Comments on: Do You Tailor Your Affiliate Program Messages?

By: RJT

RJT — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 10:05:22 +0000

That’s why didn’t have any visitors coming at my page bec. they are already annoyed by those affiliate contents.

By: Albanian Blogger

Albanian Blogger — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 23:05:04 +0000

Well, that just makes me think that I should forget completely about implementing an affiliate program for one of my sites as it could start to turn people off once they start to get more then one copy. Thanks for your insight from the receivers end.

By: mousewords

mousewords — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 05:15:12 +0000

I’ve gotten something like this in the comments on my blog, too. The one I got sounded like it had been rewritten from a personal perspective, which is fine; but it was huge and wordy (ha, I should talk, so was my blog). In this age of spam, I mentally discounted it right away because of the size and exclamation points. :-):-)

When I read through it, it actually sounded like a legitimate opportunity. Just not delivered quite right.

I would say, if you are writing a proposal, try to make it like a business letter–brief, to the point, and yes, give your personal perspective. Better as a “first impression.”

By: Karen Sugarpants

Karen Sugarpants — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 05:05:42 +0000

I’ve gotten that email at least as many times between Sugarpants and Famecrawler. Darren, I’m going to answer every single one with the link to your post.

By: Darren Rowse

Darren Rowse — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 09:35:20 +0000

I’ve had the same email now from another 6 people today. All from different people. I sent them all to this post :-)

By: Bryan Clark

Bryan Clark — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 05:29:48 +0000

While I can’t say that I can compete with the 109 that you’ve received… I’ve had my fair share of them the last few days as well. I think it started about a week or so ago, and now I get 5 or 6 of them a day.

I totally agree. When sending out affiliate pitches, make it your own. I’m sure that they have some sales copy that you can just copy and paste to send to your list, but it’s getting on my nerves!

By: Guardian Angel

Guardian Angel — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 22:31:56 +0000

This is a great advice esp. to bloggers like me who want some additional income through affiliate marketing. By the way, I wish you could check out this pay per play thing and make your own analysis…thanks!

By: Bruce

Bruce — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 20:16:40 +0000

I promoted one “special deal”, but only used the suggested copy as an outline. I already owned the product and found it useful. On the other hand, I paid $100 more for it than the advertised special.

I would definitely re-write any copy I received to be in my own voice.

By: Nick Dalton

Nick Dalton — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 19:53:07 +0000

This is what you get by default when you have a multi-level affiliate program promising money for nothing…

The company behind this particular barrage of emails and their service is not really relevant to the discussion, but if you’re interested in an in-depth analysis I wrote a blog post about them a while ago:
Pay-Per-Play – If It Sounds Too Good…

By: Little Guy Network

Little Guy Network — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 19:12:55 +0000

Thats a really good article thanks for sharing

By: Garg the Unzola

Garg the Unzola — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 17:03:38 +0000

I honestly can’t get excited about affiliate programs and clicking ads. That is why my blog avoids these topics.
http://necrofiles.blogspot.com

I try to implement these things behind the scenes. I want my blog to be entertaining to read. Hopefully that is enough to get people returning. It has worked so far, nearly 40% of my traffic comes from returning viewers and my RSS subscription is growing steadily.

By: Sangesh

Sangesh — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 15:43:03 +0000

Well,
this is the sad part that you have your emails, feedback form for all in your website. Anyone from anywhere in the world can send you this fake or whatever emails to you. I say that this is an illegal marketing that they are doing, and ppl behind this should be behind bars for disturbing and annoying others.

By: Paul Legan

Paul Legan — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 14:08:07 +0000

I’m really glad you mentioned this topic! I think some people tend to treat affiliate marketing like a “get rich quick” scheme and that limits their creativity. Personally, I’d feel embarrassed to send a stock email to someone, especially to someone who runs a blog discussing ways to make money online.

By: Teli Adlam

Teli Adlam — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 13:58:31 +0000

I left a comment on Splork’s blog to this effect, but I’m beginning to believe that in the case of product launches, the cookie-cutter e-mails are simply a play against time — each marketer wants his message to be the first one to reach your inbox. Doesn’t make it right by any stretch of the imagination, though.

In your case, Darren, the affiliates who spammed your contact form were IMO just super lazy. Unfortunately, coming up with something creative requires thought and time — two things that the super lazy affiliate (note, I didn’t say lazy super affiliate) doesn’t necessarily want to invest.

Great lesson to be learned.

~ Teli

By: Iacomus

Iacomus — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 10:34:53 +0000

Its’ a impersonal form of the comment “come check out my site its great!” and reeks of ponzi scheme. Wouldn’t touch it with a rotten cucumber…

~Iacomus

By: marhgil

marhgil — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 05:33:23 +0000

hahaha! I think I know what company you’re talking about. Yeah, they actually give affiliates something to copy and paste and send to other prospects. They even give a copy of something you can post on your blog. Well, I’m one of their affiliates and never used any of those. What I did is I make a blog post of my own, tell people what I think about it and asked them to sign-up. So far, it worked for me. :)

By: Koka Sexton

Koka Sexton — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 05:04:21 +0000

emails?!? I have gotten phone calls about this garbage. I had to get my name off a bunch of lists so the calls would stop. Word for the wise. Do not have an active phone number listed under you domain name.

By: Kelvin Kao

Kelvin Kao — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 04:22:37 +0000

I have something to say that’s not exactly Affiliate Marketing but I think it also applies: I like the way Metacafe representatives sent email to video makers. They made it sound real personal. Of course, I have no idea how many people each representative is dealing with, but they made it sound like they are paying personal attention to you. That works much better for me then obvious copy-and-paste emails.

By: Dr.Mani

Dr.Mani — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 04:02:00 +0000

Nice points, Darren. One of the modules in my primer course on affiliate marketing I ran sometime in 2004 focused entirely on writing ‘affiliate reviews’ which would pre-sell visitors and potential partners who would help promote. The key was to differentiate your message from the dozens of other affiliates who would be too ‘lazy’ or ‘inexperienced’ to tweak the templates offered by the merchant/vendor.

I have a more recent series of posts on my blog about affiliate marketing which may interest readers of Problogger too. The part dealing with affiliate reviews is here:

http://MoneyPowerWisdom.com/blogging-for-affiliate-profits-part-2/

All success
Dr.Mani

By: ghosts

ghosts — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 01:50:24 +0000

I get the same thing in my inbox daily. They just don’t want to understand that harassing people this way is not going to make them money.