Oliver Roup, Founder & CEO, VigLink

One morning this past November, as my team was reviewing highlights from the previous days’ customer metrics, something caught our eye: a purchase for $58,000.  After a few minutes of digging, we found that on an evening earlier in the week, an individual browsing an automotive site had come across a post that discussed a particular pontoon boat — complete with floating bar and tiki torches.  The visitor had clicked the link the site owner provided and ultimately purchased the item for a hefty $58,000.

We know that links within content have an intrinsic value, particularly from an SEO perspective.  They convey authority, build relationships, and generate traffic.  But, we often don’t pay enough attention to the revenue opportunity they present.  In the case of the automotive site owner, he generated tens of thousands of dollars in revenue for an online merchant.  In return (he was monetizing his content’s outbound links using VigLink), he saw his revenue on a per-click basis triple post-sale, soaring to over $1.20 per click.  And while a $58,000 purchase is certainly substantial, it isn’t as uncommon as one might think; we regularly see publishers generating sales for computers, cars, and pricey collector items from $1k to $100k+.

It begs the question: if a single link can generate tens of thousands of dollars in business, why aren’t we giving more thought to the links we include on our sites? We obviously want to maximize a reader’s time on our site, and for links to enhance a reader’s experience, but why can’t they also be sensibly integrated into a broader monetization strategy?

Here are three areas publishers can invest their time in order to get more out of the hyperlinks they include on their site.

Tracking Outbound Links

The first step to incorporating outbound links into your monetization strategy is to understand where you are sending traffic. And what value is created after a reader leaves your site.

Omniture (paid) and Google Analytics (free — but requires a modification to the standard Analytics code you add to your site) both offer tools to help you understand what happens when a reader leaves your site.

Practicing “Sensible” Linking

Think before you link.  Once you know where your readers are going when they leave your site (and even better, what they are doing), you are in a much better decision to decide what words to link and where to link them to.

A couple examples of what I mean by this:

• If traffic sent to a particular retailer produces more actions (e.g. sales) than a comparable retailer, focus links on the former.
• Links that never get clicked are just noise. Replace them with alternative text or remove them altogether and focus on adding links to other areas of the page.

When in Doubt, Link

It’s time consuming to determine what pieces of content on your site would benefit from an added link, but it’s well worth it.  When speaking with publishers, I recommend that they air on the side of generosity when linking.  If content references a product, service or brand, always include a link. And similarly, look for areas that indirectly reference these same products and consider weaving sensible links into those sections as well.

As long as you are careful not to rely on a link insertion service that adds only tangentially related links (which can negatively impact user experience), you’ll rarely encounter a reader that is turned-off by an additional link.

What’s Next for the Hyperlink?

In the near future, I wouldn’t be surprised to see links within content go the way of banner advertisements, with links being dynamically selected based on reader behavior and advertiser preferences. In the long-run, the shift will be a win for readers (fewer irrelevant links), advertisers (who will enjoy better targeting), and publishers (who will have better content and see a new revenue stream from their content). But first, publishers must realize the value they are creating with each hyperlink they add to their site.

About Oliver Roup

Shawn Collins and I will be sponsoring up to 8 merchants at Affiliate Summit East 2012, providing them with free tradeshow space in the Exhibit Hall or Meet Market, as part of our new “Pay it Forward Merchant Endowment” Program.

The goal of the endowment is to make the tradeshow networking experience of Affiliate Summit available to merchants who might not otherwise be able to exhibit.

Each recipient of the Pay it Forward Merchant Endowment be awarded their choice of one (1) 8×10 booth package (non corner), valued at $6,825 or a Meet Market with Platinum Pass package, valued at $5,295. For more information on these packages please visit: http://www.affiliatesummit.com/12e-exhibitors/.

Endowments are limited to U.S. based Merchants with active affiliate programs. Applicants will be considered based on current participation in; and future contribution to the affiliate marketing industry.

