5 Star Affiliate Blogs

“Emotion stimulates the mind 3000 times faster than rational thought”
George Miller (Psychologist)

You’ve no doubt heard the phrase “people buy emotionally and then justify their purchases logically.” Well it’s true, however I still see lots of affiliates selling features and benefits to try to appeal to the logical part of the decision making process. If you can learn to appeal to certain emotions in the selling process, your sales conversions can go up significantly.

Understand the fears and desires your visitors are facing and learn to address those issues in your sales copy. Now I’m not talking about dishonest manipulation at all here! I’m talking about understanding your potential customers and changing the focus of your copy so that you can relate to them, on their level and based on the feelings that are driving them.

Here are some good articles that will help give your affiliate campaigns the psychological edge.

Emotional Motivators in Landing Page Optimization “All of the specific strategies and tactics that you will apply to landing page optimization are aimed at influencing basic human emotions and moving your visitors off their comfortable spot… several key copywriting concepts that motivate people to act: fear, greed, guilt, exclusivity, anger, salvation, or flattery. Not one of these motivations is rational — all of them are rooted in our fundamental and unchanging emotional nature.”

Psychology of Selling Affiliate Style – 12 Conversion Boosters “But there are a myriad of emotional ‘buy’ triggers in between. I guarantee if you analyze your site and make improvements based on several of the 12 psychological trigger points below you will see a major increase in CTR and conversions.”

How to Motivate People to Buy “So, when it comes to getting someone to buy, you’re definitely invoking emotion. But by understanding emotional response in terms of motivation rather than feelings, you’ll have a better idea on how to craft your copy.”

Emotions that Drive Affiliate Marketing Sales, Part One “Call it what you will; “a feeling,” “woman’s intuition,” or a “gut instinct.” Regardless of what you call it, it’s the customer’s emotions that close the deal.”

Emotions that Drive Affiliate Marketing Sales, Part Two “We all like to believe that when we decide to buy something, we’re making a conscious, calculated, and rational decision. A decision based solely on the merits of the product. But we don’t … you don’t ….. and neither do your customers.”

Emotions that Drive Affiliate Marketing Sales, Part Three “But even if you successfully relieve your customers’ anxiety and confusion, there’s still one more customer emotional problem that you must address. And that is ….”

Today I was happy to see Linda Bustos over at the Get Elastic Blog posting about affiliate marketing again. (It’s been awhile.) She turned me onto a great FREE online seminar about affiliate marketing from Marketing Experiments that I missed somehow (below).

But 1st I wanted to share her post and comments as she makes a really good point. Affiliates CAN be a merchant’s best source of advice for improving their conversion funnel, which can help both the merchant and their affiliates reach new levels of sales success.

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Lisa Riolo joins host Linda Woods for another edition of the Affiliate Marketing Insider podcast to discuss her new company, Impact Radius, which just launched last month.

I didn’t get the announcement in time to post it before yesterday’s show, but if you missed it, the podcast is in the archives now. Click here to listen.

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We see a lot of articles about Super Affiliates and there is no shortage of tips about how to become one. However affiliate marketing is a partnership and both sides should be working toward excellence. So if affiliates are trying to learn to be “Super” then affiliate managers and merchants should be striving for that “Super” status as well.

Keith Bond is a long-time affiliate from England. Today he shares some basic tips about what AMs and merchants need to do to become “Super Merchants”.

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LinkTrust is one of the best hosted software platforms for affiliate tracking, ad network management and lead management. Many CPA networks are starting to switch to LinkTrust due to some of the great features the software offers.

LinkTrust recently announced numerous new features and updates with a big emphasis on helping advertisers, networks and affiliate managers fight affiliate fraud. Here is part of the press release.

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AFFILIATE WIRE, a new affiliate marketing radio show (podcast) premiers this week over at WebmasterRadio. It’s brought to you by RevenueWire, one of our 5 Star clients. It sounds like they have a great line-up and previous shows they have done at WebmasterRadio have been excellent!

I know many of you like to listen and learn while you are working and wanted to share their press release with you, so you know about the show and can listen in. The show airs every third Thursday of the month at 1PM EST. Here’s an overview of the 1st broadcast that airs this Thursday and the complete press release is below.

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I’m sure by now you’ve heard about all the Google Adwords bans that happened 4th quarter 09. Google reportedly banned 30,000 advertisers and it sounds like the great majority were affiliates. I sincerely hope you weren’t an honest affiliate that got caught in the middle of this, but I think many of the bans were probably warranted. The majority of affiliates that were banned seemed to have been running shady CPA rebill offers that did not properly disclose, scammy biz opp offers or were flogs and fake review sites.

For background, here are a couple posts I wrote previously about the Adwords bans. The Death of Affiliate Marketing on Google? Not Again! and Merry Xmas from Google – Affiliates get Adwords Bans

I hate to see affiliates have their Adwords accounts banned and I’m sure some decent affiliates got caught up in the bans that shouldn’t have, but in general I think this was a clean up that needed to happen and will help the industry. I think honest affiliate marketers, running honest campaigns can still use Adwords, but of course it will take a lot more than just throwing up a quick landing page that says “click here”.

