this fast-paced world, people have little
patience for options that don’t generate
results. Yet too often, publishers of affiliate
sites mistakenly assume that if they flood
their domain with the right keywords,
but pay lip service to content quality,
site visitors and, by extension, their
advertisers, will be happy nonetheless.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Online advertisers, more than anything
else, seek quality referrals. Think about it:
do merchants want “window shoppers”,
or people who are serious about buying?
It only makes sense that to attract serious
prospects, you need to provide serious
information.
Hence your need for serious, high-quality
content. Not only will higher search
rankings result, but you’ll also attract
visitors who are closely targeted to your
advertiser’s key audience—and primed to
purchase.
So what defines serious content, and how
do you generate it? First let’s look at the
traits all strong publishing content has in
common:
• It satisfies a niche. Web sites
don’t have to satisfy all aspects of
a subject to be useful. In fact, the
more completely you cover a subset
of a topic, the more value you’re
likely to be to those interested in
your subject area.
• It’s original. This is the golden
rule. Nothing draws and holds site
visitors like fresh, useful material.
Newsfeeds and syndicated copy are
valuable content sources, but they
won’t score traffic.
• It’s to the point. Obviously your
By Dylan McDanniel
content must contain critical
keywords, but just as importantly
it needs to focus on the subject
matter. It’s remarkable how many
publishers fail this test with long
home page introductions or bait
and switch text.
• It contains no flowery language.
To hold your visitor’s attention,
avoid needless adjectives,
polysyllabic mumbo-jumbo and
self-important technical jargon
(unless, of course, keywords are in
play). And if you can say something
in five words instead of ten, do it. Dylan McDanniel
• It’s updated regularly. Active Web
sites score higher in searches. You
don’t have to rework your entire site Sites with serious content are also naturals
every week, but make sure you’re for community pages and forums that
adding content regularly. count as original material. Pay close
attention to the content you furnish,
While there’s no shortcut to creating and you’ll create a destination that
a high quality, content driven site, the benefits—and profits—both you and your
payoff more than offsets the investment advertisers.
required.
If funds are tight, you can save by writing Dylan McDanniel is COO and Co-Founder of
the content yourself, as long as you have Epicenter Network (www.epicenternetwork.
expertise in the subject matter or can com) , an integrated affiliate marketing
research it adequately. But don’t be afraid network and provider of affiliate publishing
software.
to hire a professional writer; freelancers
are affordable.
Don’t forget that original videos, site-
specific applets, graphics and animation
all count as fresh content. What’s more,
free online services such as DM-2.com
enable you to easily organize your content
using attractive page templates, and even
host your site at no cost.
Strong, unique content is your key to
success as an affiliate site. Chances are
your core audience will return frequently,
bookmark you, even refer you to others.
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 13
 Lessons Learned By Scott Richter
teach my boy’s Granddad how to do PPC on PerfSpot.com, and
soon he was doing $1k a day. You can learn to do successful PPC
from scratch too!

Here are some tips to get you started:

• Focus on international traffic. US traffic is too expensive.
If you have a friend that can speak another language, ask
them to translate your ads and landing pages.
• The two schools of thought are brute force and
prototyping. Brute force is about massive keyword lists and
automated programs that cull out the garbage. Prototyping
is hand-building campaigns to find trends and clever ad
copy. You can get the best of both worlds by prototyping
first and then getting an engineer friend to scale for you
based on rules.
• Rent A Coder and oDesk are best for submitting your
engineering. The services are cheap and reliable.
• Run content network and weed out the bad sites. Try demo
targeting. You’ll be surprised how differently combos for
age, gender, geography, and time of day affect conversion.
• Rotate between direct linking and your landing page to see
which converts better.
• Work closely with your reps from the advertiser, affiliate
Scott Richter
network, and publishers. Your relationships will give you the
head start on what’s hot, plus give you sustainable profits.

Many affiliates boast inflated earnings, and then spread • Every ad group should have just two or three ads, not just
misinformation, perhaps intentionally, to mislead everyone else. one and not ten. This allows you to choose winners quickly.
Their “secrets” no longer work and are therefore safe to release. • When you start a new account, you want to build great
account history, or else your ads will go under review if
And then there are folks who hawk their ultra expensive Pay Per there are too many disapprovals.
Click (PPC) training courses and software. Not saying these aren’t
useful. Just saying it’s hard to get a real education on PPC. What • MSN converts better than Google, but it has lower volume.
forums should you read, what software, whose blog, and so forth? • Always run the same offer via two networks: your primary
(that makes the most money for you) and a backup (just to
A few years ago, I decided to give the PPC game a try. What did I keep your primary honest with payouts and scrubbing).
know as a “high volume email deployer,” guy running an affiliate
• Learn Google AdWords Editor and Google Analytics. They’re
network (affiliate.com), and new to PPC?
free and most affiliates don’t understand that you can tie
these together to create awesome reporting.
Well, I started running dating and ringtones ads and within a few
days was killing it. Markus Frind, CEO of PlentyofFish.com, was
doing the same and was teaching his father, girlfriend, and other
Scott Richter has had huge success in affiliate marketing and shares
people who had no clue about Internet marketing about PPC.
his experience in building and optimizing successful campaigns at
scott-richter.com.
And they were making a few hundred bucks a day. I decided to

