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A New Ad Platform
UK-Netmarketing Weekly Round-up - July 06, 2001

The proliferation of new devices has created a whole host of advertising and marketing opportunities. Like the time before the banner, we're all searching for the best way to utilise these new opportunities, but it's still early days. Jay Gooby asked the list for their opinion, "Do people think that PDAs (Palm, PocketPC, Psion, etc) are a viable platform for a campaign? The IBM campaign [a tennis game for PDAs running alongside their Wimbledon sponsorship] is great, but there's an even greater scope for some brands, especially those looking at other channels for fulfilment opportunities. Your PDA application has the potential to bring brand reinforcement *and* transactional revenue...

So far we've made a couple of highly branded Palm applications, with the game or application tightly themed to the brand itself. Couple this with the fact that applications can be made to beam from one Palm to another, enabling distribution between colleagues or friends and you have a potentially very successful viral platform. Nice to see a major names like IBM and the Guardian starting the ball rolling!"

Nigel Lloyd Parry replied, "Great potential - despite worldwide sales way below predictions. A winner on the games front because, unlike the PC, is more likely to be used away from the office and when the user has some time to kill (e.g. at the airport). New ones with more colour even though a mix of OS - Palm, WinCE (yuk!), Symbian. Basic Handsprings are nearly as cheap as Gameboys used to be. Once combined with mobile telephony, should really take off (Nokia 9210 already out)."

Sally Krumholz added, "Personally, I look at these games as an 'add on' to any branding and/or promotional efforts. Large packaged goods companies have been doing this for some time. Does it work? Not sure. Does it add any value? Perhaps. Just as when a company sponsors an event for visibility, these games can provide the same outlet. I mean, most of us play games on our PDA's or phones to pass the time when commuting. The added plus is that they are not really all that expensive to develop."

Sally suggested an alternative, instead of developing games advertisers could use existing opportunities within existing applications with a broad userbase, "Increased usage by advertisers by offering downloadable games & services off of their sites, via AvantGo or simply localized advertising on Vindigo are new tactics. Whether or not they are relevant is still open to interpretation depending on your goals. Last year, my company used Vindigo's nightlife channel when they first launched in NYC to promote Finlandia Vodka. Our yield was about 6.6% 'tap through' and complimented our email database acquisition campaign for them."

Mike Hales pondered the future, "...following a little digging, the surface really hasn't been scratched with what can be done on these things. From an iPAQ [Compaq's new PDA] perspective, audio and video are options that just haven't been used yet. Something smart, small, entertaining and that interfaces with the backend upon synchronisation - sounds good to me."

Jay Gooby responded, "Yep - but Vindigo's an (excellent!) application in and of itself, I'm talking about tie-in promotional games or applications for brands or companies that you wouldn't normally associate with the platform; e.g. a movie listing app sponsored by Odeon that updates itself whenever you synch, a shopping list/home shopping application (that ideally lets you actually buy stuff as well as compose a list) for Sainsburys/Tescos/Iceland, a Whiskas 'buy more cat food/litter/cat nip toys' alarm that you can configure to go off every so often, etc."

For a time, PDAs looked like they were going to be over hyped like so many gadgets before them, but as they get combined with mobile telephony, their potential is opening up beyond the business user. It's very likely that their use in advertising campaigns is going to explode, but will we see the drop-off has hampered other digital media as it has matured?

Affiliate Programs

Affiliate programs can be a great way to extend your sales channel dramatically, examples like Amazon's program which has encouraged tens of thousands of websites to offer an Amazon shop front in return for a commission on sales. So, how do you go about setting up an affiliate program? Run it in-house or outsource to one of the many affiliate networks?

Janine Ackerley asked uk-netmarketing for some pearls of wisdom, "There have probably been various discussions on affiliate marketing before, but as I am relatively new to Chinwag, I hope someone can give me some advice. I have recently joined Greenfingers.com as Marketing Manager. They were using Magic Button to run their program, but as they have ceased to exist, I am now looking for another UK-focussed company i.e. Tradedoubler, UKaffiliates, AffiliateWindow etc. If anyone has any opinions on the best company to use or which company not to use, please can you email me."

Adam Atkinson suggested, "http://www.myaffiliateprogram.com/ offers a solution, the backbone of which is used by UK affiliates and Affiliate Window."

Leslie Bunder shared his experience, "...rather than use a third party and be at their mercy (e.g. if their servers are down, your ads on affiliate sites don't appear), why not create and manage your own programme.

One company that offers this is 404found, a French firm with a base in the UK and there are several others who offer the same software that powers some of the affiliate programs. Going through an affiliate programme can be expensive both in the short term and long term and I really don't see any major advantages that you yourself can't do. They may all claim to put you before thousands of Web sites, but how many of them are core to your business and more importantly, how many of them joined the network but are not very active in it."

