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11/4/08: From The Amazon Associates Program

Dear Amazon Associate:

Now there are more ways than ever to link to Amazon.com and earn referral fees. Whether you've been an Amazon Associate for twelve years or two months, we are constantly updating our product selection to make it easier for you to monetize your web property, so there's always something new for all Associates to learn.

Here's an overview of ways to link to Amazon.com:

• Site Stripe: The new Site Stripe feature allows you to create text links directly from the Amazon.com without having to visit Associates Central. This makes adding links from any page or to any product much easier than before, all while you're browsing the Amazon.com site.
• Widgets: Widgets are attractive, customizable mini-applications that provide a window into Amazon product from the convenience of your site. In the past year, we've rolled out several new widgets including our MP3 Clips widget and Carousel widget. Stay tuned for an enhanced, more feature-packed Deals widget, which will be released this holiday season.
• Product Links: Product links allow you to build text, image, or text plus image customized links. You can also add product previews to your product links to enhance your product links. Product links are often included contextually on your web property so you can easily reference your favorite Amazon products with a link or image within your website copy.
• Banners: Primarily used for promotions or general category awareness, banners are offered in a variety of sizes and styles to attract your readers' attention and encourage them to click through to the Amazon sites.

We hope this overview was helpful and that you'll continue to explore the many ways to link to Amazon.com. As always, we want to hear your feedback so be sure to tell us what you think.

Sincerely,

The Amazon Associates Program

10/27/08: From The Amazon Affiliate Program

Dear Amazon Associate:

Last week we announced the launch of the newly redesigned Associates Central website, including the roll out of the new Site Stripe feature. We’d like to take this opportunity to tell you more about this new enhancement, which will make linking to Amazon.com even easier than ever.

The Site Stripe feature allows you to create links to your favorite products and pages on the Amazon.com site so you can update your website more frequently and with fewer clicks.

Here’s what you need to know about the Site Stripe:

If you are logged into your Amazon Associates account, the Site Stripe will automatically show up on the Amazon.com website just below the navigation bar (see example below):

There are four buttons available to you on the Site Stripe:

• 'Link to this Page': By clicking on this link, you will be taken directly to Associates Central and receive the HTML code needed to add that particular Amazon.com page to your website or blog. After visiting Associates Central, you’ll see a link to take you back to the same page on Amazon.com that you were on prior to clicking on the Site Stripe. This allows you to create links to any page on Amazon directly from Associates Central while browsing the Amazon.com site.
• 'Add to aStore': Adding links to your aStore is just as easy as creating text links. By clicking on this link, you will be taken to the Associates Central aStore configuration page where you can quickly add this product/link to your aStore. After visiting Associates Central, you’ll see a link to take you back to Amazon to continue shopping.
• 'Your Earnings Report': Keep track of your earnings with this shortcut to your earnings report directly from any page of the Amazon.com retail site. Find out where you are earning referral fees while navigating the Amazon.com site to add more links on your website or blog to products and pages that appeal to your readers, based on your earnings performance.
• 'Settings': The Settings tab allows you to configure your Site Stripe tabs as you like and also gives you the ability to turn off the Site Stripe if you would prefer not to see it while you are on the Amazon.com website. Please note that if you do turn off the Site Stripe, you will need to visit your Account Settings within Associates Central to turn it back on. All of your Site Stripe settings can be accessed there. You can always hide the Site Stripe at any time without turning it off. Just click on the “hide” button on the toolbar. To see it again, click on the “tab” at the top left.

We hope you’ll enjoy this new feature and want to hear your feedback about what you like and what you’d like to see improved.

Sincerely,

The Amazon Associates Program

10/14/08: News from EPN

Tips for Sending Engaged Buyer Traffic to eBay Sites

Our philosophical approach at eBay Partner Network is to pay generous commissions for quality traffic that drives incremental buying activity on eBay, i.e., purchases that occurred due to the affiliate's actions. Thus, we've looked closely at how engaged the traffic is from our affiliates and in the interest of eBay's sellers and the overall health of the program, we made the decision to expire a small number of affiliates who were driving the least engaged traffic. Moving forward, should we notice that any affiliate is driving low quality traffic according to our metrics, our goal is to provide help in improving the affiliate's site(s) before taking any action such as expiration.

In the interest of helping you maximize the impact of the traffic you drive to eBay, and enjoying in the financial benefits, we also wanted to re-post some of the tips from our board posts which some folks found to be very helpful.

What does "engagement" mean?

