Ah, what it feels like to be a newbie on a message board again. Greetings all, I've enjoyed the dialogue and banter thus far, and seek to create my own.

Today, I had a brief conversation with the Director of Affiliate Marketing at our firm about whether affiliates should have the right to bid on trademarked keywords. From the affiliate's perspective it obviously makes sense (you increase the amount of visitors you drive to a company, increase your take, etc). For us, it does not make as much sense, for obvious reasons.

I'd love for this highly informed gathering of professionals to share their ideas on the subject.

It's real simple, never ever allow any third party to bid on your trademarked terms. Ever.

This same exact discussion came up at a recent conference I attended this week, the IAB Search Roadshow (in Dallas).

The consensus was this: no one could really make up their mind whether it was better to allow affiliates to bid on trademarked names because there is absolutely no data (research) to support one decision or the other.

So, I would like to offer this spin: I actually feel that affiliates should be allowed to bid on trademarked names because they are actually adding to the branding effect of that trademarked name. Consider how many more times your trademarked name appears when the affiliates get ahold of it. Normally, you (the corporation) has to pay $$ to get your trademarked name out there in the public eye. But, in this case, someone else is paying to get your trademarked name out there.

There are actually a couple schools of thought on this... However, my feeling is that letting an affiliate bid on your trademarked terms may not be a good idea. First of all, those are terms you should be bidding on, and letting affiliates bid on it as well may mean that they drive up PPC costs for you on those terms... In addition, there is an argument to be made that affiliates could do damage to your brand image as well - i.e. creative is not moderated by you, there could be interim landing pages before an affiliate referral is driven to your site, etc...

However, there has also been an argument made by some folks that letting affiliates bid on these terms actually helps by making sure that you capture as many clicks as possbile for searches on those terms... Think of it as brand saturation...

In addition, letting affiliates bid on trademarked terms or related terms can also drive your competition out of the picture...

My general feeling is that brand help/harm aside, you have to crunch the numbers if you're using your PPC search ads in a direct-response manner... If you let an affiliate bid on your trademarked terms, how much does it cost you for those referrals? It just might be that the math doesn't favor letting them do it.

hartzer...

Looks like we were in the same room this week!

If you're not allowing your affiliates (or anyone else) to bid on your trademarked name then you're technically not bidding on it, you're simply paying for it--as I understand it, bidding only happens when two or more parties are essentially in an "auction" process. If no one else is allowed to bid on that term, then all you have to do is to pay the minimum bid for it to appear--you're not bidding on it anymore.

If you allow your affiliates to bid on the trademarked term, then you should probably stay out of the bidding process and you won't have to compete with them. They're the ones driving traffic to your landing pages, let them pay for it. After all, whatever they pay cuts into their commission.

Speaking of landing pages, you're the one who should be controlling where your trademarked name appears, so shouldn't those landing pages be on your website rather than on the affiliate site? In the typical situation, the corporation creates and controls the landing pages where the trademarked name appears. The affiliate just drives traffic to those landing pages.

Another way to handle some of this is to have the corporation create "approved text ads" that can be used at the PPCs. Then, the affiliates won't be creating PPC ads, just bidding on them, paying for them, and driving traffic to the landing page that the corporation controls. If an affiliate wants to cut into their commission, more power to them, right?

Another way to look at not allowing Affiliates to bid on your trademarks is this:
When someone searches for your trademarked term there is a good chance that they are doing a bit of research on your company. (I personally Google any company that I am going to buy something from everytime.) This means that they have either been to your site already or have seen some of your advertising somewhere else.

If you allow your Affiliates to bid on this term then you are diluting the power of your Advertising and Affiliate programs because you are Advertising for your Affiliates.

Bottom Line - Do not let anyone bid on your trademarked terms, EVER. :D

This really is a complicated issue with many different answers. Rather than write a book about it here, let me post links to an affiliate blog which will soon have some really good points from all sides of the equation.

PPC Bidding by Affiliates Part 1: It's about Controlling Your Brand
http://www.revenews.com/davidlewis/archives/000121.html

PPC Bidding by Affiliates (Part II)
http://www.revenews.com/davidlewis/archives/000124.html

Well the links above are the "con" side of things from one person. Revenews is working on an affiliate manager conference call where several leading AMs will be discussing all the pros and cons regarding affiliate programs, trademarks and SEM/PPC models. So stay tuned for more info on this topic.

Linda

>This really is a complicated issue with many different answers.

It is really simple honestly.

"Bottom Line - Do not let anyone bid on your trademarked terms, EVER."

Is excellant advice for a merchant.

It's real simple, never ever allow any third party to bid on your trademarked terms. Ever.
That about hits the nail on head :) good post

Cheers

NFFC:
Respectfully... your conclusion/theory is one without any reasoning at this point. I find your recommendation difficult to take seriously given that it's based on an over-simplification of a moderately complex matter. Others in this thread have pointed to the many various facets and considerations marketers should examine. Your continued "it's simple" response would seem to be suggesting that nothing matters and that your decision-making process is purely an emotional one. I also find the "high five" you just received to be rather pointless. I thought we were here to discuss? Why not step up to the plate and tell us why it's a bad idea to the point of it being a no-brainer? I would value your thoughts.

I encourage everyone on this thread to check out this (http://www.revenews.com/davidlewis/archives/000124.html) journal entry by David Lewis... an affiliate.

With Yahoo now monitoring affiliates in certain areas, why would you turn a % payout that doesnt allow you full control over image or brand?
Developing your own expansion on your business site, does take more time but allows proper direction in the areas of further development in-house where offering a "anyone promote theory" only waters down your exposure across the board which in turn does give less weight

cheers

WC

Linda and Jeff, thanks for linking to my posts on ReveNews. I have tried to start a rational, positive discussion on the topic as most people seem to be reactionary on it. There are 2 more posts that I will put up this week and next detailing other issues and what merchants can do to be proactive to grow their programs and control their brands.

NFFC: If you have a good rationale for your blanket statement, please post it. Right now you are merely throwing fuel on the reactionary fire. Would you recommend that brick-and-mortar businesses ban EVERYONE from using their trademarks? Why are you recommending throwing the baby out with the bathwater. And, why do you hide behind anonymity? Who are you? Why do you care about this topic? Did an affiliate harm you in your past and do you now seek vengeance against all affiliates? I look forward to reading your thoughtful arguments on the topic at hand.

Yes, there are affiliates out there who do bad things. There have been people who have done bad things since the beginning of time. Bad people is not an argument to stop working with good partners. Let's look at the issues and not the bogeyman of "bad affiliates". You can use good affiliates to meet your needs. If you are an affiliate manager, have you written down on a piece of paper what makes a good affiliate and what makes a bad affiliate? Do you find ways to help your good affiliates grow as they help you grow your business and protect your company's image?


Three simple rules for letting affiliates bid on your trademarks:

Rule #1: Using a merchant's trademarks is a privilege and not an affiliate's right.

Rule #2: Pick your partners online as wisely as you would offline.

Rule #3: Control your brand. Do not cede control of your brand to Google and Overture. Your good affiliates will help you.

Tough crowd.

>given that it's based on an over-simplification of a moderately complex matter.