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In spite of a valiant effort from the affiliate marketing community, the Colorado house has passed HB1193. The industry banded together and did an excellent job of rallying to fight yet another state’s misguided attempt to boost sales tax coffers via a bill that will significantly impact the livelihood of affiliate marketers.

But its not over and there are other opportunities to fight this bill!
HB1193 now has to move on to the Senate. The PMA reports:

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If you are a merchant considering starting an affiliate program or an affiliate manager with questions about how to improve and grow your existing affiliate program, this new free guide may help. Online Guide to Affiliate Marketing

This online guide to affiliate marketing for merchants/advertisers was compiled by Geno Prussakov by organizing answers to common questions and discussions about pertinent issues from the AM Navigator blog. Geno is the founder of AM Navigator and author of “A Practical Guide to Affiliate Marketing.”

The Online Guide to Affiliate Marketing is organized into 4 sections: Introductory Considerations, Setting an Affiliate Program Up, Banners, Creatives, Data Feeds and When the Affiliate Program is Live.

Check it out and bookmark for future reference.

I hear there was a lot of buzz at Affiliate Summit due to all the problems the CPA rebill part of the industry has been having recently. Some CPA networks have had to pull a lot of offers and some are having a hard time even paying affiliates, due to merchant accounts being pulled for advertisers that do rebill offers.

I blogged about part of the problem recently: Major Shakeup in the CPA Rebill Space Involving Wells Fargo, but much more has happened since then including issues with MasterCard, Visa and increased scrutiny by the FTC.

I wanted to share several recent articles that outline the problems and provide guidelines and solutions. The most obvious solution is for advertisers and networks that do rebill/continuity offers to get compliant with disclosures, billing practices and cancellation request support. This whole mess is hurting our industry image and makes affiliate marketing look shady, so I hope the current issues force a clean up that should have happened long ago.

If you are an affiliate that promotes any kind of rebill (free trial offer) you need to be aware of the different sets of guidelines below, so you can evaluate offers to be sure they are compliant. If they aren’t you could get caught in the middle, either by getting in trouble with the FTC or by having the offer cut off with the advertiser being unable to pay commissions.

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For the 1st time ever, SES New York 2010 has added an Affiliate Marketing Track to their session line up. Always good to see affiliate marketing prominently featured at sister industry conferences like SES. There is such a strong overlap between SEO and AM types that it just makes sense to me!

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Why do people decide to make an online purchase? Why to they give up their email address for your newsletter? What makes them even trust the information you offer? There’s a science that explores the convergence of human motivation, decision making and the design of web sites, called called neuroscience. If you can learn to tap into how emotions affect online decision making and the unconscious reasons that drive people to buy you can significantly impact click-through and conversion rates.

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Regardless of the primary method you use to drive traffic to your affiliate site, you still need to pay attention to basic SEO in order to get all the free traffic you can from the search engines.

There’s a new tool called WooRank that can help you analyze numerous aspects of your site performance, compliance, off page and on page SEO. I just tried it for 5 Star and it’s really quite comprehensive. See the screen shot below PLUS at the bottom of this post are other comparable tools you can add to your SEO arsenal.

NOTE to Affiliate Managers – This would also be a great tool for doing a quick check of affiliate sites as it shows Whois, Alexa, backlinks and other helpful data all on one page.

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The PMA (Performance Marketing Association), Affiliate Advocacy and AbestWeb are doing a really great job of keeping up with all the various proposed advertising tax bills that threaten affiliates in numerous states. In case you missed any of the recent updates I wanted to list them all here.

If you are a resident of any of these states you need find out what you can do to fight these unfair tax bills that could threaten your livelihood. Read the posts below to discover any grassroots efforts in your state that you can become involved in plus see resources at the bottom for how to stay informed.

Colorado is the most critically important time-wise is.  They have a hearing coming up on Wednesday,  so the troops in CO need to mobilize quickly!

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RevenueWire is blowing it out to start the New Year off right, with 3 huge contests. You have the chance to win a Harley, one of 4 incredible 007 adventures or some big cash prizes.

Earn cash. Ride a hog. ParetoLogic takes you from payment to pavement with 2010 Harley-Davidson® Super Glide® Custom bikes!

Live Dangerously! Win 1 of 4 Incredible 007 Adventures. New Affiliates Only! Find out how you can become eligible to win your choice of one of four incredible James Bond adventures including a flight in an L-39 jet fighter high in the California skies.

The Bootstrap Contest – $50,000 in Cash Prizes! Win cash and permanent commission increases in this contest from Bootstrap.

Get all the RevenueWire Contest details here!

Disclosure: RevenueWire is a 5 Star client.