All applicants must answer ONE of these questions in essay form in 300 words or less:

1. What is a problem in affiliate marketing and how do you propose it be fixed?

2. What are the top two unique value propositions for affiliates in your affiliate program?

All applications will be reviewed by the Affiliate Summit Advisory Board and winners of the scholarships will be notified by Friday, March 9, 2012.

To be considered for a Pay It Forward Scholarship, please complete the online application. The deadline for submission is Wednesday, February 29, 2012.

Good luck!

The next Orlando Affiliate Summit Meetup Group has been scheduled for Tuesday, January 31st at 6:00pm at Mucho Tequila & Tacos

Agenda:

6:00pm-6:30pm: Announcements and Housekeeping
6:30pm-7:30pm: Session:
7:30pm-9:00pm: Q&A and Open Networking

Milan Jara of DecorativeCeilingTiles.net

Session details: Milan will share his inspirational story of how he went from installer to online marketer. What tools helped him along the way, how outsourcing increased his revenue and some nice pictures of where he works around the world from his laptop.

If you would like to present on a topic in the future, please contact Missy at orlando@affiliatesummit.com.

****************************************************

RSVP on Facebook or RSVP on Meetup.com

And don’t forget to join the Affiliate Summit Orlando Meetup Group and follow us twitter.com/otownaffiliates at  to stay on top of our local events.

Jeremy Schoemaker delivered a keynote address at Affiliate Summit West 2012 on Tuesday, January 10, 2012.

He was informative and entertaining at the same time.

More about Jeremy Schoemaker:

Jeremy’s skills have led him on a wild ride swinging from unemployment to an 8 figure income in only a few years.

Jeremy “Shoemoney” Schoemaker is one of the most successful internet marketers of our time. He has proven his skills online in the PPC community, time and again in affiliate marketing, and is legendary for his $133,000 Google AdSense check.

In 2007 Jeremy launched the AuctionAds advertising network and added more than 25,000 affiliates in a mere 4 months of operation who generated millions a month in revenue. Whether its his blog or any of his companies

ShoeMoney has proven that he has the dedication, drive, and at times the audacity to get the job done.

More details on Affiliate Summit at http://www.affiliatesummit.com/.

Video: Jeremy Schoemaker Keynote at Affiliate Summit West 2012

Didn’t get to Affiliate Summit West 2012? Here’s a video of Eric Thomas (The Hip Hop Preacher) Keynote. If this doesn’t motivate you, you should make sure you have a pulse

YouTube sensation Eric Thomas has taken the attention of students, athletes, educators and corporate execs of all ages, interests, and backgrounds hostage with his energetic and heartfelt messages of hope, persistence, and moving beyond your circumstances.

The Detroit native’s understanding of the importance of education and the obstacles that hinder its pursuit remains unparalleled by colleagues in his field and enables him to connect with his audience on a more intimate level.

Eric grew up in an environment that worked to challenge his educational and social beliefs and was forced to learn to cope and manage the stressors of life without the guidance or counsel of his biological father.

Having followed the generational path of high school drop outs in his own family, Eric transitioned from being hopeless and homeless to being an iconic figure of the process of success and the determination it takes to obtain it.

He has committed his life to speaking across the country to enlighten others of the importance of education, the access it provides, and the way to the American dream.

The sixth annual Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards were presented on Tuesday, January 10, 2012 at Affiliate Summit West 2012, which took place at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas.

The Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards are affiliate marketing’s most prestigious, competitive honor for the leaders in the space. Award winners are recognized because they are innovative leaders with vision and influence.