I will say again, its not even the slightest bit complex. From the merchants point of view it is very, very, absurdly simple, do not let anyone bid on your trademarked terms.

>If you have a good rationale for your blanket statement, please post it. Right now you are merely throwing fuel on the reactionary fire. Would you recommend that brick-and-mortar businesses ban EVERYONE from using their trademarks? Why are you recommending throwing the baby out with the bathwater. And, why do you hide behind anonymity? Who are you? Why do you care about this topic? Did an affiliate harm you in your past and do you now seek vengeance against all affiliates? I look forward to reading your thoughtful arguments on the topic at hand.

I would strongly recommend that you maybe take a break, chill out a little bit, relax.
------------------
I think it depends on where you are coming from, affilates are either valued partners or scum sucking the profit from a company.

I think they are valued partners, I would never ever do anything to hurt a valued partner of mine. But as a valued partner of mine, please, don't bid on my trademarked terms, I will have no choice but to stop you. If I don't everybody will see the term as fair game, thats the way it works.

Work with your merchant, not against him.

NFFC, it sounds like you are a merchant. What is your site? What experience have you had with affiliates bidding on your trademarks? How much do you spend on brand marketing? What types of results come up in Google and Yahoo for your marks (e.g. recalls, bad press about your company, your competitors)? You still have not given a reason why affiliates should other than it being the right thing to do. WHY?!?

Thank you for making my point. You wrote "If I don't everybody will see the term as fair game, thats the way it works." Exactly! Protect your trademarks. Banning all of your affiliates from bidding on your trademarks actually dilutes your trademarks, it does not protect them. You need to treat your trademarks online as you do offline. If you have a separate agreement with a limited number of affiliates who agree to stringent conditions on the use of your trademarks, you will protect your marks and your investment in them.

Please, stop with the blanket statements. If you cannot give a good, logical reasons, don't post. I think that the readers and posters on SEW are intelligent and would like to read well thought out arguments. They will ignore you if you can't back up your statements. [Plus, you degrade the value of SEW and hurt its trademark. :o) ]

With Yahoo now monitoring affiliates in certain areas, why would you turn a % payout that doesn't allow you full control over image or brand?

Sorry, what monitoring are you referring to and how does it connect to paying affiliates to conduct search arbitrage?

As for why... simple... advertisers view this as "outsourcing SEM" to their affiliates. They are either too scared or ignorant or both. I'm not saying that's good or bad (yet)... I'm just reporting the news.

Developing your own expansion on your business site, does take more time but allows proper direction in the areas of further development in-house where offering a "anyone promote theory" only waters down your exposure across the board which in turn does give less weight

How does it water down your exposure? I don't see it that way. I see it as giving up control... so I think we agree (in the end) that it's a dangerous thing and that an "anyone promote" attitude is asking for trouble.

>NFFC, it sounds like you are a merchant.

....and an aff guy and a general SEO type person, Tri-sexual would be a better description :)

Just do me a favour though, when I have my merchant hat on don't bid on my trademark name, sends my lawyer crazy. If you are a true partner you will try and work with me, not against me.

Without getting into the debate of right or wrong, I must say that every merchant's situation is different. I do know some merchants that don't do PPC themselves and welcome their affiliates doing natural search and PPC with their trademarked keywords. Is it wise? Depends. Is it their right, certainly.
Should merchants have a right to say - no way! Of course that's what TOS are for.

Please, read my posts at ReveNews. I agree that affiliates should be partners. Before you assume that all SEO and SEM by affiliates is bad, read my blog. You will see that affiliates can protect you. Lawyers go crazy when the brand is not protected. Change the way your lawyers think. Give them a good rationale to allow it and a great way to protect your marks as they are used to doing.

Your good affiliates will view themselves as an extension of your marketing department and not out to make a quick buck off of you. Use your affiliates to protect your brand.

Why are you leaving your brand management to Yahoo and Google instead of taking control of it yourself.

P.S. NFFC, please let me know your trademarks so I won't bid on them.

>Please, read my posts at ReveNews.

No.

>Before you assume that all SEO and SEM by affiliates is bad

I don't, I'm a switch hitter, remember?

>read my blog

No.

>Change the way your lawyers think.

I am just a man, not God!

On the same train of thought, trust me on this. If a merchant asks you as a partner not to bid on their trademarked terms respect that request. Man to man, partner to partner, is it too much to ask?

Someone told me about this thread. I was excited to hear about it as this is an important issue. I thought that there would be a substantive debate about the issues. Instead, it seems to be dominated by someone who is set in his ways and unwilling to look at the issues.

If anyone is interested in exploring this, please post your views with real arguments (more than "because I say so") and questions. I will be happy to address them.

I have (and continue to) lay out arguments of why merchants should protect their brands by allowing affiliates to bid on their trademarks.

I look forward to an real debate of the issues. This is an imprtant topic. Merchants spend BILLIONS of dollars on their brands and wind up hurting it with this all or nothing attitude toward trademark bidding.

Interesting point...who are your references pointing to so we can all have a say?

cheers

WC

It's all at http://www.revenews.com/davidlewis/

More to come later this week.

nice self promotion but it didnt answer my questions...in highly competitive industries such as casino, pharma and adult we are seeing a move currently away from affiliate marketing since it is hurting all industries.Please post facts if we are to dedate "billion" dollar industries


Cheers

WC

I'm not here for self promotion. I refer to ReveNews because I have already written it up there and see no reason to put the same thing here when you can just as easily read it there.

I am talking about online shopping in general. Name the largest merchants in the US who have affiliate programs and you will have your answer. I give examples on ReveNews (again, why I refered you there).

David:
I'm going to give this one more day and then remove SEW from my places to hang out and have intelligent discussion with industry insiders. These people are not interested in discussion... only giving one-word answers and accusing anyone with something to say of being a shameless self-promoter. Candidly, if someone can't see the value in what you freely give away for free on your blog then... well, you know.

Sorry to have (more than likely) wasted your time by asking that you show up.

Another way to look at not allowing Affiliates to bid on your trademarks is this:
When someone searches for your trademarked term there is a good chance that they are doing a bit of research on your company. (I personally Google any company that I am going to buy something from everytime.) This means that they have either been to your site already or have seen some of your advertising somewhere else.

If you allow your Affiliates to bid on this term then you are diluting the power of your Advertising and Affiliate programs because you are Advertising for your Affiliates.

Bottom Line - Do not let anyone bid on your trademarked terms, EVER. :D

argue this.

as another reader pointed out, your write up on revnews.com(sic) fails to actually cite any specific examples. The examples that you do cite seem contradictory as well.

if the point of an affiliate program is to create a new sales force then why should your 'new' sales force be doing exactly what your 'existing' sales force is already doing?

the reason you are not getting a two sided discussion going is because you have not presented a coherent argument as to why the above listed points are invalid.

halfacat, thank you for a reasoned post. I do want to have a two-sided discussion on this. However, I have not seen some of the posts you refer to.

I think that I need a little more information to answer your questions. You say that I cite no specific example yet you also state that the example I cite are contradictory. Which is it? And given the examples, what is contradictory? If you let me know, I will be happy to address your concern.

