Sometimes we nail a good way to explain some of our tools and Affiliate technology while emailing folks during the course of the work day. So we thought why not start adding good Q&A’s/excerpts to the blog. So here’s our first, and it’s in a new category called “Merchant Q&A“.

Merchant asked: “Are there internal communications vehicles that can be used to communicate these [deals and special promotions] other than the email channel?”

AvantLink answered: For merchants using our Standard Integration (self-managed) solution, you’ll want to be sure you flag any special offer, deal or coupon for inclusion in our Dynamic Coupon/Deal Feed. You can easily do this by flagging “Yes” in the ad configuration field for “This is a coupon/deal campaign:”. Once you select Yes the form will provide an additional field for the offer code, if you have one. If there is no offer code then you can leave it blank. Also note that you do not have to include an offer code in the actual ad text, it you include in the “Coupon Code:” field. We will auto embed the code in that case.

So you know, the Dynamic Coupon/Deal Feed is a very popular and heavily used merchant self-managed feed that offers Affiliate integration options of dynamic Javascript or RSS, and daily updated database files. So once you flag any ad for inclusion in this feed, as described above, you’ll effectively place that ad on any Affiliate’s site who is utilizing this tool. It’s a powerful way to keep all deal and promotional campaigns active and accurate out there.

We do offer a Branding Package Service Level for merchants that provides additional, high profile channels whereby you can distribute messages and content about your program’s news and promotions. But that is different from the standard integration service level.

Introducing a new exclusive AvantLink merchant:

SparkleCartel.com

This is an exciting opportunity to promote high-quality fine jewelry and accessories at amazingly low prices…One Deal At A Time! SparkleCartel.com offers deals on jewelry typically 70% to 80% off MSRP or more. Do not hesitate with this one, folks. Get their dynamic daily deal campaigns featured on your site(s) asap, and be ready for the end of the year Q4 shopping season. You’ll earn 9% for each sale on a 120-day cookie. Outstanding conversion rate with free shipping on every order.

From the “About” page on SparkleCartel.com:

We do one thing here at SparkleCartel and we do it well. We find the absolute best deals on high-quality fine jewelry and accessories and blow them out at amazing prices. We sell only one item at a time, this allows us to buy large quantities at super deep discounts that we pass on to our customers.

Highlights of the SparkleCartel Affiliate program include:

• Parasite free
• 9% flat rate commissions
• 120-day cookie duration
• Free standard shipping
• Free gift box
• Outstanding customer service
• No return penalty

Let us know what we can do to help you get started promoting SparkleCartel.com. Contact anyone at AvantLink or the program manager Sam Hart, webmaster/at/sparklecartel.com.

Introducing a new exclusive AvantLink merchant:

o2 Gear Shop

o2 Gear Shop offers customers a knowledgeable team of gear experts, a broad selection of premium outdoor gear and a dedication to quality service. This high converting retailer, new to the Affiliate world’s top Outdoor/Recreation category, is well worth integrating into your site(s) asap. Promote top brands in the ourdoor industry including: The North Face, Burton, Oakley, Patagonia, Mountain Hardwear and Volkl. This is an exclusive merchant with AvantLink, so you know your traffic is heavily safe guarded. Get on board now for the holiday season with o2 Gear Shop!

From their Affiliate program details:

Our high rate of customer retention means o2 Gear Shop Affiliates can expect repeat commissions. A diverse selection of both summer and winter outdoor gear helps insure a steady stream of Affiliate commissions without seasonal slumps. o2 Gear Shop has experienced growth of over 150% in the past 2 years and is quickly becoming a leader among outdoor sporting goods retailers.

Highlights of the o2 Gear Shop Affiliate program include:

• 8% flat rate commissions
• 120 day cookie duration
• Average Order of $150+
• Lowest Price Policy
• Free ground shipping on all purchases over $49

Let us know what we can do to help you get started promoting o2 Gear Shop. Contact anyone at AvantLink or the program manager Chris Fink, cfink/at/o2gearshop.com.

