revenue performance magazine, spring 2011 edition
TRANSCRIPT
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BLUE BOOK Top 20The Best CPA & Affiliate Networks
Building Instant TrustWith Tim Ash
Integrated Bidding PlatformsLeading the Way Forward
BLUE BOOK Top 20The Best CPA & Affiliate Networks
Building Instant TrustWith Tim Ash
Integrated Bidding PlatformsLeading the Way Forward
DO YOU HAVEA FUTURE?THE PERFORMANCEMARKETING EXPLOSION
IS GOING TO ROCK
YOUR WORLD
ISSUE 7 | SPRING 2011 | REVENUE.MTHINK.COM
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ContentsLetter From The Editor
Spring 2011 | Revenue.mthink.com
Performance Marketing Is Your Future .....................5By Chris Trayhorn
Does Your Website Inspire Trust? ...............................6By Tim Ash
SPECIAL SUPPLEMENT
The BLUE BOOK GuideTo Ad Networks & Exchanges
How We Chose The BLUE BOOK Top 20..............BB3By Chris Trayhorn
The BLUE BOOK Top 20 - Affi liate Networks ..... BB4
The BLUE BOOK Top 20 - CPA Networks .............BB5
Integrated Multichannel Marketing ..................... BB6By Peter Bordes
The Evolution Of Performance Marketing .......... BB8By Gary Olden
Interview: Thomas Dietzel - CPAWay ..................BB12A BLUE BOOK Q&A
Maximizing Opportunity InPerformance Marketing Networks ......................BB14By Greg Bayer
Maximize Performance Across ChannelsWith Holistic KPIs ....................................................BB16By Tom Walsh
Interview: Darin Namken -Bulldog Media Group .............................................. BB17A BLUE BOOK Q&A
15 Years Of Linkshare ..............................................BB18
A Retrospective Round Table
How Mobile-Friendly Are You? .................................. 33By Geno Prussakov
Is Affi liate Tracking Software RightFor Your Program? ........................................................34By Maranda Moses
Affi liate Program Management:An Hour A Day ...............................................................38By Geno Prussakov
Affi liate Networking 2011: With Great Scale
Comes Great Responsibility ......................................40By Peter S. Klein
This edition of Revenue Performance includesthe BLUE BOOK Guide To PerformanceMarketing Networks. We have chosen toreproduce the ranking tables for 2011 for both theTop 20 CPA Networks and the Top 20 Affi liate Net-works as we have many new readers for whom therankings may be useful. Since the rankings werepublished in November, 2011, a couple of themeshave emerged in the feedback we have received.
The fi rst was that the rankings werent fairor were possibly infl uenced by whether or not thenetwork concerned was an advertiser with us.Speaking as the publisher of a print magazine in theage of the internet, all I can say to that is, I wish.We dont even have 20% of the companies featuredin the BLUE BOOK rankings as advertisers. If onlyit were more.
The truth is that the whole point of the BLUEBOOK approach to the rankings is that we wantedto get way from the online lists of my favorite net-works, written by gurus and governed by embed-ded referral commission links. Weve worked hardto make it as authoritative as possible and thats howit will remain. The second theme that has emergedis that everyone wants more education. Its clearthat performance marketing is the answer for manyof the ills that marketing professionals and agenciesare struggling with, but they need to know how tomove forward. Several of our contributors look athow the industry has evolved and where it is goingin the future - please read them and also check outmy column on page 5 for more on eduction andthe future.
Also in this issue we bring you the latest chapter
of our ongoing collaboration with Tim Ash, thelanding page and conversion expert. He once againbrings his inimitable style and invaluable advice toour pages. His piece begins on page 6 and is recom-mended reading.
Chris TrayhornFounder and Editor
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Tim Ash is the CEO ofSiteTuners.com, a landing page
optimization firm that offersconversion consulting, full-serviceguaranteed-improvement tests,and software tools to improveconversion.
Peter Bordes is the Founder CEOand Chairman of the Board ofMediaTrust. Prior to MediaTrust,he spent much of his career inbanking and venture capitaland was a founder of MasonCabot investment bank, whichspecialized in early stage mediaand technology financing. He isa Founding Charter Member and
on the Board of Directors of thePMA Performance MarketingAssociation.
Peter S. Klein is GeneralManager of the MonetizeItAffiliate Network, a division ofMediaWhiz, a leading onlineperformance marketing agency.Peter heads sales, distributionand operations, as well as productand offer development forMediaWhizs affiliate program.
Geno Prussakov is an author,blogger, speaker and consultant in
affiliate marketing and affiliateprogram management. He is awell-known speaker at conferencessuch as eMetrics Summit,a4uexpo, Internet MarketingConference, eComXpo andAffiliate Summit.
Maranda Moses is acommunications strategist forShare Results and contributessome of their widely read blogsand articles on affiliate strategies,industry news, and trends.She has vast experience as asenior account manager in the
education, family, apparel andmaternity insurance verticals.
Tom Walsh is the Senior Directorof Media Services at NetMargin,Datran Medias Multi-ChannelMedia Network since 2005. He isresponsible for media planning,buying and publisher partnermanagement specializing inoptimizing revenue opportunities.
Contributors
2 revenuePERFORMANCE
PUBLISHER & EDITORChris Trayhorn
ART DIRECTORDavid Witcomb
DESIGN & PRODUCTIONSharon Anderson and Donna Sharee
SENIOR WRITERLisa Morgan
PRODUCTION MANAGERYvonne Schellerup
CLIENT LIAISONJennifer Neaves
CONTRIBUTING WRITERSChris Trayhorn, Tim Ash, Geno Prussakov, Tom
Walsh, Maranda Moses, Peter Bordes, GaryOlden, Greg Bayer, Peter Klein
VICE-PRESIDENT, SALESTobias Siegel
ADVERTISING/SALES DIRECTORKelly Joseph Lemos
To advertise, subscribe or obtain reprints, call 415-371-8800,
or visit: revenue.mThink.com
Revenue Performance is published by mThink55 New Montgomery, Suite 617
San Francisco, CA 94105
mThink: Intelligent Performance Marketing
CHAIRMAN AND CEOChris Trayhorn
VICE PRESIDENT, MARKETINGYvonne Schellerup
DIRECTOR, WEB DEVELOPMENTRon Snow
COMPTROLLERJulienne Riveong
DEDICATED TO SUCCESSFULPERFORMANCE ADVERTISING
While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy
of the content of this publication, the publisher will accept
no responsibility for any errors or omissions, or for any loss
or damage, consequential or otherwise, suffered as a result
of any material published here. The information published
in Revenue Performance is not intended as a substitute
for legal, accounting, tax or other professional advice. The
publisher assumes no responsibility for statements madeby advertisers in business competition. All editorial submis-
sions, whether solicited or unsolicited, become the property
of mThink. Statements and opinions expressed herein are
not necessarily those of Revenue Performance, mThink, its
affi liates, advertisers or any other agent. The name Revenue
Performance and the phrase Super-Affi liate Insights a re
the intellectual property of mThink. The entire content of
this publication is protected by copyright; full details are
available through the publisher. All rights reserved. These
trademarks or copyright materials may not be used in any
media for any purpose without the express written consent
of mThink.
2011 mThink
ISSN: 1549-7615
Cover Image: Solarseven | Dreamstime.com
Stanislav Perov | Dreamstime.com
Disclaimer: Revenue Performance and revenue.mThink .com include editorial and/or advertising that refers to affi liate programs that ofteninclude many different websites. Occasionally those programs may include websites offering education in casino or card games. In such cases
no promotion or endorsement of those sites should be inferred or implied our editorial coverage and/or advertising relates only to the affi liateprogram itself. Revenue Performance magazine and revenue.mThink.com do not accept advertising that promotes online gambling.