New Sales Force: You are assuming that affiliate programs have a single purpose, to act as a "new sales force". This is one purpose and, most likely, the original purpose. I think that good affiliates do act in this way. Unfortunately, we have also seen a different type of affiliates who are in it only to extract as much revenue from the merchants with no regard for the merchants' businesses. At the same time, search has reared it head as the beast we all know it to be.

Good affiliates can help promote a merchant the way the merchant wants to be promoted in search engines. This takes two forms: (i) keeping bad affiliates, competitors and bad press out of search engines and (ii) allowing the merchant to have multiple marketing messages as results for the same search query. For example, the merchant can advertise a generic message, one affiliate can advertise discounts and another can advertise clearance (there are many more that I am sure we can all come up with).

This give control back to the merchant. By banning ALL affiliates from bidding on trademarks and banning ALL affiliates from any type of SEO, the merchant cedes control of its brand to Google and Yahoo. Why not use top affiliates as a way to promote the brand in the best way possible?

I hope that answers your question. Please let me know about the examples and I would be happy to provide more information. As I have said, I think that this is an important topic that needs serious debate.

Since nobody will actually argue specific points here on this board, I'll argue with myself based on a comment.

Why this treat your affiliates as a "sales force" stuff is complete bunk:

1) There has only been ONE affiliate network that has ever pushed this viewpoint and held it up as a "best practice." That same network (the only one who remains distasteful to those who are looking to acquire) is now marching to the market's drum of this WHOLE online marketing/advertising thing being a multi-faceted performance MEDIA game, not a "virtual sales force." It ain't 1997 anymore.

2) The industry has already tried it... and it sucks. Looking for a "hands off" approach to business partnerships wherein you can expect 80% of your revenue to be driven by *moderately* valuable search arbitrage focused "affiliate partners" or perhaps you're looking for the search engine spammers and tricksters who's activities do nothing but increase your chances of being banned by search engines? ... not to mention all of this happening without affording you an ounce of control.

Even Amazon - the pioneer of this fairly juvenile concept - has slapped so much control, and created complex payment "rules", on their affiliates such that they have, in effect, converted their "sales force" into highly controlled/regulated traffic partners.

Duh. It all boils down to an effective cost per click that marketers are after... and low and behold they don't need affiliates to leverage search for them! They are starting to realize that they can do it themselves for LESS.

As an affiliate, I am very grateful my merchant partners let me optimize/bid on their trademarked terms.

Why?

Trademarked/product name terms convert at a higher rate than general terms related to the product and are prime SEO/PPC targets since the affiliate can capitalize on expensive brand awareness already paid out by the merchant. Think about it, someone wouldn't be searching on the product unless they had already been exposed to the name at someone else's expense.

As for your blog examples:

If I was searching for Office Depot I don't know why I would scroll down to #9, or 10 and click on the Amazon listing when Office Depot is #1, right where I would expect to find it. Besides, if Office Depot really cared, Amazon wouldn't be a distribution partner in the first place.

>Amazon and EBay listings

Maybe you could explain why this equates to lost sales and control of your brand. If these are distribution partners anyway, how do they differ from affiliates? Seems to me a false dilemma.

>For example, the merchant can advertise a generic message, one affiliate can advertise discounts and another can advertise clearance (there are many more that I am sure we can all come up with)

I don't know about you, but I don't accept calls from my merchant partners dictating to me how I am going to advertise their products for them.

As for your blog examples:

If I was searching for Office Depot I don't know why I would scroll down to #9, or 10 and click on the Amazon listing when Office Depot is #1, right where I would expect to find it. Besides, if Office Depot really cared, Amazon wouldn't be a distribution partner in the first place.

I agree that the merchant shouldn't care if it's best partners do this. You have proven my point. A merchant's best affiliates are like Amazon and should be there.

>Amazon and EBay listings

Maybe you could explain why this equates to lost sales and control of your brand. If these are distribution partners anyway, how do they differ from affiliates? Seems to me a false dilemma.

Amazon: In many cases, yes, Amazon is a distribution partner for merchants. Who do you think gets a larger commission: Amazon or affiliates. If it is bad to have affiliates bid, why is it good to have Amazon there? Also, it is often Amazon affiliates who are bidding and not Amazon. These are the same affiliates who try to game the merchant's program as they are not permitted to bid using Amazon's trademarks.

eBay: eBay is NOT a distribution partner for merchant. Several merchants I have spoken to cringe at seeing not just ads for eBay selling their products but even the fact that their products are being sold on eBay. They make no money off of those sales.

>For example, the merchant can advertise a generic message, one affiliate can advertise discounts and another can advertise clearance (there are many more that I am sure we can all come up with)

I don't know about you, but I don't accept calls from my merchant partners dictating to me how I am going to advertise their products for them.

HELL YES, I DO! That is exactly my point. Affiliates should work with the merchants. They should work to promote the merchant's brand the way the merchant wants it promoted. It is all about the merchant.

I'm not sure if you've noticed but you do allow the merchants to dictate how you advertise... you take down their ads when they make you. I don't know about you but that's not the result I'm going for and I think that they are hurting themselves by doing so.

Duh. It all boils down to an effective cost per click that marketers are after... and low and behold they don't need affiliates to leverage search for them! They are starting to realize that they can do it themselves for LESS.

Duh. They do need affiliates. Jeff, I can't believe that you of all people are dragging out ROI as your main argument. You know that there is more to an affiliate program. ROI is important but being able to avoid negative impact on your brand should factor in.

CONTROL YOUR BRAND!

David:
You *have* in fact convinced me (a self-admitted un-convincable person) that it's beneficial to retain the assistance of affiliates in regard to a wide variety of other, equally important (relative to securing transactions) if not strategic tasks.

That stated, one of those tasks is not to simply "create more brand touch points" without regard to soft (brand experience related) and hard costs.

Back to my original rant/point... that of pointing out that this "use / treat them as if they were your sales force" stuff is simply crap. Why? Because in the real world, you have expectations (http://forum.affiliatemanager.net/viewtopic.php?t=360) of your affiliates! What's with marketers ignoring affiliate programs and just letting them run on their own and/or giving affiliate managers one goal: make more sales. That's just STUPID. Would you hire a VP of Sales to run your sales force and give your company's sales team one single goal: make more sales? NO! Wouldn't you set some guidelines as to what is ethical, acceptable, brand supportive... and what isn't? Why are we, as an industry, now just getting around to it? Oh, and bye the way would we have the Almighty Linkshare Addendum or "industry" Code of Conduct if it weren't for a story in the NY Times (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40913F7355D0C748EDDA00894DA4044 82) that scared everyone a bit? No... we would not. So, in effect, marketers have sent a message that is loud and clear: "we do not care to know how sales are actually created by affiliates." Concurrently we have heard one affiliate network crying out for years now, "but treat them like a sales force" when, in fact, they act like children.

No offense but look no further than statements like:

I don't know about you, but I don't accept calls from my merchant partners dictating to me how I am going to advertise their products for them.

I mean... James, you must admit that these are not the words of a business parter of yours if you were in their shoes. You would not stand for it... but then again, affiliates are not treated like business partners at all - again, because they are *expected* to mis-behave. Frankly, James, I find your comment to be symptomatic of a very serious problem - this inherent antagonism within the sphere of affiliate marketing (between marketers and affiliates).

