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Wednesday, June 17th, 2009

81 Comments

Lazy Launch Days Are Numbered

Hello there! If you are new here, you might want to subscribe to the RSS feed for updates on this topic.

I know your time is valuable so I’ll get right to the point.

Product owners and affiliates for the last couple years have lived a happy co-dependent existence. In the beginning, affiliates had limited choices. Today, it’s an ocean of opportunity.

The reason I’m writing you today is because I feel the industry needs a wake up call.

Here are the problems…

Affiliate marketers are becoming less dependent on product owners
Affiliates have more choices then ever before
Affiliates have evolved with the times but product owners have not
Product owners are relying too heavily on affiliates

Affiliates Don’t Need You Anymore

In the old days, an affiliate could simply link to a product owner and that was enough.

Then over time, more and more affiliate marketers were created by the product owners — so many new affiliates that, in order to start making sales, you had to offer some sort of bonus or incentive that no one else was offering.

Now in 2009, you need to go even further than just bonuses, because almost everyone’s doing bonuses at this point.

To compete with the massive amounts of affiliates, you now have to capture leads from your traffic, offer a bonus, and then point the prospect to the product owner.

Don’t forget that more and more people everyday are learning that they can sign up as an affiliate themselves and buy through their own links.

Affiliates are now generating their own leads, creating their own offers, and then sending the customer to someone else. How long before the affiliate thinks: “If I’m generating the lead and creating the offer, then why am I sending the customer to someone else?”

Basically, to compete in today’s world of affiliate marketing, an affiliate has to do all the same things a product owner normally does.

Most affiliates become affiliates to avoid the responsibilities of a product owner. You must alleviate some of the work your affiliates are having to do or risk losing them or worse gaining them as a competitor!

There’s a Network On Every Corner

Back in the day, Amazon, Clickbank, Linkshare, and a handful of others were the only affiliate networks on the scene. Now you’ve got over 32 “major” affiliate networks, not to mention all the small or start-up networks.

It gets worse, too, because new networks are constantly springing up and these networks are offering much more then the typical product owner.

Inside any one of the 10+ affiliate networks that I’m a part of, I’ve got all kinds of affiliate tools and a dedicated affiliate manager.

The average product launcher just scrapes by with a basic affiliate promotion kit. Banners, emails, keywords, and some links are not enough anymore.

Today, affiliates need brandable videos, landing pages, reports, e-courses, interviews, and articles… The Internet in 2009 is a content beast — your affiliates need content!

If your eyes are opening and you’re seeing the problems, then you should check out what the adult industry is doing for their affiliates.

The adult industry offers their affiliates free hosting, dedicated managers, a plethora of brandable landing pages, even whole membership sites that the affiliate can promote the product owner with.

Independents can beat the big networks by offering more customization, unique tools, and personal touch. If they don’t, then they’ll lose their affiliates. Which actually leads me into the third problem I see happening…

Affiliates evolved and optimized their methods for their product-owning partners. However, the product owners are still offering the same resources they offered 4, 5, and 6 years ago. Not only that, but it seems product owners have gotten greedier and lazier.

Product Owners Should Be Responsible For Conversions

In this last part, I’m going to speak for myself, and if anyone is feeling the same thing they can let me know in the comments.

The other parts I’ve already spoken with many other affiliates so I was comfortable speaking for the majority. This next part could possibly just be a weird fluke I experienced and could be totally alone in it.

But I doubt it!

Here goes…

Lately, I have been making some showings in the top 10s of different joint-venture leaderboards, which sounds great. However, for most of them my conversions have been almost totally dependent on my offering a bonus.

“Wait,” you’re saying, “you make more sales by offering a bonus to your subscribers who buy through you?” No!

What I’m saying is, if I don’t offer a bonus, then I don’t make sales. I know because I tried it on the last JV leaderboard I got on. I was in the top 10 for leads, and then when it came time for sales, I never offered a bonus.

Sure enough, I got an egg in my sales column as my reward for that test.