Advertiser Index
Adknowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BB7
adMedia.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IBC
ad:tech . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
CashNetUSA.com, A Cash America Company . . BB11
CPAWay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BB13
Digital River oneNetworkDirect . . . . . . . . . . OBC
DirectTrack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BB19
Effectus Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Infi nite Traffi c . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35
LinkShare, A Rakuten Company . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
MarketHealth.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31
MediaWhiz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
MillionaireNetwork.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BB2
NetMargin, A Datran Media Company . . . . . . IFC
NetX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Pepperjam . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .BB9
Search Engine Strategies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
ValueClick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
2 0 1 0
Dedicated To Performance Marketing
Find the Top 20 CPAand Affi liate Networks
on pages BB4 and BB5
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5revenue.mThink.com
Educate For The Future Chris Trayhorn, Publisher & Editor
Hey Networks!This isnt diffi cult to understand.
When people say they want the per-formance marketing sector to grow,
the answer is in their own hands. Andwhen I say people you should knowthat I mean ad network executives.Need more advertisers? There areseveral million companies in the USAalone that arent currently using perfor-mance marketing but could do so veryprofi tably. Go get em. Whats stoppingthose companies from using perfor-mance marketing? They dont knowenough. They dont understand how itall works. Theyre intimidated by thestories they hear.
So teach them. This isnt diffi cult tounderstand.
Hey Agencies!If you are an agency and youre used
to buying display ads for your cus-tomers, are you tracking the resultsall the way through to sales transac-tions? I dont mean just we ran thisad campaign and saw an uptick inoverall sales. I mean real, customer bycustomer tracking. Regarding your lastmedia buy, do you know exactly howmany leads it generated? How manybrand transactions? How much traffi c
it generated? You dont know? Well,you could. Performance marketing cando that for you.
Hey Advertisers!How about your online sales? Couldthey do with a boost? Could you usean extra 20% of sales revenue? Or howabout sales leads? What if you couldbuy them at a fi xed price, and youknew in advance exactly how manywould convert into sales? Performancemarketing can do that for you.
A couple of weeks ago I was chat-ting to a senior executive within theperformance ad network space and
he told me, we have lots of potentialcustomers. We just cant train themfast enough. Hes a very smart manwith his fi nger on the pulse of ourindustry and what he says rings true.Every week I get two or three callsfrom companies wanting to start anaffi liate marketing program or needingto generate leads. They have no ideawhere or how to begin. Then I read thenews and see that another network hasgone bust or is under investigation forfraud or something. Its madness. Asan industry, performance marketinghas one of the biggest opportunities in
history sitting right in front of it. Mo-bile Internet access and social mediaare between them driving a stake intothe heart of much of the bricks and
mortar retail sector and forcing offl ineand broadcast marketing companiesto panic as their lack of measurabilitycomes back to haunt them. Perfor-mance marketing is the answer. It isthe future of marketing. But we needto be teaching merchants, marketersand advertisers what it is that we do.Why it works. How much it costs. Andthen we can turn them into customers.Colleagues. Evangelists.
Its not that diffi cult.Performance marketing is the future.
Education of marketing profession-als is the future of the performancemarketing industry. rp
REVENUE PERFORMANCE AND THE BLUE
BOOK will be launching a number of training
and education initiatives in the coming months
to help merchants, advertisers and agency execu-
tives understand what performance marketing
is, why its the future and how to make a start.
To sign up for updates and new announcements,
please go to: training.mthink.com
Performance MarketingIs Your FuturePlease, take a moment to follow my train of logic:
STEP 1: Marketing professionals are under more pressure than ever before.The pressure is to deliver measurable results, now and in the future.
CONCLUSION 1: Measurable results are key to the future of marketing.
STEP 2: Measurable results are key to the future of marketing.Performance marketing is all about delivering measurable results.
CONCLUSION 2: Performance marketing is the future of marketing.STEP 3: Performance marketing is the future.
Marketing professionals need to know much more about performance marketing.
CONCLUSION 3: Education of marketing professionals is key to the future of the performancemarketing industry.
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6 revenue
Conversion Tim Ash, SiteTuners.com
Appearance
Dont get disqualifi ed based solelyon how you look
Does Your WebsiteInspire Trust?The Secret to Building InstantTrust Online
Figure 1 Would you buy a $30,000 grand piano from these folks?Even if the company was recommended to you by a friend, you wouldlikely question their professionalism after visiting them online.
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7revenue.mThink.com
Transactional Assurances
Relieve point-of-action anxietiesbefore they arise
Experts & Media
Borrow trust from better-known brands
Figure 2 This ecommerce site has the right idea but missed thepoint. If visitors cant see your transactional assurances, they mightas well not be there at all. Display them prominently above the fold.
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8 revenue
Conversion Tim Ash, SiteTuners.com
Consensus of Peers
Support automatic compliance bydemonstrating social proof
rp
TIM ASH
Figures 3a-3b By simplifying their form and emphasizing trust sym-bols, this company was able to increase conversions on their landingpage by 51%, resulting in a $48 million/year revenue increase.
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AKQA
AMAZON
AMERICAN EXPRESS OPEN
AT&T
BABYCENTER
BANK OF AMERICA
CBS INTERACTIVE
EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY
EBAY
EXPERIAN
FACEBOOK
FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION
GOOGLE
LENOVO
LINKEDIN
MICROSOFT
MSNBC
MTV
NBA
NBC
NIELSEN
NOKIA
OFFICE DEPOT
OGILVY
PEPSI CO
RAZORFISH
SAATCHI&SAATCHI
THOMSON REUTERS
US AIRWAYS
VERIZON
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
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powerful networkingProviding marketers a highlyeffi cient one-stop opportunityto compare and contrast the besttools, services, and partners inhours instead of weeks.
power of placeThe biggest and best marketplacefor digital marketing expertsad:tech New York 2010 hadover 10,000 attendees.
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The Best NetworksIn this section of the BLUE BOOK
we reproduce our annual ranking of
the best performance marketing net-
works. The list is updated each Fall and
remains current for 12 months. Theseare the networks that we feel able to
wholeheartedly recommend as a result
of receiving feedback from over 5,000
industry experts: publishers and adver-
tisers that do the business of perfor-
mance marketing every day.
These networks made it onto these
lists because as a group they work hard
to provide their customers with ROI.
They invest in technology, they recruit
and train their affi liate managers to
help publishers succeed and they un-
derstand that advertisers need measur-
able results.
In other words, these networks were
chosen as one of the Top 20 networks
in their fi eld because over 5,000 pub-
lishers and advertisers think they are
the best at what they do, and our Blue
Ribbon Panel of industry experts con-
curred.
No other ranking of ad networks
uses the depth of research or is as au-
thoritative as the BLUE BOOK Top 20.
Choose these networks for your nextperformance marketing campaign.
MethodologyThe BLUE BOOK Top 20 is not a
simple listing of the biggest networks.
Instead it takes into account reputa-
tion, infl uence, clientele, popularity
and scale.
An important part of the ranking
process was our survey of over 5,000
industry fi gures carried out during Oc-
tober, 2010. In that survey we asked an
open-fi eld fi rst question to identify the
respondents favorite networks for run-
ning CPA and affi liate campaigns. The
open-fi eld nature of this question wasdesigned to avoid any selection bias
caused by prompting or by which net-
works we included in a pick-list.
On a subsequent page of the survey
we provided a list of almost 80 lead-
ing networks from which respondents
were asked to choose a further four
networks in each of the CPA and affi li-
ate network categories.
We also made allowance for the
sheer number of publishers that the
big networks deal with. We didnt want
smaller but well-loved networks to be
swamped so we factored that in too.
In addition to the main survey, we
also asked our Blue Ribbon panel of in-
dustry experts to complete a survey of
their own. In this, we asked that each
should create an ideal portfolio of af-
fi liate networks and of CPA networks.
We allowed for the fact that they might
be tempted to vote for their own net-
works where relevant, and then these
confi dential results were fed into our
calculations.Finally, we also researched and ag-
gregated a variety of traffi c data, mea-
sures of industry infl uence and as many
other pieces of information as we could
gather.
The result of all these deliberations
is the BLUE BOOK Top 20: our picks for
the Top 20 affi liate networks and the
Top 20 CPA networks.
