Affiliate Project

I came across a really useful video tool for affiliate managers last month called WebVideoZone, and figured it was only a matter of time before more resources cropped up.

I’ve got a couple more video resources that affiliate managers and affiliates should check out: TubeMogul and Webmercial.

TubeMogul is a free service that provides viewership-related analytics for online video publishers. TubeMogul gathers data for the big video sites, MySpace, Revver, and YouTube.

The reporting enables you to track spikes in viewership to identify trends, aggregate comments across the popular video sites, and gather competitive intelligence.

Then there’s Webmercial, a product that enables companies to present a site, product, or service using professional voice over talent and high resolution photos.

According to Rys Fairbrother, President of Taldia, Webmercial is “completely turnkey… all you need is 2-10 photos, some wording…70-140 or so. You then pick your voice over talent, male or female and in less than 24 hours you’ll have a multi-media product that will promote your product/site in the most professional way.”

This could be an interesting and affordable option for affiliate programs to brand their sites or products.

If you use either of these, I’d love to hear what you think.

Written by Shawn Collins @ AffiliateTip.com

For the past few years or so, LinkShare has had a couple security features in place at the login that have frustrated affiliates.

LinkShare had required that affiliates change their password every 90 days and enter the correct sequence of characters in a CAPTCHA (Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart) image challenge.

But after receiving input from their Advisory Board members, LinkShare has removed those requirements.

LinkShare will continue to use SSL-encryption at login, and the Update Profile page is also secured using SSL-encryption.

Even though it’s no longer a requirement, LinkShare encourages affiliates to change their password every 90 days.

Affiliates that wish to update their password can log into their LinkShare account, select Update Profile from the Your Account tab, click on the Channel Contact (icon looks like a business card) from the Channel Manager, enter the new password, and then hit Submit.

Thanks for listening, LinkShare.

Written by Shawn Collins @ AfilliateTip.com

The AffStat 2007 Report includes a section where affiliate managers voice some of their biggest challenges in managing an affiliate program.

Here is one affiliate managers complaint…

“I noticed that competing companies try to gain affiliates from our program by trying to bad talk. I think that a lot of the affiliate managers should try to keep their integrity and highlight their benefits and strong points, not highlight the weak points from competitors for the purpose of recruiting.”

I would hope people would be above this sort of behavior when in business. Sadly, some affiliate managers choose denigrating the competition over building a great affiliate program that sells itself.

My recommendation to affiliate managers would be to follow the old adage, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all,” when it comes to referencing the competition.

It’s funny - my little kids get that this is the way to behave, but some “business people” don’t have the same character we expect of children.

More affiliate manager opinions in the latest AffStat report at http://www.affstat.com/.

Written by Shawn Collins @ AffiliateTip.com

CafePress, a company that I’ve considered to run one of the better in-house affiliate programs with innovations like TopicAds, has announced that they are moving the program over to CJ.

There is going to be a chat on Tuesday, March 27 at 3 pm PST to learn more about the new CafePress program.

Visit http://www.cafepress.com/cp/community/chat and sign in using your CafePress account information to participate.

If you would like to be contacted when the new CafePress Affiliate Program goes live in mid-April, shoot them an email at affiliates@cafepress.com and they’ll alert you when it’s up and running.

Written by Shawn Collins @ AffiliateTip.com