Neil Durrant commented on Leslie's response, writing, "Leslie makes an excellent point below in respect to networks claims of placing you in front of hundreds of 'ready made' affiliates. Almost all programs have an inactive affiliate rate in the range of 5%-10%. It's the quality of affiliates that really count over and above quantity.

Increasingly I have found merchants are better placed to operate their program in-house and use the software to track performance of key relationships personally developed. My preferred in-house solution is Kowabunga's 'My Affiliate Program' you can find a case study looking at the integration of this software at: http://www.affiliatemarketing.co.uk/aacasestudy.htm

If you do opt for an in-house solution do be aware though that you will need to take responsibility and be pro-active in affiliate acquisition (which can be surprisingly time consuming) as well as cutting the commission cheques for each sales period. If you do look at a UK network then it's actually rather difficult to differentiate between them! Frankly, I think you need to take all their claims of affiliate numbers with a pinch of salt - I believe that most of the networks affiliates are pretty much the same anyway.

Commission Junction have made a very brave move with the announcement of their 'Open Marketplace' - effectively sharing merchants performance metrics publicly with their affiliates. No longer does an affiliate need to trust merchant hype - the average EPC (earnings per hundred clicks) provides a benchmark of merchants conversions/chargebacks. This is an important move which has had major repercussions in the US market (BeFree and Linkshare have been quick to follow by enhancing affiliate support on their platforms) although it may take a while for a real impact in the UK but I believe its another milestone towards the end for 'mass affiliation'."

Jason Dale questioned, from the affiliate's perspective, how well the independent schemes worked, "From the merchant's perspective emailed, "That might be good from some merchant viewpoints, but from an affiliate viewpoint it's not so brilliant. Most of the independent schemes we're under fail to keep in touch or get round to actually paying out regularly if at all (when there's sufficient payment to be made).

By being with schemes like CJ.com, UKaffiliates, Trade Doubler and Affiliate Window - at least affiliates know they've more chance of being paid (unless they do a Magic Button) and being better informed. Just as an aside two forums about affiliates (where merchants and affiliates can discuss problems and recommend ideas and good services etc.) can be found at alt.www.affiliates and http://www.affiliates4u.co.uk/forum.htm"

Robin Gurney, from gave his insight into setting up an affiliate scheme, "...choosing an affiliate solution provider is more complex than it used to be One decision is whether to opt for the mass affiliation route (most suited to B2C operations) and select one or more (check on the exclusivity clause in the contract) of the proven public networks available. Of these we feel (with 4 years experience in online performance marketing) that Commission Junction and TradeDoubler are our 'favourites'. Commission Junction for its all round excellent product and service, TradeDoubler for its pervasive Pan European network.

If you want a smaller, focussed/private/B2B program then yes you could use 404 or even 'top end' Imediation but we have no doubt that Kowabunga's MyAffiliate program is way,way ahead in terms of functionality and value for money... More information on MYAP is available at http://www.myaffiliateprogram.com

Whilst we have our preferred solutions we appreciate that every provider has its strengths and weaknesses and so we created (and keep up to date) a FREE affiliate solution providers comparison chart which you can find at http://www.dvisions.co.uk/AP_solution_matrix.pdf.

I should also point out that running a successful program is MUCH more work than people expect- it is not a Magic Bullet- but can provide good ROI and a steady flow of new business (and numerous other cost effective benefits). To give two examples (sorry no names) from the many programs we manage on behalf of clients:

A recruitment company gained 40,000 registrations at an overall cost of £4.50 each (over 6 months) A travel company sells in excess of £20,000 per month.(at month 5)"

Robin continued, demonstrating how 'mainstream' affiliate programs have become with even the largest portals signing up, "In [answer] to Ray Taylor's comment: '... affiliate marketing schemes which are mostly about getting amateur webmasters to stick a button on their crummy sites in the hope of earning $0.10 a click commissions....'

Ray, times have changed and we see many large portals, ad networks and even search engines/directories that join well managed and fairly rewarded affiliate programs (they may not publicise the fact because of course they prefer to sell CPM). Yes there are a lot of 'crummy sites' but in fact even some of these have small, growing niche audiences that if well supported can provided small but significant flow of 'actions'. And besides, with an affiliate program you do not have to approve all applications to join - filter out the crummy ones if you want. I do however agree that there are many other online marketing options but affiliate programs are here to stay as part of the mix and 'doing it' for those merchants/advertisers that treat affiliates as people NOT 'crummy websites'."

LINKS OF NOTE:
A quick round up of interesting, funny, useful and other links gleaned from the uk-netmarketing list, office gossip and other nefarious sources...we take no responsibility should you chose to click...basically, it's not our fault. Enjoy:

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