In the product launch right before that, I offered a great bonus and came in top five in sales, making several thousand in commissions plus winning a 52″ flat screen TV.

Here’s my problem though…

I could have just emailed my list, charged for my bonus, made the several grand myself, and not shared my customers with the product owner.

If the product owner’s sales funnel requires that the affiliate offers a bonus in order to make sales…

… Then what does the affiliate need the product owner for?

(Read that again.)

I understand there is a “game” to be played, but this is not the ideal situation for affiliates. And as a product owner you want to take care of your affiliates as best you can. For example, I’ll never promote for that guy again.

In my eyes, he charged too much money for his product and the price seemed largely based on knowing his affiliates would offer a much bigger bonus to compensate for it.

Meanwhile, the affiliate is only getting 50% of revenue. Yet the affiliate is motivating the crowd, generating the leads, creating the hot offer, and generating the sale…

… While the product own just created the product!

Creating the product is a big piece of the pie, but what I’m saying over and over again, here, is that, if I have to offer such a great bonus in order for your product to make sales, I might as well just sell my bonus!

More and more of the top affiliates are getting fed up with this.

Lazy launch days are numbered because affiliates are getting sick and tired of the product owners not evolving their methods to keep the affiliates hard work secure.

Here’s a quick solutions list so you can easily identify what you need to be doing to make sure your affiliates are happy.

What You Must Do To Keep Affiliates Happy

You must offer something unique to your affiliates or risk losing them to the networks.
You must provide every resource an affiliate would need to make the sale, including a variety of different bonuses.
The more you update your affiliates tools (e.g., emails, videos, reports, landing pages, etc), then the more they will go out and promote those new tools.
As your affiliates’ job requirements evolve, so should yours as the product owner to make sure the affiliate has what’s needed and is doing what’s required.
Protect your affiliates’ commissions during launches, and make their job as easy as you can — you are the CREATOR, they are the PROMOTER.
Never steal from your affiliates by denying commissions on backend sales, especially during the launch.

I’m not saying I’m the perfect product owner, either, since I’m missing a few of these elements in my affiliate program myself. Although, you can bet I won’t be letting much time go by before I start making sure I have them all.

Thanks for listening to my rant. And please post your comments and tell me what you think of this situation. I’d love to hear them!

About the Author

Justin Brooke is the author of "SEO Lies," an international speaker, and blogger at SiteFling.com. He wanted to share with you some ideas for making your affiliates happier and in turn your affiliates will make your wallet happier!

Category: Affiliate Marketing

Tags: affiliate, article, commission, email, Internet, interview, list, money, offer, price, product, traffic, video, work

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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http://www.jasonberkes.net/ Jason Berkes

Justin – Your everywhere dude!!! What a great post. Your information is always great.

Thanks

Jason Berkes
http://www.jasonberkes.net Jason Berkes

Justin – Your everywhere dude!!! What a great post. Your information is always great.

Thanks

Jason Berkes
http://wwww.DirectMarketResults.com/ John Deck

Over the last year I have left a couple of comments around wondering if affiliate program and big launches were heading for a crash.

1. How do you feel about paying good money for a program and have it given away as a bonus for the next big launch?
2. It encourages bonus shopping.
3. Helps build someone else’s list.
4. In some cases the bonus looks to be a better value then the program being sold.
5. Each big launch seem to require bigger and bigger bosuses.

Not sure where it is all heading.

John Deck
http://wwww.DirectMarketResults.com John Deck

Over the last year I have left a couple of comments around wondering if affiliate program and big launches were heading for a crash.

1. How do you feel about paying good money for a program and have it given away as a bonus for the next big launch?
2. It encourages bonus shopping.
3. Helps build someone else’s list.
4. In some cases the bonus looks to be a better value then the program being sold.
5. Each big launch seem to require bigger and bigger bosuses.

Not sure where it is all heading.

John Deck
http://www.thefilipinoentrepreneur.com/ Lito|TheFilipinoEntrepreneur.C

Good point Justin. Affiliates have many options today and not in the mercy of product owners.
http://www.thefilipinoentrepreneur.com Lito|TheFilipinoEntrepreneur.Com

Good point Justin. Affiliates have many options today and not in the mercy of product owners.
http://www.internetmarketingspeed.com/ James Schramko

Affiliates can increase control dramatically by creating unique bonuses.