Over the course of the past few days David has built, tested and rolled out new functionality for handling inactive merchant links that result from merchants deactivating Affiliates, or leaving the AvantLink network altogether. Affiliates have always had the option of sorting to, and browsing “My Inactive Merchants”, but now there is an option on that page to “Configure inactive link handling” as well. From the configuration page for Inactive Merchant Link Handling:

When a merchant terminates their association with your affiliate account, or leaves the AvantLink.com network altogether, any affiliate links you have to that merchant will cease functioning. For large sites with many deep links to relevant content, it can be a time consuming operation to fully target a new merchant, and while this conversion is in progress your site visitors experience will be less than ideal. This page can help you control how those links behave while you update your site to advertise for other merchants…

By default, if Affiliates do not define specific actions for inactive merchant links, an error message like the following list of similar merchants will be displayed as a result of an inactive link.

You can also control the behavior of that click through message in the following other ways. Configuration options for handling inactive merchant links include:

• Show a listing of similar merchants (default click-through handling)
• Send traffic directly to an alternate merchant (when you use this click-handling option you’ll select which “Alternate/Replacement Merchant” and “Destination URL”)
• Send traffic to a custom page of my choosing (when you use this click-handling option you’ll select ”Destination URL”)

To control the click-through handling for any inactive merchant links in your account follow these simple steps:

1. Login to your Affiliate account and click “Merchants” from the main menu.
2. Sort Merchant Status to “My Inactive Merchants” and click “Get Merchants”.
3. At the right of each inactive record you’ll see a link “Configure inactive link handling”.

Look for help notes a long the way. Questions, comments, suggestions always appreciated.

AvantLink Newsletter April 23, 2009 Vol 1, Issue 2

Merchant Newsletter

In this issue we are going to outline several new Affiliate technology offerings we rolled out recently including tools for content matching, product comparison and other ad widget functionality. Understanding how these tools help your Affiliates maintain relevant, dynamic pricing and product details is a key element to successful program management. We suggest all program managers go through the process of setting up an Affiliate account with AvantLink, then signing up for your own program. Apply Now as an Affiliate*, and once you do, drop us a line to let us know so we can expedite your application to active status.

Below we will also feature a snippet of an article that outlines what merchants can expect over the first 100 days after launching an Affiliate program in AvantLink. This article highlights specific tips and strategies for effectively building and maintaining an authority program for your business, which will by design attract the most productive and value-based Affiliate marketers out there. Link to full article on our blog also included.

*Program managers are asked to sign-up to their Affiliate programs only.

Table of Contents:

  1. Submit Mother’s Day & Father’s Day Promos
  2. New Powerful Affiliate Technology
  3. Product Ad Widget Screencasts
  4. Merchant Outline for First 100 Days
  5. Affiliate Testimonial: Big Fans of AvantLink

Submit Mother’s Day & Father’s Day Promos

Over the course of the next two months we will move through two distinct shopping periods for both Mother’s Day (May 10th) and Father’s Day (June 21st). For both of these popular shopping events we will be distributing Affiliate newsletters featuring promos from AvantLink merchants specific to Mother’s Day or Father’s Day.

Merchants, you can submit your Mother’s Day or Father’s Day promos (to be featured in these newsletters) for free! Simply email support/at/avantlink.com or your AvantLink contact. Make sure to include the specifics of each promotion you want featured, and the start-end date of each offer. Deadline for Mother’s Day submissions April 29th, and for Father’s Day June 12th.

New Powerful Affiliate Technology

As always the developers are working hard to not only build out new Affiliate tool offerings (labeled [NEW] below), but they are also continuously rolling out upgraded functionality (labeled [UPGRADE] below) to our existing tools and scripts. Here is a list of some of the most notable technology upgrades and releases so far in 2009:

• Product Ad Widget Public BETA [NEW] – We’re pleased to announce the public BETA release of a new AvantLink affiliate network tool. The Product Ad Widget is the next generation of our Product Display Builder. It has a completely redesigned configuration interface that makes use of the Yahoo User Interface (YUI) JavaScript library. The Product Ad Widget has three widget display options: Product Display, Content Match Ad Widget and Flash Widget. Read more…
• Filtering Datafeeds by Brand or Sale Price [UPGRADE] – For affiliates using our raw datafeed (datafeed files) or Web Service Datafeed Client we’ve added some new flexibility to the configuration of those tools that you may find interesting. First, it is now possible to restrict the web service datafeed client to display only products from one or more brand names. Second, both types of datafeed tools now support filtering to just on-sale products. Read more…
• Notification Center: Email Event Notifications [UPGRADE] – The AvantLink Notification Center aims to provide a central location for ways to keep tabs on your AvantLink.com account. Whether it’s via RSS feeds, report subscriptions, or Firefox plugins to show your daily stats, you’ll find it there. Read more…
• Additional Product Content Widget [NEW] – We’ve been working for some time now on a project to allow affiliates to easily pull together all of the datafeed information, coupons, video ads, etc. – in other words, content – that we have at AvantLink.com. Well now it’s here! Read more…
• Showing Additional Product Content in the Web Service Datafeed Client [NEW] – Now another of our offerings, the Web Service Datafeed Client, provides the ability to quickly enhance your site with valuable product-specific information above and beyond what it can normally yield. Read more…
• Web Service Datafeed Client Improvements [UPGRADE] – We’re proud to say that we’ve recently rolled out a massive list of improvements to one of our flagship affiliate tools: the Web Service Datafeed Client. Before getting into the exact details it should be noted that all existing deployments of this tool will work perfectly with the new improvements. Read more…
• RSS Product Feeds [NEW] – The large number of options available in that particular API module may be overwhelming to new users. So, we’ve recently added a simpler configuration page to your affiliate login: the “RSS Product Feeds” configuration page (accessible from the “Tools” page, under the “Datafeed Manager” section). Read more…

Product Ad Widget Screencasts

To compliment some of our new Affiliate technology releases Scott Kalbach, our CEO, has started producing screencast tutorials. So far he has posted two excellent segments to specifically outline the configuration processes and capabilities of the “Product Comparison Widget” and “Content Match” Product Ad Widget options. You can click each of the screen capture images below to start the tutorials. We encourage all program managers to watch these screencasts to better understand the power of the Affiliate tools available FREE OF CHARGE for both Affiliates and merchants, once activated in AvantLink.

Product Comparison Widget

Content Match Widget

Merchant Outline for First 100 Days

Everyone on your team worked hard to meet the AvantLink tracking and datafeed specifications, perform the appropriate test measures, collect collateral and program materials, etc. Now your Affiliate program is open for business on the premiere Affiliate network, but you are a little confused on what comes next. Let’s discuss the first 100 days of Affiliate marketing on AvantLink.

Summary of what to expect from, and how to approach your first 100 days:

• Be sure there are a few good promotions for Affiliates to feature as soon as you go live. You could also consider some kind of activation bonus to create a buzz around the launch of your program.
• Follow-up on launch announcements by engaging readers on those articles with comments and/or participation in the discussions.
• Maintain your own branded communication channels for Affiliates. Be creative with the news on your own blog, Twitter account, press releases, etc.
• Communicate often with your active Affiliates using the AvantLink email tool. Embed ad creative directly in the emails you send out.
• Consider creating a newsletter for Affiliates that will keep them informed of promotions, seasonal best sellers, and new product additions.
• Make sure to view your active Affiliate list often to see who is sending recent traffic, and who isn’t. This is the best place to start when working to optimize your program.

Read full article…

Affiliate Testimonial: Big Fans of AvantLink

As we continue to build the Affiliate end of our business, we have quickly come to appreciate the quality of merchants on the AvantLink network, the ease of use of the Affiliate tools, the consistent and usable product data we can retrieve, and the responsiveness of the entire AvantLink team.

To sum it up we are big fans of, and benefiting financially from, a strong partnership with AvantLink.

Craig & Rusty
GearBuyer.com

Read more testimonials…

We’re proud to share another Merchant testimonial, this time from Rett at Backcountry.com.