"Engagement" is how we look at a user's experience on eBay once directed via an affiliate link. Among other metrics, we look at the time that users spend on eBay, the number of pages that they view, and their bidding and buying activity after coming through an affiliate link. For example, a user who visits eBay and then leaves the site immediately is not "engaged", whereas a user who comes and browses the site and places a bid or makes a purchase is highly "engaged."

Can affiliates affect engagement and conversion?

Definitely and there can be a big difference in performance on these metrics between affiliates. To illustrate the point with an extreme example, a site that helps potential buyers find and research stereo receivers and then points them to great deals on eBay will drive more engaged buyers with better conversion rates than an eBay banner on a ringtone site. Also, a user is far more likely to be engaged if they knew prior to the click that they were going to be driven to eBay.

How can affiliates improve engagement from their sites?

Many of you are already using these techniques and others, but for those who may not be, here are some tips to improve engagement.

• Maximize the amount of unique content to your site. Create commerce-oriented content for your site that engages the user in the shopping experience. Conversely, avoid putting eBay affiliate ads on pages that have little to do with shopping - e.g. ringtone sites, non-commerce oriented social network sites, e-mail services, etc. Also, sites that do little other than offer links to redirect to eBay generally don't perform well and remember to always make it clear on the affiliate links that they will be redirected to eBay to shop

• Use more targeted creatives and tools. If all you have is a simple text link to eBay or a static eBay banner ad on your site, consider using one of our flash creatives. Use what you know about your users and your content, so consider using our banners targeted to specific demographics (e.g. male vs. female) or categories. Also, consider using our Editor Kit and eBay To Go (US only) widgets, which can be customized to show specific eBay listings for a given category or keyword right on your page.

• Integrate eBay links within your content. Sites that find a way to work eBay advertising into the content, rather than just as a simple ad at a top, side, or bottom of a page, tend to perform better.

• Optimize your landing pages. Use what you know about your users to help them find what they want on eBay. If your site is about tennis rackets, avoid landing your users on the eBay homepage, and instead send them to a search results page on eBay for targeted tennis queries.

• Use our geotargeting functionality. Sending a visitor on your site who is from the UK to ebay.co.uk (our British site) rather than ebay.com (our US site), will significantly improve conversion rates and engagement. You can select this option when you're generating eBay links in the "tools" tab.

• Avoid simply incentivizing visits to eBay or registration with eBay -If you are going to give your users cash back or points, tie those rewards to actual valid purchases on eBay. If you incentivize visits or sign up, a user's primary motivation is typically not browsing or purchasing from eBay, so their value to us is low.

How can affiliates test & improve their performance?

• Set up specific campaigns to test out any new sites, links, content, etc., and ideally, test these new approaches in smaller volumes than your overall traffic. This way you will be able to evaluate the performance of each new campaign separately, ramp up the ones that perform the best, and prune the ones that don't perform.

• Leverage the custom ID reports to further segment your testing. In an upcoming release, additional category reporting will be made available that will help you identify at campaign, tool, and program levels the categories whose traffic is most likely to convert into sales, which will help you further optimize your content and affiliate links.

Lastly, as we have set high standards for the program, we are also taking this into account as we screen new registrations. We are committed to growing the number of quality affiliates in the program, and we want to make sure our newest partners can meet those expectations. As a result going forward we are paying close attention to all aspects of applications - especially the descriptions of affiliates' business models and URLs that affiliates are planning on sending traffic from. If you are interested in applying, please keep this in mind as you fill out your application.

We hope you find this communication helpful and wanted to thank you for your work in driving great traffic to eBay. We remain committed to working with you to continue to build and strengthen eBay Partner Network.

The eBay Partner Network Team

10/12/08: Chitika Premium

As we talk to more and more publishers about what is working out best with Chitika | Premium, we are learning that publishers who are adding Chitika | Premium along with their AdSense units are seeing large increases in their overall advertising revenue.

So what is the best way to use AdSense and Chitika | Premium together? Take a look at this example:

This is just one example - since there are unlimited ways to set up a website, here are a couple guidelines to make sure you are making as much revenue as possible with your Chitika | Premium ads:

• You should place Chitika | Premium ads above the fold, near your main content (usually right above or below article titles is the best placement).
• Make sure you are placing us on all of your pages - especially the pages where you get the most search engine traffic. For most people, this is the individual article pages (permalinks).
  

Get started on your placement optimization by grabbing Chitika | Premium code.

10/9/08: eBay Partner Network Australia

eBay AUSTRALIA Affiliate Program - Special November 2008 Promotion!

Christmas is just around the corner so it is a great time to promote eBay Australia and the eBay Australia Affiliate Program wants you to have a great November in 2008, so we are increasing the rate card for this month!

