When Google acquired DoubleClick earlier this year they got Performics, an affiliate network, they have since rebranded it as the Google Affiliate Network. Affiliate networks work with Advertisers to develop CPA campaigns. CPA, or Cost Per Action, advertisers usually pay the highest of the various monetization methods: CPM, CPC, or CPA. Advertisers only pay a Publisher when an specifc action is taken such as a user sign up or download of trial software.
Advertisers tend prefer CPA campaigns over other types because they only pay for actual results, after the conversion has taken place. CPM and CPC advertising requires the user to not only take an action to initiate an interaction between the visitor and the Advertiser but must then compel the visitor to take another action such as signing up.
Some of the other players in the affiliate network space, Affnet.com or Commission Junction, need to worry. Google has the scale to immediately contend with the established affiliate networks, and as small publishers look for ways beyond AdSense to monetize their audience “graduating” into Google’s Affiliate Network will be a natural progression.
WordPress is a near ubiquitous blogging and content management systems out there. Not only do some of the biggest blogs out there like techcrunch utilize it but so do small niche sites that end up with a few pages before whithering into the ether, and everything in between, including NicheBuilder.net. But while ubiquitey makes WordPress platform a reliable proven choice it also means there are literally dozens, if not hundreds, of sites that look just like yours. If you want to spend the money or you have the time and expertise you can contract out or develop a custom one off theme yourself. Since my expertise isn’t in PHP/CSS but rather .NET I decided I would purchase a theme. Why didn’t hire a developer to create a custom theme for me so the site would really stand out? Three reasons. One, I could still get a very clean, professional looking theme without spending a few thousand dollars. Two, if I want to start other niche WordPress sites, I would need a theme that I could use over and over as a starting point. Three, the theme developer I settled on offered an affiliate program (af).
Why was an affiliate program a factor in where I purchase my theme from? Simple, were I to ignore a potential revenue stream through the referral of new customers to the theme developer would be contrary to the whole point of this blog. Affilates programs are what are referred to as PPA/CPA programs, Pay Per Action or Cost Per Action depending on whether you are the publisher (affilate) or the advertiser (seller). I’ll be discussing affiliate programs and CPAs in great depth in future articles.
I settled on a theme from solostream (af), specifically, the Solostream 3-Column theme. Solostream utilizes e-junkie.com for their affiliate program. The sign up was easy but they don’t offer creatives for their various sellers which puts additional work on the affilate if they want to use more than text links, it’s not a huge issue but it would be nice and it highlights the differences between e-junkie and some of the big boys like Commission Junction. Regardless of where you get your theme from, search google therearenumerous sources, take the time to get a good theme as the base for your site, you won’t regret it.
One of the most common affiliate programs out there is eBay’s Partner Network, formerly administered via Commission Junction, if you go to SitePoint or Digital point their sites for sale forums are riddled with these types of sites. The most basic of these, of which 95% are, are implementations of eBay’s Widget Editor Kit. Affiliates earn money through referring new users that create eBay user accounts or a user winning an auction they found via your website. eBay’s affiliate program is enticing due to it’s massive scale, everybody is familiar with eBay and a significant percentage have transacted business, either as a buyer or seller, through eBay. Recently however eBay has been dealing with a seller revolt due to changes in the changes to how they handle seller ratings, long story short sellers cannot respond to negative buyer ratings and search results favor highly rated sellers over established sellers. It may seem like a small distinction, but if you’ve been around long enough as a seller you are bound to have at least some negative feedback, and new sellers with no history what so ever are ending up at the top of the search results which is threatening to put established sellers out of business. Naturally, people find a way to game system, in this scenario established buyers register new accounts to end up at the top of the search results until feed back forces them to abandon the account (lather, rinse, repeat). Here is a video a seller, at eBay Live, going off in response to the new feedback guidelines.
What remains to be seen is how this impacts affiliates, if you look in the video the place is pretty empty, in the past it had been extremely crowded. As markets tend to resemble ecosystems, collections of buyers and sellers that coexist, the long term impact on the eBay Partner Network could be dire. One of the sites I have on deck intended to implement the eBay Partner Network, I won’t have historical data to reference but we will at least be able to see whether the eBay Partner Network can be leveraged to create a reliable revenue stream.
