The commandments of Being a good AM

I just read a post here that gives a great explination of what i think to be the unwritten rules of affiliate management.

My favorite is #3 and i can’t stress this enough to any other affiliate manager in the business.

“3) Thou shall know what the hell you are talking about

I don’t care if you’ve been in the affiliate game for 1 month or 6 years.  KNOW WHAT THE HELL YOUR TALKING ABOUT.  I’ve had affiliate managers who don’t know what a scrub is (they had to check with their manager).  I’ve had affiliate managers who don’t know the difference between traffic sources.  I’ve had affiliate managers who can’t tie their own shoelaces.  Figure out what you are doing and learn about your industry before you make a fool of yourself. “

you can read the full post here

SOLD OUT! But try this instead…

Have you ever been our shopping for a certain product only to find the shelf empty with what you were looking for? After looking around for the product and not finding what you wanted, you start to look for quick alternatives. The product right next to your empty shelf might be just the same thing with a different logo. If the price isn’t extraordinarily higher than compared to the original price of your once sought out product I’m sure consideration for this new purchase might be in order.

This correlates DIRECTLY into affiliate marketing and what is called herding. A study, recently taken, shows that people are more likely to purchase something knowing that their original intended purchase is no longer available to them.

Read more on the study taken, here

Scarcity can be a very effective marketing tool as long as it’s used properly and in moderation. Try to implement this slowly in your campaigns and see if there’s any effect on conversions. But proceed with caution, you don’t want to overuse the scarcity tactic too much or it won’t have the full effect of your initial intentions.

Introduction to your goals!

“Before you begin a thing, remind yourself that difficulties and delays quite impossible to foresee are ahead. If you could see them clearly, naturally you could do a great deal to get rid of them but you can’t. You can only see one thing clearly and that is your goal. Form a mental vision of that and cling to it through thick and thin.” – Kathleen Norris

So everyday we wake up and get to the grind (except for some of us on Sundays who have cocktail flu) but that’s a different story. We hit the road on projects we’ve either started or need to get started. Think about the goals you’ve set for yourself. Is it turn for you to accomplish a daily or weekly goal? Or is it time for you to get working on that long term year end goal?

Having a goal can make a persons drive THAT much stronger. In order to continue growth as an individual, there must be something you’ve wanted to get accomplished or want to get started.

This follows affiliate marketing very much in the sense that if your goals aren’t set in perspective then you’ll never amount to much. Try panning out a goal for the month. you’d be surprised how much you’ll get accomplished in a few months time.

Dealing with competition

Mostly everyone in any business has competition. Whether it’s another business, individual or personal, competition will always surround you. The thing you have to keep in mind is how to best handle competition.

Business competition- In any industry there’s always business competition. Microsoft/Apple, Dell/HP, Sony/Samsung etc. One thing I like to do with my ‘business competition’ is research. Whose got what and how much are they giving it out for. Now as an affiliate manager, it’s my job to know who’s giving the best campaign for the top payout. There might be other networks out there that don’t have a clue on what payout they need to give an affiliate to make the offer back-out. There are also networks out there that give the highest payout possible in order to draw in affiliates. The key is finding the medium that keeps everyone afloat. If everyone’s happy, then there’s progression. If not, you’ll find that relationship doesn’t last long.

Individual competition- This relates more to our industry and our affiliates. Affiliates are always competing with one another. Whether it’s a keyword, a keyword list, a specific niche or if the competition is just simply trying to earn more money than the other. What you have to think in this case is that there’s more money out there than anything. There’s ways to get better keyword structure. And there’s always a niche that’s hardly touched that no one knows about. Keep these things in mind when, if at all, worried about your individual competition. You know you’re the best at what you do, that’s why you do it. Don’t second guess yourself, it will only help your competition get ahead.

Personal competition- This is going to be your worst nightmare if not handled properly. Some things that might be personal competition would be time investment. What should you put time into versus what do you put your time into. Everyone has things they want to do, but they also have things the need to do. In order to stay off tangent in completing things try a little to-do list. Check things off as you complete them and rest assure, when time comes to launch that campaign, so long as your check boxes are marked, you’ll be ready to go, and you’ll have the confidence in knowing that you’ve won over your own personal competition.

Although some may see this as business competition as well the best way I can describe having individual competition is to think of selling your car. How the mileage, interior, exterior, does it drive well, are there any dings in the body, etc? Basically, is the next person who looks at your car going to want to buy it? Relating to our industry; Does your landing page look proper, how’s your keyword list (is it cleaned up/related), Is your ad copy sharp, how’s the ‘mileage’ for your site, etc? Is the next person that comes to your site going to buy whatever it is you’re putting in the window?

In the internet industry, it’s a little different in the sense that most of the competition is fairly negotiable. Sure there might be four affiliate networks that have the same offer, but ask yourself; what makes this network different than the others. How’s their response time, payout terms, communication. These are all things I pride myself on and they’re what make me different and better than most others.

Losing Touch

Sometimes there are things that keep us distracted from what we’re intentionally trying to either finish or progress on. What I find myself doing sometimes is getting tangible with my tasks. Doing one thing on my sites sometimes I run into a problem where I stumble upon three or five other things that I find I want to do to my site. Although getting tangible on your mission is fine, keep in mind the original motivation should never be overshadowed.

When setting up multiple campaigns, make sure, even when distracted, that your site or landing page doesn’t lose its integrity. I’ve seen many people get so distracted from their original tasks that they lose focus and end up running a shotty campaign.

Just make sure you stay focused on your main objective. Take notes of any sites you stumbled on and go back to them later. Finish the one project/campaign and then move on to the next. You’ll not only be more productive, but your days will go by so much quicker having ‘more’ to do.

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