BLUE BOOK Top 20The Top CPA and Affi liateNetworks For 2011
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
BB3The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK bluebook.mthink.com
HELP US GET EVEN BETTERPerformance marketing is
growing so quickly that the next
update to the BLUE BOOK Top
20 rankings will expand. For the
first time it will include displaynetworks used for performance
marketing media buys. It means
a lot more work for us and so the
research and survey effort will
begin immediately after ad:tech
San Francisco. If you are a net-
work of any kind and you would
like to participate in the survey
and assist with distribution of
our survey link, please email me
directly at: [email protected]
Thank you,
Chris Trayhorn
BLUE-RIBBON PANELThe authority of the Top 20
rankings are much enhanced by
the input of our distinguished
panel of industry experts. They
are an unfailingly helpful, intel-
ligent and patient group.
The members of the Blue-Rib-bon Panel are: Heather Paulson,
Peter S. Klein, Brendan J. Smith,
Jennifer Lovette, George Hansen,
Dennis Syracuse, Evgenii Geno
Prussakov, Bob Kumagai, Michael
Sprouse, Matthew R. Sandin, Jeff
Kamikow and Chad P. French.
These are stars of our indus-
try and for their help we thank
them sincerely.
For more information on our methodologyand on the best affi liate and CPA networksgo to: mthink.com/bluebook
BB3
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Network URL Survey comments or notes
1 ClickBank www.clickbank.com ClickBank, you are the greatest. You know what you are doing and how tohelp your affiliates. Keep up the great work.
2 Commission www.cj.com CJ is the best at balancing the relationship between the merchants, theJunction network, and the affiliates.
3 ShareASale www.shareasale.com Absolutely the overall best performance marketing network in the worldtoday is ShareASale.
4 Affiliate Window/ www.affiliatewindow.com The biggest affiliate network in Britain, received abuy.at buy.at lot of support from affiliates in Europe.
5 oneNetworkDirect www.onenetworkdirect.com Digital Rivers oneNetworkDirect is the leader in software sales with theindustrys best network technology and offices worldwide.
6 LinkShare www.linkshare.com Owned by Japanese company Rakuten with strong foreign language andcurrency capabilities.
7 Amazon affiliate-program.amazon.com Although Amazon offers a smaller percentage per sale, their reporting systemfar surpasses other big networks.
8 Google Affiliate www.google.com/ads/affiliatenetwork The Google affiliate program is much easier to deal with than most others.Network
9 AvantLink www.avantlink.com Avantlink is incredibly professional. I wish to heaven the rest of the networkswere in the same league.
10 TradeDoubler www.tradedoubler.com Founded in Sweden and now covering 18 different markets in Europe.
11 eBay Partner www.ebaypartnernetwork.com eBays affiliate network with the Quality Click Pricing (QCP) payout system.
Network
12 LinkConnector www.linkconnector.com A newish network that claims to be breaking the mold by taking a differentphilosophical approach.
13 Advertising.com www.advertising.com Claim to monetize almost 2 billion impressions a day from a network thatincludes more than 70 of comScores Top 100 ad supported sites.
14 Pepperjam www.pepperjamnetwork.com Because of networks like Panthera, Commission Junction and Pepperjam Iwas able to start with little to no traffic on my web pages. They will always
have my loyalty as I grow.
15 Affiliate Future www.affiliatefuture.com Affiliate Future claims to be the UKs number one content-based affiliatemarketing network, delivering over 130m in sales in 2007.
16 zanox www.zanox.com Europes biggest affiliate network. Part of the Axel Springer news and mediagroup in Germany.
17 Webgains www.webgains.com Formed in 2004 and part of the ad pepper media group. Delivers campaignsin over 50 countries.
18 RevenueWire www.revenuewire.com A network specializing in digital products, built on elevated principles ofsustainable and ethical commerce.
19 AdCommunal/ www.adcommunal.net AdCommunal is the best affiliate network in theAdCanadian internet marketing industry today.
20 Bridaluxe www.bridaluxe.com Specialist network focused on weddings - if thats your market you will lovethis network.
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
The Top 20 Affiliate Networks 2011
BB4
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Networks URL Survey comments or notes
1 Epic Direct www.epicdirectnetwork.com Ive found Azoogle/Epic and MaxBounty to be the best mainly due to theiraccount management with the advertiser. They both seem to see the bigpicture for the advertiser - many other networks only see a short-term
requirement to get revenue and allow scammers in.
2 NeverBlue www.neverblue.com A Canadian network strong in lead-gen worldwide. Popular withhigh-performing affiliates.
3 Market Leverage www.marketleverage.com Recommended by two different Blue Ribbon Panel members, MarketLeveragehas a great reputation.
4 Clickbooth/ clickbooth.com Ranked #5 on the Inc. 500 list and regarded as one of theIntegraclick leaders in the industry. Focuses on exclusive offers.
5 Max Bounty www.maxbounty.com Clickbank and MaxBounty are the two networks that work best for me. They
have great products that meets the customers needs and also have excellentcustomer service.
6 CX Digital Media www.cxdigitalmedia.com A 2-tier network that claims to reach more unique visitors than any other USonline advertising network.
7 NetMargin - Datran www.netmargin.com NetMargin is the best network around. They understand how we makemoney and provide us with the resources to make even more.
8 MediaTrust www.mediatrust.com MediaTrust has been repositioning itself and is now focused on its newlylaunched CPC bidding platform, PerformanceExchange.
9 MediaWhiz www.mediawhiz.com MonetizeIt has great offers and the affiliate managers provide great service- MonetizeIt
10 COPEAC www.copeac.com Part of the newly renamed IMM Interactive, COPEAC claims over 40,000publishing partners.
11 Adknowledge www.adknowledge.com The buyers of MIVA and Hydra, Adknowledge has highly-rated predictive/behavioral technology.
12 Motive Interactive www.motiveinteractive.com A premium, invitation-only CPA network with a well-respected, proprietarylead-gen platform that offer great tracking.
13 Rextopia.com rextopia.com A smaller network with a good reputation and a well-liked team.
14 Convert2Media convert2media.com Rucks network. Thats all you need to know. Great reputation.
15 DirectLeads www.directleads.com Digital Rivers long-established CPA network, running on the DirectTrackplatform.
16 Affiliate.com www.affiliate.com Part of Scott Richters Media Breakaway empire.
17 Panthera www.pantherainteractive.com Panthera is one of my favorite networks. Matt Sandin is honest and likeable. Interactive His team gets the job done right.
18 RevenueStreet www.revenuestreet.com Part of TheMediaCrew.com and in the Inc. 500 two years running.
19 Adperio www.adperio.com We currently work with 35 different networks, some of which we run a lotmore volume with, but Adperio still remains our favorite network.
20 PeerFly peerfly.com PeerFly is my favorite network. They are courteous, helpful, and point you inthe right direction. We love PeerFly.
The Top 20 CPA Networks 2011
BB5
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Integrated MultichannelMarketing: Moving FromMassMarketing To Me Marketing
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
We have begun to enter the next evo-
lution of the web and internet market-
ing. Web 3.0 is the age of relevance and
the shift from mass marketing to me
marketing.
Good marketers already understandthat pushing messages excessively at an
audience will only cause them to slam
on the brakes; consumers are now the
ones behind the wheel. In order to get
to a destination that makes everyone
happy, it will have to be on the consum-
ers terms. Its no longer the content but
rather the consumer that is king, and
they will decide if, when and how to re-
spond to communication.
In performance marketing, it is more
important than ever for advertisers and
publishers to empower consumers with
relevant information to engage them
and to provide tools with which they
can choose how they want to interact or
transact with a brands campaign. Mar-
keters must provide value and can no
longer use mass marketing techniques
to push or trick the consumer into
a transaction.
In order to anticipate and meet the
needs of consumers, the evolution of per-
formance marketing has led to the rise of
truly integrated multi channel marketingplatforms. Consumers are able to choose
whether they will read, click, fill out a
form, make a phone call, text, reply, and
so on, and providing all those options
not only leads to more satisfied consum-
ers but also better conversions and ROI
for advertisers and publishers.
Instead of cobbling together multiple
solutions to reach consumers via a mul-
titude of channels, performance market-
ers are turning to solutions that combine
all the moving parts. Why shouldnt we
be able to access all the tools, channels
and partners we need in one platform?
Thats why the industry has moved
away from focusing on specialized servic-es, and toward a more holistic approach.