Let me take it a step further and take the heat off of James for a moment as I don't think it's fair to point *only* at him (or affiliates). The whole thing starts with selfish merchants IMO. Frankly, I helped bring a good number of them into affiliate marketing and have benefited significantly in doing so... so I want to be up front on that. I also have serious regrets and hope to foster change through knowledge exchange (http://www.revenews.com/jeffmolander/).

To a large degree, the attraction to this approach has been what makes affiliate marketing so popular among marketers and is, I suggest, what drives the high degree of perceived value. "I don't pay unless I get the desired action that I define" (usually a sale). Realistic? Not really. Consider the fact that someone might make a purchase at a marketer's physical store. Example: First they visit an affiliate site (assumed: they spent money to get user there), then download a trial version of software, conduct more research on other products and then purchase through another re-seller or at a store. Value delivered to the affiliate? Yes. Value recognized by merchant and reward sent to the affiliate? No. Stupid, short-term strategy? Yes! Will you find anything like it outside of the Internet? No. Does it encourage affiliates to abuse and push the envelope without regard to the marketer's trademark or overall well being (i.e. future relationships with search engines (http://www.clickz.com/experts/search/results/article.php/3293791))? Yes!

Bottom line: If you have decent traffic to your site, why relegate yourself to affiliatedom? You don't... you throw up AdSense. Why? Because AdSense delivers on the original promise of affiliate marketing - connecting commerce with contextual relevancy at a publisher's site!

Back full circle... Pay your sales force on pure commission and then ignore them. Walk away and see what happens. When you notice your sales people doing things you can't really control, you punish them by telling them "you can sell for me, but you can't use my name/brand in doing so." That's right, you take all the things away from them that help them earn most of their money. Next you wake up one day and realize "hey, my customers are hearing my radio ads, comparison shopping at BizRate and then shopping through affiliate coupon sites!" (I'm spending like mad here and taking none of this into account when paying these individual parties). Therefore, you cut your commission percentage across the board... and on and on... and the resentment deepens.

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Why not just have traffic partners and call it a day? That or, as David preaches, have actual business relationships with your affiliates. That we agree on, David, I assure you.

My point was simply this:

Merchants have their business, I have mine. When our mutual interests cross, we do well as business partners.

When a merchant starts jerking me around and dictating that I must advertise this discount while this other affiliate does this other one, I start thinking about other options. I am not their puppet and there is always other options. Smart merchants understand that and respect an affiliate's business.

When merchants are dealing with super affiliates, they must respect what that is affiliate is doing for them - providing alot of no risk lead generation. I am not their paid employee, I am an independent business man.

At this point, my merchants respect that and we work together very well.

Every affiliate needs to arrive at a stage of independence from any one merchant, IMO and create enough leverage to garner respect and a real threat of pulling the plug and promoting a competitor's products instead. Without this self protection, you will get jerked around.

create enough leverage to garner respect and a real threat of pulling the plug and promoting a competitor's products instead. Without this self protection, you will get jerked around.

Exactly. Build yourself to the point where you are more vital to the merchant than they are to you. There are very, very few truly mutually beneficial relationships in the business world. Someone will always be in a position of advantage even if it is miniscule. I want to be in that position.

By doing this as an affiliate I will be able to persuade my merchants into letting me do things they might not understand completly. They know I make them money and trust me.

On the other hand, if I was a merchant I would want that position of power as well. I would want to be able to control my affiliates and have them do what I said because there would be no where else they could go.

Basically, as an affilaite I want to be able to bid on trademarked terms, brand names, etc. As a merchant there is almost no way I would allow this. The person in the power position will make the call and either way I want the power.

Exactly. Build yourself to the point where you are more vital to the merchant than they are to you. There are very, very few truly mutually beneficial relationships in the business world. Someone will always be in a position of advantage even if it is miniscule. I want to be in that position.

By doing this as an affiliate I will be able to persuade my merchants into letting me do things they might not understand completly. They know I make them money and trust me.

On the other hand, if I was a merchant I would want that position of power as well. I would want to be able to control my affiliates and have them do what I said because there would be no where else they could go.

Basically, as an affilaite I want to be able to bid on trademarked terms, brand names, etc. As a merchant there is almost no way I would allow this. The person in the power position will make the call and either way I want the power.

As a Merchant if you dont have the power to tell your Affiliates to stay off your trademarked terms then you either need to hire that Affiliate full time, partner, or sell them your business. This is because you have failed at actually creating an affiliate program in the greyest sense of the concept.

The point of creating an Affilaite program is to diversify your sales/advertising/marketing and focus on the backend aspect of your business. If you only have a few Affiliates making you money and your relationship with them is such that you cannot tell them to stay off your trademarks without them leaving you then you have to take one of the options listed above. If its at that point then you are no longer running an Affilaite program, you are in a hostile takeover.

Jeff- We agree! Even if there are minor points that we can debate, they are not as important as the big issues.

James, Dr. Cool and Half A Cat- It's been a long week. I'm too tired to reply right now. All I can say is come back Monday and I will explain why what you are saying will lead to the end of Affiliate Marketing. In the meantime, you should read Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged'.

I am thinking of changing my handle and going anonymous. You can call me John Galt.

I've been weary to weigh in here because I don't need another forum to follow.

But, I wanted to provide Audible's perspective on this matter and why we decided to implement David Lewis's policy as part of our overall search and Affiliate Marketing programs.

And before you all beat me up for not knowing a thing about this issue, I've been running affiliate marketing and search program for 5 years -- remember when Overture was GoTo? Mark May, a senior analyst at Kaufman Bros. called me an affiliate marketing expert the other day on the Audible Investor Relations quarterly conference call. Name one other Affiliate marketer every noticed by a Wall Street analyst? If you want to hear it for yourself, just listen to the call from Audible's IR page.

That said, I just find this debate silly. David has a well thought and well reasoned argument at Revenews and Audible changed our policy based on this. And it was at the urging of my search person not me.

As you can see, we have banned affiliates from bidding on our brand and look at the results:

Take a look at http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=audible&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t&cop=mss&tab=

Audible owns the trademark "audible' but it's also a real word and look at how horrible that search page is for our brand. Next Tag, Ebay and others are on that page. Look at what that does to how people perceive Audible.

We are going to knock them all off the page with our affiliates -- affiliates we trust to work with us. And by the way, we're leaving up Hoover because we think it protects the brand. Hoovers bidding on Audible is a compliment.

We think David is correct. Merchants spend millions of dollars building a brand, what are a couple bucks to protect it.

Cheers,

Beth

Welcome Beth!

So let me get this straight. You have a problem with third parties bidding on your trademarked terms and your solution is.... to let other third parties bid on your trademarked terms?

With respect I really hope you have run this by legal.

With respect part 2, I'd be tempted to concentrate on giving your affs as much help as you can rather than encouraging them into a low converting bidding war with some of the biggest pockets on the www. imho.

Did you read what I wrote. I said we have two affiliates we work with that we trust to protect our brand. We don't let people bid whom we don't trust. These guys have earned the right to bid on our brand.

It's all about trust and protecting the brand.

Look at everything you wrote about power games and how affiliates need to play them with merchants. Why should I trust you?


