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Affiliate Marketing Book Receives Small Business Classic Award

classic: noun : a work of enduring excellence [Merriam-Webster Dictionary]

Today is a very special day for me. Due to your overwhelming support, my “Affiliate Program Management: An Hour a Day” tome has won a big award, winning the first place in the Classics category of 2013 Small Business Books Awards.

I feel honored and altogether humbled to be acknowledged in this way. As far as I understand this is the first time an affiliate marketing book gets selected as a small business classic. Thank you for your support, everyone! It means the world to me!!

In case you haven’t yet heard, later this Spring the book is coming out in Russian, and it is now also being translated into Chinese. If you are interested in acquiring translation rights for it, I’d love to hear from you.

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Affiliate Management Hour – 2013 Small Business Book Award Nominee

Yesterday I was pleased to learn that my last book — “Affiliate Program Management: An Hour a Day” — has been nominated for a 2013 Small Business Book Award. I’ve learned about it from this Tweet:

I am especially honored to see it being nominated in the Classics category.

At the time of this writing, the book has 65 reviews on Amazon.com, averaging 5 stars.

As I have mentioned in a recent interview to Affiliate Window, “Affiliate Management Hour” is now being translated into Russian and Chinese. Should you be interested in publishing it in other languages, do talk to me. I’d love to also see it in Spanish, Japanese, Portuguese, German, French, and a number of other languages [details here].

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Super Bowl 2013 Power Outage: Best Reactions & Lessons to Learn

When the lights turned off over half of the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in the middle of SuperBowl XLVII, I Tweeted:


Honestly, I didn’t expect some of the turns this “talk” has ended up taking, and today (one workweek into the reflections on it, and reactions to it) I’d like to bring a compilation of the five articles I’ve found to be most interesting. Here they are (in chronological order):

1. How Advertisers Made The Super Bowl Power Outage Work For Them by Jennifer Rooney of Forbes.com (02/03/2013, 10:13p)

2. 10 Innovative Social Media Newsjacks of the Super Bowl Power Outage by Anum Hussain of HubSpot (02/04/2013, 11:30p)

3. Marketing Lessons From Super Bowl Power Outage by Daniel Rodriguez of Indivly Magic (02/04/2013)

4. Marketing Lessons and Missed Opportunities From Super Bowl XLVII by Julio Fernandez at HuffingtonPost.com (02/05/2013, 11:51a)

5. Four Things Corporate IT Can Learn from the Super Bowl Power Outage by Jay Livens of Iron Mountain (02/06/2013)

Have you found some interesting follow-ups on the subject? Please share them through the “Comments” area below. I’d love to read them too.

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Facebook Gifts and Principles of Effective Social Commerce Campaigns

On December 11, 2012 Facebook rolled out a new feature. A little too late in my opinion for pre-Christmas shopping, but they have made it possible for “everyone in the U.S.” to receive gifts from friends [original announcement here]. Of course, the friend would have to pay for the gift. That’s the whole point of the exercise. Long gone are the days when we all wondered how (wasn’t the better question “when”?) Facebook is going to monetize their massive membership base.

On the same day TechCrunch‘s Josh Constine ran some numbers and concluded that “Facebook could earn up to $1 billion a year from Gifts” [more here]. His higher-end estimate was based on Facebook earning 20% per purchase. Knowing a bit about what various merchants pay through their affiliate programs, I, actually, think that Facebook’s average cut is closer to 10% here. While they do feature some products from higher-paying niches (e.g. magazine subscriptions, T-shirts, sunglasses, gift baskets) which may yield 20% in “commissions” to Facebook, the majority currently featured merchants do not really pay as much as that. The more common range would be 5%-6% (e.g. Target, iTunes, Cheryl’s) to 7% (e.g. Starbucks) or, maybe, 10% (e.g. Brookstone).

But whether they are going to reap $510 million or $1.02 billion is really irrelevant. The idea itself is great, and represents a perfect example of a well-built social commerce campaign. Here’s a screenshot of how I saw it earlier this morning:

This is one beautifully-crafted social commerce campaign (from which we can all learn something). It is:

(1) Timely — It is Scott’s birthday.

(2) Relevant — He is my friend, and I am a perfect “target audience” for gift buying.

(3) Convenient — I can buy my gift right there and then (out of their selection of gifts) without having to search elsewhere.

(4) It incorporates compelling Social Proof — My others friends, whom I trust, “have used Facebook Gifts” already. What am I waiting for?

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go check my own social media or other online marketing initiatives — to see how they compare with what Facebook is doing with Gifts. I’m sure I’ll find plenty of things to tweak.

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Excessive Shipping Costs – Top Reason for Shopping Cart Abandonment

I love Guinness.