14 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE


The Power of Guest Posting
There are approximately 100 blogs related
to affiliate marketing, according to the
2009 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report. With
all of these blogs, it’s hard to stand out,
hard to get noticed, and hard to achieve
success.
So how can you continue to increase your
traffic, attract advertisers, and create a
loyal fan base while competing in such a
heavily saturated market? One of the best
ways to do that is by guest posting, which
provides a number of benefits.
Authority
Credibility is huge in this industry. As I
mentioned before, there are many blogs
out there (according to TechCrunch, over
100 million), so in order for you to gain
a loyal audience, you have to stand out
and prove that you are an expert worth
listening to. The more people start seeing
your name and content on other credible
industry blogs, the more you will be
acknowledged as a leader and expert
in the industry. This will help you attract
advertisers to your blog, sell your own
products/services, build a reputation for
yourself in the industry and in turn, open
doors to many other great opportunities.
Relationships
Relationships are a key component to
success in business. By guest posting,
you are not only establishing a great
relationship with that blogger/affiliate,
you are also forming a connection that
may lead to more connections and other
valuable opportunities in the future.
Furthermore, you will be engaging and
creating relationships with a brand new
audience, which is a great way to expand
your network and build a loyal fan base.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Another benefit to guest posting is that
most bloggers will allow you to include
a short bio with a link back to your site
in the beginning of the post. This can
be an excellent opportunity to increase
your site’s rankings on Google for a
specific search term, thus allowing you
to capitalize on that traffic. Imagine how
powerful it is to rank organically in the top
5 results for your key terms. So think about
some terms you want your site to rank for
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 15
By Eric Schechter
Eric Schechter
and include them in your byline.
Free Advertising
There are tons of ways you can advertise
your site, but the problem is, most of
them cost money (some of them a lot of
money). Guest posting is an effective way
to advertise your blog/site for free to a
very targeted audience, but can also be a
lot more helpful in getting readers to click
over to your site. Just make sure that you
put your time in and write a powerful and
informative article.
Now that you understand how beneficial
guest posting can be, start writing some
great articles and contact the top blogs in
your niche. You may be surprised at how
fast you start seeing results.
Eric Schechter is responsible for ClickBooth’s
Social Media efforts and works hand in hand
with industry bloggers and the company’s
top publishers.
 Affiliate Marketing
in the Regulators’
Cross-Hairs
By Thomas A. Cohn
Advertising claims by merchants have
long attracted the attention of state
Attorneys General (AG) and the Federal
Trade Commission (FTC), but recently
these regulators have signaled a
willingness to pursue advertising cases
against a new target: online affiliate
marketers.
Until recently, affiliates have operated
anonymously and attracted little
scrutiny, because they do not sell
the goods/services featured in their
published content. But affiliate-
published pages have always been
vulnerable: if they contain misleading
claims about a product, or fail to disclose
connections with sellers, the affiliate
may face liability for deceptively driving
online sales.
Recently, the FTC and AGs have stepped
up scrutiny of online claims. Regulators
have attacked a variety of questionable
practices, from misleading product
claims, to deceptive trial offers with
unauthorized charges, to falsely implied
celebrity/expert endorsements and fake
consumer blogs.
Affiliate-created blogs, review sites and
other pages have proliferated, filled with
claims that drive traffic to merchants.
When this content contains suspect
claims or fails to disclose connections
with sellers, there may be liability for
deceptively inducing sales.
16 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
It is no surprise that the FTC shows
increased interest in affiliates. It has
long held that it is not just advertisers
who are liable for deceptive advertising.
Anyone who plays a promotional role,
be it ad agencies or shopping channels,
is liable for its role in allegedly deceptive
advertising.
Now the FTC may apply this expanded
liability principle to affiliates. It is
revising its Endorsement Guides
to clarify that both advertisers and
endorsers could be liable for the
endorsers’ false advertising claims,
and for failing to disclose material
connections between advertisers and
endorsers. But it has not confronted this
issue – until recently.
In May, the FTC sued affiliates
who pretended to operate
“MakingHomeAffordable.gov,” the
official Web site of a federal program
providing free mortgage assistance. The
defendants purchased links on results
pages when consumers searched for
“making home affordable.” A sponsored
link displaying the official site’s full URL
appeared in the search engines’ results.
Consumers clicking on the ads were