With respect part 2, I'd be tempted to concentrate on giving your affs as much help as you can rather than encouraging them into a low converting bidding war with some of the biggest pockets on the www. imho.

My affiliates love me! :)

Check out this thread
http://abw.infopop.cc/eve/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=548608979&f=6536027055&m=4106021785

And my affiliates even wished me happy birthday! :D

http://abw.infopop.cc/eve/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=548608979&f=6536027055&m=141104666

Have you ever wished your manager Happy Birthday?

The issue is that we need to work together as a partners. Merchant and affiliates working towards the same goal: more sales and protecting the brand.

I'd love you to join my program and will treat you will respect as a partner, so feel free to get in touch with me. We can make some money together. Beth

Cheers,

Beth

>I'd love you to join my program and will treat you will respect as a partner

Hmmmm...can I bid on your trademark?

lol.....We let two affiliates bid on our brand and they have been with us forever and have earned my trust.

I don't even know who you are, you don't even post your name. It's all about trusted partners working together.

Cheers,

Beth

I've re-read the thread again, maybe I am tainted by my own position [smalltime guy]. I suppose there *may* be a case for allowing a select few third parties to bid on your trademarked terms, if you are prepared to get your legal ducks in a row.

My feeling is that for the small to medium webmaster the advice "It's real simple, never ever allow any third party to bid on your trademarked terms. Ever." is still good. For the larger companies maybe they can carry the additional legal overhead of ensuring that their brand is protected and that their aff's present exactly the right image.

So, and here's a first, I'll admit that maybe I was w..w..wro... I can't say it!

Lets all agree that better advice would be:

As a small to medium website owner never ever allow any third party to bid on your trademarked terms. Ever. If you are a larger merchant and assuming you have run it by legal and assuming they have taken specialist advice and assuming that the third parties agree to the conditions and assuming that it is viewed favourable by the stockholders and assuming that you can deliver additional value to those stockholders then maybe, just maybe it might be something that you would do in a very limited range of senerios.

Agreed?

NFFC, I am glad to see you coming around. Keep reading. I think that if you are open-minded about this (as you now appear to be) you will see that there are no absolutes and that (dare I say) size doesn't matter on this issue.

I am not saying that any one solution will fit all merchants. I am saying that all merchants must ask certain questions in evaluating this issue. I will say, however, that I do not think that a total ban on bidding for all affiliates is a good idea for any merchant. I have not heard any ratioale to justify that strategy given the unintended consequences that usually appear.

>I am glad to see you coming around. Keep reading. I think that if you are open-minded about this (as you now appear to be)

I think you mistake agreement for the subtle form of humour known as Brit style. I suppose in a way that reinforces your point, we aren't all the same?

My affiliates love me!

Even other managers love Beth and wished her Happy Birthday! ;)

Sorry couldn't resist trying to add a brief moment of levity to this thread.

JamesR, halfacat and DrCool, you have inspired me. Instead of posting here about why what you propose will amount to the death of Affiliate Marketing, I am going to spend some more time with it and post to ReveNews about what is wrong with Affiliate Marketing and how we can fix it. It most likely is more important than this issue (which is a subset of that one anyway).


NFFC (to paraphrase from "The American President"): We have serious problems to solve, and we need serious people to solve them. And whatever your particular problem is, friend, I promise you, NFFC is not the least bit interested in solving it. He is interested in two things and two things only: Making you afraid of it and telling you who's to blame for it. My name's David Lewis, and I am an Affiliate Marketing advocate.

what is wrong with Affiliate Marketing and how we can fix it

If you could change human nature while you are at it that would be great.


It is all about the merchant.


If you are going to try and convince me that merchants have affiliate's best interests in mind and would never hose their affiliate partners, I have to respectfully decline to believe you. I have been at this for 4 years now and make quite a good annual income off of it and I will tell you this, if I didn't have killer traffic and serious leverage due to my industry position, merchants wouldn't take me seriously at all, I would be making 10% commissions instead of my current 30-50% and some merchants wouldn't even let me join their programs.


I will explain why what you are saying will lead to the end of Affiliate Marketing


Not quite sure how you will argue that one but I am excited to hear it. My best merchants partners understand completely that I have a business to run and need to do what is best for that. They compete with their competitor's affiliate programs by making theirs the most attractive for me and other top affiliates. If not, there is no reason they would believe I would stick around and take a lower commission from them or lose out on lifetime commissions if their competitor's are offering that.

will amount to the death of Affiliate Marketing.

If you are talking about affiliate marketing as "I have a site and want to throw a banner and some links from CJ on it" then kill away.

If you are talking about affiliate marketing as "Hey merchant, I want to develop a site around your products and make us both a lot of money. I know how to generate quality traffic and have proven in the past that I can generate good revenue for my merchants. How can we work together on this?" then that will never die.

If you are talking about affiliate marketing as "Hey merchant, I want to develop a site around your products and make us both a lot of money. I know how to generate quality traffic and have proven in the past that I can generate good revenue for my merchants. How can we work together on this?" then that will never die.

That is very different from what you guys have been writing. This time you used words like "both" and "together". That's my point. It is a partnership that has to be mutually beneficial and will be more successful with cooperation. Definitely get more from your partners (whatever more may be in any case) but don't do it through extortion.

but don't do it through extortion.

Definitly not. But if my merchant isn't taking care of me and there is another merchant who will what will keep me from switching merchants? There have been numerous cases where I have been working with merchant A making a certain percentage. Merchant B contact me and says they can pay a higher commission. I then go back to merchant A and see if they can match or beat the offer. If they can I stay. If they can't I leave. All other things being equal of course. It doesn't just have to be higer commissions either. Could be keyword bidding policies, quality of datafeed, product selection, etc.

But my point still stands. I am in a position of power at that moment. Since I have a better offer on the table I am giving the first merchant a chance to match it. If he feels that he will make more money by paying me a higher commission and keeping me as an affiliate than he would lose if I left for the second merchant that is his choice and one he needs to make for himself. Just because I am in a position of power doesn't mean I want to harm him. I want to use my power to help him and generate as many sales as I can for him.

Hi all,

Back in the fray!

Even other managers love Beth and wished her Happy Birthday! ;)

Sorry couldn't resist trying to add a brief moment of levity to this thread.

Thanks Linda! The feeling is mutual.


If you are going to try and convince me that merchants have affiliate's best interests in mind and would never hose their affiliate partners, I have to respectfully decline to believe you. I have been at this for 4 years now and make quite a good annual income off of it and I will tell you this, if I didn't have killer traffic and serious leverage due to my industry position, merchants wouldn't take me seriously at all, I would be making 10% commissions instead of my current 30-50% and some merchants wouldn't even let me join their programs.



I'm sorry I started entered this thread joking around because I’m as tough as any of you. So, yes, my affiliates love me, but it's a strategy to build loyalty and let me tell you it works wonders with super affiliates as well as the little guys.

James, I'm going to take you issues right on. I don't disagree with you at all in many ways. We agree on the facts 100%! And with 95% of merchants I think you are right about the solution, affiliates need to use their leverage. And if I was in your shoes, I would do the same thing. With other merchants I disagree, but I think it's a unsual AM that can pull it off.

I've been doing affiliate marketing and biz dev since '99. Here are the issues from my vantage.

