affiliate networks

Networks and Marketers May Profit From Google Affiliate Network Shutdown.

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Google's exit could be good news for competitive affiliate networks and affiliate program management companies.

The closure of Google Affiliate Network (GAN) will create a lot of work for affiliate marketers. But Google's exit is good news for competitive affiliate networks and affiliate program management companies, which have leapt to snap up the business dropped by Googliath. Ultimately, getting kicked off GAN may be better for affiliates, too.

The Google Affiliate Network let advertisers buy and track affiliate ads on a cost-per-conversion basis. Publishers could quickly post the ads and get paid via AdSense when a user clicked through and converted. On Tuesday, Google announced it would wind down the network over the next few months. In a blog post, J.J. Hirschle, head of Google Affiliate Network, cited the rapid evolution of CPA advertising and said the company would focus on newer CPA tools like Product Listing Ads, remarketing, and Conversion Optimizer. Google did not make an executive available for comment.

Businesses that depend on affiliates to drive traffic and sales will need to first find a new network to manage their accounts and then notify affiliates of the new network, so that affiliates can sign up. Affiliates, for their part, will need to keep track of where their merchants have moved, sign up, and then replace all the affiliate links in their sites.

Says Tricia Meyer, who operates 12 affiliate sites including SunshineRewards.com, and averages $25 million in annual sales, says that while larger affiliate sites may be run off a database and need to replace a single link per merchant in that database, "If you're a blogger, every time you write a blog post about a merchant, you pull a link from Google. So you might have to replace every link in five years of blog posts."

Acceleration Partners is one of the many affiliate program management companies that has offered free evaluations and help in migrating from GAN. "A lot of people want to look at their programs, but it's a lot of work to change. It's a good time [for a merchant] to look at the whole affiliate program, like clearing house before you move," says Bob Glazer, co-founder and managing director. "Google is encouraging everyone to get off the network quickly, and we think we'll benefit from people seeking strategic advice."

GAN was likely not a priority for Google, according to Glazer. "It was something they inherited through their acquisition of DoubleClick, and it doesn't fit into their model," he says.

A June 2012 report by Forrester for affiliate marketing platform Rakuten LinkShare found that affiliates are profitable for advertisers, drawing new customers, often triggering reconsideration and closing the sale. Moreover, affiliates attract consumers who tend to spend more than the average online shopper.

By 2016, affiliate marketing will represent slightly less than 16 percent of the total spent on paid search, Forrester said, while total affiliate spending will reach $4,474 million that year.

More important was channel conflict, as Google began to compete directly with affiliate marketers via its product listings, which usually appear at the top of product search results.

Glazer said that many in the affiliate marketing industry still need to fear Google, despite its shutdown of GAN."What is Google's take on affiliate marketing?" he asks. "Will they make it harder for other people to operate in it? Some fear they will potentially impose their will to make it easier to do advertising directly with Google. With Google getting out of conflict of interest with the affiliate industry, they may be looking to direct more advertising dollars to their other platforms."

Google Product Listings not only compete with affiliate marketers, they will continue to take a bite out of affiliates' profits, says Meyer. But those who suffer worst will be those who relied on Google for their traffic. "It depends on how you do your own marketing," Meyer says. Affiliates with loyalists who come to them directly, and those who market directly to those loyalists via email, Facebook, and other channels will likely see little effect, she thinks. "But if you rely on search engines to drive affiliate traffic, you will be hurt by it."

In fact, Meyer says, the closing of the Google Affiliate Network could be the best thing that happened to the latter group. They may have begun with GAN because it's a well-known brand and never looked at the offerings of other affiliate networks that have more robust technologies, will bells and whistles like widgets and pay-per-call.

"When these merchants actually start looking at different networks," Meyer says, "they'll realize that they're getting networks that are actually better. They think Google does everything right, but it didn't do affiliate marketing that well."

Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is a type of performance-based marketing in which a business rewards one or more affiliates for each visitor or customer brought about by the affiliate's own marketing efforts. The industry has four core players: the merchant (also known as 'retailer' or 'brand'), the network (that contains offers for the affiliate to choose from and also takes care of the payments), the publisher (also known as 'the affiliate'), and the customer. The market has grown in complexity to warrant a secondary tier of players, including affiliate management agencies, super-affiliates and specialized third party vendors.

Affiliate marketing overlaps with other Internet marketing methods to some degree, because affiliates often use regular advertising methods. Those methods include organic search engine optimization (SEO), paid search engine marketing (PPC - Pay Per Click), e-mail marketing, and in some sense display advertising. On the other hand, affiliates sometimes use less orthodox techniques, such as publishing fake reviews of products or services offered by a partner.

Affiliate marketing is commonly confused with referral marketing, as both forms of marketing use third parties to drive sales to the retailer.^[1] However, both are distinct forms of marketing and the main difference between them is that affiliate marketing relies purely on financial motivations to drive sales while referral marketing relies on trust and personal relationships to drive sales.^[1]

Affiliate marketing is frequently overlooked by advertisers.^[2] While search engines, e-mail, and website syndication capture much of the attention of online retailers, affiliate marketing carries a much lower profile. Still, affiliates continue to play a significant role in e-retailers' marketing strategies.

Every day is different

Every day is different -- not to mention every hour. The old complaint that we often have is that life is at a standstill. That promotion you wanted, the change that you wanted to happen, never seems to happen. You are waiting for something to happen, perhaps for your opportunity to fall in your lap. The thing is that, if you notice it or not, the world is changing, and changing constantly. If you have any doubt, just ask Claude Monet.

A book can be written on Monet. Well, several have been written. Here I will not attempt to dive deeply into all the different aspects of Monet's life and work. Monet is perhaps one of the most loved artists today. It wasn't always like that. He was often made fun of and insulted. At the time his art was considered a real insult to the critics and traditional artists.

The constant change that Claude noticed all had to do with the light. Claude was obsessed with light and color. He delighted on how the colors changed when the different hours of the day would create a different image, all depending on the light. This might seem a simple enough idea, but just look at how often we ignore our surroundings. Since we are born, we notice the light, the contrasts it makes, and the shadows it creates. We were thrilled with the light and the games it played. As we got older the contrasts and the shadows became less interesting because we grew accustomed to them. Next time you're around an infant watch where the baby looks. When not looking at a loved one, the infant will often look at the light and shadows.

So while we might ignore these changes once we grow older, Monet embraced them. When looking at Monet's body of work, and a large one it is, you notice that he painted the same scene over and over again. The location might have been the same, but what he painted each time was very different. Monet noticed how the light changed during the day and created different colors and shapes in otherwise the same exact location and place. His focus on nature, colors and shadows reminds us of the true beauty of the everyday we ignore. Perhaps this is why he is so loved and admired today.

Monet was constantly told how to paint and what subjects he should paint. The themes he was told to paint were basically patriotic and idealistic. He was to paint like the old masters, and he was enrolled in a studio in Paris. He was taught under Charles Gleyre, a known painter who taught and emphasized the traditional ways. If you did not paint like the old masters, you were not a real artist. If you challenged the rules, you would not get accepted by the Salon. The Salon, the big boys controlled the art world in France. This was the basic tone of art in France during Monet's early life.

Monet tried to listen to Charles for a short time, but his ideals conflicted too much with Charles' and the Salon as a whole. He was interested in nature and he wanted to paint outside. He left Gleyre's studio and decided to explore the outdoors himself. He looked around -- and I mean really looked around. He noticed that the trees were not really just green, but many different colors. He also concentrated on how the light changed the colors and the look of his surroundings. To further emphasize his vision he would often sit at the same location painting the same scene during different times of the day. It is when you look at these works side by side that you really learn to appreciate how dramatic the changes are when the light changes. After time, people understood the beauty of Monet's work. He was not interested in techniques but color and light.

