Electronic Signatures for Affiliate Agreements
September 8, 2009 | Comments Off
This post originally appeared on the Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins
Electronic Signatures for Affiliate Agreements
I got an email the other day that RackSpace is re-launching their Partner Network, and that I would have to sign a new contract. That was met with an ugh, as I figured I had to go through the old process of printing, signing, and faxing the agreement back to them.
But then I saw that they were using this company EchoSign, and that it was a quick and easy process online.
I’ve had accounts with affiliate networks for so long that I don’t know which, if any, are using this sort of thing. But it would be great to see this with the affiliate networks and affiliate programs.
It’s a green thing, and a convenience thing.
Check out a blog post from EchoSign on “Why We Need Web-Based Electronic Signatures“.
Get Involved in Affiliate Day 2009
September 8, 2009 | Comments Off
This post originally appeared on the Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins
Get Involved in Affiliate Day 2009
Affiliate Summit is organizing Affiliate Day 2009 on September 14, 2009 as a day to recognize the power of affiliate marketing.
There will be several fun-filled promotions over the course of the day, designed to increase awareness of the industry and reward affiliate marketers with all sorts of goodies, including passes to Affiliate Summit West 2010 in Las Vegas.
For a chance to win prizes, simply post a Tweet using hashtag: #affday09 on Affiliate Day.
Alternately, you can enter by sending your name and email address to Affiliate Summit at 1253 Springfield Ave., Suite 327, New Providence, NJ 07974-1935. Entries via postal mail must be postmarked no later than September 11, 2009.
On September 18, Tweets and other entries will be chosen at random and winners will be notified by DM (if you’re following @affiliatesummit) or an @ reply. Entries via postal mail will be notified by email.
Support the Industry
We’re in the process of collecting prizes to give away on Affiliate Day and we’re asking your assistance in making the event a success.
Additionally, you’ll benefit from exposure of your company’s name to all who participate in Affiliate Day. We will also be posting a list of donors on the Affiliate Summit blog.
How to Donate an Item:
You can donate your item by completing this form by September 11, 2009.
If you provide a prize, you will be responsible for shipping it to the winner.
Contact us with any questions.
Surviving a Gmail Outage
September 8, 2009 | Comments Off
This post originally appeared on the Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins
So Gmail was down for about 100 minutes yesterday, and people freaked out. Facebook, Twitter, and message boards went crazy with the Gmail exiles that couldn’t figure out what to do without access to email.
Some of the email stress would have been alleviated for people if they’d simply enabled Gmail Offline in Google Labs.
Once you turn on this feature, Gmail uses Gears to download a local cache of your mail. As long as you’re connected to the network, that cache is synchronized with Gmail’s servers. When you lose your connection, Gmail automatically switches to offline mode, and uses the data stored on your computer’s hard drive instead of the information sent across the network. You can read messages, star and label them, and do all of the things you’re used to doing while reading your webmail online. Any messages you send while offline will be placed in your outbox and automatically sent the next time Gmail detects a connection.
So, you’re able to access all of your archives, and you’ve got a local copy of your emails.
While you won’t be able to receive new emails while Gmail is down, you can otherwise go on with your business. So stop contemplating a move back to Outlook – just go and enable Gmail Offline.
As far as the reason for the Gmail outage, Google explained it as a server overload after performing maintenance on some servers that were taken offline.
Video: Offline Gmail (in Gmail Labs)
GSI Commerce Acquires Pepperjam
September 8, 2009 | Comments Off
This post originally appeared on the Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins
GSI Commerce Acquires Pepperjam
GSI Commerce Inc. (NASDAQ: GSIC) announced yesterday that they have acquired “certain assets” of the Pepperjam affiliate network and the Pepperjam marketing agency.
Pepperjam will operate as a separate business unit of gsi interactive and report to Nick Pahade, President of gsi interactive.
More details at http://www.pepperjamnetwork.com/blog/2009/09/01/gsi-commerce-acquires-pepperjam/.
WordPress vs. Blogger for Affiliates
September 8, 2009 | Comments Off
This post originally appeared on the Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins
WordPress vs. Blogger for Affiliates
Q: Why is WordPress recommended over Blogger? I find Blogger so easy, and WordPress seems so complex. Plus, I am told WordPress will not take AdSense, so I am curious… why is it recommended?
A: I am not sure if this is in response to a recommendation I made in the past. If so, the version of WordPress I would have recommended is the one you download and install on your host.
I would not encourage anybody to build an affiliate site on either Blogger.com or WordPress.com. You just don’t have the same level of control, and I haven’t read the Terms of Service on either recently, but you may be limited on the extent and type of advertising.
If you have a tough time installing WordPress yourself, there are many hosts, such as LivingDot, where they will do the installation for you for free.
As far as WordPress being more complex than Blogger, there is a learning curve with WordPress and Blogger is very basic, but that’s part of the point – you can do so much more with WordPress, and you are constrained with what you can do with Blogger.
With WordPress, you can pick the Theme that best works for your project – this is the layout of the blog, and it’s really easy to switch it up. Literally the click of a mouse to do it.
I would encourage you to pick up one of the books out there that help to build a WordPress site, such as WordPress for Business Bloggers or WordPress for Dummies.
Once you get used to it, WordPress is really easy to use, and you’ll find it to be an incredibly flexible and efficient platform.
Video: WordPress vs. Blogger for Affiliates
