Just got my weekly email from Practical eCommerce and - per usual, they had a really good practical tip that is a good one for newbie Pay Per Click marketers.

Bidding for Position No.1. I often see new AdWords advertisers over paying for clicks because they are pursuing the No. 1 position. I think they assume that being in position No. 1 is always best, but I think when you consider the additional cost for position No.1, often times positions 2-5 are a much better value.

- Mat Greenfield, website conversion expert, and founder of Conversion Results

Getting top ranking on competitive terms can be really pricey and the difference in clicks may really not be worth having that 1st spot. How many more clicks would you be able to afford if you went with number 3-5 instead? Do the math and make an informed decision.

Practical eCommerce is one of my favorite publications (print and digital) and I highly recommend it to anyone who does eCommerce and/or online marketing of any kind.

God Bless,

Wade

A quick reminder- if you are considering attending Affiliate Summit in February, and have been waiting to sign up, you might want to do it now if you are ROI conscious. Early Bird pricing expires on 12/21. What’s the difference?

If you are going to pick up an Exhibit Hall Only pass, your cost will go from $99 -$199 and if you are looking for a Full Conference pass the cost will go from $949 to $1449. Remember, you can also save 10% by using the coupon code “CAMA” when you sign up.

I just perused the Agenda for the Summit and this year looks like the best yet in terms of addressing relevant issues like marketing with Video and Widgets, Managing Legal Risks and more.

If you are up for it, save a few bucks and register now, and I’ll see you at Affiliate Summit in February.

My dad forwarded this over to me. It’s the transcript of a Ben Stein essay recited on the CBS SundayMorning commentary. It has nothing whatsoever to do with Affiliate Marketing, but has some awesome stuff to say about the holidays, Christmas, God and America. Check it out:

My confession:

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors
was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when
people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees.
I don’t feel threatened. I don’t feel discriminated against.
That’s what they are: Christmas trees.

It doesn’t bother me a bit when people say, “Merry Christmas” to
me. I don’t think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me
in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all
brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year.. It
doesn’t bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at
a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu If people want a
creche, it’s just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred
yards away.

I don’t like getting pushed around for being a
Jew, and I don’t think Christians like getting pushed around for
being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired
of getting pushed around, period.. I have no idea where the
concept came from; that America is an explicitly atheist country. I
can’t find it in the Constitution and I don’t like it being shoved
down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the
idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we
aren’t allowed to worship God as we understand Him? I guess that’s a
sign that I’m getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who
are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the
America we knew went to. (more…)

Thanks to Charles at MyChristianHost for showing some Scratchback love and being the first person to put his money where his eyeballs come a few times a week to check out the latest news and tips and tricks in the Christian affiliate marketing world.

Remember, you two can pick up a link on my toplist for just $5 a week… AND… 50% of the profits will go to Covenant missionary efforts in the Congo.

The rest will go to keep my wife from killing me for registering so many domains

(Hi… I’m Wade and I am a domain-a-holic)

God Bless,

Wade

Wade, I just stumbled across your site from the Christian webmasters
site…looks good. I have some marketing questions, and I just don’t know
where to turn. I have a 6 month old business that a friend and I put together
AltaregoBrand.com. I am having a terrible time figuring out how to get traffic
to it - I get 1-3 uniqes per day. I have added to a few directories, and we
have an affiliate system put together that has banners on about 10 myspace
pages…don’t know if we are going about this right…I have tried to read up,
I am very technical, wondered if you could offer any advice…Thanks in
advance.

Steve,

Thanks for the question, there are a few things that I might recommend in terms of getting traffic to your page. I’d start with some issues with your page first to make sure that you get all you can from the traffic you receive - so we’ll handle that first:

1. “Hero images” - on your “Home Page” you have a nice looking image - but it has little(that I can tell) to do with your products. Take a look at sites like C28 and JesusBranded and you’ll see that they show their designs, on people or with the design really visible. JesusBranded does this really well.
2. Product images - you need to pump up the image size and detail to help your shopper make their decision. Make sure you can zoom in and really see some detail.

You might want to think of upgrading your cart ASAP to get some better merchandising possibilities…On to traffic.

What are you doing to find affiliates ? Are you actively seeking them out? How much time a week do you spend tracking down sites that appeal to your target demographic? (thinking youth and young adult evangelicals) ?

