My Space Sues Ad and Affiliate Networks
The BIG talk in the world of affiliate marketing over the last couple of days is that MySpace has filed a lawsuit against Scott Richter of of Media Breakaway, LLC /CPAEmpire.com for violating CAN-SPAM by arranging for millions of spam “bulletins” to be sent from MySpace users’ accounts without their knowledge.
Although the PDF of the court documents that Jon at Wicked Fire posted today only names Richter and 2 other individuals, Jon claims that MySpace is suing 20 ad and affiliate networks for 500 million dollars.
Whether it’s one affiliate network or twenty, Linda Buquet over at 5StarAffiliatePrograms sums it up best:
“I’ve warned lots of affiliates that ask on forums “which networks allow you to market on MySpace” that regardless of the network’s rules MySpace is cracking down - don’t go there. If some of those networks go down they probably won’t be able to pay all those spamming affiliates that thought they were gaming the system.”
Exactly! And sadly, they won’t be able to pay the non-spamming affiliates either.
Popularity: 3% [?]
Your Thoughts on the Summit?
Did you go to Affiliate Summit 07 West in Vegas? What did you think?
- Did you have a full or limited conference pass?
- From which presentation did you learn the most?
- Which was more valuable to you? The presentations or the networking?
- What were your best take-aways?
- Would you recommend the Affiliate Summit to others? If so, what type of marketer do you think would benefit most? Newbies or advanced affiliates? Merchants? Managers?
Please share your thoughts…
Popularity: 6% [?]
How to Choose the Right Affiliate Programs
Affiliate Classroom Magazine has chosen to focus on “affiliate marketing fundamentals” during 2007. So it’s no wonder the January issue is all about choosing the good programs and reputable merchants.
The cover story is a nice introduction to merchant selection written from an affiliate’s perspective, and includes practical tips for analyzing program performance and checking cookies - as well as finding out how other affiliates feel about the program.
If you’re an international affiliate, there’s also an an entire article on how you can find and promote good affliate programs . The advice comes straight from the mouth of an affiliate living and working in Hungary, and includes tips for how to increase conversions from international buyers.
Finally, did you know Affiliate Classroom Magazine’s Product of the Year Award is the tool I turn to every time I start a new site? It’s not only the most powerful affiliate marketing weapon today… it’s also free!
Right-Click here to download and save your copy of the Affiliate Classroom magazine now.
Popularity: 4% [?]
Got a Credit Repair Site?
CREDIT REPAIR FOR DUMMIES! is the latest offer from ROIRocket that should do well for affiliates with financial, credit card or credit repair sites.
ROI Rocket Affiliates get $17.00 CPA per sign up. There’s a 14-day free trial period and conversion happens when user gives cc# for shipping and handling for $1.97.
The banner creative could be better, but the copy should work well for you… “Stop letting the Credit Bureaus control your life! With our FREE Credit Repair Kit you can take back up to $120,000 of your own money and start the life you deserve!”
Happy Promoting!
Popularity: 2% [?]
Affiliate Summit West Overview
Finally back in the home office again after 13.5 hours of travel from the Affiliate Summit West in Las Vegas and a desperately needed good night’s sleep. 
Affiliate Summit has grown considerably in size and scope, boasting 2,000 attendees, 83 exhibitors, 26 classroom sessions and rotating roundtables, as well as fun events such as oneNetworkDirect and Wynn Las Vegas party that was held at the TRYST nightclub at the Wynn.
During the party, the Pinnacle Awards Show took place and six awards were presented to outstanding affiliate marketers. The winners were:
- Affiliate of the Year: Scott Hazard
- Affiliate Manager of the Year: Angel Djambazov
- Exceptional Merchant: Amazon.com
- Affiliate Marketing Advocate Award: Brian Littleton of ShareaSale (should gotten a best network award too!)
- Best Blogger: Jim Kukral
- Wayne Porter Affiliate Marketing Legend: Todd Crawford
In addition to points picked up at classroom sessions, outside networking is the point of the Summit for many. Included below is a pic of one such session that happened on Tuesday afternoon. From left to right: Michael Sperber (T3Report), Raja (HyperMedia), Rosalind Gardner (Super Affiliate Handbook), Matt Frary (ROI Rocket), Colin McDougall (VEOReport) and Michael Stark (Post Your Property).
