Good morning affiliates! Day 2 of Affiliate Summit West 2010 wrapped with a bang yesterday at Azoogle‘s party in the Hugh Hefner suite at The Palms. Azoogle is known for having killer parties and last night was no different. I don?t usually get excited for nice hotel suites. I?ve traveled a lot of places and I?m staying in a pretty nice suite myself here at The Wynn. However, at the Hugh Heffner suite at The Palms last night I was amazed.

The place was immaculate and is something that I will never forget visiting. I forgot to bring a digital camera with me but I took some cell phone photos I posted in the Photo Gallery. Luckily Ryan did a video tour of the suite before the party got too crowded and I?m sure he?ll upload that here on the blog as well.

The party featured a DJ, a couple of fully stocked open bars and the famous pool (with the Playboy logo) overlooking Vegas was open for business. It was pretty cold outside last night so I didn?t see anyone get in, but Ryan and I left early. I was able to briefly meet Azoogle co-founder Alex Zhardanovsky on our way into the party.

It?s funny because I recently saw the Huge Hefner suite on one of the shows Kara watches on E! and last night I got to experience it in person. Thanks Azoogle for a great party and more great memories!

Shortly after posting this blog we’ll be heading back over to The Rio to wrap up Affiliate Summit West 2010. I hope to see you there!

Hello from the desert, it’s “the other Gray” reporting live from Las Vegas. Today was our first full day in Vegas for Affiliate Summit West 2010. We’ve only been here a short time but I already feel like a lot has been accomplished. I also learned some new things today:

The Meet Market Is Chaotic
No offense to the people planning but the Meet Market today at The Rio was utter chaos. There were too many people in the rooms with the tables thus making it impossible to move from table to table. I missed Affiliate Summit East in New York but Ryan told me they had the same problem at The Hilton. Something needs to be done to better accommodate the event. For starters they need to have the Meet Market in a larger space and better organize the way tables are displayed. The way the tables were presented made it hard to distinguish who was at which station. If you’re claustrophobic and spent any time at the Meet Market today you probably utilized the cash bars a good bit. I’m having anxiety just thinking about it.

There’s A Lot of Interest in Affiliate Marketing
People came to Vegas in droves and it’s good to see with the current problems with our economy that so many affiliates are doing well. We always hear a lot of negative stories but I talked with several people today that saw significant growth in their businesses last year. Good job guys! We’re proud (and fortunate) to have achieved record success last year. Hopefully 2010 will be even better.

AT&T Still Sucks
I’m not sure how many of you are carrying iPhones but mine has been very limited again this trip. I had the same problem with AT&T at AdTech back in November. It’s enough to make me want to change carriers but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love my iPhone. The device is great but the service needs to be improved, especially in larger cities. It gets old not being able to call out or send text-messages.

I’m Getting OLD!
The first time I came to Las Vegas was in 2006 and I’ve been back every year since. Every year I can tell a difference in what I am able to do but I just can’t party like I used too. I should be at the COPEAC party here at Tryst in The Wynn but I just can’t muster up the energy to go. I had a busy evening working and still haven’t been able to shake the jet lag. Maybe tomorrow will be a different story, but I’ll be going to bed shortly after I post this. For those of you still able to bounce from party to party and are still under 25 years old, enjoy it while you can. If you’re over 25 and can still do it, my hat is off to you.

Aside from my Dallas Cowboys completely tanking, today was a good day. I got to enjoy Las Vegas, meet up with several readers of the blog and ate some great food. I highly recommend the sushi at Wazuzu at Encore (I’ve already eaten there twice). Ryan and I had dinner alone tonight at Red 8 in The Wynn and it was enjoyable. I look forward to meeting with several of you tomorrow. If you’re reading this before heading out to a party, be safe and drink one for me!

I want to open by apologizing for my lack of updates this month. December has been very busy month for me and unfortunately my blogging responsibilities have suffered as a result. Today I want to talk about New Year’s Resolutions. A big part to the success I’ve had from working online for the past eleven years has had to do with setting goals and doing all I can to reach them. To have success in Affiliate Marketing you have to set goals. Without them, you run the risk of running an unorganized operation that is not built for success. New Year’s Resolutions are obviously goals that many people set for the New Year.

I always get a laugh at how busy the gym gets at the end of December into the beginning of the New Year. Usually when I go to the gym early in the afternoon, it’s just me and the retirees that are walking on the treadmill at a brisk setting of 2 (I actually run at a setting of 6.5 for a mile but whatever). On Monday when I went to the gym it was covered up with people trying to shed the holiday pounds and build some muscle. Obviously the gyms use this to their advantage with membership specials, but how does this relate to affiliate marketing?