Making an affiliate program go takes some real effort, especially when you are just getting started as a brand and don’t have a big name to trade on or a ton of budget. There’s a lot of “sweat equity” involved.

Here are a few of initial suggestions for grass roots marketing effort:

1. Go after blogger/reviewers - you search for terms like “t shirt blog” and see what you find. Send them a shirt and a note that lets them know about your company and what you believe and what makes you special.
2. See if you can dig yourself in at some youth/young adult centered social networks- you might consider doing some giveaway promotions through them and making them an aggressive revenue share offer.
3. If you do take the social network approach, set up an account and participate actively as well
4. If you have some budget, and a means of tracking the results (Google Analytics if nothing else) do some PPC buys in MSN, Yahoo and Google with appropriate keywords. Set some spending limits to make sure you don’t dig yourself into too much of a hole.
5. Use VIDEO - if your products are cool and you get video of say - extreme athletes with “cool factor” wearing them as they do their stuff - put them on your site and post them in the video networks like YouTube, GodTube, etc. Encourage your customers to submit their own video - Everyone under the age of 30 seems to have at least a camera phone now. Encourage participation with giveaways.
6. Watch out for using affiliate links in MySpace - it is actually against their T’c and C’s and can get all of your ads blocked if MySpace catches on.

I am really hesitant to spend or to recommend spending much on PPC until I know that my site’s results will justify it.

Anyone else have some ideas for Steve? Feel free to post comments here. As a community of Brothers and Sisters in Christ, I think we should do what we can to help each other be successful in putting Gospel promoting products out there.

In the meantime, here’s some LOVE from ChristianAffiliateMarketers.com my Brother

God Bless!

I get asked quite a bit about how to get started in affiliate marketing. I’ve asked a lot of my friends in the business what they recommend and the answer has been almost unanimous. If you don’t have big cash and the knowledge to play the Pay Per Click marketing game, they all recommended blogging. I whole-heartedly agree.

Why? Here are a few reasons:

• Blogging is easy to get started with.
• Blogging is cheap (just pay for your domain and hosting)
• Blogging requires no real technical expertise. If you can write and operate MS Word or a similar word processor, you can blog.
• Blogs get ranked very quickly in Google (see Jim Kukral’s post on Blogs and Google Universal Search)
• If you blog with integrity, and recommend only products and services that you really believe in and have a connection with, you can make a very powerful recommendation

Want an awesome example of an affiliate blogger? Here is one example that just emailed me today with a post he did for my friends at JesusBranded

What is so good about this example? They wrote a good headline, included an image, and wrote some really personal, compelling copy in recommending the product.

If you are serious about getting started in affiliate marketing using blogging, I personally recommend that you check out Sherman Hu’s product called WordPress Tutorials. Sherman has put to video a complete course on how to set up an effective blog using WordPress.

Happy Blogging!

Wade Tonkin

One of my favorite things to to is to help folks who may be new to the business with questions they may have.

Do you have a question that you have been dying to get an answer for? I’m here to help.

What are merchants looking for in an affiliate?

What should affiliates look for in a merchant?

Is this affiliate program or offer legit?

How can I make my affiliate site more effective?

How do I develop an email marketing list without violating the CAN-SPAM laws and getting fined?

I know that we all have questions and I’ll do my best to provide the answers. Have a question you’d like to Ask Wade?

It’s easy, just go to the Contact CAM page and submit your question and I’ll reply on the site (maybe even by video) when I can.

God Bless,

Wade Tonkin

A while back I posted on what to do when your application gets turned down by a merchant or affiliate network.

One of the bits of advice I gave was to make sure to put your best foot forward. If you are applying for a Christian program, provide a link to a Christian targeting site or blog, or sample of an email newsletter. Email the merchant first (if the merchant is smart enough to provide that information) and give them a heads up as to what your plans are.

But what if you aren’t promoting the merchant with a website or blog? What if you are a PPC affiliate?

I like the approach this affiliate took. Granted, it won’t win anystyle points, but it tells merchants what they need to know to make a decision.

I’d takes things a step further than they did and list a few more things:

• list some companies that you have worked
• list a couple of references
• make sure to provide contact info including phone number, email and chat

Good PPC affiliates are worth their weight in gold and can be awesome producers, but the bad guys can give a merchant a bad name.God Bless and Happy Selling!

Wade Tonkin