AffiliateCarnival » Social Media

Biggie-Size Your Affiliate Summit East 2010 Pass

Yudhi — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 01:00:11 +0000

We’ve received a number of inquiries about whether passes to Affiliate Summit East 2010 can be upgraded. And the answer is yes.

The cost of upgrades is the difference in the price of your pass when you registered and the price of the higher level pass at the time of the upgrade.

There are four pass types: Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Diamond. If you’re interested in seeing sessions at Affiliate Summit, Gold will get you into the Sunday sessions and Platinum provides access to all three days of sessions.

Diamond passes get access to all three days of sessions, plus DVDs of all recorded session videos.

Visit http://www.affiliatesummit.com/register/ for more details on the various pass types. Contact us about upgrading your Affiliate Summit pass.

Call Me Anything, Just Don’t Call Me Late for Dinner

Yudhi — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 01:00:22 +0000

There’s been a lot of talk of late regarding a change in the affiliate marketing nomenclature; inclusive of the industry name itself.

Some argue that as our industry evolves, that the designation should take on a broader descriptive, e.g., “performance marketing industry”, in which affiliate marketing plays a vital role as a significant channel; yet one of many.

As an industry, we do tend to over-complicate the issue by using disparate terminology for essentially the same things, leading to even greater confusion, especially to folks outside of our community.

For the last decade, I’ve called myself an “affiliate”, while others have preferred to be called “publisher” or “associate”. Lately, I’ve also seen the term “media partner” being used to essentially describe the same relationship that I’ve had with my “merchants” (or “advertisers”, depending on what THEY choose to call themselves).

Some make a case that “affiliate marketing” carries a lot of yucky baggage with it and by renaming it “performance marketing”, that our industry will garner more media attention, become shielded from advertising tax laws and that it will somehow change the perception that some people have about our industry overall.

Others maintain that after spending years educating online marketers and the public about affiliate marketing that changing the name now, would set us back in a time where our industry continues to emerge and is now being recognized as a legitimate, viable marketing channel.

As I look at the Affiliate Summit East 2010 agenda included in this issue and the incorporated articles written by the experienced marketers that specialize in various subsets of internet marketing, I would wager that many do not call themselves affiliate marketers or performance marketers. Rather, they likely have labeled themselves as social media marketers, SEO’s, bloggers, e-mailers, direct marketers, etc., even though they all are involved in affiliate marketing at some level and are actively trying to increase their foothold in our growing sector of online marketing.

So, while I’m all for a term to better reflect our industry’s forward-thinking, innovative, multi-channel approach to generating sales and leads, I don’t know if I’m ready to change it to performance marketing, just because it somehow seems more mainstream.

“A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”- William Shakespeare

Email me your thoughts at missyward@affiliatesummit.com to be published in FeedFront Magazine’s new Letters to the Editor section.

11 You Tube Video Tips For Maximum Results

John — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 12:01:58 +0000

Were you aware that 50% of all the traffic on the Internet today comes from videos? That is a pretty unbelievable number when you consider it.

Here are 11 tips on how you can create and market your You Tube video to get better results.

1. Post your videos on other social media sites besides just You Tube. These could include Twitter, Facebook, Stumbleupon, and Digg. Post it on your blog as well. Said a mailing out to your email list and invite them to visit your blog and watch the video and leave comments.

2. Make your videos professional. Do not cut corners on sound and edit them so they are presentable. This should include lighting and color that is easy on the eyes.

3. Keep your videos short and on message. I am not going to sit thru a 10 minute video and neither are most of your viewers. Get to the point and then wrap it up. You can say a lot in a 2-3 minute video.

4. Just as in blogging find ways to make your videos unique. This should include humor, controversy and really useful information that is not recycled from other people’s videos.

5. Use your You Tube video to brand yourself and your internet business. Include your website logo, and your website url in the beginning, in the text, and at the end. Videos really give you a great chance to come across as an expert on what your video is about.

6. Before you tape it live practice it a few times. This will give you confidence because you know exactly what you are going to say. Never create a video on the fly.

7. Think about creating a series of videos on one theme. This can bring people back to watch more of what you have to say. It also will help you break your video into smaller portions so you can really stay on message for each one.

8. Get search engine benefits by incorporating targeted keyword phrases into the title of your video. You should build a keyword list and know what you are trying to rank highly for. Search engines love to rank videos on their search results for fresh and unique content.