Below are the finalists for the Pinnacle Awards at Affiliate Summit West 2012 and the winners are in bold:

Affiliate of the Year

• CouponCabin
• Tricia Meyer
• Eric Nagel

Affiliate Manager of the Year

• Carolyn Kmet
• Amy Miller
• Kim Salvino

Exceptional Merchant

• Amazon
• Overstock
• Tiny Prints

Affiliate Marketing Advocate

• Brian Littleton
• Rebecca Madigan
• Tim Storm

Best Blogger

• Mr. Green
• Sam Harrelson
• Tricia Meyer

Affiliate Marketing Legend

• Kim Rowley
• Brad Waller
• Adam Weiss

Video: Affiliate Summit West 2011 Pinnacle Awards

There are a lot of evening networking opportunities taking place during Affiliate Summit West 2012. Below is a listing of the parties during the conference.

Please note: As some of the parties are “by invitation only”, we suggest you contact the company directly for more information.

Friday, January 6, 2012

Friday ASW Drinks in Vegas!

• Sponsor(s): No sponsors – just turn up and buy your own drink!
• Time: 6:00pm – 10:00pm
• Location: Galleria Bar in Ceasar’s Palace
• How to RSVP: RSVP at http://www.facebook.com/events/285348488179825/.
• Who is invited?: Everyone.

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Affiliate Summit West 2012 Tweetup at Gilley’s

• Sponsor(s): Adrants (Steve Hall), Murray Newlands, Heather Smith
• Time: 7:30pm – 11:30pm
• Location: Gilley’s inside Treasure Island
• How to RSVP: RSVP at https://www.facebook.com/events/216247098460701/.
• Who is invited?: All Affiliate Summit West 2012 attendees.

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Affiliate Meet Up of The Year

• Sponsor(s): Stackthatmoney, Adsimilis
• Time: 4:00pm – 7:00pm
• Location: Suite at Caesars Palace
• How to RSVP: RSVP at https://www.facebook.com/events/303084089713840/.
• Who is invited?: Affiliates.

Mailer Meetup

• Sponsor(s): XY7 Elite, Digital Bulldogs, RTK Media, VoloMP, Impressionwise
• Time: 7:00pm –
• Location: Kingpin Suite @ Palms
• How to RSVP: Registration at mailermeetup.com.
• Who is invited?: Email marketers.

Las Vegas Classic Basketball Tournament

• Sponsor(s): XRev Media, Fanatics.com, Crush Ads
• Time: 7:00pm – 9:30pm
• Location: Impact Basketball 121 E. Sunset Rd
• How to RSVP: RSVP at http://www.lasvegasclassic.net.
• Who is invited?: Everyone.

ShareASale Under the Stars Party

• Sponsor(s): ShareASale
• Time: 8:00pm – 12:00am
• Location: Chateau Nightclub (Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino)
• How to RSVP: See us at the Meet Market Sunday from 12-6 to pick up your ticket! You’ll need a ticket to attend so come early to ensure we’ll have enough left!
• Who is invited?: Everyone.

Neverblue VIP Event

• Sponsor(s): Neverblue
• Time: 9:30pm – 12:30am
• Location: PURE Night Club (Red Room)
• How to RSVP: Contact your Affiliate Manager.
• Who is invited?: Invite only.

Badger Ball

• Sponsor(s): Sytropin.com, Webair.com, Aaronkellylaw.com, Freshadsmedia.com, Sellhealth.com, Snapterms.com, eaglewebassets.com, PerformTel.com
• Time: 10:00pm –
• Location: The Palms Penthouse B
• How to RSVP: Request an invite at honeybadgerwebassets.com/badger-ball.
• Who is invited?: Invite only.

Tip Off Party

• Sponsor(s): Infinite Traffic, React2Media, CPAWAY, Optimal Fusion
• Time: 10:00pm –
• Location: The Hardwood Suite at the Palms Hotel
• How to RSVP: Click RSVP at tipoffparty.com.
• Who is invited?: Affiliates.

Strike Out Breast Cancer Charity Bowling

• Sponsor(s): BowlingShirt.com, GTOManagement.com, and ThingsFromAnotherWorld.com
• Time: 12:00am – 3:00am
• Location: Goldcoast Lanes, 4000 W Flamingo Rd
• How to RSVP:
  1. Register at http://asw12bowling.eventbrite.com.
  2. Make a donation of $25 or more to any of the walkers on this year’s Affiliate Marketer’s Give Back Team for the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer.
  3. Forward your email confirmation of your donation to bowlASW12@gtomanagement.com
• Who is invited?: Affiliate Summit attendees.

