Affiliate Marketing Blog - a Traffic Junction Blog

Something always expected and always speculated on is now turning out to be true— Google AdSense is testing a Cost per Action model (by invitation). At least at this present moment, it seems that it will be an additional option for AdSense publishers and is not expected to negatively impact publisher revenues from the cost per click model that they have been operating on.

However, I am intrigued by one of the conditions that Google has apparently applied during the test phase which is that publishers are not allowed to incite users to click on the CPA ads ie. say Click here. Publishers are given the freedom to make positive statements about the ads, but not make an obvious call to action. While such a condition can be understood in the case of a CPC model, I am not sure why it should apply on the pay-for-performance model. Obviously, as a marketer getting a return only when the user completes a pre-determined action/ transaction, it is in my interest to make the user click on the ad as a first step towards generating sufficient interest in the product/ service. Of course, this is a test phase, and hopefully, Google will get sufficient feedback from affiliate/Adsense publishers to put together an offering that is fair to both the advertiser as well as the publisher.

With a prorgram like this, can Google seriously dent the major affiliate networks? Definite possibility — but this had to be something that the affiliate networks should have seen coming and been prepared accordingly. How well they are prepared for the major search engines using their distribution networks for a pay per action model, we will know soon.

eBay has made some key announcements recently, chief among them being the launch of eBay Blogs and eBay Wiki (proposed, I believe, as I didn’t spot it on the website). The launch of eBay blogs will provide members of the eBay community, particularly sellers, with another opportunity to promote (”soft sell”) themselves. It is another endorsement of the power and potential of blogs and another way in which it is being used to ensure ’stickiness’ within a community, while providing an additional marketing opportunity.

Besides blogs, another development that will excite publishers is the proposed roll out of eBay’s own contextual advertising network, a la AdSense, the only difference being that the ads will link to auctions on eBay. It seems very much like an extension of its affiliate program, at least based on the few details available in this story. Add eBay to the list of syndicated contextual advertising options available to publishers after AdSense, Yahoo Publisher Network and the Amazon network.

Meanwhile, eBay has also formally launched eBay Express which had been in a “preview” mode in the United States for almost two months, during which millions of users used the service enabling the company to test and fine tune the offering. This is bound to give consumer-to-consumer e-commerce another big boost.

If you know your target audience really well, then the latest enhancement to Adwords “Ad scheduling” should be of considerable interest to you, because it allows an advertiser to set the time of the day for campaigns to run. This was an expected addition, particularly with Microsoft’s adCenter boasting of this feature in its launch version.

This, and some of the other features that are now available such as location targeting, position targeting, demographic targeting are great for sophisticated advertisers and search engine marketing companies who understand how these work and how best to use them to optimize their campaign spend.

There is a view expressed on ClickZ.com that “dayparting” could enhance the relevance for searchers, though I am not entirely convinced of the logic used for that inference. Advertisers may however find bids getting higher as more of them try to get higher ad positions during the time of the day that they are targeting.

One thing is certain– there doesn’t seem to be a dearth of choices for the marketer to reach the target audience; the onus is on the latter to make the most of those choices.

Seems like CJ has given in to affiliates for once. The much talked-about link management initiative (LMI) which it had announced recently, that would have completely replaced legacy link types with JavaScript links, will now merely become the ‘default link type’ and use of the legacy links will be allowed until early 2007 at least. The change in the default link system will happen on June 23. According to an e-mail received earlier today, “At this time we have not scheduled a date for which the Legacy links will no longer be available or supported. We will notify you at least six months in advance of making this change and will not require the change during the 2006 holiday season.” (additional emphasis mine).

This seems to be a case where the product management folks took a decision without fully evaluating the implications or listening to their clients or assoiates. If they had, they’d probably have gotten a better idea of the concerns of the key stakeholders and planned this initiative, if absolutely necessary in the first place, accordingly. There was quite a bit of debate/review/commentary in the blogosphere on what the changes meant —- with views ranging from we don’t understand what it will do, to let’s wait and watch, to questions on whether this could spell the doom for affiliates (doomsday scenarios don’t usually take long to come up anyway). Thankfully, all this “volatility” and “noise” seems to have reached CJ, and so now we have a compromise solution. Credit to CJ as well for not turning a deaf ear..

The best part is the window of at least 6 months that has been promised for complete removal of the legacy link types, which seems fair and reasonable. I do wish that significant product development initiatives such as these took account of the needs & views of the key stakeholders before they are rolled out– it can not only enhance the product offering but also the relationships between the players involved.