Affiliate Summit 2007 East will be at the Intercontinental Hotel in Miami from July 8th through the 10th.
P.S. I’ll be posting some of my better takeaways from the Affiliate Summit over the next couple of days.
P.P.S. My apologies if you posted a Shout Out! for me and I didn’t get back to you. I’ll be doing follow-up calls today and tomorrow.
Popularity: 10% [?]
Online Dating Site Owner Arrested for Spamming
As reported in a January 18th Sophos press release, the owner of a Japanese online dating site has been arrested for sending 5.4 billion emails to promote the website.
“Japanese authorities arrested 47-year-old Yoshimitsu Hirono, president of Tokyo-based dating website Takumi Tsushin, along with three other suspects. Approximately 90 million spam emails a day are said to have been sent promoting the site over a two month period” and according to reports, the four men have admitted the allegations against them.
Hirono and the other men are said to have remotely used a bank of 128 computers located in China’s Heilongjiang province in order to send the spam messages.
Ros comments: Hmmm… wouldn’t that be a great list to have to promote Asia FriendFinder?
But as Mr. Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos, said, “Companies need to know that by spamming they could find themselves drawing attention from the international law enforcement agencies, and end up with a unpleasant date in court.”
Unpleasant indeed. Think ‘jail’ the next time you’re feeling inclined to move away from your honest efforts to build a list.
Popularity: 5% [?]
Airport Security Killed My VAIO!
Man, was I choked when I realized that the airport security staff at Toronto International airport broke my Sony VAIO laptop when we were returning home after Christmas. Here’s what happened…
At the xray, I’d placed my winter coat and purse into one tray and my laptop in another. When I remembered that I would also have to put my suit jacket through the xray there were no more trays available, so I placed the jacket under the laptop.
BIG mistake! Read more
Popularity: 7% [?]
10 Video Upload Sites
Making your own videos? Here are a few sites where you can gain some exposure for your work.
- ClipShack - Upload limit is 100 MB per member.
- EyeSpot - 25MB filesize limit.
- Flurl.com
- Google Video - Unlimited number of uploads. NO size or length limitations.
- Putfile.com - Unlimited number of videos, up to 25MB in size.
- Sharkle Upload limit is 40 MB.
- Streamload.com
- Vimeo Weekly limit of 20 MB.
- YouTube.com - Maximum 100MB and 10 minutes in length per video. Unlimited uploads.
- Zippyvideos.com - Unlimited number of video file uploads up to 25MB in size.
Click here to learn how to make your own videos.
Popularity: 27% [?]
How to Embed Video into Your Website
Here’s an easy way to make the search engines love your site.
Adding video to your site or blog increases the amount of time that visitors spend on your site. The more time they spend, the ’stickier’ your site appears, and ’sticky’ sites enjoy higher search engine rankings.
The easiest way to put video on your site is to embed code from a video that you found on YouTube, Google Video or other video-sharing site. The video is served by YouTube, so you save bandwidth on your server.
Regardless of your niche, you should be able to find relevant content on any of the major video-sharing sites that will be of interest to your visitors that you can post to your affiliate sites.
For example, to entertain my visitors at Sage-Hearts.com, I posted a very cute animated proposal video that I found on YouTube to my online dating blog.
Find out how easy this is to do by watching my own short video “How to Post a YouTube Video to Your Blog“, which is served by Google Video. Read more
Popularity: 19% [?]
Dell Sues Affiliates
Dell affiliates Alf Temme, Lars Crispin Temme and Kim Temme are in big ka-ka for profiting from the avails of typosquatting.
The typosquatters registered d3ell.com, de3LL.com, d4ell.com, de4ll.com, dedll.com, derll.com and dxell.com, all of which redirected visitors to Dell.com through their affiliate links.
Dell has taken legal action on the basis of trademark infringement and wants the the defendants to hand over the domain names, and to pay legal fees and damages.
I dunno, but the terms and conditions of Dell’s affiliate program at Linkshare are pretty darned clear and posted right there on the front page … Read more
Popularity: 7% [?]