For one it gives us a very clear picture of what niches need to be exploited in January. Any campaign that deals with a New Year’s Resolution is a perfect campaign to get the ball rolling. One thing is for sure in New Year’s Resolutions – people want to do better. They want cleaner diets, whiter teeth, to stop smoking, etc. Have you considered the campaigns you want to run in the New Year?

Ryan, John and I have already put plans in place and signed Insertion Orders for several media buys for our New Year’s Resolution campaigns. Our New Year’s Resolution is to capitalize on other people’s New Year’s Resolutions. We have built our company for success going into the New Year. We’ve spent countless hours developing plans and strategies to get everything going. I hope you have as well. If not, you better put the champagne up and get busy for the next couple of hours! Don’t let this profitable time of year pass you by. Holidays are big for marketers and the New Year is a great example!

Happy New Year everyone – thanks so much for your support in 2009. This year has been a great one for myself personally and our company. We’ve grown leaps and bounds and hope to continue that success into 2010 and well past. I want to thank all the affiliate networks, other bloggers and people in the industry that have worked with us in making us a success! I hope you experience success in the New Year as well!

Well, we’ve all been there. Whether you are a big or small affiliate there comes a time when you have to pull the plug on a campaign. It varies from campaign to campaign how long the life is but one thing is for sure ? all campaigns have a lifespan. Obviously the most disappointing campaigns are those in which a considerable amount of time is spent on, only to have them fail and fail quickly.

Last week I spent a considerable amount of time building out a particular campaign that was compliant and well done only to have to pull it within six hours of starting it. While I don’t want to get into the specifics, I spent several hours building an original landing page that not only looked great but sent a considerable amount of my bought traffic to the offer. In fact, the landing page was sending over 20% of the traffic that clicked my ad all the way to the offer. The thing was ? the offer was not converting.

This was very frustrating because I felt like I had done all I could do to make things work and while I could have tried to split test different landing pages, ads and traffic sources I felt like I had sent a large amount of my traffic all the way to the offer and determined it had to be the culprit. I actually did split it with another offer and amazingly enough, the other offer had just as crappy of a conversion rate. My EPCs were terrible and my CPA left no room for optimization. Like my Affiliate Manager said ? you can’t win them all.

It’s hard for me to accept defeat and had it not been for John and Ryan I would have probably dug myself into a real deep hole to start the month. I didn’t want to give up but the numbers didn’t lie. While I thought the offer looked good and I heard other people had success, it didn’t work for my particular situation.

When you have had success like we have had it’s extremely difficult when a campaign doesn’t work out. This particular campaign was especially hard on me because I thought it was going to blow up big. It ended up blowing up in my face and sending me back to the drawing board. I guess this is why I don’t like the label “Super Affiliate” because if I had superpowers I would have been able to make it work.

There was nothing “super” about me with this campaign and it was an all around humbling experience. Of course that wasn’t the first campaign that had to be yanked in the beginning and it won’t be the last but it doesn’t make it any easier to swallow. I wasn’t even concerned with the money I lost as much as I was to admit defeat. I hate to lose at anything. I love a good challenge and hate when it doesn’t work out. When a campaign hits on all cylinders, the successful experience is almost as gratifying as the pay.

One of the biggest keys to my success as an Internet entrepreneur has been the utilization of one of the most-basic marketing concepts – brand awareness. Creating a brand has been very important in all of my projects, but especially my content-based projects. Unlike a lot of affiliates, I do not make 100% of my living “slingin da? Berries” as a high-volume affiliate. It?s a large part of my career but I also spend several hours of my day managing other popular Web properties.

A lot of people ask me how to develop a “popular” website and while I can give them the basics – good information, easy to navigate and Search Engine Optimization – the most important thing is to make people remember you. Regardless if you are running a discussion forum, an online store or a content-based website there has to be something worth visiting. This concept is even important for affiliate networks.

Developing a brand is not easy and cannot be done by the lazy. You have to work at developing unique content that is interesting and makes the visitor want to “sink their teeth into it.” Once you have created a brand there are going to be people that love it and people that hate it. Both of these groups of people are what you are going for. What you do not want in developing a brand are visitors that do not care. If your visitors are indifferent when they visit your website, it?s unlikely they?ll return.

I?ve had my highs and lows out of all the popular websites I?ve developed but one thing has remained consistent – I?ve always created a buzz. I?ve created a buzz by developing a brand. There has never been a time where I?ve just “mailed it in” and thrown a website online without carefully considering my content. I always take it as a tremendous compliment when I am able to draw an emotional response out of a visitor. I don?t care if it?s positive or negative; if I am able to garner a response then I have gave the visitor a reason to return.