The paradigm shift away from mass
marketing and toward me marketing
has replaced the use of multiple black
box systems with transparent multi-
channel platforms. We are moving away
from siloed and fragmented solutions to
platform driven ecosystems of services
and solutions driven by technology
The fragmented nature of the market
has always made performance marketing
harder than it should be and MediaTrust
has long been a proponent of bringing
participants together to strengthen the
industry. Our recently launched Perfor-
manceExchange is an example of the
new integrated environments: a real-
time bidding platform that brings adver-
tisers and publishers from a variety of
industries and channels together.
Advertisers can bid on aggregated
traffic from publishers who are carefully
curated based on the value they provide
to advertisers. Initially launched with
email, advertisers will soon be able toreach customers who have opted in to
receive communication through email,
mobile, content, social channelsany
of the consumers preferred methods of
communication.
Likewise, sophisticated performance
metrics and analysis also need to be
included within any truly integrated so-
lution, so that users can evaluate their
efforts and determine which channels
and approaches are working. The new
integrated platforms live and die by
transparent performance metrics.
Unlike previous solutions that rely
on the traffic in, traffic out mantra,
multichannel platforms dont rely onsimply getting consumers in and churn-
ing them through the process. Instead,
they focus additionally on what might
happen after the initial contact. There
are ways to optimize the relationship
by contacting the consumer at differ-
ent points along the length of the value
chain, placing importance on the long-
term value of relationships rather than
on short-term, immediate monetization.
As an example, within PerformanceEx-
change, publishers are evaluated and
paid based on the long-term quality of
traffic that is delivered, so only those
publishers that provide most value will
survive and thrive.
Multi-channel platforms are now be-
coming a reality as advancements in
technology have allowed the creation
of truly integrated environments. When
combined with a focus on catering to
the unique needs of individuals rather
than a spray and pray mentality, con-
ditions are ripe for integrated platforms
to become the approach of choice forenlightened publishers and advertisers.
Peter Bordes is the Chief Executive
Office of MediaTrust
by Peter Bordes, MediaTrust
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The Evolution ofPerformance Marketing
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
Although theres plenty of healthy
debate about precisely when and how
affiliate marketing programs emerged
on the Web, few will argue that the
channel has considerably evolved since
it began over a decade ago. Understand-
ing the evolutionary cycles that have oc-
curred in the affiliate marketing space
can provide large brands and advertisersa valuable perspective on the best ways
to take advantage of the performance-
based opportunities that exist for busi-
nesses today. More importantly, by
broadening definitions of comprehen-
sive performance marketing and antici-
pating what lies on the horizon, advertis-
ers can effectively position themselves
for long-term program success.
2000-2010: First Wave AffiliateMarketing
The early days of affiliate marketing
can be broadly identified by two major
hallmarks. One is the era of primitive
ads and the other is the emergence
of the network model. Together, they
make up what I consider to be affiliate
marketings first wave.
Primitive Programs and TacticsChances are, when you think back to
the affiliate marketing activities done
between 2000 and 2006, you remember
the annoying pop-up ads and bannerswith bad creative. I refer to this era of
primitive or suspect ads as the caveman
period on the affiliate marketing evo-
lutionary timeline: Early man thrived
by hunting prey with stones and clubs,
and early affiliate marketers thrived by
luring unsuspecting traffic with rudi-
mentary advertising traps. Web surf-
ers got wise to these tactics, and when
that happened, many publishers moved
to different and progressively more
nefarious black hat marketing tactics.
This is the main reason many large brands
shied away from the affiliate marketing
channel altogether for many years.
The Network ModelAround the same period of time, be-
ginning around 2004, the affiliate mar-
keting and advertising network modelemerged. First, publishers discovered
new revenue opportunities by recruit-
ing other publishers and direct advertis-
ers. And not long after that, networks
realized they could work together to
build exponential revenue via super
networks, using tools like DirectTracks
CrossPublication solution.
Many very successful businesses
emerged from the network model
and plenty of good things came from
it, including the development of more
sophisticated technologies to handle
tracking and detect fraud. Whats more,
since enterprise networks have always
been low risk and theyve offered low
barriers to entry, some large brands feltmore comfortable dipping their toe into
the affiliate marketing waters via the
network model.
2008-2014: PerformanceMarketing Today
Because of reluctance on behalf of
publishers and networks to give brands
enough visibility into who their affiliates
are and where traffic comes from, first
wave network models have either need-
ed to adapt their offerings to accommo-
date large advertisers requirements, or
advertisers have pursued their own pro-
gram development. Additionally, primi-
tive advertising tactics and opaque net-
work models do still exist in various
capacities, but their survival requires ad-
aptation to rapidly changing consumer
perceptions and todays competitivebusiness climate. As such, I consider the
first wave of affiliate marketing to be be-
hind us for the most part. That brings us
to today.
Whats In a Name?Over the past several years, large
brands have increased their knowledge
of affiliate marketing through their rela-
tionships with agencies and networks.
So today, more than any other time in
the past, advertisers and publishers
have gained a greater understanding
of the channels real value. Along with
this understanding comes a movement
to redefine some of the terms that have
traditionally dominated our industry.For example, an affiliate has typically
been defined rather narrowly as a pub-
lisher. But as the industry responds to
and learns from old first wave stereo-
types, they tend to eschew terms like
affiliate marketing in favor of more
comprehensive terminology, like per-
formance marketing.
This trend isnt really about a change
in vernacular. Instead, it reflects an im-
portant reality: Performance marketing
by Gary Olden, Direct Response Technologies
Because of reluctance on behalf of publishers and networks to give brands
enough visibility into who their affiliates are and where traffic comes from,
first wave network models have either needed to adapt their offerings to a
ccommodate large advertisers requirements, or advertisers have pursued
their own program development.
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
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The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
has evolved to become much more com-
prehensive than yesterdays basic af-
filiate program. Today, merchants realize
they haveand have access tomany
different types of partnerships. Call
them affiliates, publishers, advertisers,
value added resellers (VARs), channel
partners, or what you will. They are all
relationships that can help drive rev-
enue for brands.
Todays ChallengesAs large brands recognize that any-
one who makes a commission from sell-
ing their products is an affiliate of sorts,
they have started to craft new business
visions to maximize these opportunities.
However, when looking at their perfor-
mance marketing needs and objectivesmore broadly, merchants do face some
challenges.
Operational Challenges:Program Management andDecentralization
An enterprise network program can
function as an effective intermediary
between an advertiser and a publisher.
However, on the operational side of
things, finding a way to manage the out-
sourced relationship with an affiliate or
advertising network alone can be diffi-
cult, especially for businesses with lim-
ited investment in staffing and support.
A challenge merchants can face when
moving toward a true performance mar-
keting mindset is that one program has
now become many programs. Addition-
ally, while affiliate marketing has always
been perceived to be an extremely low-
risk endeavor, placing an advertisers
entire affiliate program budget with
a single network can potentially add
some risk. This risk can come from a lackof diversification and because with an
outsourced network brands rely on the
same vendor to provide the technology
as well as the revenue reporting.
Brand Challenges: Distributionand Control
Another challenge consistently faced
by major brands who have entered into
affiliate marketing is that they eventu-
ally hit a revenue plateau. This happens
for two primary reasons. The first reason
is that many networks have limited dis-
tribution options and the second reason
is that networks dont offer tools that
allow merchants to build direct relation-
ships with their top affiliates. From a
brand perspective, these challenges can
be significant. If the network is strug-
gling to ensure that added distribution
is achieved, and if the advertiser cannot
connect directly with publishers, thiscan create an environment where dis-
tribution volume and traffic quality can
both begin to decline. In this type of
environment, merchants can easily lose
confidence in how their brand is repre-
sented online.
Todays OpportunitiesThe good news is that solutions exist
that allow merchants and publishers to
realize the value of a true performance
marketing program in a way that can
also address current challenges. Now,
performance programs can encompass,
simplify and optimize any third-party
relationship or sales channel that a
company wants to leverage. As perfor-mance marketing continues to evolve,
brands are capitalizing on available op-
portunities to diversify their current
programs to help ensure high volume,
and theyre developing new, highly stra-
tegic programs and campaigns that can
reflect and inform their brand aware-
ness objectives.