directed to sites that sell paid loan
modification services. Although the FTC
did not sue those Web sites, it alleged
the affiliates were attempting to defraud
homeowners by falsely implying
through search results that visitors were
Thomas A. Cohn
being sent to the government’s Web
site.
Also, state AGs have cited the role of
affiliates in their latest actions against
online promotions, and these may
be followed by other AG and/or FTC
actions against merchants, affiliates,
and/or networks that either engage in
deceptive advertising, or knowingly
assist and facilitate it.
In addition, affiliates’ unauthorized use
of celebrity and news images and marks
is subjecting them (and the merchants
they link) to charges of trademark
infringement, false endorsement and
related allegations, under state and
federal law.
Now that the FTC and AGs have
brought cases, affiliates should consider
themselves on notice: any affiliate
who engages in or assists with fraud
might end up in the crosshairs of law
enforcement. Affiliates must be careful
to publish truthful content that is not
deceptive and contains the proper
disclaimers and disclosures.
Mr. Cohn focuses his practice on advising
clients on the legal and practical aspects
of compliance with state and federal
consumer protection regulations and
industry self-regulation programs,
as well as representing clients during
investigations and enforcement actions.
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 17
The Infotainer.com
By Shawn Collins
I came across a video this past spring with a guy named Joel Bauer
talking about his business card. It was an oddly compelling couple of
minutes on personal brands that I’ve re-watched dozens of times.
And I’m not alone. The video, “Your Business Card is Crap”, has been
viewed about 750,000 times on YouTube.
So I had to find out more about the man behind the business card.
It turns out Joel Bauer is a best-selling author, and he has been a
professional performer since he was 7 years old.
Also, Joel spent a couple decades creating and producing
Infotainment presentations and road-shows internationally for
the likes of IBM, Nortel, Dresser Wayne, Polaroid, and ITT, as well
as creating systems on personal marketing, branding, passion,
Infotainment, speaking, and closing from the platform.
All that is great, but what about the business card video?
The Most Famous Business Card
Shawn: So, the first place I came across you was your business card
video.
Joel: Oh that thing. [laughs] I didn’t put that out there, let me tell
you. I think that was someone trying to do damage. It actually didn’t
do damage, but stimulated a lot of activity out there, in the form of a
bunch of television shows and other stuff. It’s still ongoing.
Shawn: Yeah. I guess the place that actually was brought to my
attention was on the show “Red Eye” on Fox News.
Joel: Yeah. Yeah, that was fun. It was kind of weird sitting in a room,
staring into a camera while you are watching a monitor with a six
second delay from New York.
Your Business Card is Crap on YouTube
18 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
Shawn: Yeah. One thing I was curious about there is, I guess, you
were saying that you thought someone was trying to do damage to
you. And, you mentioned on Red Eye that you were sort of playing a
character there. So, was that you just sort of hamming it up for that?
Joel: Well, I mean, I’m on the phone with you right now. And you tell
me, was I playing a character or not? I mean, obviously; the entire film,
called “The Pitch, Poker & the Public”, is where it was extracted from.
The documentary which was made by a guy by the name of Chris
Zubryd, who actually published an apology about how someone had
taken this small 25 second or 35 second excerpt from the film, out of
context. Because if you watch the film, it has me with my children. It
has Joel light, Joel family man.
And then when they asked me to go into the pitch mode, I went into
what was a trade show-style pitch mode because that’s what I was
doing then. I was a trade show performer. And I was going into that
very intense mode... what you would use on a floor.
I’m sure you’ve been to MacWorld, or Comdex, or some major trade
show, and you’ve noticed that the only people who are noticed there
are those that are intense.
Shawn: Yeah. Absolutely.
Joel: And they’re loud and they’re kind of carnie. So that personality
was very polarizing and very edgy and obviously very effective from
a viral stand point because here you have a man talking about a
business card, without taking his clothes off; and generating as many
hits as usually the sites that do that kind of nonsense.
So that was kind of interesting. It’s been fascinating. I don’t think
there’s any predictable formula behind viral other than using the word
dog or cat. [laughs] Or Megan Fox or one of those things that tends
to get people to click on the video. Your Business Card is Crap is not
exactly a positive title.
And I do know who put it up there originally. And they did try to do
damage and it kind of backfired. I think you fight the fire. They want
you to start a fire. They want you to respond. And I don’t respond,
because it doesn’t matter. The people that study with me and follow
me, they know that what I do has integrity.
Joel on Social Media
Shawn: I was looking to see your real identity on Twitter, and saw
there’s one, @TheJoelBauer, that has your picture and your Web sites