It?s what I try to do in all of my posts on this very website. I want to enhance the visitor?s experience by giving down to earth examples when comparing affiliate marketing to real life (“Have a safe flight”) while discussing the frustrations of life as an affiliate ( $100,000 A Day To Nothing Overnight – Welcome To Affiliate Marketing) and having some fun at the same time ( You Know You?re A Super Affiliate When?).

Becoming one of the “Super Affiliate Twins” is yet another brand I?ve added to my resume? as an Internet entrepreneur. To be honest I?m not even a huge fan over the term “Super Affiliate” but people in the affiliate marketing industry are beginning to learn of the Super Affiliate Twins. If you?re thinking of starting a business outside of the affiliate world or just a blog about your life as an affiliate, you certainly want to create a brand and define it in your project. Once you have a brand the ways you can monetize it are limitless and it can provide you with not only a high income but visitor loyalty and career stability.

Today is the day a lot of marketers have been dreading as the revisions to the FTC guidelines regarding product endorsements go into effect. Beginning today, marketers that use blatantly false techniques to promote a particular product are breaking the law and are subject to fines, litigation and even jail time. The FTC announced the revisions on October 5th, giving marketers nearly two months to get their act together. So that brings up the question, are your landing pages compliant? If not, why not?

This blog, along with several other affiliate blogs online, offers tips in regards to building campaigns that can make you a lot of money as an affiliate. My tip today can save you a lot of time and hassle. If you are not compliant, get compliant. It isn’t that hard to make pages that are FTC compliant that still convert and convert well. Ryan, John and I have worked very hard in making sure everything we promote meets the new guidelines of the FTC. If you are struggling to get compliant, take the following tips into consideration:

* Build your campaigns from scratch. If you are copying someone else’s campaign then there is no way you are compliant. If you are taking testimonials from someone else and making them your own, you are lying. It takes a lot more time to build a campaign from scratch but it is well worth it in the end.

* Use the products you are promoting. If you do not want to use the products yourself, find someone that is willing to experience the product, tell about their experience and sign legal documentation that the claims they have made are accurate. Not only will using the products make you more familiar with what you are promoting, but it guarantees you original content to use for your campaign.

* Do not mention celebrities. Even after Oprah Winfrey and Dr. Oz went after affiliates this summer, there are still landing pages claiming that certain celebrities endorse certain products. Unless the celebrity actually endorses the product, do not make false claims. You can garner just as many conversions without using a celebrity’s likeliness.

If you do not want to work at getting compliant either stop promoting re-bills or promote offers that can be direct linked. If you direct link to an offer, any claims are on the advertiser and not the affiliate. You could always choose to risk it, but I do not recommend that. That’s no way to make a living or create a business model that is going to be around for any length of time.

Now get off here and go check your campaigns!

I?m back from Dallas an engaged man! I asked my fianc?e Kara to marry me on Friday night, she said yes and we celebrated the weekend in Dallas, Texas. It was a great trip highlighted by the Washington Redskins falling to my Dallas Cowboys on Sunday afternoon. The game would have been boring to watch on television (with the final score 7-6), but it was an unreal experience being in the stadium. I highly recommend checking out Cowboys Stadium even if you are just a casual football fan. The building is the nicest sports complex I?ve ever visited and is absolutely massive.

We arrived at Dallas Ft. Worth International Airport on Saturday and took the cab ride to the Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek in downtown Dallas. The Mansion is the only five star, five diamond hotel in Texas and is a really nice place. The staff-to-guest ratio is two to one and the service was immaculate. I?d heard a lot of people say The Mansion was one of the nicest, if not the nicest hotel in the country but I wouldn?t go that far. The place was well decorated, clean and highlighted by excellent service but their hot tub and pool facility left a lot to be desired.

Saturday night Kara and I had a wonderful fine dining experience at The Mansion Restaurant in our hotel. The place wasn?t easy on the wallet and they didn?t hook us up with any freebies even though we were celebrating our engagement. Nonetheless I highly recommend the food, especially the shrimp cocktail which was one of the best I?ve ever had. We capped the night off in the Mansion Bar with live entertainment and a champagne celebration. The third bottle was a bad idea, but it was a very special night!

On Sunday we made the trip to Arlington to Cowboys Stadium. Our taxi cab driver was not much of a fan as he explained to me why he thought ?Tony Romo was bullshit.? It was hilarious listening to why he didn?t like our quarterback. Prior to the game we visited the Dallas Cowboys Pro Shop which was packed full of people with 18 cash registers going nonstop. We had great seats for the game, only six rows up from the field right in front of Emmitt Smith?s box. I didn?t see number 22 but was told by a season ticket holder that?s where he normally sits. I got chills during the pre-game stuff; it was surreal watching Cowboys cornerback Mike Jenkins pray on the star in the endzone in front of us. There?s not much to say about the game other than we eked out a win at the last minute.

