The #1 Insurance Affiliate Program

For those that don’t know there actually is a difference and the people over at affiliateabcs.com are here to explain.  I get a worn down reading blog post after blog post so Affiliate ABC’s hosts Deborah Carney and Vinny O’Hare are with Karen Varecka from buy.at to provide us with an explanation in podcast form.  It explains the difference between SEM, SEO, PPC and the pros and cons of each. It’s highly informative and I hope to listen to it.

I wanted to let everyone know that we have updated our affiliate terms and conditions. They can be found here. There are no drastic changes, however, it’s still a good idea to read through it. As always, let us know if you have any questions.

Last week I talked about the recipe to online marketing success. While you might be following the recipe, you still might need some guidance. Geno Prussakov at amnavigator.com has given us just that. He has compiled some of his previous blog posts that he thinks are the most relevant for affiliates and created the How To Guide to Affiliate Marketing. This is the best guide that I have seen of its kind and something that all affiliates should have bookmarked for future references.

In the 2010 Affstat report, surveyors asked, “Are you currently integrating video in your affiliate marketing plan? The response? 70.6% of affiliates answered no. With new web-based technology and high speed internet, web videos have become easier to create and distribute. But before you turn on the camera and start rolling, here are a few tips.

1. Know your target audience. Remember, you are making the video for them, not for you.

2. Know the objective of your video. Are you trying to sell, market or simply entertain?

3. Decide what type of video you want to make. Your video style should match your objective.

4. Keep your audience engaged. If you don’t, you will lose them right off the bat.

5. Make sure the video is high quality. Good video quality establishes credibility and bad looks sloppy and unprofessional.

The city of Philadelphia is asking its blogging citizens to pay $300 for a lifetime blogging license. The city is claiming that if you operate a blog and you choose to make money from ads, then it qualifies as a business, no matter how little money is generated.

I think it is ridiculous to ask people to pay $300 to blog just for having AdSense on a blog. Its one thing to tax income made, but it’s another to charge a fee based on potential future earnings. You can check out the full story here: http://citypaper.net/articles/2010/08/19/blogging-business-privilege-tax-philadelphia

So what do you think? Will other cities catch on and start charging you to blog? What about the bloggers hosted on Wordpress and Blogger? If blogging is a major part of your business, would you be willing to continue to do so if you had to pay for a license?

In an effort to keep things new, modern and cutting-edge, we have redesigned our affiliate website site and blog. This is simply a cosmetic update. You still login the same way you always have and you still have the same account features, options and reports. We have only changed our look and feel. What do you think of our new design? This is a two-way street, so let us know what you think. We always want to hear your feedback.

Make sure you bookmark our RSS feed and come back soon! We’ll be posting regularly.

We’re excited about the new design for our affiliate site. Take a look around and let us know what you think!