I often have very little patience and find myself never being able to replicate what Monet had done -- to sit in a location and paint the same scene over and over, with the different lights. Maybe it is all that TV watching, and wanting to be entertained. It was very difficult for me to continue this project. When trying this I notice that Monet had to paint rather quickly, because of his rough, unfinished style. I tried to focus on the colors and the light. I once heard that squinting helps one see the true colors and not the colors that we might have in our head because of association. The world was a different place for me that day. I never noticed how much the light influenced our world. It's often something we ignore in our busy lives.

Monet can teach us many things, but one of the most important is how light is ever-changing. Light is what changes our world. So the next time you think nothing is going on or you're just waiting for something to happen, take a look around and really look. You will see that every hour has a new tale to tell. Just maybe then you will stop waiting, and take action in our ever-changing world.

Every day is different

Every day is different -- not to mention every hour. The old complaint that we often have is that life is at a standstill. That promotion you wanted, the change that you wanted to happen, never seems to happen. You are waiting for something to happen, perhaps for your opportunity to fall in your lap. The thing is that, if you notice it or not, the world is changing, and changing constantly. If you have any doubt, just ask Claude Monet.

A book can be written on Monet. Well, several have been written. Here I will not attempt to dive deeply into all the different aspects of Monet's life and work. Monet is perhaps one of the most loved artists today. It wasn't always like that. He was often made fun of and insulted. At the time his art was considered a real insult to the critics and traditional artists.

The constant change that Claude noticed all had to do with the light. Claude was obsessed with light and color. He delighted on how the colors changed when the different hours of the day would create a different image, all depending on the light. This might seem a simple enough idea, but just look at how often we ignore our surroundings. Since we are born, we notice the light, the contrasts it makes, and the shadows it creates. We were thrilled with the light and the games it played. As we got older the contrasts and the shadows became less interesting because we grew accustomed to them. Next time you're around an infant watch where the baby looks. When not looking at a loved one, the infant will often look at the light and shadows.

So while we might ignore these changes once we grow older, Monet embraced them. When looking at Monet's body of work, and a large one it is, you notice that he painted the same scene over and over again. The location might have been the same, but what he painted each time was very different. Monet noticed how the light changed during the day and created different colors and shapes in otherwise the same exact location and place. His focus on nature, colors and shadows reminds us of the true beauty of the everyday we ignore. Perhaps this is why he is so loved and admired today.

Monet was constantly told how to paint and what subjects he should paint. The themes he was told to paint were basically patriotic and idealistic. He was to paint like the old masters, and he was enrolled in a studio in Paris. He was taught under Charles Gleyre, a known painter who taught and emphasized the traditional ways. If you did not paint like the old masters, you were not a real artist. If you challenged the rules, you would not get accepted by the Salon. The Salon, the big boys controlled the art world in France. This was the basic tone of art in France during Monet's early life.

Monet tried to listen to Charles for a short time, but his ideals conflicted too much with Charles' and the Salon as a whole. He was interested in nature and he wanted to paint outside. He left Gleyre's studio and decided to explore the outdoors himself. He looked around -- and I mean really looked around. He noticed that the trees were not really just green, but many different colors. He also concentrated on how the light changed the colors and the look of his surroundings. To further emphasize his vision he would often sit at the same location painting the same scene during different times of the day. It is when you look at these works side by side that you really learn to appreciate how dramatic the changes are when the light changes. After time, people understood the beauty of Monet's work. He was not interested in techniques but color and light.

I often have very little patience and find myself never being able to replicate what Monet had done -- to sit in a location and paint the same scene over and over, with the different lights. Maybe it is all that TV watching, and wanting to be entertained. It was very difficult for me to continue this project. When trying this I notice that Monet had to paint rather quickly, because of his rough, unfinished style. I tried to focus on the colors and the light. I once heard that squinting helps one see the true colors and not the colors that we might have in our head because of association. The world was a different place for me that day. I never noticed how much the light influenced our world. It's often something we ignore in our busy lives.

Monet can teach us many things, but one of the most important is how light is ever-changing. Light is what changes our world. So the next time you think nothing is going on or you're just waiting for something to happen, take a look around and really look. You will see that every hour has a new tale to tell. Just maybe then you will stop waiting, and take action in our ever-changing world.