AvantLink is a true partner for innovation. Their technology is first class and their attention to detail is impressive. The interface is ultra fast and easy to navigate, which saves us valuable time every day. The standard reporting options cover the majority of our needs and customization is easy to implement. AvantLink understands the affiliate space better than most and is very accommodating when additional functionality is requested. Merchants will not be disappointed with the affiliate network provided by AvantLink.

Rett Clevenger
Online Media Manager
Backcountry.com

Thanks Rett! It’s been our pleasure to work with you, Brian and the rest of the team. Here’s to a great 2009 and beyond.

Time to expand the Testimonials category on our Affiliate Marketing Blog to include AvantLink merchants. We’ve been publishing Affiliate testimonials for a while now, but we also have a bunch of Merchant testimonials to share. To start things off, here is what Chuck Hamrick sent us recently on behalf of Affiliate Crew’s client Little Giant Ladder.

AffiliateCrew.com has been very pleased with the technology and support that AvantLink has given us on the Little Giant Ladder Affiliate program. When we wanted to test an unscrappable coupon code, AvantLink was the only network capable of giving us the tools necessary to make it work. Scott Kalbach and team are always one step ahead of our needs with new features coming out monthly. Gary Marcoccia has helped promote our program(s) and given us invaluable advise for online PR. AvantLink creates Affiliate tools that people want to make their sites convert better in these competitive times.

Chuck Hamrick
AffiliateCrew.com

Thanks Chuck! We value our partnership with Affiliate Crew, Little Giant Ladder and their fine Affiliates.

We are happy to announce that two new branded blog categories are now live on AvantShare.com. Avantshare is where our Affiliate network blog lives, and where a number of our merchants sponsor branded categories for their Affiliate programs. This is a powerful distribution channel, not only because AvantShare is tagged with authority from the major search engines, but because every merchant blog headline gets published as one of the “Latest Merchant Blog Entries” on EVERY Affiliate’s login screen (not just the Affiliates active in the merchant’s program).

If merchant blog headlines are compelling enough, it proves to be a very effective new Affiliate acquisition/recruitment tool.

The two new blog categories we just introduced include a branded presence for both The-House.com and their sister site Proboardshop.com. Click their respective logos below to visit their new blog categories, and be sure to subscribe their RSS feeds for up-to-the-minute promotions and import news about these Affiliate programs.

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We’re excited to announce that we now offer a 5th ad type on the AvantLink platform: Flash Banners!

(Five Ad Types now available on AvantLink: Banner, Text, Html, Video, and Flash)

Merchants can now easily integrate Flash banner ads into their ad list by simply uploading a compatible .swf file (1MB size limit)*, which we’ll store and serve to Affiliates through one line of Javascript. Affiliates can then embed flash ads by pasting this Javascript on their site pages or blogs.

Rich media such as Flash has been measured as a more effective ad type, converting at higher rates than static or animated banner campaigns.

Merchants also have the option of including an alternate image file for Affiliates that will display whenever browsers do not support Flash, so there is no risk of a blank ad display. You can’t go wrong with this ad type!

Affiliates, to view all the Flash ads currently available from your active merchants follow these steps (note that we just released this new ad type functionality so you may not find very many Flash campaigns yet):

1. Login to your Affiliate account and click on “Tools” from the main menu.
2. Under Ad/Link Tools, click on “Get Merchant Ads”.
3. Leave the Merchant drop down menu blank, then select “Flash” from the Ad Type menu.
4. Click “Get Ads” to see all Flash campaigns associated with your active merchants.

You could of course filter by any of your active merchants, then select “Flash” from their respective Ad Type drop down menus. If the merchant has Flash ads configured, you’ll be returned with their Flash Ad options.

Merchants, to include Flash campaigns to your ad list it’s the same process as adding a banner campaign. Simply select the “Flash” Ad Type when creating a new campaign, and follow the instructions.

Let us know what you think, or if you have any questions.

* In order for Flash ads to function properly it must make use of the “clickTAG” parameter, as described by Adobe in their guidelines for rich media tracking. The “clickTAG” is how we provide your Flash movie with the tracking information necessary to credit the appropriate affiliate with click-throughs.