Profit from Online Marketing Services for Small Businesses

The Kutenda affiliate program offers an exciting opportunity for affiliate marketers to generate lucrative revenue by signing small and midsized businesses up for Kutenda’s online marketing software suite, which integrates tools for email, search marketing and web site development into one application.

Partner with Kutenda and profit! Earn $70 to $600 commission per sign-up. In order to maximize our partner’s earning potential, Kutenda provides high converting banners, landing pages and web page content as well as ensuring that a dedicated affiliate manager is available to provide one-on-one support.

Kutenda Affiliate Program Benefits

.:. Generous $70 to $600 commission per sign-up
.:. Great conversion rates and on time payments
.:. Nice long 45-day cookies – get paid for the people you refer
.:. High converting creatives, landing pages and web site content
.:. Reliable, trusted tracking by MyAP (My Affiliate Program Software)
.:. Dedicated affiliate manager available – get the support you need

Join the Kutenda Affiliate Program Today

About Kutenda
Kutenda’s marketing tools and training help small and midsized businesses generate leads and grow revenue. The Kutenda Online Marketing Suite simplifies online marketing by integrating tools for email marketing, web site development and search engine marketing into one toolset.

Join the Kutenda Affiliate Program Now!

As always, please let us know if there is anything we can do to help you be successful with this 5 Star Affiliate Program.

Disclosure: Kutenda is a 5 Star client.

Well the Summit is over and most people are back home trying to recover and playing catch up. It sounds like a great time was had by all at the sold out event. Monday I posted a TON of the best Affiliate Summit pictures, blog posts and videos that I was able to find up to that point and added a few more to that post yesterday, but it got too long.

Today is part 2 with lots more awesome Affiliate Summit coverage. So below, in no particular order, are some more great highlights from the show. (Long list)

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During the sold out Affiliate Summit West 2010 event, several industry press releases went out for new affiliate programs launches, product upgrades and an acquisition. I’m sure there were other exciting announcements at the show, but these are the only ones I could find press releases for. Three of the companies mentioned are 5 Star clients, so I’m excited to share their news.

Microsoft Zune Launches Affiliate Program at Affiliate Summit in Las Vegas “This program is a clear win-win for Microsoft Zune and affiliate marketers” said Linda Buquet, President of 5 Star Affiliate Programs. “Having a Zune affiliate program will help to expand Microsoft’s reach in the online music and entertainment community and will offer affiliate partners the opportunity to share the revenue.” (Microsoft Zune is a 5 Star client)

Share Results Launches New and Improved Affiliate Marketing Software Solution “Part of our goal at Share Results is to continually develop our software and services to offer merchants and affiliates the most advanced, most robust marketing solutions. On this note, we are very excited to let you know that we have been working diligently to enhance our affiliate marketing software, and we are now ready to launch. Here’s a breakdown of our new and improved affiliate marketing software.” (ShareResults is a 5 Star client)

MediaTrust Acquires Kenzei “MediaTrust is announcing the acquisition of email marketing company Kenzei. We are committed to making MediaTrust the most comprehensive and full service performance marketing platform. The Kenzei acquisition helps us execute on this vision.”

New Ad Manager Solution for Affiliate Summit West “The new HasOffers Ad Manager is not just another advertising banner rotator. It is a complete solution for creating ads, optimizing ad campaigns, geo-targeting campaigns and more.”

What is Bevo Media? The Offical Launch Of Bevo Media “Bevo Media can be best described as a “Full Scale Affiliate Marketing Platform”, that works to consolidate literally every aspect of affiliate marketing.”

CityMax.com Website Builder Affiliate Program Launches Today “White Hat” Website Builder Affiliate Program Kicks Off at Affiliate Summit West 2010.”

SupportSquad™ Technical Assistance Launches at Affiliate Summit West 2010 | Business Wire “Technical Assistance Affiliate Program Joins the SaveologyNetwork.” (SaveologyNetwork is a 5 Star client)

If you know of any other press releases or if you launched a new affiliate program at Affiliate Summit, feel free to add to comments below.

The fourth annual Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards were presented today at Affiliate Summit West 2010. “The Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards are affiliate marketing’s most prestigious, competitive honor for the leaders in the space. Award winners are recognized because they are innovative leaders with vision and influence.”

Congrats to all the winners of the Pinnacle Awards!

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Today is officially day two of Affiliate Summit and it’s the biggest event to date with over 4,000 attendees. It sounds like the sessions and parties have all been great and the pics I’ve seen show an enthusiastic crowd and an overly packed Meet Market!

I’ve collected some of the best Affiliate Summit pictures, blog posts and videos that I’ve been able to find up to this point. Seems like not as many people as usual are blogging the event, maybe because they are all tweeting up a storm. So below, in no particular order, are highlights from the show so far.

UPDATE: 1/19 – Added quite a few new ones below.

SUMMIT DAY 1 & 2 VIDEOS, PICS & BLOG COVERAGE

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