Opportunities forProgram Diversification
Large advertisers are looking for
expanded distribution, long-term sus-
tained revenue, program simplicity and
brand control. The best opportunities
for them to achieve their objectives
can currently be found by taking a two-
pronged approach. This approach, where
the enterprise network relationship is
augmented by the brands own internal
performance marketing programs, is
what I consider to be a key harbinger of
entry into second wave performance
marketing.
Here are some results that can be
achieved by augmenting an affiliate
network relationship with an in-house
performance marketing program:
Risks decline as the brands perfor-
mance marketing portfolio is diver-sified across a wider set of distribu-
tion channels.
Distribution increases, which means
incremental revenue.
Brands can identify, reward, and fos-
ter direct relationships with their
top-performing affiliates, resulting in
higher returns.
Internal program management tools
can centralize control and can add
performance marketing operational
efficiencies and scalability.
Opportunities to BecomeMore Strategic
Another opportunity that has been
created by the increase in large brand
adoption of internal performance mar-
keting programs is an exciting invest-
ment in program strategy. We continue
to see a rise in new types of programs be-
ing developed by brands, including VAR
programs and other independent sales
channels. And from todays leading-edge
publishers we see better, more relevantoffers and very sophisticated publisher
site content that provides real customer
value. Darwin would be proud this is
evolution at its best.
2012-2016: Whats Next?In addition to offering an effective
response to brand and operational chal-
lenges, program diversification and con-
tinued strategic investment offer great
ways for brands to position themselves
Performance marketing has evolved to become much more comprehensive
than yesterdays basic affiliate program. Today, merchants realize they have
and have access to many different types of partnerships. Call them affiliates,
publishers, advertisers, value added resellers (VARs), channel partners, or what
you will. They are all relationships that can help drive revenue for brands.
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for continued success as we enter the future of affiliate mar-
keting. Why?
The Medium is the MessageThe third wave promises to build on technology advances
that exist today. As end users become more mobile, additional
distribution channels are becoming available. Phones and
tablets have emerged as ideal platforms to target consumers
and keep brands top of mind. In addition to these enhanced
ad targeting opportunities, further monetization can be real-
ized from app downloads, ring tones and social media revenue
opportunities.
Whats great about these opportunities is that they con-
tinue the forward progression of our industry, where ongoing
evolution will be key to ongoing success. Consumers will con-
tinue to become savvier about who markets to them, how they
do it, and when. And the future of the Internet is likely to bring
further convergence with other mainstream technologies and
consumption channels, including Internet television. Thatswhy the concepts were currently formalizing, such as program
and channel diversification, transparent affiliate relationships,
and strategic program management, are so important. As the
future unfolds, nobodymerchants, publishers, networks, or
the solution providers who support themcan succeed by ap-
plying first-wave tactics to third-wave innovations.
ConclusionThe affiliate marketing industry has recently entered the
second wave of maturity and evolution. The number of large
advertisers and major brands who are recognizing the true
strategic value of better managing their network program
alongside many other types of business partnerships is reach-
ing critical mass. Indeed, as companies learn to build programs
that work specifically for their brand affiliate marketing will
continue to be redefined. An elite group of solution providers
bring the appropriate level of service, technologies and expe-
rience required to work with major brands. These companies
can effectively address first-wave challenges, fully capitalize
on second-wave opportunities and strategically position busi-
nesses for the future of performance marketing. This is raising
the bar across the board.
Done right, performance marketing can play an important
role in the online marketing mix for large advertisers for years
to come. As the third wave brings an onslaught of new adver-tising channels and opportunities, long-term performance
marketing profitability will hinge on advertisers ability to con-
tinue to evolve their programsleveraging second wave stra-
tegic accomplishments and building on direct affiliate relation-
ships to maximize success across new channels and media. rp
Gary Olden is the vice president, enterprise sales for Direct
Response Technologies, a leading provider of performance
marketing solutions including their flagship performance
marketing tracking solution, DirectTrack (www.directtrack.com).
Direct Response Technologies is a business unit of Digital River.
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BLUE BOOK Interview: CPAWay
BB12 The Authoritative Guide to Ad Networks and Exchanges
In our most recent survey we noticedthat CPAWay was getting a lot ofsupport from publishers and advertis-ers alike, so we thought it was a goodtime to get together with Thomas
Dietzel, their founder and President,in order to find out more.
Q. Tell me a little about CPAWay. Why
are you growing when so many net-
works are struggling? What makes
you different?
Ha! Good question. I think its our
approach to merchants looking to get
started with performance marketing.
We really take the view that if we want
to grow, we need to help bring them
into the industry. As a result, we dont
ask for a setup fee, or an integration fee
or even a creative services fee from our
merchants. This approach allows us to
bring on merchants that would have
previously been turned down by other
agencies or networks. Once we bring a
new merchant on board and they see
the ROI that performance marketing
provides, nine times out of ten we have
created a loyal customer for ourselves.
Q. What about technology? Is that
something that you think is important?
Absolutely. CPAWay has always tak-en a strong approach on building our
own technology. We have built our own
tracking platform from the ground up
which means that we can offer publish-
ers and advertisers new features when
theyre needed, not when the software
supplier gets round to it. We have also
been able to build in an integrated fraud
detection platform that helps catches
rogue affiliates before they cause any
headaches for our merchants. Technol-
ogy helps us to deliver on our promises
to both publishers and advertisers.
Q. Technology is great but personal
support is always valued highly by
publishers and advertisers. How do
you ensure they get the support fromyour team that they need?
We have a dedicated sales team that
works continuously to develop new
campaigns for our publishers and to
provide fast turnaround times to our
merchants. We treat all of our mer-
chants and affiliate the same, regardless
of how much or how little business they
do with us, and everyone is allocated a
go to personal contact. This means
they only have to deal with one person
within our organization for all of their
day to day needs. Were very proud of
the fact that our account managers and
executives work hard to earn the trust
of our publishers and merchants and
that they sometimes put on the boxing
gloves to fight our management team
for whatever their merchants and pub-
lishers need. We like that.
Q. Publishers sometimes feel that its
hard to trust networks completely.
What would you say to those people?
As with any new business partner,
you need to your homework. Simplethings like Googling the name of the
network, checking if they have a physi-
cal address and seeing if they pick up
the phone can weed out more networks
than you would think. Search on some
of the industry forums to see what the
networks reputation is. Then once ap-
proved into the network, ask your ac-
count manager for publisher referenc-
es. These are simple steps but they can
make all the difference in terms of en-
suring that publishers get paid. Always
do your homework before extending
credit to any network.
Q. So thats what publishers should
look for in a network. What do you
look for when it comes to recruitingnew publishers?
We just look for honest, hard-work-
ing affiliates. Performance marketing
takes time and energy; we are looking
for publishers who are willing to give it
their all. We take care of veteran pub-
lishers and super-affiliates, but we also
welcome new publishers.
Q. If you had one piece of advice for an
advertiser thinking about trying per-
formance marketing, what would it be?
Only partner with networks or agen-
cies that have an established reputation
for delivering quality leads and/or sales.
Have clear goals in mind, but get input
and suggestions from at least two or
three companies. Make sure that you
know the margins youre making on
your products or services before dis-
cussing any commission rates; that way
you can negotiate rates with assurance
and wont find yourself over-paying for
sales or leads.
Q. Finally, what lies ahead for CPAWay?
Well, were growing fast, we have zerodebt and plenty of funding, and there
are huge opportunities in performance
marketing that are still wide open. We
are focusing on the development of new
tracking tools to help improve ROI even
more, on new exclusive campaigns for
publishers and on identifying new sec-
tors such as mobile into which we should
invest. We are here for the long haul, in
the best industry there is. Performance
marketing is our passion.
Assembling the research for the BLUE BOOK rankings of
the top performance marketing networks provides us atRevenue Performance with a wonderful insight into the sheer
depth of talent in the performance marketing industry.
Q&A: With Thomas Dietzel
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Maximizing Opportunityin Online PerformanceMarketing Networks
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
Large online performance marketing
networks offer a multitude of channels
and pricing models. Finding the right
mix is key to maximizing yields for
publishers and securing high-quality
leads for advertisers. Marketers needstrategies for building multi-channel
campaigns that effectively leverage the
opportunity in a cost-effective way.