9. Ask your viewers to leave comments. This helps get them involved and let you know what they are thinking. Do not be afraid to delete really negative comments.

10. Track your hits by using You Tube Insights to see who is watching your video and where they are coming from. Just as analytics are helpful on your blog or website they can give you a lot of good information about your video.

11. Have fun. Do not swear or use inappropriate actions in any way. Do not offend people when you are having fun with off color jokes or comments.

These are 11 ways the experts create You Tube videos and market them to build their internet business. If you are not using video you need to start today!

Jeff Schuman invites you to visit his make money at home website for free JV With Jeff training and starting your own make money online business tips. Visit it now to find one real way you can finally make money online!

Affiliate Summit Donates $5,000 to the Avon Breast Cancer Crusade

Yudhi — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 01:00:11 +0000

The Affiliate Summit East 2010 Challenge, a Nike+ Challenge where Affiliate Summit pledged to donate $1 to the Avon Breast Cancer Crusade for each mile run (up to $5,000) through the challenge has hit the goal.

Affiliate Summit has made our $5,000 donation to the Avon Breast Cancer Crusade.

But the challenge is still running through August 13, 2010 for any runners interested in affiliate marketing bragging rights.

There are currently 75 folks involved in the challenge, and the top ten runners have tallied 2,280.10 miles so far.

Overall, there have been 5,437.83 miles run by all of the participants.

Shawn is at #15 right now (see his Nike+ profile) with 151.63 miles, and is hoping to hit the top ten by Affiliate Summit East 2010. I’m in 41st place — not too shabby considering I was down and out with pneumonia.

Here are the top ten runners, as of July 1, 2010.

This is an invite only challenge, so that we don’t have a bunch of random people joining. If you’d like to participate, shoot us an email.

Get more details at http://www.affiliatesummit.com/2010/02/15/affiliate-summit-east-2010-challenge/.

Missy Ward Gets “Approved” by Suze Orman

Yudhi — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 01:00:20 +0000

There was a fundraising contest going on during the 2010 Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in Chicago in which for every $250 that a walker raised between May 1 – May 10, they received a chance to win a 20-minute “Ask Suze” phone conversation with financial expert, Suze Orman. Additionally, the Top 5 fundraisers of that walk would appear in a short video with Suze that would be filmed during the Closing Ceremonies.

After winning last year’s fundraising contest and having a blast meeting Patrick Dempsey, I knew there was no way I was going to pass up the exciting opportunity to meet Suze.

So, being the extremely competitive, and thick-headed gal that I am, I hustled my butt off and won both contests, coming in just 2-spots away from Suze and our Team Affiliate Marketers Give Back coming in 5th overall.

During Day One of the walk, my fellow teammates were subjected to my excitement of meeting her for 26 miles. I’m fairly certain they wanted me to meet her as much as I wanted to so that I’d finally shut up.

Unfortunately, around mile 7 of Day Two’s walk, I got a phone call alerting me to the fact that Suze was in the hospital and was undergoing an emergency appendectomy.

I have to admit, I was kind of disheartened that I wasn’t going to get to meet her, even though it was a pretty damn good excuse.

But being the class-act that she is, Suze Orman recorded a special message for me which immediately brought a smile to my face.

I’m glad to see that she’s feeling better from her surgery and I’m truly looking forward to my phone call with her.

http://www.savevid.com/video/a-special-message-from-suze-orman-to-missy-ward.html

Affiliate Summit Get Together in NYC

Yudhi — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 01:00:17 +0000

Affiliate Summit hosted nearly 200 affiliate marketers in New York City on Monday, June 21 at the Antarctica Bar for a night of networking, complimented by free beer and Lombardi’s Pizza

There was lots of good conversation, complimented by an entertaining convergence of cost per action and cost per sale affiliates. And as @adhustler Tweeted, “CPS affiliates are weird.”

I think that’s only half true – we’re all weird.

Thanks to everybody that came out for the night to do business and have fun.

Take a look at the pictures from the Affiliate Summit Networking Party in NYC.

Brian Solis to Keynote Affiliate Summit West 2011

Yudhi — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 01:00:09 +0000

Brian Solis will be the keynote speaker at Affiliate Summit West 2011 on Tuesday, January 11, 2010 at the Wynn Las Vegas.

