I’ve said it for years now and it seems that some are in agreement… one very large segment of “affiliate creativity” is capitalizing on advertisers’ other BIG media spends by leveraging their ignorance of (and non-participation in) paid search.  It can be summed up as:

Advertisers spend millions on media buys (TV ads).  Consumers navigate to the advertiser brand using Google (not their browser address bar).  Affiliates pay pennies for Google ads so as to shuttle consumers onward to advertisers’ site, pocketing a commission with HUGE margins (considering the low cost of ads targeting your brand and high shopper conversion).  I’ve been watching this since 1999, y’all and today we see an outstanding article in Electronic Retailer Magazine focusing on direct TV (DRTV) advertisers.

I’m giving a shout out to Paul Soltoff today, CEO of SendTec who tries playing nicey-nice in the onset of his piece, ”Should You Be Employing an Affiliate Program“ but in the end tells it like it really is without much sugar coating.  Soltoff goes as far as giving examples of typical affiliate behavior.

Just what is that behavior?  His very pointed piece is broken into two bits “Branding and Marketing Communications Risks.” Sounds familiar to me.  The second chunk is entitled “Paying a Premium for Your Brand.”

Says Soltoff, “While manipulative marketing communications are a significant risk an even bigger risk can show up in your P&L statements should you let your affiliates go unchecked.” I’ve also discussed this here at Thoughtshapers in that our affiliate program audit clients are, increasingly, the CFO. 

To be blunt, Soltoff is relentless in his clear illustration of what’s going on and how it’s BAD for DRTV advertisers. 

An example from Soltoff’s article, “Should You Be Employing An Affiliate Program.”