Concept 1: Offer a bonus for buyers. This way you capture all the buyers details in a qualified list. You can market to that list for the next launch.

Concept 2: Have your bonus included inside the launch members area for the ‘shock and awe’ part of the launch. I recently did this for a big launch and built a huge list of qualified targeted buyers.

My big idea is this:

… affiliates should be product owners if they want to control the game

Regards

James
http://www.internetmarketingspeed.com James Schramko

Affiliates can increase control dramatically by creating unique bonuses.

Concept 1: Offer a bonus for buyers. This way you capture all the buyers details in a qualified list. You can market to that list for the next launch.

Concept 2: Have your bonus included inside the launch members area for the ‘shock and awe’ part of the launch. I recently did this for a big launch and built a huge list of qualified targeted buyers.

My big idea is this:

… affiliates should be product owners if they want to control the game

Regards

James
http://buildingfromnothing.com/ Anna

Okay, well – Lets say Joe, Bob and Pete Offer me Product X.

I ignore Joe’s and Bob’s emails. But when I see Pete promoting it, I get interested. Why? Because I have followed Pete’s blog, read some of Pete’s free eBooks, and Pete even helped me once on a forum. Pete gave me useful information and seems like a level-headed guy so I trust him.

So I look into Product X and I decide to buy it.

Then I remember that Joe and Bob wrote about it. I check their emails to see what they have to say.

Joe, who I never heard of till last week, is offering a big bonus that I can’t resist. I was going to buy it one day for $200 but now I can get it for free. So, I end up buying through Joe’s link. Even though I wanted to buy it through Pete.

Truthfully, Pete earned the sale. In my opinion.

So, maybe affiliates shouldn’t be allowed by product owners to offer bonuses?

Although personally I can attest that there have been times I would never have bought something or tried it, if it weren’t for the bonus. And I wound up keeping it.

Which makes me wonder if affiliates should all have their own bonuses … making them a combination of affiliate and product owner.

Then you run into a scenario where a person doesn’t buy a person’s product because they are wondering if it might be offered up for free one day as a bonus.

Food for thought is right.
http://buildingfromnothing.com Anna

Okay, well – Lets say Joe, Bob and Pete Offer me Product X.

I ignore Joe’s and Bob’s emails. But when I see Pete promoting it, I get interested. Why? Because I have followed Pete’s blog, read some of Pete’s free eBooks, and Pete even helped me once on a forum. Pete gave me useful information and seems like a level-headed guy so I trust him.

So I look into Product X and I decide to buy it.

Then I remember that Joe and Bob wrote about it. I check their emails to see what they have to say.

Joe, who I never heard of till last week, is offering a big bonus that I can’t resist. I was going to buy it one day for $200 but now I can get it for free. So, I end up buying through Joe’s link. Even though I wanted to buy it through Pete.

Truthfully, Pete earned the sale. In my opinion.

So, maybe affiliates shouldn’t be allowed by product owners to offer bonuses?

Although personally I can attest that there have been times I would never have bought something or tried it, if it weren’t for the bonus. And I wound up keeping it.

Which makes me wonder if affiliates should all have their own bonuses … making them a combination of affiliate and product owner.

Then you run into a scenario where a person doesn’t buy a person’s product because they are wondering if it might be offered up for free one day as a bonus.

Food for thought is right.
http://www.MoneyPowerWisdom.com/ Dr.Mani

Nice post. Got me thinking

The line between ‘joint ventures’ and ‘affiliates’ has been blurred in the Internet marketing niche for a long time now.

What many call ‘JV’ deals are often little more than affiliate joint promotions.

Which, in context of what you’ve just highlighted (and most product owners have known intuitively for many years now), makes me wonder: why not merge the two concepts into something more valuable, intimate and hands-on?

