Weeding out affiliates?

[LandL]

I was thinking of going through my list of affiliates and checking the sales they made and seeing if I am actually being promoted on their site. If an affiliate hasn't made a sale or I don't see my galleries on their site, is there really any point of keeping them as an affiliate?

Affiliates: have you ever signed up for a program (or programs) that you've stopped promoting? Or don't really make any sales from? And if so, would you care if that sponsor contacted you to say they are going to delete your affiliate account since it obviously isn't beneficial for either person?

Thoughts?

[nyllover]

I can speak as an affiliate and program owner as well...

The reasons why someone didn't make any sale could be millions, especially among small affiliates (i'm one of them), so i wouldn't really decide considering only the number of sales or the number of visits the affiliate sent.
Best way would be to send a nice e-mail, asking if you can do anything to help them in promoting you. That's actually something i would surely appreciate from a program owner.

Of course after that e-mail...if things don't change in a month or so...you could surely send another "less nice" e-mail and then...just delete the affiliate

[LandL]

Yes, I was thinking of sending a email first. Also, I was thinking over the time span of a year (sales made).

[Toby]

Is there any real advantage to removing them? And how exactly are you going to know what sites they have. CCBill only has room to list one site. I have 7 TGPs and a number of blogs.

IMO, your time is better spent elsewhere.

[jscott]

I agree with Toby. Time and worry is better spent on other things.

I've joined affiliate programs and didn't promote them for years. Sometimes we forget or something comes up.

I've also joined affiliate programs and didn't begin sending traffic yet, and was informed my acct deleted, and then just killed any desire or want to help or promote that program ever again.

This is the internet, and those affiliate join pages are setup for us to join automatically at any time we want. I think we should be able to promote any time we want too. No pressure is better imho

[LandL]

Well, I thought it would be nice to have a streamlined list of affiliates that I know are actually making sales and DO promote my content.

What I don't really get is that an affiliate can say "this sponsor isn't working for me" and delete their galleries/banners and stop promoting them. But if an sponsor says "well, this affiliate hasn't made a sale in 2 years and I contacted them with no reply about where they are promoting me and it's NOT okay if I delete them"?

I'm not talking about affiliates who actually have my galleries out there on their pages, I'm wondering about those who have signed up but I'm not getting any traffic from them or sales.

[Toby]

Originally Posted by LandL

I'm not talking about affiliates who actually have my galleries out there on their pages, I'm wondering about those who have signed up but I'm not getting any traffic from them or sales.

What if they come back 18 months later, finally getting around to completing that project they had in mind when they signed up only to find their account deleted. You just lost business over a desire to have a tidy list.

If there's no monetary advantage then I say leave it alone and work on something else that will make or save money.

[desyranoir]

Originally Posted by jscott

I agree with Toby. Time and worry is better spent on other things.

I've joined affiliate programs and didn't promote them for years. Sometimes we forget or something comes up.

Thats right....you joined in my affiliate program too!

[Secretease.com]

I've had a some new affiliates sign up and the domains they link to either don't exist, aren't relevant or don't respond. I drop them an email but usually get no response. Would be good to know which sites they run, if any.

[Naughty-Pages]

Originally Posted by jscott

I've joined affiliate programs and didn't promote them for years. Sometimes we forget or something comes up.

I've also joined affiliate programs and didn't begin sending traffic yet, and was informed my acct deleted, and then just killed any desire or want to help or promote that program ever again.

This is the internet, and those affiliate join pages are setup for us to join automatically at any time we want. I think we should be able to promote any time we want too. No pressure is better imho

I couldn't agree with this more..

As I see programs I am interested in, I make a note and set the aside for later.. Then when I need content for a project I will go through and sign up for all of them in one day.. The most frustrating thing then happens almost every time with a good portion of them: They require approval.

Ugggh.. ticks me off every time! Because I had signed up for them with a project in mind that I wanted to work on at that time. What usually happens is they approve the account days later and I have already completed the project I wanted them for.

As far as the accounts that missed out because they required approval, I put them on the back burner until I need more content for a project.. this could be months or even a year or longer depending on what content they have and what i need..

If I went back and saw that they had deleted my account, I'd then automatically chalk them up as a scam. I would not want to risk spending days adding content to hundreds of sites only to find out that I had to go back through and remove them all.

On a similar but different note, there was one program I was actively promoting, but had not logged into their admin area in over 6 months (because I had exported all of their content and had what i needed locally, and I had email notification on for sales). I went to log in one day and found my account was disabled because I hadn't logged in for an extended period of time (even though I was sending traffic and generating sales).. I thought that was super shady.. ended up i was not the only one and they blamed it on a rogue employee.. Needless to say, even though they fixed it and apologized I cut way back on pushing them, and eventually dumped them. I think they are out of business now..

Originally Posted by LandL

... or I don't see my galleries on their site, is there really any point of keeping them as an affiliate?

When I sign up for a program, I list a single site of ours... odds are a lot of programs would not see their content on that site as we promote several hundred programs. We own over 1,000 sites, they could be getting promoted on any one of those, or on hundreds of them.

If you have some really old inactive accounts, you're probably just better off shooting them emails or trying to get them on something like ICQ to see if they need anything to help them promote you.

[LandL]

Wow Toby, you sound like you are taking it personally with your tone. I just asked a question. So basically it's okay for affiliates to decide who they want to promote but not the other way around. Got it now, thanks.

[nyllover]

Toby is very right on what he last said. Happened to me more than once to have an idea in mind, write it down (on EverNote ) and then...actually putting it online in 2 years time (i swear).

I still think it's a good idea to send out an e-mail, also for what Jscott said: sometimes we join programs that we than actually forget about

[Toby]

Originally Posted by LandL

Wow Toby, you sound like you are taking it personally with your tone. I just asked a question. So basically it's okay for affiliates to decide who they want to promote but not the other way around. Got it now, thanks.

I've had programs terminate my account before I could get around to completing the project I had in mind. Have also had accounts terminated, when I was sending traffic and making a few sales, because they couldn't find their content on the ONE site listed on the CCBill form when I signed up.

So yeah, perhaps it is a bit personal, but not directed at you specifically.

[Secretease.com]

All good advice especially from Toby. I get undeliverable email notices when sending out affiliate FHGs but don't delete the accounts because you never know.

[cots]

As a programme owner and affiliate I see it both ways. In the main I agree with what the affiliates here have to say. I think they have got it 100% right. I "test" sponsors and then take a view. Having said that I will often keep "testing" over a longer period of time.

LandL I don't even know what your sites are. Maybe you should list them/link them here? I may have tested them and I may not - but can't say as I have no idea what the are.

One thing is for sure - if you want to get the highest level of promos then make life easier for your affiliates. Life on the web is a struggle at the moment and spending hours searching for content/galleries will put a lot of affiliates off. Plus we can't remember all the sponsors that we have signed up for, (I have about 600!!) so when looking for new stuff a sponsor that doesn't promote his stuff well/frequently may well get forgotten!

Do you send out affiliate newsletters or emails? Do affiliates know when you have new stuff? We mail out our new galleries pretty much weekly (as do a number of sponsors on here). Are you doing that?

Before you sack the affiliate ask yourself are you doing enough to help him?