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THE
AFFILIATE MARKETING PRIMER
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7
- SETTING UP AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM
(Part 2 of 3):
You did
read PART
ONE, I hope?...
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CUSTOMER
SERVICE NEEDS:
One
thing I should mention before
going on: Yes, it will
likely cost you something to
set up a program, whichever
way you go about it - you knew
that. A business expense
you might not be expecting is
the quantity of email
(/phone?) support you may have
to deal with (perhaps
proportional to the number of
affiliates you recruit).
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You'll get
questions and appeals for help from
some intelligent people, from whom you
can learn how to fine-tune your
program, and from some people who will
perhaps make you shake your head in
amazement at their apparent lack of
sense. (Or could it be that your
instructions weren't clear, or the
person fielding the query at your end
didn't understand??)
The idea is
that as your revenue grows through the
success of your affiliate program,
you'll be able to pay people to handle
the incoming queries, if they pile up.
If you
haven't read in the primer section "How
to Get the Most Out of Your
Affiliate Programs"
the paragraph beginning with "Some
affiliate companies seem to be
contemplating how to jettison 'poor
producers'", I hope you will do so
now. Don't be shocked by the
influx - be prepared for it.
Spend some time thinking like an
unknowledgeable affiliate (even like a
not-terribly-bright affiliate) so that
you dispose of as many points of
trouble as possible before they crop
up as queries. (This is one of
the best reasons to work on a really
useful FAQ file!)
But realize
that this point of contact is also
where you can get a lot of creative
ideas about improving your website or
services, for free! Everyone who
contacts you is interested, and
possibly they are even more
imaginative than you are.
Please,
don't make the mistake of having a
narrow-minded loyalist as your
customer service
representative... Someone who
defensively turns questions or mild
suggestions for improvement into
challenges to the greatness of their
company (and perhaps, when asked
nicely to pass an idea on to the
website design people, instead cites
the years their team has been on the
web and even trots out the "Marketing
Degrees" everyone has, to prove that
the website is already perfect and the
"customer" simply too inexperienced to
grasp it - I had it happen to me while
writing this!)... That's how to
get behind and stay behind (and quite
possibly lose customers and/or
affiliates, of course).
Also
realize that in any situation, of the
many people who have
questions, only a small portion of
them ask. You will do
yourself a favor by taking it as read
that any question you get is
representative of an issue that is
wrinkling the brows of a number of
people who you aren't hearing
from. You want the most
intelligent, thoughtful, (patient,)
and analytical people you can find in
your customer service positions!
(including if that's you).
It's a
long-proven truism in marketing that
the customers who come to a business
with problems that are satisfactorily
resolved
by a customer service rep become some
of that business' best ambassadors.
...So don't treat this lightly!
(Perhaps
you might even test your
customer support people periodically
with "customer" messages sent by you
via email addresses unknown to
them. If they know you'll be
doing it, so much the better - they'll
be on their toes all the
time!)
I think
you'll enjoy this article from Ken
Evoy of SiteSell, Turn
Lemons into Lemonade, Sure... -
about the difference between customer
satisfaction and customer delight.
(Mere customer satisfaction [i.e.,
they aren't actually complaining!]
isn't enough to drive businesses to
greatness.)
And here is
a short article on "the 80/20 rule"
(80% of a business' success tends to
come from 20% of its, in this case,
affiliates)... And how affiliate
companies can empower all
affiliates to achieve better marketing
results: "Affiliate
Empowerment".
And of course, a
facility for handling international
customers (and affiliates!) can boost
your business greatly.
BEING
CHOOSY ABOUT AFFILIATES:
A more
appropriate time to worry about which
are the best affiliates for you, if
this seems critical to you, is before
you sign them up. (See the
"Affiliate Empowerment" article linked
in the previous paragraph for some
excellent clues on what to look
for.) If a prospective affiliate
does have a website, by all means take
a look at it - if it is very
amateurish or you just don't feel good
about it, you certainly have the right
to turn down the application.
But
remember - it isn't only webmarketing
affiliates who can make you money.. .
Do you really want to limit affiliates
to only those with websites?
Also, I
wonder about those companies that make
it clear on their affiliate
information page that they'll only
consider sites with a direct
connection to their field...