Brian Solis is Principal of FutureWorks, an award-winning New Media marketing and branding agency in Silicon Valley. Solis is globally recognized for his views and insights on the convergence of PR, Traditional Media and Social Media. Considered one of the original thought leaders who paved the way for Social Media and PR 2.0, Solis is co-founder of the Social Media Club and is an original member of the Media 2.0 Workgroup.

BrianSolis.com is among the top 1.5% of all blogs tracked by Technorati and is ranked as one of the leading voices in the Ad Age Power 150 index of worldwide marketing bloggers. Solis is also the publisher of bub.blicio.us, a popular lifestyle and technology blog, and is also a contributor to TechCrunch, BrandWeek, and Mashable.

More details soon on Affiliate Summit West 2011 at http://www.affiliatesummit.com.

The Basics on Search Engine Optimization for Online Marketing

Yudhi — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 01:00:10 +0000

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a technique webmasters use to get search engines like Google to index and rank their websites well. It’s one thing to build a fantastic website, but if no one can find it, it’s useless. The goal for every webmaster is to have their website appear on the first page of a search listing for their product or service.

Search engines use web crawlers to index websites. This happens when a crawler visits your site and gathers information to determine its subject matter. SEO is when webmasters plant clues, such as keywords, within their websites so that crawlers are able to index and rank them correctly.

Keywords are words or short phrases that searchers use to find information online. The goal is to select keywords that are popular to searchers, but not so popular with webmasters.

Keywords should be added to every page, and within the HTML tags for “keywords,” “description,” and “title,” as well as the “alt” attributes for all images. When writing content, add keywords in headings (H1) and subheadings (H2-4), and within the first and last paragraphs on a page. Search engines recognize websites that are all keywords and no content, so don’t go crazy or your website may be penalized.

Links within a website are helpful for search engines to crawl around your site. Make sure your links take crawlers on an easy journey through your website, but don’t run them around in circles.

Back-links are links on the internet that lead to your website. The more back-links the better because they bring visitors to your site, and that looks good to search engines. You can add back-links by adding content to other sites and adding a link to your signature, or adding comments to blogs and adding a link back to your site.

Not only should your content have keywords, but it should be updated regularly. Search engines will continue to crawl updated sites in order to keep their indexing up to date.

SEO is a fundamental step in building a successful website. It is also a work in progress, so don’t be afraid to change keywords and content periodically to see what works.

About the author: James Mowery is a computer geek that writes about technology and related topics. To read more blog posts by him, go to http://www.laptopcomputers.org/

Free Beer and Pizza from Affiliate Summit in NYC

Yudhi — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 01:00:08 +0000

Affiliate Summit will be hosting a meetup of affiliate marketers in New York City the night before LinkShare Symposium East 2010.

Join Shawn Collins and I for free drinks, food, and networking.

This will be a great opportunity to mix and mingle with fellow affiliate marketers on the evening before the LinkShare Symposium East kicks off.

(You do not have to be attending the LinkShare Symposium to come on over to the Affiliate Summit Get-Together. It’s open to all affiliate marketers.)

Where: Antarctica Bar, 287 Hudson Street (at Spring), New York City
Date: Monday, June 21
Time: 9:00pm – ?

We’ll have open bar from 9pm-11pm, and we’ll be bringing in pizzas from Lombardi’s (America’s first pizzeria).

Also, there will be a red carpet and photographer to take pictures at the meetup. Plus, the Antarctica has some billiards and darts.

The bar has WiFi, but come on, don’t bring your laptop. Talk to people and do business!

Oh yeah, we’ll also be giving away some free gold passes to Affiliate Summit East 2010.

RSVP at http://lseast.eventbrite.com/ or on Facebook.

Picking Sessions to Attend at Affiliate Summit East 2010

Yudhi — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 01:00:21 +0000

We receive requests for various types of tracks for sessions every time we collect feedback on Affiliate Summit, and we’ve tinkered with tracks focused on experience level and topic.

But the realization we keep coming to is that the industry is so multi-dimensional that a handful of tracks don’t handle the topics covered.

So, we’ve enhanced the agenda to include the experience level, target audience, and niche/vertical being covered in each breakout session.

Be sure to have a look at this information when deciding which sessions to attend at Affiliate Summit East 2010.