and everything, so they are certainly trying to give the impression. But
is there any reason why you don’t bother to go in there yourself?
 affiliate marketing. But I do make some beyond your years. I believe in the Internet.
recommendations. And obviously with the No question about it.
following I have, if I wanted to make money
on people I could just have JV (joint venture) Four Suggestions for Your Site
links everywhere. People would click all day. Joel: I’d love to close with four simple
comments that would probably take us two
And you might say, well, why don’t you minutes. I would just like to label them. I
do that? It’s because, quite frankly, I’m not constantly see Internet marketers, with Web
looking for every dime. And the marketers sites, not talking about your guys. I don’t
Joel Bauer on Red Eye on FOX News who are doing that aren’t transparent. We all know who your guys are exactly. I have an
know what’s being done. idea but there are four things they’re not
doing and they wonder why their Web sites
Joel: The absolute, with clarity, revelation
When it has Shawn’s last name at the end, aren’t making money.
here, is that I am so consumed doing what
forward slash Shawn. Well, we kind of get it.
I do for my students. Right now I am sitting
Shawn’s making money. I always tell people The first is, when you arrive, there’s no
here in front of an hour training that is going
where I’m making money, and when I’m not. live video. There’s no warm, ingratiating
out to 74 recent students. I train professional
So when I’m doing a training, I say, “Here’s my call to action video that inspires someone
speakers. People that want to do what I do.
contact for printing. Here’s my contact and my emotionally. That has specifically you’re
I am on platforms two, three, four times a
resource for audio. Here’s my contact.” mission statement and benefit to them and
month, training people in our marketing
why they would want to come to the other
systems. And as a result of that, I do what
And I tell them, “By the way, I don’t make side. The video is generally missing and it’s
most other speakers don’t do and that is I
money on any of these resources. You’re not auto-play. That’s a mistake. It should auto-
actually take care of them.
actually paying direct what they would play.
charge normally. There’s no markup. There’s
I’m so busy doing this stuff. Traveling. I’ve
no kickback. There’s no motivation for me. I Second component missing on those sites is
got three kids. I don’t have time. Really, if you
don’t have anyone’s hand in my back pocket.” an opt-in. They’re not even asking for name,
want to be effective on Twitter or Facebook,
email address. They don’t ask, they don’t get.
you need to do it every day. And it needs to
And they appreciate that. They’re paying a Most sites you can go there check out the site
become very personal. That’s my belief. You
considerable amount of money to train with and leave. It’s a massive error.
need to participate.
me. See Shawn, the difference is when people
train with me, they’re spending 10, 15 grand I don’t believe in sites where you just check
And I am so busy servicing those who are
to be in a room with me for seven days. That’s them out and leave. I believe in sites that
quite frankly spending a fortune on my
not a lot of money, but it’s a lot to them. And inspire a call to action with a video and have
attentions. I coach. I coach a very small group.
they’re blown away. They’re absolutely blown an opt-in that requires really only the email
And I’m out there doing it. And I don’t talk the
away by the training. Again, I’ve never had a address. A double opt-in, of course, using an
talk. I walk it. So if you hear me teaching, they
refund, a cancellation, or anyone upset with AWeber, iContact, or whatever service they
know that I’m actually doing it. Because then
these live trainings. Anyone. Because I over decide to use.
that’s how they met me or that’s how they
deliver; I give them too much.
saw me. The stuff that I reveal actually works.
So my process is more of an offline process, in
Joel on Affiliate Marketing
terms of what I’m teaching. I’m showing them
Shawn: I saw that you had some affiliate links
how to speak on a platform, and generate
to Amazon for your books. Do you do much
massive dollars right there, right then, doing
with affiliate marketing at all, or is that pretty
what it is they believe in, and communicating
much the extent of it?
from their heart. Their area of expertise. An
area they can empower others through.
Joel: No. Really what we’re doing is I have
a group building all that. And it will be
And that’s very different than the Internet
done. The only affiliate marketing I will do is
model. The Internet model complements it. I
with people I actually believe in. Where I’ve
also believe that without the Internet you’re
actually used their system extensively for
leaving at least 50 percent of your money
significant periods of time and had massive
on the table, and you’re leaving your forced
results.
continuity. You’re leaving that element of your
business that would have enabled you to do it
For example, there’s a link on my blog
once and never have to do it again. And have
right now that says, “Cancer free.” And I
an automated, replicatable, duplicatable,
don’t make any money on it, and it’s not Joel Bauer
transferable process that generates income

FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 19

The Infotainer.com
If they ask for only the email address they’re going to have a much Infotainer.com
higher conversion level or opt-in level than they would asking for
more information at that point. We don’t have trust, we don’t have
rapport. We have nothing.

The email address is the safest thing to request, but double opt-in
ensures that if they’re going to put “screw you Johnny” or whatever
it is, they’re putting some stupid entry in there, that obviously you’re
never see it. It will get kicked. It will never be confirmed in the system.

Opt in, video. Third component. At the end of the video, which is very
short, 15 seconds, call to action. There should be social proof. A stream
of 10 to 15 seconds of people raving about what it is you do. They
should be monetized.

“As a result of Shawn, we generated 30 grand in the first three weeks.

We couldn’t believe it. His writing style has enabled us to write more
effective copy that has motivated people from the heart to invest in
our products. We never thought it was possible.”
amazed how many Web sites you go there, you opt in.
Then it goes on. “Before John, 30 pounds overweight. After John,
So those are the principles I discuss in detail prior to going to a live
his simple guidance and steps...” See, a monetizable testimonial is
event, even though I don’t teach Internet at those events. I teach
anything that shows the before and the after the transformation.
something very different, branding and differentiation, and yet I’ll talk
about those four Internet principles because most people have a site,
The fourth component missing from Web sites is the call to action. If
and it’s not generating any money.
there is no specific call to action, none will be taken. I would venture
to say that in your group, we could go through a list together. We’re
They build it, and no one came. They’re not Kevin Costner. It’s not a
not going to. I’m just saying we could, and we could find 20 or 30
field of dreams for most people. They’re still dreaming about why it’s
percent of them that aren’t doing those four things. They may know
not working. I would start with those four repairs right there.
about them, Shawn. What I’m indicating here is, beyond knowledge,
transcending knowledge is application. Are they applying it? Most of
I would like to ask you something right now. Would you agree that if
them aren’t.
those components are missing, they’ve got a problem from the get
go?
Dan Kennedy, one of the top marketers on the planet, one of the most
brilliant men in marketing, has finally embraced video marketing, and
Shawn: Yeah. The one thing I would question is for me, as a user, I
won’t argue the fact that it’s more effective than copywriting.
can’t stand auto-play video, and I’ve talked to a lot of people that don’t
like it. So I use video a lot, but I always have the user having to take the
If you had an audience, and they had to make a choice between sitting
action to play it.
and listening to a video, and reading 50 pages of copy, right now
they’ll choose the video. Now if you do both, video and transcription,
Joel: No, that’s fine by the way. I would agree with your assessment,
you’re going to optimize very effectively. That’s really effective, new,
in terms of having interviewed audiences, but in terms of conversion
relevant data for positioning on the engines.
level, our testing produced a very different result. If we want to strictly
go according to the numbers, I would say everyone should ignore Joel
Absolutely the video of the call to action is what most are now using,
Bauer, ignore Shawn, ignore everyone, and do their own test.
some of the most effective marketers. I’m sure you could name names,
because you’ve seen it done. That’s a massive change that’s taken
place in the last two years.
Shawn is a Co-founder of Affiliate Summit and Co-Editor-in-Chief of
FeedFront Magazine.
Video now dominates. It’s huge. Copywriting is also very effective. I’m
not putting it down. There are people that love to read copy, but the
majority would rather be sitting and entertained initially, and then
read the copy. I think both should be there, but on a different layer. I’d
rather have video on the first layer, as it’s relatively non invasive and it’s
an entertainment.

Anyway, I just wanted to make that comment. Very simple four

principles. Auto-responder sequencing, the silent salesman. I’m

20 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE

 Choosing the
Right Email
Service Provider
By Andrew Paul
aul
A ndrew P
Email marketing is NOT a science. There is no such
thing as 100% deliverability or some magic “Pixie
Dust” that can be sprinkled on your servers to help
you deliver your email creative into the recipient’s
inbox.
There are only “best practices”, which you can follow
to help you get the best possible results.
So, the question is, what makes some email get
delivered, some go into the spam/junk folder and
other email get lost in space? The answer is pretty
simple, reputation.
The reputation of your IP addresses will determine,
with 95% surety, if, when and how the email you are
sending will be handled by an ISP. You may ask, how
do I manage the reputation of my IP addresses and
where do I start? My answer would be, “Find the right
Email Service Provider (ESP)”.
Choosing an ESP with an intelligent, knowledgeable
and educated staff is the first place to start. An ESP
that works on a flat rate or monthly fee, versus on the
amount of email you send is the way to go.
Working with a company that will provide free
technical support, monitor and manage your IP
reputation, help clean and validate your email data,
give you advice on setting up and sending out your
campaigns is very important.
There are many companies who will sell you a service
and get you setup, but you will find that you are on
your own after your check has cleared.
Once you have made it through the process of
choosing the right ESP, here is where most will drop
the ball. Many do not realize how important it is
to put a competent person in the role of the email
marketing system administrator.
This role is the key to the success of any email
marketing system and whether you make money or
not. Many times I have seen this job left to an intern
or a receptionist, who hasn’t had experience, training
or grasps the type of performance required and thus
the program fails.
This is tantamount to letting a monkey with a wiffle
bat rebuild the transmission in your car or manage
your 401k. You can have the best email marketing
system, with white listed IP’s, great deliverable data
and the best converting offers on the planet, but if
you don’t have the right person running the program,
there is no chance to make money.
Think of your email marketing strategy as if you
were baking a cake. Each ingredient in the recipe is
important to the success of the cake as a whole. If
you omit one ingredient like sugar or flour, your cake
will not be the success you thought it would be.
Likewise if you skip one of the important steps in
your email marketing strategy, you will not get the
deliverability, results or ROI you expected. If you do
your homework, you’ll be mailing into the world’s
inboxes while munching on the best chocolate cake
you have ever had and getting paid for it.
Andrew Paul is the CEO and Managing Director of Boca
Networks, an ESP and email marketing publisher.
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 21
>
By Michael Vorel

Staying Productive
There was a time when travel and work
were not possible simultaneously. But
now, with the help of portable gadgets,
staying productive while on the road is a
reality.

I learned how to rely on mobile

technology more than ever this summer
due to a family vacation, sandwiched by
two business trips.

With various destinations in mind, I

needed a small arsenal of gadgets to be
fully mobile. Packing also needed to be
kept light, so multi-use items were high
on my list.