They might be blindly ruling out some
more creative connections that would
work well.
For
instance, what if I had a site all
about the Orkney Islands? - a travel
company would be a great addition,
because you have to get there
somehow. Or that site about
Harley motorcycles - people travel on
them... But I've seen
travel-related affiliate programs that
state that they'll only consider
"travel websites". It would seem
more prudent to simply invite people
to present their sites and/or other
marketing ideas for consideration,
with the understanding that their
applications will be reviewed with the
company's objectives in mind.
If you
aren't willing to accept an affiliate
without a demonstration of his or her
website's drawing "X" amount of
traffic, please don't turn down the
application with one of those "you may
have been denied for any one of the 8
reasons listed below; but feel free to
reapply" notices - that's simply
rude. (Why would anyone want to
come back for more of that? And
wouldn't you
assume that any such treatment would
apply to their being a customer?
- I would. ...Which would assure
that I didn't become an ambassador -
and could even become something
opposite, in my blog or social media
chatting, in my web reviews. Especially
these days, that's really taking a
chance with your business'
reputation!)
If you
require a minimum volume of hits
(i.e., you are going to deny everyone
with a brand new website), let people
know clearly when to apply
before they do so and
are denied. There's no
sense in being negative when you can
avoid it.
(And in
case this wasn't obvious, if you're
leaning toward having a lot of control
over your affiliates, you probably
won't want to set up a multi-tier
program.)
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AFFILIATE PROGRAM SOFTWARE:
In "doing it
yourself", you have three
options:
- Program it
yourself
- Purchase
affiliate software to run on your own
server
- Pay a
company to run their in-house software
for you on their server
- Opt for a
more "generic" ClickBank-type program
(entirely handled from their
servers)...
Read through the
reviews of particular options to get ideas
on what to be aware of in your own
analysis of any
option.
(For the first two types, you will have
the advantage of definitively promoting
your own website via its URL being in all
the affiliate links on your affiliates'
websites.)
1)
Program it yourself:
If
you're
a great programmer, of course, you
could create your own program!
(No doubt some of the programs for
sale started out this way.)
Maybe you want something quite simple,
or maybe you are up for any
challenge...
So
I
should point out one small thing, in
case you take up the gauntlet:
As mentioned in the discussion on the
previous page, some search engines use
"link popularity" as one factor in
ranking your site. What you need
to be aware of is that link codes
shouldn't contain question marks,
because search engines can't "spider"
(follow) through such URLs. It
might not make a huge difference, but
there's no sense in penalizing
yourself unnecessarily.
Other
than
that, I can't give you any help!
2)
Purchase affiliate program software
to run on your own server:
Some affiliate program software sells
in the range of up to $10,000
(!). A number of programs sell
for under $1000, though some of those
are very basic and/or
inflexible. Particularly for
those who want total control over
their own program, it's a challenge to
find in-house software that will do
the job.
Pretty
inexpensive
and pretty darned powerful affiliate
program software called Ultimate
Affiliate is available
from Groundbreak.com. At a cost
of $200, this software ( for use on
Unix-based websites) allows you to set
up a one- or multiple-level per-lead
or per-sale (percentage or flat fee)
affiliate program. (A
pay-per-click program can be
maintained with software titled
"Ultimate Advertiser".) It
tracks by cookies, IP address logging,
and MySQL database (if applicable),
and the administrator can set the
timeframe (up to indefinitely).
It will even create replicated
websites for your affiliates, if you
should choose that.
The
Ultimate
Affiliate program can be integrated
with any Perl-based shopping cart (and
some others). It gives you a
mechanism to email your affiliates
easily. The fee includes
lifetime software updates; but
installation, if you choose not to do
it yourself (you need a decent
understanding of Perl, and HTML for
forms customization), is $100
extra. There are question marks
in the codes (they work with various
shopping cart programs), but that
arrangement can be changed by the
administrator. ...The site is
chock-full of information! - and you
can actually access some of the
modules and play around with them.
Definitely
a bargain! Really, about the
only downside I note is that there's
no automated mechanism for paying
affiliates (e.g., linking up with a
PayPal account) - you're on your own
with that.