Monday, January 9, 2012

MGECOM VIP Cocktails

• Sponsor(s): MGECOM
• Time: 5:00pm – 8:00pm
• Location: MGECOM suite, Caesars Palace Las Vegas
• How to RSVP: Invite only.
• Who is invited?: Affiliates and merchants.

Meet SeaWorld’s Animal Ambassadors

• Sponsor(s): SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment
• Time: 6:00pm – 7:00pm
• Location: Neopolitan I & II, Caesars Palace Las Vegas
• How to RSVP: RSVP at http://seaworldasw.eventbrite.com/.
• Who is invited?: Everyone!

RevenueWire VIP Party

• Sponsor(s): RevenueWire
• Time: 6:00pm – 9:00pm
• Location: TBA
• How to RSVP: Invite only.
• Who is invited?: Invite only.

Affiliate Karaoke

• Sponsor(s): Affiliate Summit
• Time: 9:00pm – 12:00am
• Location: Neopolitan III-IV, Caesars Palace Las Vegas
• How to RSVP: Not necessary.
• Who is invited?: All Affiliate Summit attendees

Affiliate Ball

• Sponsor(s): MaxBounty
• Time: 9:30pm –
• Location: Crown Theater, Rio Hotel
• How to RSVP: Get a pass at the Affiliate Ball table in the Meet Market.
• Who is invited?: All Affiliate Summit attendees.

Affiliate Fight Night with Randy Couture

• Sponsor(s): Clickbooth, Authorise, Calculated Creativity, Dating Gold, Molding Box, Optizmo
• Time: 10:00pm – 3:00am
• Location: Xtreme Couture (4055 W. Sunset Rd.)
• How to RSVP: Go to affiliatefightnight.com.
• Who is invited?: All Affiliate Summit attendees.

If you’re running a party, dinner, etc. during Affiliate Summit, submit your details to us and we’ll add you here.

This post will be updated as we get more details.

Internet ad revenues rose 23% to a record $14.9 billion in the first half of 2011, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC US). This is twice the rate of growth during the same time frame last year and with staggering increases such as these, we have to ask ourselves why?

Assessing the Economic Condition

One of the strongest contributing factors in the growth of online ad revenues is the weak US economy. Since the market crash in late 2008, just about every single industry has struggled with weak sales figures and lagging growth rates and has turned to additional ad spends to garner more sales.

A second contributing factor to the explosive growth of online marketing is the fact that consumers now spend an average of 13 hours per week online, which is approximately the same amount of time they spend watching television. Advertisers with products and services to sell would be remiss if they didn’t leverage that fact.

Affiliate Marketing Proves Recession Resilient

In the wake of budget constrictions and ROI scrutiny, smart advertisers have embraced affiliate marketing because of its inherent benefit of only paying when a specific action is achieved.

Additionally, affiliate marketing offers advertisers a way to explore other customer acquisition channels, as affiliates are quick to jump on emerging advertising platforms such as mobile, social media, as well as offline activities like print and coupons.

The amplified adoption of affiliate marketing by advertisers and affiliates is responsible for its enormous growth. In fact, affiliate marketing is forecasted to grow to $4 billion by 2014, according to Forrester Research.

The Growth of Affiliate Summit

As I write this article, Affiliate Summit West 2012 is projected to achieve its largest attendance with over 5,000 affiliates, advertisers, networks and service providers converging at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas.

The increased implementation of affiliate marketing into advertiser’s customer acquisition plans coupled with the bolstering of the industry’s impression overall are contributing factors to Affiliate Summit’s success.