There are particularly attractive op-
portunities for marketers on hard-to-
reach channels (email, display, social
media, affiliate networks and more),
where traditional search engine ad-
vertising has proven less effective. But
marketers face three key challenges
when moving into performance mar-
keting outside of search engines:
Consistently meeting their target ROI.
Understanding how to effectively
price media buys depending on channel
and ad unit (CPC, CPM, CPA, CPL, CPI,
revenue share, etc.)
Managing media buys efficiently
across tens or hundreds of unique seg-
ments online.
Planning Multi-channelCampaigns
There are two ways to approach plan-ning a multi-channel campaign:
1. Use an Aggregator
Aggregators like Google Adsense,
which focuses primarily on contextu-
ally-targeted, display inventory, or
like Adknowledge, which offers a
bid-based platform to access email,
display, social media (virtual currency
in particular) and affiliate distribu-
tion. Both of these example services
provide a centralized marketplace
(Google Adwords and Adknowledges
Bidsystem.com) where you can buy
all types of ad units on a cost-per-
click basis across the Web. A market-
er is able to control cost-per-click bids
to ensure that target ROI is achieved.
2. Do-it-Yourself
This typically requires the marketer
to have a great deal of expertise
understanding the best practices in-
herent in each channeland can be
very time consuming and inefficient.
Objectives Regardless of which approach is
taken, marketers need to be clear
about their objectives in order to
effectively achieve return-on-
investment:
Who is the target audience?
What outcomes are desired? Sales?
Lead generation?
What are the cost-per-acquisition
targets?
What are the revenue goals? How
fast must revenues come in?
Methodology Another set of important questions
to consider is howobjectives willbe achieved:
What specific product or service is
being sold?
What pricing or other incentives
are available to use?
What is the communication idea that
will inform all of the messaging?
What promotional tactics will inspire
the clicks that are needed?
How will a transaction get com-
pleted? Online? In-store? By phone?
Understand The AudienceOnce youre clear on your objectives
and methodology, its important to con-
duct research to deeply understand
your target audience(s). Too many mar-
keters make the mistake of planningfor advertising channels rather than
the audience they are aiming to reach.
Know your audience first and the chan-
nel strategy will come into sharper
focus. Select the channels that best
address specific business barriers and
opportunities.
This approach will empower you with
the best chance of reaching your audi-
ence at the right time and place on the
Web. First and foremost, understand
your target market segments life stage
and media habits, environments where
they congregate, and their intent (e.g.,
purchase, research, socialize, etc.):
Are they consumers of social media?
Can they be reached via email?
What is their online activity? Do
they use search? If so, what do they
search for? And what keywords do
they use to find it?
How do they find and get informa-
tion? Blogs? News sites? Entertain-
ment sites?
Executing Multi-channelCampaigns: Data is Critical
The use of data for effective target-
ing is critical. Based on your goals and
your research planning, make targeting
choices that ensure youll get in front of
the right audience with the right mes-
sage at just the right time. Leveraging
systems like Adknowledges Bidsystem.
comwhich relies on highly advanced
predictive analytics to identify the audi-
by Greg Bayer, Adknowledge
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ence segment youre targeting within each channelcan take
a lot of the guess- work out of the equation.
Adknowledge Chief Scientist and Advisor, Usama Fayyad,
who formerly ran Data Analytics at Yahoo!, leverages vast
stores of information and a proprietary predictive analytics
engine and advanced tracking mechanisms, to help us empow-
er marketers with data insights that make their campaigns the
most effective possible.
Data is what makes performance marketing so revolution-
ary. Its power becomes apparent especially when campaigns
reach the scale and critical mass that is possible only through a
robust network.
Therefore, its also imperative that you have effective track-
ing and reporting mechanisms in place. Be sure youre look-
ing at the performance of each channel along each step of the
acquisition funnel. You should be detailed in your tracking so
you can show campaign ROI. At a minimum:
Establish your conversion event
Set your conversion value Create your acquisition funnel
Achieving ScaleThe most robust networks often function as media market-
places, bringing together both buyers (advertisers) and sellers
(publishers) in a bid-based environment where smart pricing
brings value to all parties. Publishers benefi t from having
their content monetized through a robust portfolio of diverse
advertisers and offers. Advertisers benefi t by having access
to a diverse range of publishers whose quality and convert-
ibility relative to their offer is managed dynamically. Only
the most comprehensive networks have the technical ex-
pertise to manage the targeting and tracking, compliance
methodologies and key performance drivers in real-time to
ensure that the right ad reaches the right audience in the right
channel. When all of these pieces come together, advertisers
are able to reach the scale, effi ciency and ROI that exemplifi es
performance marketing.
In the end, an effective performance marketing campaign
should leverage a combination of email, display, social media,
search, and affi liate channels. This is the best way to get high-
er-than-average conversion rates, especially if youre able to
use predictive targeting technologies to reach the right audi-
ence with the right message at the exact right time. Youre
sure to achieve results far superior to that of traditional mar-keting or search engine advertising.
Greg Bayer is the general manager of Adknowledges
Affi liate Division and has over 15 years experience in affi liate
marketing and digital media. He has occupied senior positions
within Epic Advertising, Sony, Linkshare and barnesandnoble.
com and holds a B.A. in English and American Studies from
Princeton University.
For more information onthe best affiliate and CPAnetworks go to mthink.com/bluebook
Counsel to the
Online Marketing Industry
CONTRACTS,PRIVACY POLICIES,
Sweepstakes, Gaming,
LITIGATION, ETC.
Contact David O. Klein today at:(212) 935-6020 x 244 | [email protected]
485 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10022
T: 604-689-8962
www.chexxinc.com
An easy way topay affiliatesin over 60countries.
The Leader in Health Insurance Online
Partner with eHealthInsuranceUp to $75 Per Action*
CJ Horizon Award Winner
Generous Performance Incentives
*An action is defined as a Submitted application for health insurance
www.eHealthAffiliate.com
CLASSIFIEDS
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Maximize Performance AcrossChannels with Holistic KPIs
The Online Advertising BLUE BOOK
It almost seems too obvious
to say it, but the one essential of
every single campaign is that it
needs to succeed.
As performance marketers,
we tend to interpret that tru-
ism as being relevant only to our
particular channel, rather than
looking at the campaign fromthe viewpoint of the advertiser.
He or she may be using multiple
channels integrating different
pricing models, social media,
offline, email, etc., and the over-
all success or failure of the cam-
paign is likely to spring from how
well they all work together.
Just because we in our industry focus
on online channels doesnt mean that our
customers only evaluate our campaigns
in terms of the online results achieved.
Nor should they. Our online activities
on their behalf can drive engagement as
well as leads, brand awareness as well as
traffic, and offline sales as well as online
conversions. As sophisticated marketers,
we need to look at campaigns holistically,
so we understand how each of the com-
ponent parts affects the rest.
A key part of this process is identi-
fying which metrics should be used to
judge success. These chosen metrics
the KPIs or Key Performance Indicators
should provide us with a way to deter-mine if a campaign is performing across
all channels, not just those in the digital
domain. If you dont look at how your
channel-specific KPIs are influencing
consumer behaviors and results in other
areas, you could be missing a big piece
of the puzzle and some key insights into
your target audiences.
As an example of this, a banking client
of ours ran an email campaign around a
new checking account product, which
incentivized consumers to sign up on-
line or print out a coupon to redeem
offline. When we analyzed the metrics,
we were pleased with the KPIsopen
rates were up, checking accounts were
being set up and coupons were being
redeemed. It was a good campaign. But
we looked deeper and found gold.
Further analysis showed a 4-to-1 ratio
of offline redemptions to online, which
led us to identifying three different
types of customers that were reacting
to the same advertisement. Consumers
who redeemed online via email seemed
to display an immediate need of the ser-
vice. Consumers who printed the coupon
showed that they preferred the conve-
nience and reassurance of a brick andmortar store. And finally we identified
a third group of consumers for whom
the email seemed to generate purchase
intent as evidenced by later engagement
with display or search campaigns. This
represented significant and useful feed-
back for our client, allowing them to
tailor messages and future promotions
much more effectively and providing im-
proved ROI across other digital channels.