The item that best fits the bill is also my

most trusted gadget - the Apple iPhone. I
was able to answer emails, take pictures,
update social media, listen to music, watch
videos, hear podcasts, read Kindle books,
and more.
With the addition of useful apps, I
transformed the iPhone into a social
media powerhouse, updating Twitter
and Facebook status in seconds. No one
was the wiser that I happened to be on a
sailboat.
Just as effective in aiding in productivity is
the MacBook Pro 15, which truly became
my mobile office while traveling. Because
I use a PC Desktop, I had to be creative in
getting this all to jibe, and VMware Fusion
was the key.
By installing Vista on the Mac I was able
to utilize remote access software from
GoToMyPC and a mobile broadband
card from Verizon to login to my office
computer. With two operating systems I
had the ability to run either software. The
best of both worlds!
After five days, my vacation was coming
to an end, and it was time for my mobile
office to hit the road. I hopped on an
Amtrak train heading to New York City and
opted to upgrade to business class for $20.
I found the upgrade essential in order
to optimize the two hour travel time. I
could setup my office on board, access my
desktop in Tampa, and listen to Pandora
Internet Radio.
While mingling at the show I was armed
with two essential items; the Flip Cam HD
for video interviews and the Panasonic
Lumix DMC-TZ5 digital camera. These
gadgets enabled me to catch footage of
the show and photograph the highlights.
I uploaded the pictures and edited the
video with the help of the iMovie software
on the Mac and was able to put it all on
my blog right on the spot.
Michael Vorel
As the show wound down and my
business card collection grew, I almost
forgot to reserve my JetBlue seat. With a
few clicks on my trusty iPhone, I secured
that instantly. Having some time before
boarding my flight in JFK, I made a video
call to home via Skype to check in.
On the flight home, as I was kicking back
enjoying my glass of Cabernet I was
relieved knowing that although I had been
out of the office for almost two weeks,
business was running smoothly with the
help of some handy gadgets.
Now if only I had those noise cancelling
headphones.
Michael Vorel is President & Founder of
Vastplanet.com an E-Commerce & Internet
Marketing Consulting firm in Tampa, Florida
and blogs on ProjectGadget.com

22 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE


Jodi Rieg
er
Expanding your US business into Europe
can be a great opportunity to open a
new revenue stream and increase your
brand internationally. Last year, eMarketer
estimated there were 136.1 million
Europeans online in the five largest
European Union countries – France,
Germany, Italy, Spain, and the UK.
Advertisers spent $7.5 billion to reach all
Western Europeans, up 25% from $6.0
billion in the previous year. European
online retail activity rose “a staggering
58%” in 2007, with a similar increase
witnessed in 2008 (see the Forrester
Research report ‘Robust European Online
Shopping Growth to Continue’ 2008).
Which markets?
German based InnoGames (www.
innogames.de) is a developer and
distributor of browser-based games.
It runs affiliate programs for its most
successful title Tribal Wars across Germany,
Spain, Sweden, UK Netherlands, Portugal
and Romania.
Julian Bock, Product Manager, believes
that the question of which markets to
enter first is not simply a case of launching
in the biggest markets. “Tribal Wars
was a huge hit and we used customer
information & the existing user base to
give us an idea of which countries to go
into.”
A key understanding of your customer
and market data will give you the initial
Taking the Leap
Across the Pond
insight you need to make good planning
decisions.
Opening your US business in the UK,
where there is a shared language, is the
obvious first choice. YesAsia.com, a leading
Asian online entertainment retailer, sells
Chinese, Japanese and Korean products
including CDs, videos, books and games.
Stefan Janssens, Internet Marketing
Manager for YesAsia.com and YesStyle.
com, explains that language was the key
reason they launched first in the UK. “We
started in the UK, for the simple reason
that our site is in English. We then also
started programs in France and Germany,
because they are the largest markets
outside the UK.”
The Right Partner is Key
Launching an e-commerce operation
into a new market can be high risk. Which
markets should you expand to, when and
how? Is there sufficient customer demand
for your products and services? How will
you handle shipping and distribution
in another country? Will you need to
consider language and translation issues?
Are there legal or tax issues?
Even if you have done all the primary
research, it may be easier with a local
partner who can advise you of local best
practices. The right affiliate network can
help by:
• Providing a bi-lingual point of
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 23
By Jodi Rieger
contact for you and your affiliate
partners
• Understanding local market
conditions
• Knowing local affiliates who can
best promote your program
• Understanding the local competitive
landscape and advising on USPs,
commission structures and
affiliate benefits you’ll need to stay
competitive
• Advising on localized website
language, design and presentation
Merchants in the United States that are
entering new international markets
should consider affiliate networks with
an established presence to help them roll
out their business. With careful planning,
running a European affiliate program
should become a springboard to greater
things.
Jodi has ten years of experience in
e-commerce and performance marketing
and is currently an Account Manager for
Webgains USA where she is working with
many of Webgains’ international publishers
and advertisers.
 Making the Most
of Your Show
Experience
By Dina Riccobono
If you missed Affiliate Summit East
2009 (“ASE”), you missed a great
business opportunity. While sessions are
educational, the best networking occurs
after-hours. You can wait until you get
to town to plan your schedule, but your
best bet to maximize your time is to
plan ahead, stay connected, and always
follow up after the show.
Before you book your plane ticket, know
what your goals are. What does success
look like to you? Whether it’s developing
new connections or taking advantage of
open bars, keep your end goals in mind
when planning your show strategy.
Take a look at the attendee list and pick
three potential partners you’d like to do
business with. Set up meetings during
the show well in advance. It’s almost
impossible to track down big names
during the show and when you do,
they’re overbooked and may not be able
to chat before hopping on a plane.
Do your research in advance; know what
your business goals are and who can
best help you accomplish them. Find
those people now, set up a meeting, and
put together a business proposal. Don’t
oversell, but do show up prepared.
If you want to make a big impact and
get the most out of the show, get
24 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE
Dina Riccobono
the word out that you’re attending. least, send a courtesy email to each
Announce your presence prior to the person and try to include something
show on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, memorable about your prior meeting.
and the Affiliate Summit social network.
While you won’t end up working with
While you don’t have to set up meetings everyone you meet, connections go far
with every person who replies, you can in any industry. The social media whiz
stay in the loop with the important you meet today could be friends with
events that allow you to make the most the super affiliate who helps get your
of the show. campaigns to the next level tomorrow.
The biggest thing I learned from ASE Approach each and every show like a
and really all the shows I’ve been to business opportunity; at the end of the
is that it’s a 24-hour event. There are day, the goal is always the same - to
keynotes, panels, dinners, and parties. make more money.
If you don’t plan ahead, you end up
missing some great opportunities for
meeting unexpected guests. Dina is the Marketing and Social Media
Manager at MarketLeverage Interactive
Pack some Red Bull and save up cash Advertising, Inc., a performance-based
for cab fare around town, because the online marketing services company.
longest nights are the best for getting to
know people.
When you exchange contact
information, keep notes on the back
of cards of conversations or points you
want to remember. If you did your job,
you’ve ended up with so many cards
you won’t remember every person you
met.
Even if you can’t place faces with names,
do not make any exceptions when
it comes to following up. At the very