Conversely, it’s with great pride that we look upon each Affiliate Summit event and meetup, every FeedFront Magazine issue and all GeekCast.fm podcasts as a platform to inspire the growth of our industry overall.

The Future of Affiliate Marketing

As consumers spend more time online and as the economy continues to bounce back, it is certain that the U.S. Internet marketing sector will continue to grow.

Additionally, through continued innovation, acquisitions and as more online content creators integrate affiliate marketing in their monetization plans, there leaves little to no doubt that affiliate marketing is poised for expansive growth as well.

Affiliate marketing is an exciting and lucrative space to be in right now. Will you be joining us in 2012?

Join Affiliate Summit for another free webinar,  Advanced Affiliate Recruitment Tactics that Work,  with Mike Nunez and Jon Nunez of Affiliatemanager.com on Thursday, December 1st, 2011 at 2:00pm EST.

Register now – space is limited: Advanced Affiliate Recruitment Tactics that Work

What is the webinar about:
This special presentation will feature several advanced tactics on how to find and communicate with prospect affiliates.

About Mike Nunez:
Mike Nunez began his affiliate marketing career while taking Computer Science classes at the University of Central Florida. Upon graduation, he leveraged his newfound knowledge to launch the Wyndham Vacation Ownership affiliate program, which quickly became the the highest converting lead source in the company. Mike was then recruited to launch the LastMinuteTravel.com affiliate program, where he grew sales from $0 to $500,000 in under 3 months. Upon realizing that affiliate management was in high demand with a low supply of quality managers, Mike co-founded AffiliateManager.com. After our first year, the firm won “Best New OPM” (outsourced program manager) on the most popular affiliate marketing forum. The company quickly grew to over 15 clients, where we currently maintain a solid client to employee ratio. To better serve our affiliates, Mike spearheaded the creation of BounceLinks.com, a tool to monetize user generated content as well as streamline product level link creation. Mike has served as a member of the Linkshare Advisory Board, and currently serves as a member of the Affiliate Summit Advisory Board, the largest affiliate related convention. Lastly, Mike often speaks at industry events and meetups to educate current affiliates as well as those new to the space.

About Jon Nunez:
Jon Nunez began his affiliate marketing at LastMinuteTravel.com in 2002. After identifying the need for a quality outsourced affiliate management service, he Co Founded AffiliateManager.com in 2004, which has become one of the leading Affiliate Program Management companies in the industry and has since expanded managing programs for more than 20 major brands that span across many product verticals. AffiliateManager.com has also won many awards in the affiliate marketing industry. Jon Nunez has managed the affiliate programs for several of the leading brands in the nation such as FootballFanatics (Best Affiliate Program – 2009), Golfnow.com, GolfChannel/NBCUniversal/Comcast.

Be sure to register for the this FREE Webinar: Advanced Affiliate Recruitment Tactics that Work – space is limited.

If you are interested in presenting in the Affiliate Summit Webinar series, please contact Mary Poiley by email.

Also, you can see a list of all past and present webinars.

The Affiliate Summit staff wants to wear your company’s logo on their shirts at Affiliate Summit West 2012, taking place January 10-12, 2012 in Las Vegas — and it’s all for charity.

Shawn Collins and Missy Ward modeling the Affiliate Summit East 2011 Staff Shirt that DIYThemes sponsored. Their sponsorship money was donated to the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer.

Once again, in conjunction with Affiliate Marketers Give Back, we teamed up with Avon Walk for Breast Cancer to help raise money for breast cancer research, treatment and community programs.

The cost of the sponsorship is $7,500 and will be donated in full, to the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer.

By booking this sponsorship, the entire Affiliate Summit team will wear your company’s logo on the FRONT of our conference staff shirts for all three days of the event.  [Just like this picture to the right.]

Even though Affiliate Summit lasts for just three days, your company logo on the shirts will continue to receive exposure in the Affiliate Summit photos and videos.

Book the staff shirt sponsorship today and check out other remaining sponsorships for Affiliate Summit West 2012.