On
the
other hand, here's on-site software
that has its own (real-time
credit card processing
service-integrated) shopping cart - and
is designed with downloadable products
in mind... Synergyx,
by Paul Galloway. (You might say
that it's comparable to ClickBank's
own system, if you're familiar with
that - more on that in the next
section - but you don't have to have
[only] intangible products.)
Single- or two-tier, and the
commission structure can be very
flexible.
You don't have to use the
shopping cart (now - room to grow?).
Synergyx
may
be getting into the pricey range,
but it includes installation,
integration with 5 different payment
services, and
phone-based live training and customer
support. Paul
is utterly devoted to customer service
(and many very successful webmarketers
stand by his software products.)
...And wow, does this program have
features! - I think you'll be very
impressed (and the site offers a great
demo).
Then
we
have iDevAffiliate,
quite sophisticated on-your-server
software at only $99. Many
testimonials laud the super-easy setup
and range of features. Good
info/demo on the site. This
choice might be especially good for
merchants in three categories.
- For
those wishing to use PayPal, this
interfaces with other shopping
carts, but it's easy to integrate
the PayPal mass payments
option.
- For
those focusing on speakers of
Spanish, German, French, Italian,
Dutch, or Portuguese, the control
panel for both affiliates and
merchants can be set to any of these
languages (or English). Plus
one can calculate payments in any of
52 currencies.
- And
for programs which especially lend
themselves to offline marketing,
there is an option for creating a
special page on your site for
customers to type in the affiliate's
ID (which could be called a
"promotional code" or some such
thing). The company also
offers a monthly-fee,
on-their-server option (which,
coupled with the "promo code" page,
would be a way for a merchant
who works largely offline to run an
affiliate program nevertheless).
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| 3) Pay a
company to run their software for you on
their server:
Truly
excellent company-hosted affiliate
program software is offered by Inuvo -
it's called MyAP
(formerly MyAffiliateProgram). I
think of this as the Cadillac of the
genre... Yes, it costs to get
going with it; but it has an abundance
of truly useful and elegant features.
The site is a well-honed
information-giver, and their merchant
services are superb, with different
levels of service to choose from.
You might want to check out their site,
no matter what route you're thinking of
going. One of the main virtues of
this type of program, aside from server
cost/space saving, is that it allows for
easy portability in case you change
servers or ordering systems.
A very good
alternative is AffiliateShop,
by Pendulab. For a good-value
monthly plus small setup fee, you can
have access to the means for click,
lead, or sales-based affiliate
tracking. (No residual - but you
can pay different amounts, either by
percentage or flat fee, to different
affiliates.) You can also pay
extra to have the company pay
your affiliates each month.
Single- or multi-tier program
options, ad tracking, even an
optional live chat feature for your site
- and good access to support. Your
domain in the tracking code. The
software tracks by both cookies and
"session variables", for a period of 30
days. You can also be included in
a directory of merchants who use the
AffiliateShop service.
4) Opt
for a more "generic" ClickBank-type
program (entirely handled from their
servers):
For those wishing to base an affiliate
program around services or ditigal
products (i.e., not tangible
products), ClickBank
is very popular (and easy/quick/cheap to
get going with). It provides an
internationally accessible
infrastructure that both takes care of
all the order processing (via
credit/debit card - so that you don't
need an expensive merchant services
account) and a single-tier
affiliate program. The affiliate
program is fairly basic - but for what
it is, it's an effective solution for
many businesses.
ClickBank
represents, to me, the "lazy merchant's
answer to affiliate programming" -
minimally, all you have to do is set it
up and let it go. (Let me clarify
that I don't mean to put down anyone who
chooses the easy way! - I so chose
myself. I feel that it's very
important to limit your responsibilities
to what you really want to be
doing - otherwise burnout is likely to
ensue.) While you can
develop your own relationship with those
acting as your affiliates (which is
likely to add to your overall success as
you work to add to your affiliates'
success), you don't have to when
you use ClickBank. You also don't
have to pay the affiliates
yourself (which is true for most of the
affiliate program clearinghouses).