Death of an Affiliate Network
As of August 2009, exactly nine years
after launching and powering a peak of
over 600 affiliate programs at one time,
the FusionQuest affiliate network is
closing its doors and the domain will be
absorbed by ShareASale.
Yes, it is a sad day. I had a lot of great
plans that may be delayed a bit.
However, in the spirit of making
lemonade from lemons, is there anything
that has been learned from all of this?
Well, yes. Quite a lot actually. And I would
like to share what I have learned with
others in the hope that it may help them
to avoid similar mistakes.
Stay Focused
If you start out with a plan, stick to that
plan. Stay focused on your core project
and don’t let short term enticements
distract you from concentrated
development on your long-term plan.
If you are not starting out with a long-
term plan, get a plan.
This issue is most pronounced when
starting up. Someone offers you
involvement in a project that pays a fair
amount of money. You may be tempted
to do it to get the fast cash. Don’t.
Stay True to Yourself
You have the vision. You have the idea.
You know how you want to reach your
goal. You want to share your idea with
others.
Unfortunately, this is the usual response:
“Hey, great idea! But, you know, what you
really need to do is blah, blah, blah.”
If they were so smart, why didn’t they
think up the idea themselves? Believe in
yourself and don’t let others confuse you.
Use Money Wisely
If you have start-up capital, please, hang
on to it. Repeat this mantra: “Every penny
counts!” Seriously consider every single
expenditure, whatever the size.
And, if your best friend or relative is
working for you for pay and it isn’t really
adding value to your project, let them go.
Now.
Affiliates Rule
If you are a network, or run an affiliate
program, your number one asset you
need to protect and develop is your
affiliates. They are the foundation.
Affiliate marketing does not exist without
affiliates.
There is always a lot of talk about how
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 25
By JB McKee
affiliates defraud merchants. However,
from what I have seen, it is the affiliates
that really need the protection. They get
ripped off more than the merchants do.
Stay Active in the Community
Give. Freely. And lots.
Participate in the community. Contribute
everywhere possible. Encourage
discussion. Get involved in any and all
forums and movements.
Keep At It
Above all, keep moving forward. Don’t
get discouraged. Don’t give up. Develop
the mindset that you have already
achieved your success.
What the future holds…
FusionQuest as an entity may be dead.
But, by no means am I. The time and
money I invested into FusionQuest is time
and money I invested into myself, my
education, my personal development.
I intend to use it. Bring on the next!
JB McKee is a passionate veteran of
affiliate marketing and web application
development who is game for the next
big thing and can be reached at jb@
informdorm.com.
Lessons from North Carolina’s
Affiliate Tax Fight By Matt Enders
Over the years many events, technologies, and companies
have changed the face of affiliate marketing. The current battle
against the Affiliate Tax (Advertising Tax, Amazon Tax) is one of
the most important events to happen in our young industry.

The Advertising Tax has the power to both reform and injure
our entire industry. To date New York, Rhode Island, and North
Carolina have all passed the tax. Other states have seen the
damage these laws do to small businesses and have shot down
similar legislation.