Help us drive registrations and activity on the site and take advantage of these increased rates in November. The Special Rates for November:

We look forward to seeing your November results!

Kind regards,

eBay Australia Affiliate Program Manager

10/9/08: eBay Partner Network UK

Earn a 20% bonus and win a Nintendo Wii with eBay.co.uk!

Christmas is coming and it's the busiest time of year for eBay.co.uk, as everyone rushes to buy their presents and stock up on festive goodies. The eBay UK Affiliate team want to encourage you to send even more quality traffic to eBay.co.uk across this period, so we're giving you the chance to earn a 20% bonus and you could even win a Nintendo Wii!

How to earn your 20% bonus

We have set targets based on the Winning Bid and BIN Revenue you generated for eBay.co.uk in September and if you beat these targets, you will earn a 20% Rev Share bonus, which will be paid to you in January.

Beat September Revenue £ amount by 35% in November = 20% RevShare bonus

Beat September Revenue £ amount by 15% in December = 20% RevShare bonus

Of course, these targets take into account that traffic to eBay.co.uk naturally increases in the run up to Christmas and don't forget you'll also receive commission on all the ACRUs you drive too!

Win a Nintendo Wii

Everyone who hits their targets and earns more than £100 in commissions in both November and December will be entered into a draw to win a Nintendo Wii. We'll even throw in a Wii Fit to help you work off the Christmas pudding! The lucky winner will be notified in January.

Tips to increase your Christmas traffic:

Use our new seasonal banners, which come in a variety of different sizes and designs. You can find them in the Link Generator if you filter by 'seasonal'.

Identify this year's "must have" gift and showcase eBay listings of that item using the Editor Kit. Keep watching our blog for news of our top-selling products and hottest categories.

More people are searching online for products at this time of year than any other, so ensure your site is optimized for search engines.

We're looking forward to seeing you earn your bonuses in November and December and good luck with winning the Nintendo Wii!

The eBay Partner Network UK Team

10/7/08: eBay Partner Network France

Change of Payment Structure for the eBay.fr France Affiliate Program on the 1st of November 2008!

The eBay France affiliate team is very happy to inform you that as of the 1st of November 2008, the payment structure of the French affiliate program will change in order to help you earn more!

Up to now, the eBay.fr affiliate program has mostly rewarded the recruitment of new registered users. As of the 1st of November, we want to compensate you more for the activity of the 12 million registered users we have already!

This is why, on top of the new ACRU compensation, the ebay.fr affiliate program will be tying your earnings per bid and BIN to the revenue we get for the sold item and the share you receive will vary from 40% to 65%. This model has already allowed affiliates to increase their income in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia.

Details on the Revenue Share Payout structure (or "Rev' Share")
The revenue used to calculate your commission is made up of the seller fees (listing fees and final value fees) earned by eBay after a winning bid or Buy-it-Now that has been generated by traffic that you have driven to eBay.fr

Basically, this means that when you generate sales on eBay.fr and eBay.fr receives €100 of revenue from these sales, you will be paid between €40 and €65, depending on the total monthly revenue generated by your account.

On top of an exceptional payout on revenue, the eBay.fr affiliate program will continue to reward you for New Active Users based on a new payout structure (see detailed structure below).

The Payout structure:

A couple of examples:

If you generate 100 New Active Confirmed Registered Users and €8,000 of eBay revenue in any given month, you will therefore receive compensation of (€15 x 100) + (€8,000 x 50%) = €1,500 + €4,000 = €5,500
If you generate 600 New Active Confirmed Registered Users and €120,000 eBay revenue, you will receive compensation of (€20 x 600) + (€120,000 x 65%) = €12,000 + €78,000 = €90,000

This new Payout structure will apply to all affiliates for the activity generated from the 1st of November onwards! Use this new compensation to increase your income during the holiday season!

10/2/08: From Pepperjam Network

PEPPERJAM NETWORK ANNOUNCES RELEASE OF REPORTING WEB SERVICES

In an effort to provide our most sophisticated affiliates with the ability to interact with our network and automate basic tasks such as reporting we are proud to announce the official release of Pepperjam Network Web Services!

Pepperjam Network Web Services allows affiliates to automate some of the basic tasks and functions that typically require manual log-in through the Pepperjam Network affiliate interface. In addition, PJN Web Services allows technically advanced affiliates and programmers to interact with the Pepperjam Network system and build cool tools and features not currently offered by Pepperjam Network. It is our hope that this release will help foster and promote creativity from our 10,000+ active affiliates, while also helping everyone make more money with Pepperjam Network.