In other words, as a product owner, work with ONLY a close ‘inner circle’ of affiliates/JV partners.

Keep your product promos exclusive to this small group. Give them extra perks and special, customized promo tools to use, like interviews/webinars with them, co-authored special reports, virtual workshops done together. Maybe even ‘reciprocal promotions’ to your own database.

The bit that often gets overlooked by many product owners is that, in the headlong rush for ‘quick’ profits, they ignore the real goldmine of a satisfied, even delighted, loyal client base. With one of those, you don’t need too many ‘new’ clients to keep the profit pump primed.

Years ago, I scaled down on ‘external’ or ‘outbound’ marketing, and in the process, cut down on my own affiliate recruiting efforts BEFORE the ‘bonus war’ reality hit the marketplace. In this way, I have been insulated against the madness and mayhem, while my business chugs along – maybe not expanding massively, but definitely thriving.

Periodic inflows of new clients come from joint venture co-promotions – and with a good system of delivering value to clients, you don’t need too many of these deals to keep things going well.

But what’s a beginner to do?

Use this reality of ‘affiliate bonus wars’ to deliver a killer FRONT-END product – and forego all profits, over-deliver to affiliates, and build intimate relationships with the best performing partners.

All of this would be done with a view to developing and growing a client-base that will be delighted with the quality of your product or service to the point they’ll be repeat buyers… and at the same time nurturing relationships based on real benefits and value-delivery with your affiliates (who will later morph into that exclusive group of ‘JV partners’).

Done right, this strategy will simply bypass the need to ‘go back to the well’ too often, and lets you siphon off a segment from your broader marketplace to focus on, deliver value to, and mine for continuing value for years to come – maybe forever!

In a nutshell, for a product owner, a strategy build entirely on getting more affiliates to sell more products for you is one that condemns you to either working harder than ever, and/or accepting diminishing returns for this effort.

Build a team that works together. Create a client base that you can help by providing value. And use affiliates ethically to reach that point – by over-delivering to them, too.

Just my 2 cents!

All success
Dr.Mani
http://www.MoneyPowerWisdom.com Dr.Mani

Nice post. Got me thinking

The line between ‘joint ventures’ and ‘affiliates’ has been blurred in the Internet marketing niche for a long time now.

What many call ‘JV’ deals are often little more than affiliate joint promotions.

Which, in context of what you’ve just highlighted (and most product owners have known intuitively for many years now), makes me wonder: why not merge the two concepts into something more valuable, intimate and hands-on?

In other words, as a product owner, work with ONLY a close ‘inner circle’ of affiliates/JV partners.

Keep your product promos exclusive to this small group. Give them extra perks and special, customized promo tools to use, like interviews/webinars with them, co-authored special reports, virtual workshops done together. Maybe even ‘reciprocal promotions’ to your own database.

The bit that often gets overlooked by many product owners is that, in the headlong rush for ‘quick’ profits, they ignore the real goldmine of a satisfied, even delighted, loyal client base. With one of those, you don’t need too many ‘new’ clients to keep the profit pump primed.

Years ago, I scaled down on ‘external’ or ‘outbound’ marketing, and in the process, cut down on my own affiliate recruiting efforts BEFORE the ‘bonus war’ reality hit the marketplace. In this way, I have been insulated against the madness and mayhem, while my business chugs along – maybe not expanding massively, but definitely thriving.

Periodic inflows of new clients come from joint venture co-promotions – and with a good system of delivering value to clients, you don’t need too many of these deals to keep things going well.

But what’s a beginner to do?

Use this reality of ‘affiliate bonus wars’ to deliver a killer FRONT-END product – and forego all profits, over-deliver to affiliates, and build intimate relationships with the best performing partners.

All of this would be done with a view to developing and growing a client-base that will be delighted with the quality of your product or service to the point they’ll be repeat buyers… and at the same time nurturing relationships based on real benefits and value-delivery with your affiliates (who will later morph into that exclusive group of ‘JV partners’).

Done right, this strategy will simply bypass the need to ‘go back to the well’ too often, and lets you siphon off a segment from your broader marketplace to focus on, deliver value to, and mine for continuing value for years to come – maybe forever!