However, ever since an Irish friend has recommended me to try Beamish, I’ve been asking about it in every grocery (and liquor) store around. Unfortunately, to no avail…

Finally, I’ve decided to look for it online. Luckily, I was able to find an online store — located within just 50 miles from me — that carried it. “Wow! How terrific!” I thought.

I added a four-pack to my shopping cart, and proceeded to checkout. Having reached the “Enter Zip for estimated shipping” field, I’ve entered mine, and oh my… Here’s what I’ve seen:

Did you know that 7 to 9 out of 10 online shopping carts get abandoned? Yes, between 70% and 88% of online customers leave the shopping cart without completing their purchase! And guess what the main reason is…

Per Forrester, the top reason for online shopping cart abandonment is excessive shipping costs with 44% of consumers dropping out under the shock of that “shipping and handling” field [more here]. ComScore echos these findings, revealing that as much as 55% of online customers abandon their shopping carts when shipping costs made “the total purchase cost more than expected” [more here]. My above case exemplifies it better than anything. Four pints of beer that cost $10 shouldn’t cost 246% of their price to ship — especially when I am only one-hour drive away from the store’s physical location.

If you run an online store, re-think your approach today. Whenever possible, offer free shipping (over a certain amount, of course) to (a) encourage greater spending, and (b) take the “shipping cost” stress out of the equation.

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Is Your Business Local? Target Your Online Advertising Accordingly!

A recent study by EyeTrackShop (ETS) has revealed that due to the way Facebook users view it (see ETS’ heatmap below), “Facebook’s page post ad visually outperforms its standard ad.” The ads that imitate posts on your timeline yield “200% higher visibility” than the right sidebar ads [more here].

However, regardless of the types of ads that you use (Facebook, Twitter, paid search campaigns, etc), before wasting your advertising dollars, tweak your settings to display your ad only to your target audience. For example, if you run a taxi service which covers Washington, DC and vicinities, no need to bid on taxi-related keywords/key-phrases nationally. Serve your ads only to Internet users in DC, Northern Virginia, and Southern Maryland.

Here is a Facebook “page post ad” that I couldn’t help but spot on my timeline yesterday night:

While, there are other things that could be improved here, the main one that jumps at me is that they are located in (and servicing!) Southern California. Malibu is 2,700 miles away from me. No matter how well they do their job, there is absolutely no sane way that they can wash my windows. Why waste the money on serving this ad to me?

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Facebook Opens Up Your Inbox to Strangers (for $1 per Message)

If you haven’t been to your Facebook “Messages” tab lately (since Wednesday, December 19, 2012, to be exact), go ahead — log into your Facebook profile and navigate to that tab. Upon doing so, you will see the following message (highlighting mine):

So, “now anyone can message you” — whether you know the person or not; and Facebook has announced this “update to messaging” in yesterday’s blog post. Here’s an excerpt from it:

Today we’re starting a small experiment to test the usefulness of economic signals to determine relevance. This test will give a small number of people the option to pay to have a message routed to the Inbox rather than the Other folder of a recipient that they are not connected with.

Several commentators and researchers have noted that imposing a financial cost on the sender may be the most effective way to discourage unwanted messages and facilitate delivery of messages that are relevant and useful.

This test is designed to address situations where neither social nor algorithmic signals are sufficient… This message routing feature is only for personal messages between individuals in the U.S. [source]

As you can see from the above screenshot, before this change strangers could also message us, but all their messages would land in the “Other” folder. Now you may see them in the “Inbox” instead.

Reuters adds:

A Facebook spokesman said the charge for the test is $1 per message, but added that the company is still looking for the “optimum” price. Users can only receive one of these paid, re-routed messages per week, he noted. [source]

Yesterday after Jill Whalen’s Tweet based on my earlier Tweet on the subject, an array of reactions followed. Here are just a couple of them:

 

 

What do you make of it?

Keep in mind, also, that less than two months ago Facebook crossed 1 billion users threshold and it now engages “nearly half of the world’s Internet users” [source].

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2 Keys to Selling on Twitter: Monitoring and Designing Conversations

Less than an hour ago I tweeted that I’ve booked my airfare and hotel for Affiliate Management Days West 2013. Very shortly after that Tweet, Mozio (which positions itself as an “airport ground transportation search engine”) tweeted right back at me:

Of course, I couldn’t help but notice this. Their Tweet was (a) relevant, (b) timely, and (c) hit the nail on the head. No, I didn’t have my ground transportation arranged yet. And guess, who I will use to find it now!