Let me make it clear that we understand that PJN Web Services requires a significant level of technical expertise and doesn't apply to all of our valued affiliates.

As part of the initial release and roll-out of PJN Web Services we have provided detailed documentation and instruction on how to access your individual Pepperjam Network reporting, including SID Reports, Transaction Summary Reports, and Transaction Detail Reports at http://webservices.pepperjamnetwork.com.

Questions regarding Pepperjam Network Web Services should be posted in the form of a comment to the Pepperjam Network Blog.

Best of luck!

Kristopher Jones

9/17/08: From EPN

We have identified an issue that may be inflating revenue data in eBay Partner Network reports. Due to an issue with one of our databases, some of the revenue fees for publishers were double-counted in our system. The issue appears to have affected publishers only from Sept 5th-Sept 9th, and only in the US, UK, Australia, and Canada programs. Although the impact varies by publisher, the revenue was overstated by as much as 20% or more for those 5 days.

We have been able to calculate down to the individual publisher level what the correct revenue should be for those days. Our team is in the process of correcting the associated data and tables but may take several more days to complete this task. In the meantime, please keep this information in mind as you run any reports that span the associated time periods.

Thank you,

The eBay Partner Network Team

9/16/08: From Pepperjam Network

Dear Affiliates,

Thanks for all your all your hard work promoting the eBay Affiliate Program on Pepperjam Network! We understand that some affiliates may be generating traffic through other ad networks to promote eBay. Pepperjam Network, along with eBay, does NOT prohibit the use of 3rd party ad networks, however each affiliate is responsible for the quality of all of the activity in their account. Each affiliate in the eBay Affiliate Program on Pepperjam Network is accountable for all traffic that is generated maliciously, including mal ware incidents, and will be considered in Violation of the eBay Terms and Conditions.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us directly at anytime.

Again, thanks for all your hard work promoting eBay and all Pepperjam Network merchants!

9/12/08: From The eBay Partner Network Program

Dear Affiliate,

As you may already know, our newest release of the eBay Partner Network went live on September 10th. This new release incorporates additional reporting functionality to more easily track your traffic's performance on eBay, as well as a new Campaign Quality Report that will help you determine the quality of new registered users you send to the US program. As of November 1st, ACRU's payouts for all publishers in the US program will calculated using these quality tiers. For a full description of all the new features in this release, please check out our blog post about it from last Friday.

Please also note that the Network Agreement and Advertiser Terms and Conditions have been updated with this release. Please review these documents thoroughly to make sure you fully understand the updated policies. Some updates you may want to pay special attention to include:

- The eBay UK and eBay FR programs now allow eBay sellers to become affiliates (in their programs.)
- Any transaction resulting from traffic that has been redirected off of an Advertiser site (e.g. eBay.com) will be disqualified, and you will not receive commissions.
- Paid Search: Bidding on KW eBay or any variations is not permitted in any program.
- If you choose PayPal as a payment method, your PayPal account must be verified in order for your payment to be released. To learn more about how to verify your account, go to https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/gen/verification-faq-outside

The updated Network Agreement and Advertiser Terms and Conditions will go into effect for existing publishers on September 19th. If you choose not to accept any terms set forth by the new policies, you may end our affiliate agreement before September 19th by closing your account under the Account: Business Information section of the eBay Partner Network interface. Please ensure before you close your account that a payment method has been entered and is correct as you will not be able to edit this information after you have closed your account. If you have any questions regarding the new policies, please contact customer service.

Regards,

The eBay Partner Network Team

9/8/08: From The Amazon Affiliate Program

Dear Amazon Associate:

The Associates program is excited to announce the availability of Amazon Video On Demand. With Amazon Video On Demand, customers can now instantly watch movies and television shows commercial-free on Macs or PCs. With this new service, you can offer your customers the ability to enjoy instant playback of hit Hollywood movies and the latest TV shows.

Take advantage of the launch of this popular new Amazon movie & TV streaming service and earn a 10% referral fee on all movies, TV seasons, and TV episodes such as The Office, House and Law & Order. Leverage Amazon Video On Demand’s Preview Player widget and add movie trailers to your site. Hit movies and top TV episodes are among the most compelling forms of video on the web with the highest conversion rates.

To make it even easier for customers to decide to rent or purchase a movie or TV show, the first two minutes of videos automatically play at no charge to customers when they visit the product detail page. At any time during this 2-minute viewing period, customers can choose to purchase or rent the title to watch it in its entirety, driving higher conversion and increased referral fees for Associates. TiVo® customers can still download movies and TV shows to their TiVo DVR and watch on their TVs as before.

EZ Affiliate BLOG
EZ Affiliate FORUM

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