This is a real-world example of
how understanding KPIs across
channels can help marketers
maximize performance of cur-
rent and future campaigns. It is
also important to understand
the different roles that each
channel may play in the buying
process and how they impactperformance. For instance, dis-
play gets eyeballs so its great
from a branding perspective;
search is great for leads because
of its refined nature, and email
and social are having an increas-
ing impact on engagement. Email
is especially useful because of its ability
to kick-start customer engagement.
David Perez, co-founder of Convertro,
confirms, Overlap is costly to market-
ers. When were looking across channels,
email tends to be one of the strongest
performers, as 60% of the time it doesnt
overlap with other media. As marketers
we are responsible for generating posi-
tive ROI from our media placements. We
should always keep in mind that orga-
nized, consistent, focused multi-channel
campaigns where we understand the
value and strength of each channel are
the most effective use of our market-
ing spend. Identifying Key Performance
Indicators that give a holistic view of
results is an important first step.
Tom Walsh is the senior director
in charge of media services for
Datran Media.
by Tom Walsh, Datran Media
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Online Marketing Channels - Timing of Marketing Interaction
Paid Search
21%
Affliates
32%
Display
36%
Email Acquisition
37%
Organic Search
Source: Convertnu Client Data
42%42%
Last Click
Middle Click
First Click
When Overlap Does Occur, Organic SearchEmail Acquisition Tends to an Introducer
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For more information onthe best affiliate and CPAnetworks go to mthink.com/bluebook
Bulldog Medias CommissionSoup
is one that caught the eye in ourlast survey, and we recently satdown with their President and co-founder, Darin Namken, to find outmore about what makes them tick.
Q. To start with, tell us a little about
the history of CommissionSoup.com.
A. CommissionSoup is over 10 years
old now. It was originally part of Cred-
itSoup, Inc. Internet usage was just
beginning to grow and we saw a gap
for a network that had real marketing
skills and a customer focus. We wanted
to zone in on strong business relation-
ships and understanding our partners
needs, and then we built on that by de-
veloping our own proprietary tracking
software. Everything grew from that
focus on what our partners need.
Q. So you have your own tracking
platform? What advantages do you
think that offers you?
A. Flexibility, first and foremost. We
can adapt and change to whatever our
partners need. There is no cookie cuttertracking at Bulldog Media Group. We
speak all the time with our merchants
and adapt to their requirements. Hav-
ing our own tracking platform means
we can help them to identify the best
performing channels: those that pro-
duce the cleanest traffic, the best quali-
fied leads and whether those leads are
converting or not. It lets us provide a
quality of service that simply couldnt
be done with an off-the-shelf system.
Q. Fraud is on everybodys mind these
days. How are you dealing with it?A. One thing that really works in our
favor is that our reporting was origi-
nally created for the banking industry
where security and compliance are the
top priorities. Theyre part of our DNA.
That helps us to both deter fraud and
to offer transparency to our advertisers.
We dont just say that we are transpar-
ent, we are truly transparent.
Q. Affiliate marketing is always
changing. How do you deal with
that?
A. Weve seen a lot of changes in 10
years, especially as so many networks
come and go. Were happy to be on
such a solid footing. And in that time
the industry has grown enormously,
theres a broad acceptance now that
transparency is needed which plays to
our strong suit, and weve continued
to see with amazement the incredible
work, effort, and knowledge that so
many of our affiliate marketers bring to
the table.
To keep up we now have three divi-sions that together provide complete
online marketing solutions to our part-
ners. Along with CommissionSoup, we
now have Infusion Strategies, which
provides lead generation, data man-
agement, email marketing and a variety
of internal properties to assist in mar-
keting various products. Most recently,
we added The RewardsRunner Net-
work. RewardsRunner.com is a cash
back shopping network that makes
shopping an individualized experience
for its members.Q. So whats your elevator pitch? If
you only had 20 seconds to tell some-
one why they should work with Bull-
dog Media, what would you say?
A. Integrity we are a company that
truly gets it. Whether were working
with affiliates or merchants we take
the time to understand their needs and
adapt to their requirements. We al-
ways pay on-time and we have our own
tracking system that allows affiliates
to track their progress daily and mer-
chants to have full clarity on their cam-
paigns. Whats not to love? (smile)
Q. Whats next? Whats coming down
the pipe?
A. Were constantly on the lookout
for both new technologies and for new
opportunities. In affiliate marketing
you can never relax so were always
looking for the next big campaign,
whether its in banking, education, pay-
day loans or whatever. We always want
to find a way that we can make a dif-
ference, give our publishers an edge inthe marketplace and our merchants the
best ROI possible.
There is always going to be change
in this business, so at Bulldog Media
we embrace it and the opportunities
it brings. I always say that we cant fail
if we continue to innovate, stay on the
cutting edge and stick with what has
made us successful so far: experience,
customer service, an open mind, and
technology.
It is always interesting here at Revenue Performance when the first results
come in from the BLUE BOOK survey of advertisers and publishers.
Most exciting is to see a network rising in the rankings, showing the
result of them working hard to make a good impression with their partners.
Q&A: WithDarin Namken
BLUE BOOK Interview: Bulldog Media Group
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The following Q&A providesperspective from five LinkShareexecutives: Adam Weiss, VicePresident, Network Development;Melissa Feemster, Vice President,Client Services; Russell Pechman,
Vice President, Lead GenerationServices; Deepa Sureka, Vice Presi-dent, Affiliate Marketing Services& Education; and Liane Dietrich,Managing Director, LinkShare UK
Q. When looking back what do you
think has been the biggest impact of
LinkShares 15 years in the industry?
Adam W: Well for me its really about
publisher commissions. We took a look
at the total amount of commissions the
LinkShare Network has paid out since itwas founded and its over $1.2 Billion.
Russ P: I like to think of the new
opportunities that have been created.
Weve developed so many new offer-
ings - Pay-Per-Call, hosted-forms, email
so over time weve really been able to
expand the definition of the network.
Melissa F: You can easily flip that
around and look at it from an advertis-
er perspective. Affiliate marketing has
grown to become an incredibly impor-
tant channel for driving sales and find-
ing customers. LinkShare has played
a pivotal role in helping to establish
affiliate marketing as a respected mar-
keting and sales channel and were re-
ally proud of that. Same store sales
in the network grew close to 40% in
2010 far out pacing overall e-commerce
so I think the numbers truly speak for
themselves.
Q. Over the last 15 years has anything
fundamentally changed in the way
affiliate marketing should be ap-
proached?
Melissa F: Thats a great question
because although there are certainly
more tools and product features today
than even just a few years ago, its still
about getting the basics right. Werestill adding new features to the Link-
Share platform every year but you still
have to have competitive offers, great
creative and clear, concise communica-
tions with publishers.
Deepa S: I do think Affiliate Mar-
keting has got easier and as the tools
become ever more accessible we see
more advertisers managing their own
program. We take a lot of features for
granted now which were simply not
there a few years ago. Take year-over-
year reporting as an example today
you can just login and see YOY data
instantly both at the program level and
publisher level. That wasnt possible
just a short while ago.
Adam W: I think a lot of the change
has actually been on the publisher side.
Publishers are incredibly innovative
and sophisticated. Just look at the buzz
around new sites and new business
models. We see thousands of new pub-
lishers join the network every month
and there is constant innovation. Social
media, mobile, coupons, content blogs
you name it. It never stops.
Liane D: Well I might be biased but I
think the launch of our UK network was
a huge milestone. It was a really goodexample of how you could enter a mar-
ket and succeed by offering a higher
level of service. That was our strategy
from the get-go and it was good to see
that it worked.
Q. So lets talk about innovation on
the network side. How has the Link-
Share platform changed over the
years?
Deepa: Innovation is still incredibly
important. While one could argue that
15 Years Of LinkShare
BLUE BOOK Interview: LinkShare
Its hard to believe but its now 15 years since LinkShare was founded.
A lot has changed since the early days or has it? To find out, I sat down
with several of their executives to reflect back on LinkShares history and
more importantly to find out whats on the horizon for one of the
industrys leading players.