I also couldn’t help but recall Jeff Molander‘s advice. In his “Off the Hook Marketing” book he wrote:

The answer to selling more with social tools is rooted in starting conversations that are worth having, conversing in ways that align the needs of buyer and seller, and designing conversations with customers in ways that generate inquiries and sales.

The above-quoted startup has made a perfect example of a company that (i) monitors other people’s Twitter conversations, and (ii) chimes in when they have something relevant to offer. Are you utilizing these two simple keys to selling on Twitter yet?

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Upcoming Speaking Appearances and AdTech NY 2012 Discount of 25%

Whether you’re dying to learn where I’m speaking next, or not, I’m gonna tell you anyway. After all, this is what this website of mine is for.

In the course of the following two months I will speak at three different conferences. Here’s the information on them (together with short descriptions of what to expect from my appearances at them):

Affiliate Management Days (Ft. Lauderdale, FL, Oct 9-10, 2012)

First off, less than two weeks from now I’ll be speaking at the affiliate management conference I’m chairing. At Affiliate Management Days (AM Days) I’ll be the host and the “conductor”, opening it up, setting the tone for each of the two conference days, and gearing throughout.

To get a feeling of what to expect from this one-of-a-kind conference see the agenda here.

Conversion Conference (Ft. Lauderdale, FL, Oct 10, 2012)

This conference will be co-located with my AM Days, and I’ll be the only person tackling the subject of affiliate marketing. My session is entitled “What Makes Them Tick? How Knowing Your Affiliates Can Increase Conversions.” Over the years I’ve seen too many merchants blaming the affiliate channel for not working, of working poorly; yet doing nearly nothing to facilitate better conversions. I’ll walk you both through the fundamental principles to understand, as well as provide you with immediately applicable ways to improve the conversions in your affiliate program.

ad:tech NY (New York, NY, Nov 8, 2012)

This one I’m especially excited about. Not only will this be my first ad:tech ever, but ours will be the only session on affiliate marketing (out of 35). “Ours” because it will be a panel (with Bob Glazer moderating, and other panelists including Brian Littleton and Samantha Howe). Title: “Affiliate Marketing Revisited: How Top Brands Are Rethinking & Refocusing Affiliate Programs.” If you want to learn how to protect and enhance your brand with affiliate marketing, how to build your affiliate team wisely – to get more out of your affiliate program, come to our session.

I also have a special code for you to use to receive 25% off your full conference pass. What you need to do is start here, and when during the registration process you are asked for Discount Code, enter this SPKRGUESTNY25. Registering on or before November 6th will save you most on your pass.

Hope to see you at these conferences! I’ll be giving out copies of my “Affiliate Program Management: An Hour a Day” at each!

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5 Steps That Helped Increase LinkedIn Search Appearances Five-Fold

Did you know that every minute there happen 177,000 Tweets, 700,000 Facebook messages, 2 million YouTube views, and 7,610 LinkedIn searches [well, according to this source, at least]? It is the latter that impresses me most, as with the former three stats, we’re talking an ocean of data, whereas with LinkedIn searches, we’re looking at a very focused type of activity — professional searches.

LinkedIn is “the world’s largest professional network on the Internet with 161 million members” aboard, and “approximately two new members” signing up every per second [source]. Mind-blowing, isn’t it? Per LinkedIn itself they are actually “on pace to surpass 5.3 billion” searches in 2012. Dividing this by the number of minutes in a year, we arrive at nearly 10,084 professionally-oriented searches a minute, or 168 searches every second.

Wouldn’t you, as a professional no matter what it is that you do, want to take a bite of this pie of (tremendous) opportunity?! So I thought too; and without any prior study or experience went in to improve my LinkedIn profile. And what do you know! With very little effort put into the optimization of my profile, my appearances in LinkedIn search results increased nearly five-fold in two months [going from 65 in the week of May 6 to 324 in the week of July 7]:

Surely many will want to know what exactly it was that I did. And that’s what this post is for… It was the improvement in 5 specific areas of the profile that led to it. Try doing the same and see it goes for you:

1. Optimize Job Titles

As you can see below, I focused on the core things that I do: affiliate marketing, affiliate (program) management, speaking, and consulting:

2. Fill out Publications

Whether you have a list like mine, or a more modest one, it doesn’t matter. Do enter them there, using the space provided for descriptions too.

3. Enter Honors & Awards

This is another great section not to overlook. Build your credibility!

4. Expand the Summary

Use this one to the max! Present yourself beautifully; and remember to use the keywords that you want to be found by:

5. Choose your Skills & Expertise

This is one of my favorite sections. Here you can choose both the already-populated “specialties” (the ones that other people chose before you), and also enter your own:

Good luck; and if you have your own LinkedIn optimization experience to share, I’d love to learn from you! The comments area under this post is all yours.