Being headquartered in North Carolina, mgecom took a leading

role in the fight against the Advertising Tax. In this fight, we
learned many things which could be of great value should you
find yourself in a state considering the implementation of the
Advertising Tax. My best advice is this:
• Start an online petition and gather as many signatures as
possible. The volume of signatures is important, but more
from your state equals more relevance to lawmakers.
• Gather short, personal stories from every affiliate you can
reach whose business will be negatively impacted. Print
and bind these, and hand deliver them to your legislators.
• Use Twitter to get the message out and gain new
Matt Enders
supporters. Create a hash tag (we used #ncaffiliatetax) and
include it in every Twitter update you write.
• Talk to the Performance Marketing Alliance and leverage Many were focused on ensuring that Amazon.com and local
their experience, data, and reach. book retailers were both subject to the same taxes and
• Utilize the enormous power and community of ABW removing what was seen as an unfair competitive advantage.
(ABestWeb.com) and other affiliate marketing forums.
North Carolina being in a significant budget deficit certainly did
• Organize face to face meetings with anyone in your state not help our chances. To lawmakers, the Affiliate Tax seemed
who has an interest in seeing the law shot down. Use these like a way to both close the budget gap and keep local retailers
meetings to plan your group strategy. happy.
• Don’t wait to start the fight. Make yourself heard as soon
as the legislation appears. Even better, be preemptive and We found that personal stories from affiliates and getting
start educating your legislators on our industry. legislators to see how the Affiliate Tax laws negatively affect
small businesses and individuals was much more effective
• Visit your legislators in person. Meeting with lawmakers than speaking to them about their misconceptions of fairness
from your county is very important, but talk to anyone who and new tax revenue streams. In the end we lost the fight, but
will listen, particularly if they are on your State Finance we did make headway with key legislators. Now, we will work
Committee. towards repeal of the Affiliate Tax.
• Call your legislators multiple times. Don’t settle for
speaking to an aide.
Matt Enders is the CEO and Founder of mgecom, inc., an
• Be persistent.
Outsourced Affiliate Program Management firm.

In North Carolina, we were unfortunately fighting against the

perception of “fairness” in the eyes of lawmakers.
Affiliate Summit
East 2009
By Shawn Collins
Affiliate Summit East 2009 (ASE09), the
biggest of any Affiliate Summit East with
3,076 attendees, kicked off in New York
City on August 9, 2009.
The previous peak attendance for an
Affiliate Summit East show was 2,341 in
Boston last year.
Day one of ASE09 featured a series of
educational sessions and the Affiliate
Meet Market, where six hours of
networking took place.
After we experienced some long lines
this past January at Affiliate Summit West
2009, a number of things were changed
to alleviate the time for picking up
badges and registration materials, and
lines were low throughout the day.
The second day started with the keynote
address from Chris Brogan and Julien
Smith, co-authors of the New York Times
bestselling book, “Trust Agents”.
The capacity crowd was engaged as the
keynote ran beyond the end time with
the entertaining banter between Smith
and Brogan.
After the keynote, Chris Brogan and
Julien Smith signed copies of Trust
Agents for a line of Affiliate Summit
attendees.
Recap
The day also marked the opening of the
exhibit hall, which spanned two floors
and was crowded until closing.
There were also a series of packed
educational sessions on the second day.
Towards the end of the day, there was a
progression of roundtables hosted by a
dozen experts on various topics related
to affiliate marketing.
Day two wound up with a four-hour
session of networking and karaoke at
TechKaraoke, where a long list of folks in
the industry sang their hearts out.
The final day of Affiliate Summit started
with a keynote address from Peter
Shankman, who had the crowd laughing
and thinking with his talk.
The day also featured a series of
educational sessions and the final day of
the exhibit hall.
The final session was GeekCast.fm Live,
where podcast hosts answered questions
from the audience on podcasting and a
host of other issues.
Finally, ASE09 wound up with the Affiliate
Triathlon, where participants contributed
$100 each to Big Brothers Big Sisters of
New York City for the chance to win a
FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 27
Registration at Affiliate Summit East 2009
booth or five Platinum passes at Affiliate
Summit West 2010.
The three sports in the competition
were toilet racers (motorized toilets on
wheels), Skee-ball, and Whack-a-Mole.
As things drew to a close, I was chatting
with a number of people about the
syndrome that hits attendees as they
leave an Affiliate Summit (or any other
conference).
After several days of networking, we
strengthen our bonds, and there is a
sense of emptiness when everybody goes
their separate ways.
But it doesn’t have to be that way – we’ve
got YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, the
Affiliate Summit Social Network, and
other venues to stay together.
Then again, there is no replacing Affiliate
Summit West 2010, taking place January
17-19, 2010 in Las Vegas. We look forward
to seeing everybody again next January.
Shawn is a Co-founder of Affiliate Summit
and Co-Editor-in-Chief of FeedFront
Magazine.
 ket
Affiliate Meet Mar ote Address
Chris Brogan and Julien Smith Keyn

Exhibit Hall Crowd

Advertising on Facebook Session

ke Event
ic at the TechKarao
ockin’ the M
Jim Kukral R Ask the Experts Ro
undtables

Peter Shankman Keynote Todd Farmer

and Beaudo
n Spaulding
at the Triath
lon

28 | OCTOBER 2009 | FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE

FEEDFRONT MAGAZINE | OCTOBER 2009 | 29