Affiliate Manager ISO Affiliates, Maybe More?

[jlewis]

Hi!

I was shoehorned into the role of affiliate manager for a real estate website company. I am completely lost, staggering through acronyms and Commission Junction.

I'm going to be asking for a lot of help in the next few months, and will be grateful for anything I receive from you all. I'd like to ultimately turn to my CEO and say, hey, here's ten bazillion dollars, but I need help learning how to recruit affiliates and how to get the most our of our affiliate program to do so.

Our affiliate program has been live for three months now, and while it's been growing, I've been spending a significant amount of time canceling fake credit card numbers and wondering what the hell is going on.

Thanks in advance.

Jason

[Linda Buquet]

Hi Jason,

Welcome to 5 Star. I don't envy you one bit and can sympathise with what you are going through. Feel free to ask management questions down in the merchant/affiliate manager section and we will try to help.

Have you contacted your CJ rep to ask about support and training?

[jlewis]

As a good Jewish kid, I genuinely appreciate the sympathy . Thanks Linda!

I have indeed talked to CJ. They've been somewhat less than helpful thus far- offering me very little and then saying that I essentially have to pay them to discuss anything beyond basic definitions of the product.

The fact that access to anyone other than grifters from Nepal requires a minimum of five grand through them irks me. I'd rather spend the time getting to understand affiliate marketing and uinf the forums to develop actual relationships.

If I post regarding our program in the merchant section, will it be considered spamming?

[Linda Buquet]

"If I post regarding our program in the merchant section, will it be considered spamming?"

You CAN post about your program and I'm interested in hearing which one it is.
BUT the only place you can post it is in the
Merchants Promote Your Affiliate Program Here section.
http://affiliate-marketing-forums.5s...splay.php?f=26

BTW I specialize in recruiting and promotion, so if you have a little budget
and IF I think your program has 5 Star potential, I could possibly help.

[jlewis]

Will do. And thank you again.

Are you on yahoo! IM?

[jlewis]

Done. Please read it over and let me know what you think!

[Linda Buquet]

Your post looks good, Jason. For some reason when I saw the words real estate, I just assumed it was B2C, but now I see it's B2B.

[jlewis]

Is that a problem?

[Linda Buquet]

Oh no, not really. I was just thinking B2C - like a program to help consumers find or buy homes. B2B affiliate programs are just much harder to grow and do recruiting for. I don't do B2B recruiting because almost all my affiliates are B2C.

[jlewis]

Kind of B2B.

Since the end user of our products is the Real Estate Agent (quick demographic: the average RE agent is a single woman in her late fourties who is just starting out in a new career), it's really more B2C, with the RE agent being the consumer.

Talking to real estate agents is somewhat like talking into a time machine. A lot of them are staggered by new technology (at conventions I have been asked more times than I'd like to admit, "How much do links cost?" and "How do I get up on the Google?"). They need to be gently coached into getting websites- especially websites with all the trimmings.

This is a wide open space for affiliates. Sometimes I feel very alone out here, marketing to the hundreds of thousands. You can hear the Western movie whistle. If affiliates set themselves up as gurus, they can make tons of money off of us- right now we have two mega-affiliates who are making over a quarter million in commissions each. I'm trying to figure out how to recruit another four or five of them.