BB18 The Authoritative Guide to Ad Networks and Exchanges
ADAMWEISS
MELISSAFEEMSTER
RUSSELLPECHMAN
DEEPASUREKA
LIANEDIETRICH
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were in a mature industry, our clients
are very smart and increasingly sophis-
ticated themselves and they have great
ideas. So we have to stay focused on
client needs while finding ways to one-
up the competition. That could be any-
thing from reporting enhancements, to
link types, to productivity tools. Last
year was an important milestone be-
cause we launched an entirely new Ad-
vertiser Dashboard.
Melissa F: I totally agree with Dee-
pa - the new Advertiser Dashboard
was a huge milestone. I also think pixel
tracking and near real-time reporting
was significant in our history because it
was not something we were known for.
These days advertisers can also choosebetween pixel and enterprise tracking,
for example. Theres no end to the fea-
tures we offer now that werent avail-
able 15 years ago.
Deepa S: When we install tracking
now were also testing mobile devices
so thats a significant development as
well as we watch the adoption of mo-
bile commerce unfold.
Adam W: Yes, as I think back, we
brought in the new Publisher Dash-
board in 2007 which was a big deal and
then theres what we call the LinkShare
BentoBox our collection of tools to
help publishers find, get and distribute
links. From Twitter and Facebook to
Tumblr, to WordPress we have lots of
tools that make publishers lives easier
and offer new ways to promote links in
the context of social marketing.
Melissa F: And more recently, theres
LinkShare Lightning our ad network
for e-commerce. Were just ramping
up but already weve seen interest
from more than 100 advertisers whichis great because it tells us that theres a
real demand out there for new, innova-
tive technologies.
Q. Tell me more about LinkShare
Lightning what need are you ad-
dressing in the market?
Adam W: Affiliate marketing is a
very time-intensive process. Lightning
provides publishers with the ability to
create optimized ad units that update
automatically and contain one or more
advertisers. Lightning will figure out
which ad is best performing and serve
that one more often.
Melissa F: Ultimately addressing the
need to have more intelligent ad units
that have a higher conversion rate. The
ad units themselves do the optimizing
saving time.
Deepa S: Theres also no program
application process, however, Adver-
tisers and publishers have control over
who they want to work with simply by
Including or Excluding at the click of
a button.
Adam W: Its also a great way for
publishers to keep their sites updated
with new creative without having to
swap out code.Q. I remember when Rakuten ac-
quired LinkShare in 2005 how have
things changed culturally at Link-
Share since then?
Adam W: In one word: momentum!
Its great to have a parent company
thats not just successful but is also
very supportive. Were now the desig-
nated performance marketing platform
for all of the Rakuten divisions and that
really provides us with the confidence
and the resources to think big to re-
ally think outside the box.
Deepa: Rakuten has also been a
great influence when it comes to ana-
lytical thinking as an organization
were more metrics driven than ever.
Kaizen or continuous improvement is
something we live and breathe and it
has really made a positive impact on
overall productivity.
Melissa F: Rakutens overall corpo-
rate philosophy is based on 5 Principles
of Success: 1) Get Things Done; 2)
Complete Professionalism; 3) Hypothesize>>Execute>>Verify>>Incorporate; 4)
Maximize Customer Satisfaction; and
5) Speed! Speed! Speed! Weve really
been able to apply this in the context
of the services we provide clients. If
we regarded it as just a set of slogans it
wouldnt mean anything but when you
consciously think about it and execute
on it, it does make a difference.
Liane D: To be able to tell advertis-
ers and publishers that we have a high-
level strategy is important. Our clients
want to know that we have the resourc-
es to grow with them.
Q. What about the future? Where are
you focusing your efforts?
Melissa F: Well first and foremost
were listening to our clients to under-
stand what they need, where theyre
going and how their requirements are
evolving. So within that context we
are focused on three major areas: 1) En-
hancing LinkShare technology and ser-
vices based on requests from advertis-
ers and publishers; 2) the development
of new and innovative technologies not
available on any other network; and 3)
strengthening our global capabilities
and then entering new markets.Russ P: On the lead generation front
were completely focused on quality.
Delivering on quality is what really sets
us apart from other networks. Pay-per-
call, email, hosted forms theres tre-
mendous opportunity in all these areas.
Deepa S: Were also very focused on
finding ways to help those advertisers
that are managing their own programs
to be successful. We understand these
advertisers may need help in specific
areas like recruitment or communica-
tions but perhaps only for a limited
length of time. So were packaging up
service offerings to meet those needs.
Were also taking a fresh look at how
to approach on-going training to em-
power affiliate managers with the right
tools and support.
Adam W: And I think the global part
of the strategy is really taking hold.
Were seeing more interest from adver-
tisers and publishers in entering new
markets and regions. ShopStyle for
example recently joined the LinkShareJapan network. More advertisers are
launching in the Canada network and
were not making plans for a Euro net-
work as well. We believe that no other
network offers the same level of access
to Asia. So as e-commerce becomes
more global, the LinkShare Network
will become more global as well and
that will spell opportunity for Link-
Share advertisers and publishers.
20 The Authoritative Guide to Ad Networks and Exchanges
BLUE BOOK Interview: LinkShare
BB20 The Authoritative Guide to Ad Networks and Exchanges
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20%
OFFFOR DETAILS VISIT: WWW.SESSANFRANCISCO.COM
20RE
POWERING ONLINE MARKETINGSearch. Social. Display.
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33revenue.mThink.com
Managing Performance Geno Prussakov, AM Navigator
1.
2. 3.
4. 5.
6.
7.
8.
9. 10.
rp
EVGENII GENO PRUSSAKOV
How Mobile-FriendlyAre You?
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34 revenue
Managing Performance Maranda Moses, Share Results
Your IT team consists of one staff member
Your online marketing manager is fresh out of school
You want to invest in more exclusive affi liate partner-ships
You want your affi liate program to mirror your brand
You need support for multiple products under oneumbrella
rp
MARANDA MOSES is a communications strategist for Share Results
and contributes some of their widely read blogs and articles on
affi liate strategies, industry news, and trends. Over the years
shes honed her skills in the online marketing space as a senior
account manager in the education, family, apparel and maternity
insurance verticals.
Running Your Own Program?Is Affi liate Tracking SoftwareRight For You?
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36 revenuePERFORMANCE ISSUE 7
The Future Network Chris Trayhorn
It is said that when the industrial revolution was takingplace in the 1800s, many people had no idea that a revo-lution was what they were living through. Unless theytook the time to look around them and really think about theimpact of the new steam-powered machines that were beingintroduced, things seemed much the same.
Their days were still fi lled with work or with fi nding
enough food to eat, and in the normal way of things it didntreally matter when they saw a steam train for the fi rst timeor if ships were made of steel instead of wood. Life went on.
But eventually the forces of change accumulated enoughmomentum and rapid disruption happened. The old orderpassed away, and new organizations took over, comfort-able with the amazing new technologies and suddenopportunities.
Thats what we are seeing at this moment in the market-ing and advertising business.
Let us take a few minutes to catalog just a little of thedisruption that is all around us right now.
In media, TV and radio giants fi nd their audiences frag-
menting and drifting away. The movie business is suddenlybeing out-sold by the computer games industry. Newcom-ers like Netfl ix and YouTube are commanding more viewerhours than 95% of cable TV channels. Newspapers andmagazines are dropping like fl ies while clutching desper-ately at novelties like iPad applications and paid contentwalls as potential saviors. But all the time, the drip, drip,drip that they hear is the sound of their audiences, leakingslowly away.
Look at agencies. Even the largest of them have had toreinvent themselves and learn new skills. Rarely, if ever,do they now get to rake off 20% off every media buy orspend $5 million on research for a new product name. They
struggle now to educate a new generation of marketers thatbrand is worth something, and that clicks, views and con-versions are not the be all and end all of marketing.
Their selling proposition - that they were the only oneswith the knowledge of how to reach mass audiences and tocommunicate effectively with them has been diluted bythe ease with which audiences can be aggregated today andthe simple effi cacy of applying a test and optimization cycleto advertising creatives.
Then there