(1) Affiliates have been screwed over by merchants for years. They are seen as a disposible resource. It sux. I'm sorry it happens and I think it is totally irresponsible of the merchant.

(2) Affiliate marketing is actually biz dev not marketing. It is misplaced in the organizational structure. The affiliate manager should actually be the number two person on the biz dev team and have coordintor to deal with the little guys. They should have the authority to cut the deals they need to cut -- most of the time they don’t.

Instead, you have these young managers who have no experience that are in the marketing department. Moreover, they just don't care that much in general because they are treated poorly internally and then they have affiliates beat them up. It’s unpleasant. And who suffers because the AM has little power internally. The affiliates.

(3) Most importantly, this is what I believe the heart of the problem is for affiliates at your level. With a biz dev deal, potential partners sit down with each other; the dating game is played, with a bit of negotiations along the way; the potential partners learn about each others’ business models; and, if it makes sense, the players develop a joint business initiative. However, only at certain times, in this industry, is this practice followed. Because of this lack of process, sometimes business relationships are built on perception as opposed to true and open communications between the partners.
Contracts are not signed and expectations are not clear. There are no real comittement by the company to care about the relationship. Then Affilaites are left to fend for themselves and the relationship is disposable.


My best merchants partners understand completely that I have a business to run and need to do what is best for that. They compete with their competitor's affiliate programs by making theirs the most attractive for me and other top affiliates. If not, there is no reason they would believe I would stick around and take a lower commission from them or lose out on lifetime commissions if their competitor's are offering that.

And that is exactly my point. In a biz dev deal the parties understand that people have businesses to run and are treated with respect – even if they don’t always get along. It’s the respect partners have for each other.
I’m given more authority than most AMs and can cut better and more complicated deals, and I also care, I care about my little guys growing and learning and my big guys succeeding.

I sent this thread to one of my top guys to read and this is what he wrote:

“At first I was thinking about how off mark the comments those affiliates made are- then I was thinking that, to be fair, from their perspective, most AM's are absolutely not like you and so sometimes I think people get defensive because they are very tired of being kicked around by not so nice AM's. I believe that (I got this from a book, although I can't for the life of me remember which) in order to succeed, you have to be helped. People that think they can make it all on their own with out help from anyone are deceiving themselves. People have to want to bring you up, or else you will never go up. The book was referring to "climbing the corporate ladder" but I've found that it applies to lots of things. Being defensive and manipulative and controlling may get you some level of success, but real success can only come because the people in power want you to be successful.”

This is a top guy in lots of programs and he has been jerked around like you guys. But since we started working together His sales have grown 400% since took over this program and started working with him. Today, I added $5 per membership just because he had really moved to a new level and he earned it. It shocked him

So, that said James, here is my offer to you. Look at www.audible.com, we are pretty niche and don’t work for all affiliates. But we work well for the right affiliates.. We run most of our affiliates outside if CJ (so my EPC is a joke -- but if your getting lifetime commssions some people are running you outside of the networks). If you think you can deliver us significant sales I’ve match our the best offer we have with our premium partners. If you tell me what you need to earn per click we can look at your approaches and our VIP offers and back out a reasonable package for you.

It’s a partnership! We are both running a business after all. I don’t want to screw you over, if you have quality traffic, let's see if it makes sense to work together.

Do make sure what this is product you can work with though. No reason to waste your time or mine if it’s not. It’s also the kewlest product I’ve ever sold. If you want to try it I’ll comp you a few books.

Cheers,

Beth
Bkirsch [at] audible.com

Beth,

I think we are more on the same page than I initially thought, fantastic reply. No wonder your affiliates like working with you. Yes, it is business development. I think there have been abuses on both sides that we are reacting to. I have only seen merchant abuses, you probably more affiliate abuses.

I don't have any sites that match your content right now, I would have to build from scratch and that would take more time than I have at the moment. Will keep you in mind however.

James, you must admit that these are not the words of a business parter of yours if you were in their shoes. You would not stand for it

Jeff, I think I didn't clarify enough. Of course I take calls from my merchants, I actually enjoy speaking with them and do what I can for them. But I don't let them dictate to me that I have to do this or that on my site like I am some kind of employee. I definitely consider all requests but since I run verticals and partner with many merchants, I have many options to consider. Maybe I presumed on David's position, but it seemed like he was advocating an affiliate to be at the beck and call of the merchant's every desire. I don't do that and that was what I was trying to communicate.

Maybe I presumed on David's position, but it seemed like he was advocating an affiliate to be at the beck and call of the merchant's every desire. I don't do that and that was what I was trying to communicate.

James, you are stretching part of what I was saying too far. Should you be at your merchants' beck and call and do everything they say? No. But when it comes to their trademarks, do you have a choice? Well, you always have a choice but if you don't do what they request, they will either fire you (if you don't fire them first) or they will ban you from bidding on their trademarks. (Yes, you can argue about volume and that they can't fire you if you have volume but remember that it may be the CEO who wants you fired and not the AM.)

What people seem to miss is that if you abide by a ban on bidding on a merchant's trademarks, <b>you are following exactly what the merchant dictates</b>. My point is that it is better for you to follow what they say in partnership as opposed to the adversarial manner that bans create.

Outside of the trademark issue, I assume that I work more closely with my merchants than you do with yours. As you correctly point out, that is a choice we each must make. However, I am glad to hear that you take their calls... at a minimum.

Beth,
I think we are more on the same page than I initially thought, fantastic reply. No wonder your affiliates like working with you. Yes, it is business development. I think there have been abuses on both sides that we are reacting to. I have only seen merchant abuses, you probably more affiliate abuses.

Thanks for the nice note back.

You might like this blog I wrote. I talked a little bit about it why trust is so very important. http://www.revenews.com/bethkirsch/archives/000117.html#more

I think this whole issue is truly crazy because it doesn't need to be like it is.

And James, didn't we both respond to each other like mature partners? Right? We think we might disagree, but in fact we don't -- we can walk in each other's shoes.



I don't have any sites that match your content right now, I would have to build from scratch and that would take more time than I have at the moment. Will keep you in mind however.

No problem, it's my job to try. :) I figured your answer because I know what industries can give 30 to 50% and it's not a vertical that would complement us.

But, after your two thoughtful posts, I do hope we get to work together at some point.

Maybe I presumed on David's position, but it seemed like he was advocating an affiliate to be at the beck and call of the merchant's every desire. I don't do that and that was what I was trying to communicate.

Let me defend one my friends here and blow his cover a little. David is too modest to give more than his name because his is not looking to promote anything beyond the topic at hand

David is a top affiliate in CJ (with 5 bars) and Linkshare (on their advisory board). He is as tough as anyone and gets what he needs. He was a biz dev guy for a long time for some pretty significant players.

What makes David extraordinary is that he gets treated well because he treats people well. Just like my affiliates respond to me differently because I treat them differently, merchants respond to David differently.

It goes back to the how you want to be treated and trust.

It's just styles. :)

Happy Friday!

Beth

Another affiliate chiming in here:

"Unfortunately, we have also seen a different type of affiliates who are in it only to extract as much revenue from the merchants with no regard for the merchants' businesses."