In a nutshell, for a product owner, a strategy build entirely on getting more affiliates to sell more products for you is one that condemns you to either working harder than ever, and/or accepting diminishing returns for this effort.

Build a team that works together. Create a client base that you can help by providing value. And use affiliates ethically to reach that point – by over-delivering to them, too.

Just my 2 cents!

All success
Dr.Mani
http://twitter.com/drmani drmani

Well worth a read (for affiliates and product owners) by @justinbrooke http://marketersboard.com/lazy-launch-days-numbered/
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
http://twitter.com/keithgoodrum keithgoodrum

Reading @justinbrooke “Lazy Launch Days Are Numbered” post on @michelfortin blog http://bit.ly/13cNdQ
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
http://www.internetmarketingspeed.com/ James Schramko

@Anna –

The market decides!!! Why couldnt Pete make a bonus anyway?
http://www.internetmarketingspeed.com James Schramko

@Anna –

The market decides!!! Why couldnt Pete make a bonus anyway?
http://www.sitefling.com/ Justin Brooke

@Dr.Mani – I’ve seen authors doing the virtual summits and teleseminars with their promoters. In fact I just did that with Dave Lakhani for his latest book.

A “rolling” launch with one new big affiliate per week and that strategy could be the best for all three parties. The affiliate, the product owner, and the customers.
http://www.sitefling.com Justin Brooke

@Dr.Mani – I’ve seen authors doing the virtual summits and teleseminars with their promoters. In fact I just did that with Dave Lakhani for his latest book.

A “rolling” launch with one new big affiliate per week and that strategy could be the best for all three parties. The affiliate, the product owner, and the customers.
http://www.ThinkWriteRetire.com/ Dr.Mani

Maybe I thought of this idea because I’m right in the middle of promoting my first print book!

All success
Dr.Mani
Author: ‘Think, Write and Retire’
http://www.ThinkWriteRetire.com
http://www.ThinkWriteRetire.com Dr.Mani

Maybe I thought of this idea because I’m right in the middle of promoting my first print book!

All success
Dr.Mani
Author: ‘Think, Write and Retire’
http://www.ThinkWriteRetire.com
http://buildingfromnothing.com/ Anna

@James – I think you’re right. Pete really should make a bonus if everyone else is … but then that takes us back around to the “why not just sell the bonus” question.

Maybe a different bonus with every launch, which was never sold formerly, but never repeated again for free? Of course that’s a lot of work so the person would have to have a big following to make it worthwhile. But at least that would avoid some of the other potential problems which are mentioned in this post and comments.

Affiliates wouldn’t be promoting a paid product, only to have it be given away later as a bonus. And people wouldn’t avoid buying something “in case in becomes a bonus later” if it were offered free only once and after that it were for sale.

Just means people will have to come up with a lot of great ideas for products, which gets tricky when so many people are in info-overload as it is. Get’s interesting at least!
http://buildingfromnothing.com Anna

@James – I think you’re right. Pete really should make a bonus if everyone else is … but then that takes us back around to the “why not just sell the bonus” question.

Maybe a different bonus with every launch, which was never sold formerly, but never repeated again for free? Of course that’s a lot of work so the person would have to have a big following to make it worthwhile. But at least that would avoid some of the other potential problems which are mentioned in this post and comments.

Affiliates wouldn’t be promoting a paid product, only to have it be given away later as a bonus. And people wouldn’t avoid buying something “in case in becomes a bonus later” if it were offered free only once and after that it were for sale.

Just means people will have to come up with a lot of great ideas for products, which gets tricky when so many people are in info-overload as it is. Get’s interesting at least!
http://www.thefallofwork.com/ Joseph B.

WOW, touchy subject

Just my two cents…

Are your products really worth much if you give them away on every launch?

This is a terrible cycle because product owners have to charge more to get the affiliates to offer sweet bonuses. Don’t believe for a second that you aren’t somehow paying for that bonus.