If you like
the ClickBank model overall but are a
little frustrated at some of its
restrictions (intangible products only,
no monthly billing, cap on the amount
you can charge customers and pay
affiliates, no payment differential
possible for JV partners) - and are
willing to at least commit yourself to a
single session of affiliate-paying
(through their easy-to-use mechanism)
each month - I suggest taking a look at
two other options...
www.Click2Sell.eu
is pretty comparable to ClickBank - but
as the late-comer, it offers some
further advantages: It handles
tangible and intangible products,
including subscription sales - and it's
truly geared toward international
programs. Also, it's totally
free to set up an account, for
any number of products; and the
transaction fees are minimal (especially
for pricey products). And you can
receive payments instantly
instead of waiting for a monthly (or
less often) check.
PayDotCom
is another totally cheap way to go if
you have only one product, which is
totally free - and their activation fee
(pay once for all the other products you
ever want to add) is still cheaper than
ClickBank's fee (for 50 products).
A major benefit of using PayDotCom is
that purchasers can use their PayPal or
StormPay electronic funds as well as
credit cards and online checks to buy
your products. (Also, your
payments are instant instead of
a) monthly b) and only if over a certain
amount c) and minus a check charge -
they go into your PayPal or StormPay
account. No money held in reserve,
either.) Take a look... there are
a number of other feature differences
that might make a big difference to you
(notably the ability to track,
communicate with, and provide tools for
your own affiliates). Still
single-tier, though. And it has
one disadvantage you'll need to
carefully consider: they charge affiliates
a small fee for each sale they make for
you (which might make some affiliates
reluctant to work on your behalf).
And for
another option entirely, there's the
2-tier affiliate program option for
those who wish to simply add an
affiliate program "on top of" their
webhosting, via WebsiteWizard
- an excellent webhosting service with 3
levels of service (and this feature is
part of #3). Even the least
expensive version of WebsiteWizard (quite
cheap) let's you add a PayPal-linked
shopping cart to your site; #3 also
enables you to take credit cards without
PayPal (and has some other nifty
features, naturally).
There are
many ways to go! - it just depends on
your desires and your budget.
The issue of
how and how long links are tracked for
your program could be of great
concern...
Savvy
affiliates are looking for the most
complete link tracking possible, for as
long as possible. If you're
seeking quality affiliates who will feel
loyalty towards your company, this
factor might help you in deciding which
affiliate program management software
option to go with. Here is an
informative article called "How
Does
Affiliate Tracking Work: A
'Not-too-technical' Overview!", by
Todd Farmer and Jeff Doak of Kowabunga!
Technologies.
While we're
on the subject of affiliate program
software, there are some adjuncts I
should mention...
HANDLING
ALL THOSE SMALL PAYOUTS EFFECTIVELY:
If you're
going to be handling the payments
yourself, a complementary service that a
great many merchants are finding
valuable is PayPal.
Their Partner Program gives businesses
all over the world a cost-effective
means of handling the many smaller
payments that tend to go along with
affiliate reimbursement, via electronic
transfer.
You would
submit to PayPal a list of email
addresses and payment amounts; they will
then automate a batch payment to all of
your affiliates. Money is
transmitted securely from your credit
card or bank account to each affiliate's
"holding tank" - the recipient can then
retrieve it by direct deposit or ask for
a check to be mailed to him/her.
You can still set a minimum amount to
prompt a payment - but now you don't
have the expense of cutting checks,
stuffing envelopes, and paying
postage... And the service,
incredibly, is free to both sender and
receiver.
Some international
affiliate programs avoid the big expense
of cutting checks in foreign currency
this way... They might send checks
in their own currency or
distribute payments via PayPal.
However, recipients in only some
countries are able to take money out
of their accounts (by transferring to
their bank accounts) - which limits them
to utilizing their affiliate income in
purchases from vendors who accept PayPal
payments.
(Anyone can
use this service, by the way, not just
affiliate programs. Individuals
use it like a debit card. It's
popularly used on auction sites.
And it can be used to especial advantage
by any other type of business that makes
many small payments regularly, such as
rebates. Money can even be
transferred from one PayPal account to
others via email as well.)
Another such
growing service, also free to join, is
MoneyBookers,
which is rather more popular than PayPal
in many countries outside the U.S.
The website is in your choice of a
dozen languages, and it supports
payments between people (and/or
businesses) in 40+ countries.
There's
one more section to go - See PART
THREE of
7 - SETTING UP AN AFFILIATE
PROGRAM...
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