Never forget that not all merchants are wearing halos and their Sunday best. Some of these poor abused merchants skim (steal) from their affiliates, will knowingly recruit email spammers and more. There are bad apples in *every* bunch.

"For example, the merchant can advertise a generic message, one affiliate can advertise discounts and another can advertise clearance (there are many more that I am sure we can all come up with)."

I don't know any professional affiliate who is going to be micro-managed by a company they promote for. If we wanted that, we'd be in a cubicle somewhere. Basic rules are one thing, but an over the shoulder AM will cause any affiliate worth having to leave the building. And trust me, their competitors will happy to snap them up.

"looking for the search engine spammers and tricksters who's activities do nothing but increase your chances of being banned by search engines"

How do you figure? As long as those merchants aren't linking back to those affiliates, I don't see how this could be an issue.

"They are starting to realize that they can do it themselves for LESS."

Could have fooled me ;). New merchants pop up every day and I couldn't even look at a new program at the moment because I have so many waiting in line to be promoted. And that's not saying something about me specifically. Number one complaint of every professional affiliate I know is a lack of time. That certainly isn't occuring because all of the merchants are beating feet out the door. As a matter of fact, affiliate marketing as a sales vehicle is starting to gain very prominent exposure in magazines like Internet Retailer, etc.

"That is exactly my point. Affiliates should work with the merchants. They should work to promote the merchant's brand the way the merchant wants it promoted. It is all about the merchant."

No, it is far from all about the merchant. I don't know where you're seeing these merchants who think it's all about them. If you become known as a producer (as an affiliate) trust me, it isn't. I certainly don't track down my merchants home phone numbers and beg them to let me switch my links to them. However, I've certainly seen merchants do it to affiliates. If a merchant wants an employee, they can hire one. If they want affiliate partners who can bring in sales they feel their lacking, give us a set of basic rules, support when we need it and let us do what it is we do.

"Because AdSense delivers on the original promise of affiliate marketing"

Maybe I live in a parallel universe. ;) Merchants don't bring in affiliates to put some ads on some content pages. They bring us in to bring in sales, and lots of them. And whose to say those content pages have rank, or targeted traffic?

"providing alot of no risk lead generation"

Exactly. I am putting out the time and monetary efforts. You brought me in to sell. So, let me do it. I'm not saying don't have any rules. But, you certainly are going to respect that I am not your employee. I am a targeted traffic machine. If you want, I'll drive it to you. If not, there is another merchant who will be glad to take the traffic. If you have an issue with something I'm doing, tell me, and we'll get it situated. If you think you are going to run my site, my business and my time - it simply is not going to happen.

I'm sorry, the above was more to do with the comments being made about merchants, affiliates and their relationship that I honestly believe David, from your statements, that you only see one side of.

Now, back to the issue at hand.

"The point of creating an Affilaite program is to diversify your sales/advertising/marketing and focus on the backend aspect of your business."

I can definitely see that point of things. Companies focus on brand and already spend a ton of money on brand. You want affiliates to bring in traffic on fruit and not on Granny Smith Apples.

On the other hand, if your affiliates aren't bidding on your brand, competitors may end up doing so. In that respect, it may be better to compete with people who at least sell your product, even at a lower profit to you than to the competition which equals zero profit for you.

As an affiliate, I don't care either way. As long as you don't prevent me from using your brand on my pages (I do have to sell the stuff and to do that, I have to tell people what is being sold) and possibly achieving natural search results as a byproduct of that, I'll be more than happy to let you buy all the paid advertising on the term.

I am entering the merchant scene myself, so I can say that being an affiliate for so long gives me a certain respect for what it is they do and how valuable they can be that seems to be lost on others.

Also, missed two of the above threads (not sure how) so two additional points:

"what is wrong with Affiliate Marketing and how we can fix it"

I would add "from a merchant's standpoint" to the end of that title. As shown by the threads from the affiliates in this topic, we don't see the same points as being "key issues".

"That is very different from what you guys have been writing. This time you used words like "both" and "together". That's my point."

Sorry, but that isn't what you said either. You said it was all about the merchant. There was certainly no "both" or "together" in that statement. ;)

I find the SEW Forum to be an interesting place.

Just look at the backgrounds of the folks who have posted in this thread.

They seem to be coming from such different perspectives.

That is good for any board and I hope we can keep it up.

It is clear that some people don't seem to know who other people are here.
Just because you have not seen the nic before doesn't necessarily mean they are a newbie at what they do best.

The Brit "humour" does take some understanding.
And the Brit term affiliate "scheme" always rubs me wrong - lol

1. The search engines get money when people click, and more money when there are bidding wars for valuable terms.
2. Trademark terms convert higher because they are what people search for who know what brand they want to buy (= late in the buying cycle)
3. Hence, search engines let anyone bid on trademark terms, with a bare minimum of editorial requirements. PPC is the Wild West in this respect, and governing bodies in the U.S. have not crossed the Mississippi yet.
4. Affiliates look for the path of least resistance, and the path of least resistance is trademark terms. In some cases using a merchant's trademark term is fine, in others it isn't, but in all cases affiliates do it.

This is capitalism, folks, and affiliates are going to do what the law allows them to do. If you have a problem with the current law, change it; otherwise don't berate affiliates because both sides of the aisle are just trying to make a living without breaking the law.

I'll just drop this NEWS ITEM (http://news.com.com/Geico+gets+green+light+to+sue+Google%2C+Overture/2100-1024_3-5345484.html?tag=nefd.lede) in here and lurk to see what happens.

Oh how I have missed MrMackin. Welcome back ;)

Yeah, saw that headline last week and wonder if it would make it to this thread. Honestly though....I thought NFFC would have beat you to it.

Seems like this is the initial domino that if toppled, could bring both engines to their knees.

However, where do the courts draw the line? Selling ads vs. SERPs? Ads sold can be sued because there is money received?

chrisnrae, I appreciate your feedback but not the way you have chosen to twist my words and attribute what others wrote to me. If you want to benefit from what I propose, you are free to. If not, that is OK. I am glad to have feedback from you and others. I'm not going to beat a dead horse and rehash my arguments.

As for the latest topic, it only reinforces what I have proposed. Think about it.

I look forward to meeting any of you at CJU. I'll be easy to find. The burden is on you as none of you have identified yourselves.

On an historical note, the third anniversary of the Playboy case is approaching. It was heard on September 11, 2001. I was on my way downtown to sit in when I heard about the WTC. I assumed that the courts would be locked down so I went to work instead.

Sorry, but I don't feel I twisted any of your words at all. I responded to exact quotes by you and others. You are entitled to your opinions, as am I to mine - and my post gave them. I don't attempt to force my opinions to be fact - though I can see many others refuse to see that a lot of their "facts" are actually opinions.

Yes. I just read the whole thread for the first time. chrisnrae has pretty accurately responded to several of your points.

Very good thread, i've got a few heros in here, and there was me thinking it was prolly just the usual paff we see around ;)

Great stuff, thanks..

Nick

I guess it depends totally on who you are and what you sell. But in my opinion it is kind of weird to tell your affiliates to not use your name. It´s like saying: "It´s ok that you sell my stuff,... but don't tell anyone."

That doesn't make sense.

If you believe in affiliate marketing then you should allow your affiliates to use your name. I can't really see a situation where it would make sense to tell your affiliates to not use your name.