I buy your product this lauch then next launch you give your product away as a bonus! Why did I even pay?

I agree with Trish, Stomper does it right “most of the time”

One of the biggest and most insidious problems is thier hurting (and targeting) mostly newbies

There is affiliate incest going on too (remember the big guru video explaining how to clear your cookies in great detail) why should I even bother trying to promote you with that kind of #$%& going on

Lastly but not leastly, (made that last word up), YOU DON”T NEED HALF THIS CRAP!

P.S. What ever happened to building “quality websites?”
http://www.thefallofwork.com Joseph B.

WOW, touchy subject

Just my two cents…

Are your products really worth much if you give them away on every launch?

This is a terrible cycle because product owners have to charge more to get the affiliates to offer sweet bonuses. Don’t believe for a second that you aren’t somehow paying for that bonus.

I buy your product this lauch then next launch you give your product away as a bonus! Why did I even pay?

I agree with Trish, Stomper does it right “most of the time”

One of the biggest and most insidious problems is thier hurting (and targeting) mostly newbies

There is affiliate incest going on too (remember the big guru video explaining how to clear your cookies in great detail) why should I even bother trying to promote you with that kind of #$%& going on

Lastly but not leastly, (made that last word up), YOU DON”T NEED HALF THIS CRAP!

P.S. What ever happened to building “quality websites?”
http://www.sitefling.com/ Justin Brooke

@James Schramko – We’re discussing ways to improve whats currently happening. The whole bonus war is scenario is a becoming a big issue. For exactly the reason Anna brings up from my post…. Why not just sell my bonus that I was going to offer for your product and then I don’t have to share my buyers with you.

It’s easy to say “toughen up and offer a better bonus, it’s all part of the game” but that’s really just sweeping the problem under the rug. Eventually other product owners will change their ways and anyone who hasn’t will slowly start to lose partners.

and if all affiliates changed their model to just being product owners, selling their own products… we as product owners would lose all our affiliates. Sure we’re smart enough to drive our own traffic but I’d sure like to keep the leveraging power of having affiliates drive all my traffic.
http://www.sitefling.com Justin Brooke

@James Schramko – We’re discussing ways to improve whats currently happening. The whole bonus war is scenario is a becoming a big issue. For exactly the reason Anna brings up from my post…. Why not just sell my bonus that I was going to offer for your product and then I don’t have to share my buyers with you.

It’s easy to say “toughen up and offer a better bonus, it’s all part of the game” but that’s really just sweeping the problem under the rug. Eventually other product owners will change their ways and anyone who hasn’t will slowly start to lose partners.

and if all affiliates changed their model to just being product owners, selling their own products… we as product owners would lose all our affiliates. Sure we’re smart enough to drive our own traffic but I’d sure like to keep the leveraging power of having affiliates drive all my traffic.
http://twitter.com/GoAskLesley GoAskLesley

Lazy Launch Days Are Numbered.. http://bit.ly/4ljG5
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
http://twitter.com/GoAskLesley GoAskLesley

Lazy Launch Days Are Numbered.. http://bit.ly/4ljG5
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
Pingback: 6 Ways For Product Owners To Keep Affiliates Happy | Kikabink News - Internet Marketing News
http://CommonSenseLiving.com/ Carole

Excuse me?

People become affiliate marketers because they don't want to spend the time to research and develop a product, or handle delivery, customer service, refunds and such. And on top of that – products owners are supposed to provide a website that converts, and any and all promotional tools, articles, ebooks, videos, so all they have to do is send an email and split the money? Oh no, even that's not good enough – they should get 75% or more? Only in IM…

Does anyone else see a problem with this?
http://CommonSenseLiving.com/ Carole

Excuse me?

People become affiliate marketers because they don't want to spend the time to research and develop a product, or handle delivery, customer service, refunds and such. And on top of that – products owners are supposed to provide a website that converts, and any and all promotional tools, articles, ebooks, videos, so all they have to do is send an email and split the money? Oh no, even that's not good enough – they should get 75% or more? Only in IM…

Does anyone else see a problem with this?

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