I thought you might find some of these articles from Goyami interesting.


Companies Ask Top Affiliates to Bid on Trademark Keywords (http://www.corante.com/goyami/archives/006156.html)
Commission Junction University Kicks Off (http://www.corante.com/goyami/archives/015665.html)
Trademark Bidding Discussion Continues (http://www.corante.com/goyami/archives/006160.html)


Adam Viener

hmm. this whole thing made me wonder why non of the president candidates register their own name. That way they can stop the other side from using their name in commercials and ads,.. :D

That would actually be a good thing.... Then the candidates can talk about things that really matter in stead of trying to put them selves up by putting the other guy down.

On the same train of thought, trust me on this. If a merchant asks you as a partner not to bid on their trademarked terms respect that request. Man to man, partner to partner, is it too much to ask?

Agreed, if the merchant makes the decision, that is their right. However, they should make an informed decision. The knee jerk reaction of not allowing affiliates to bid on trademarks hasn't worked out so well for some merchants, and many of them have changed their minds.

It seems like in the long term merchants are moving towards a policy of controlled tm bidding in such a way that their partners don't drive up the cost of their own trademark bidding practices.

At the end of the day though, the merchants have the right to do what they want. If they want to kick you out of the program because they don't like the way you dress in the morning, that is their right too.

I am a big proponent of more communication on the issue, and merchants and affiliates working together as partners for a common goal: More revenues for the company and more commissions for the affiliate.

Remember, affiliates are the merchants sales Internet sales force. Where else are you going to find a sales force willing to front most of the advertising costs and take 100% of the risks??

Adam (superaffiliate)

"I am a big proponent of more communication on the issue, and merchants and affiliates working together as partners for a common goal: More revenues for the company and more commissions for the affiliate.

Remember, affiliates are the merchants sales Internet sales force. Where else are you going to find a sales force willing to front most of the advertising costs and take 100% of the risks??"

I totally agree with you and wish more merchants had this attitude. Affiliates ARE our Internet sales force. Many of our existing clients share this attitude. We are lucky in that we attract really high integrity merchants that share our values. But then there are also those clients that have already invested heavily in their own PPC campaigns so you can't blame them either for not wanting the bid wars to start and drive up the bid cost for their own brand name or not wanting to give up the PPC campaigns they are already profiting from. So of course if the merchant has a no PPC policy or certain restrictions then their partners need to abide by the merchant's TOS.

I can totally see both sides of the issue, but since I am so pro affiliate, one of my favorite scenarios is when we get a brand new client that has not done much marketing on their own yet. Then we can typically convince them to give affiliates free reign to market in any *ethical* way that makes sense, including advertising the client's tradename for them.

Linda

"But then there are also those clients that have already invested heavily in their own PPC campaigns so you can't blame them either for not wanting the bid wars to start and drive up the bid cost for their own brand name or not wanting to give up the PPC campaigns they are already profiting from.

I can understand this viewpoint as well, but more and more merchants are finding that they are bidding against their competition. Also, since the merchant can only take up 1 ad spot, the rest of the real estate on the page is wide open to competitors when affiliates are forced out of the game.

The best strategy I have seen is merchants who allow keyword bidding but ask their affiliates not to outbid them for top position. You get the best of both worlds here.

Adam - super affiliate

Hi Adam,

Agreed that's always a good compromise. Of course if the SE could prohibit competitors from using tradenames in ads, then the merchant's ad would be the only PPC ad showing, but that's a whole other subject.

Linda

I can understand this viewpoint as well, but more and more merchants are finding that they are bidding against their competition. Also, since the merchant can only take up 1 ad spot, the rest of the real estate on the page is wide open to competitors when affiliates are forced out of the game.

The best strategy I have seen is merchants who allow keyword bidding but ask their affiliates not to outbid them for top position. You get the best of both worlds here.

Adam - super affiliate

Wow, I have not been on this thread in a while and it's still going.

I want to reinforce Adam's statement. We cut brand bidding by affiliates and then reexamined that policy. Now we allow two very trusted affiliates to bid on our brand but not out bid us.

I think the best example of this is NetFlix, their competitors and their competitors affiliates bid on their brand why should they stop some of their affiliates. Check out this link.

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=netflix

This is what David Lewis was talking about a few pages back. I know about 15 merchants that are now using this approach.

We'll see what happens with the Geico case, but until then I more and more merchants are starting to think this way.

If I was an affiliate I would be thinking how to score one of these spots with a merchant. And we all know, there is serious money to be made leveraging a strong brand in search.

Cheers,

Beth

Hi Adam,

Agreed that's always a good compromise. Of course if the SE could prohibit competitors from using tradenames in ads, then the merchant's ad would be the only PPC ad showing, but that's a whole other subject.

Linda

Linda,

I have to say, based on the recent lawsuit activity, I think it's a smarter decision for Google to not get in the position of being the cop. I think their past actions in this area have put them in a rough position.

Do you ever feel it's weird that merchants give affiliates all sorts of banners that all include the companies trademarks, but then don't want them to use the marks to market their company on the engines. I actually had some from a major retailer suggest we should market their gift cards online without using their brand in the ads. Maybe I could just run an ad for Gift Cards and see what happens...

Adam

But then there are also those clients that have already invested heavily in their own PPC campaigns so you can't blame them either for not wanting the bid wars to start and drive up the bid cost for their own brand name or not wanting to give up the PPC campaigns they are already profiting from. That is a good point, but if a company is using the exact same sales channels as its affiliates then it is like they are their own affiliate and one of the reasons that affiliate marketing works is because there is competition between the affiliates. So it kind of doesn't make sense to be using the same sales channels as the affiliates.

A possible solution would be to move away from PPC and leave that to the affiliates. In stead spend the money that was for PPC on other Marketing Channels that are less likely to be used by the affiliates. A good example is the use of text links. High quality text links can have a huge effect on sales, both through the visitors they bring and the positive effect they can have on positions in the search engines.

Of course this depends on how many affiliates you have, but if you have enough of them, and they bring in a substancial amount of sales, you may want to investigate other marketing channels.

A possible solution would be to move away from PPC

I think PPC can be benefitial for both the affiliate and the merchant. There are A LOT of keyword combinations out there and the merchant can usually only take up one ad spot on their own. Also, since the merchant is making 100% of the profit from their own ads, they can typically afford to bid on the highly competitive keyword phrases that affililiates making 10-20% typically have to stay away from or bid very low on.

Adam Viener
imwave.com
Super Affiliate

I think PPC can be benefitial for both the affiliate and the merchant. There are A LOT of keyword combinations out there and the merchant can usually only take up one ad spot on their own. Also, since the merchant is making 100% of the profit from their own ads, they can typically afford to bid on the highly competitive keyword phrases that affililiates making 10-20% typically have to stay away from or bid very low on.

Adam Viener
imwave.com
Super Affiliate

You are assuming that the merchant makes 80 to 90%,.. But this is not true. The real profits per product for the merchant can actually be lower than for the affiliate. What makes them more money is that they sell a lot more than 1 affiliate.

If they spend a lot of money in PPC, then the cost per sale could actually be higher than when an affiliate brings in a sale. I would suspect that for many merchants this is actually the case.

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