Monday was our most relaxing day as we slept late and took a trip to the Northpark Mall in Dallas. We spent the entire afternoon there and I experienced an order of cheeseburger tacos for the first time. The Northpark Mall was beautiful and one of the nicest malls I?ve ever visited. They had every store you could imagine from Burberry and Tiffany?s to American Eagle and A?ropostale. I didn?t do much shopping, but Kara bought some nice things to wear to upcoming parties relating to our forthcoming wedding.

The Monday afternoon highlight was randomly seeing Dallas Mavericks Power Forward Dirk Nowitzki in traffic driving his Cadillac Escalade. We were heading back to our hotel from the mall and I randomly looked out the window at a red light to see this:

Our best dinner of the trip was Monday night where we went to Nick & Sam?s in Dallas. I told the restaurant we were celebrating our engagement and they went all out to accommodate us for a very romantic experience. They covered our table in roses and brought us two free glasses of champagne to celebrate. I ordered the gourmet deviled eggs as our appetizer which were topped with variations of caviar, avocado and tuna tartar. The ones with tuna tartar were my favorite, but Kara didn?t care much for them. The restaurant offers complimentary caviar and toast points to all their guests which was very good. Next up was their award winning Caesar salad and bread which was delicious. For my entr?e I had their rib eye cooked medium-rare with a crab stuffed potato. Kara had their filet minion and a regular baked potato. We ordered a bottle of white wine with our dinner but they brought us complimentary glasses of red wine with our red meat. I can honestly say it was one of the best steaks I?ve ever had, ranking right up there with Porterhouse in New York. We didn?t want dessert, but they brought us out a complimentary dessert liquor to cap off the evening. I was shocked with all the free stuff we got because we were celebrating our engagement. If you are ever in the Dallas area, go out of your way to eat and Nick & Sam?s. Great atmosphere for a romantic date and outstanding food; it?s also not as expensive as you would think and well worth the price.

After dinner our hotel limousine was running a little late so we went to a hotel across the street to have a drink and enjoy the city. We capped the night off at the Mansion Bar with just one drink and called it an early night. Overall it was a wonderful trip with great memories. I couldn?t have asked for more for an engagement celebration. I arrived back home in West Virginia yesterday evening and went right back to work. Once I finish typing this, it?s off to spend time with our families for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Have a great holiday everyone!

Many of you that read this blog are affiliates so I don’t have to tell you that nothing should surprise you. It’s really comical how many times I am surprised each day in my campaigns. To have success in a campaign you always have to do a significant amount of testing to find out what works and what doesn’t. Ryan, John and I are very big on testing several different variables until we find something that coverts and converts well. We are like everyone else in that we want to see a large return on investment with every campaign that we launch. This is very difficult, time consuming and complicated.

I’ve mentioned on more than one occasion that there is no “winning formula” as an affiliate. We do not have the magical secret that can make you an overnight millionaire. What works for us, might not work for you and vice versa. The variables that have to be evaluated in each campaign start with the traffic, then the ad copy, the landing page and finally the offer. These four variables must all line up in order to make a profit.

It does not matter if you are promoting offers through pay-per-click or media buying, the variables are the same. It is amazing how one little change to any of these four variables can swing a campaign drastically in either direction. The advertiser can make a small change to the offer page and flush a very profitable campaign down the toilet. The question I am often asked is, how do you know when you have all four variables exactly right?

Well, the answer is obvious. All four variables are right when the campaign is profitable. However, that doesn’t mean to stop there. Most of the time a campaign can be scaled several times over to increase its bottom line; this is a time-consuming process that can take months to accomplish. We’ve talked about it several times but very few campaigns are profitable out of the gate. However, once you’ve eliminated the junk ads and done your optimization homework, a profitable campaign can be found.

When I notice a campaign performing particularly well, I’m always looking for ways to make the profit even bigger. I test and optimize, test and optimize and just when I think I’ve squeezed every bit of profit out of the campaign, I test and optimize again. I think many people are either too impatient when creating their campaigns or too lazy to continue to scale their campaigns. The difference between a regular affiliate or a “super” affiliate often comes down to who is willing to work harder.

I’ve spent hours building out an original and creative campaign only to have something go wrong and have it tank or never even make it into our mix of what we are promoting. Life as an affiliate is frustrating and risky. Sometimes I feel like a hypocrite because I get impatient in my campaigns and go against my own advice. It’s important to have patience, not be afraid to take risks and hang in there when times are tough.

If you’ve never experienced challenging times, then you’ve probably never made any money as an affiliate. This business is not for the weak. This business is meant for people who like taking risks and do not mind riding a rollercoaster of emotions. Some days you are on top of the world with lucrative earnings and other days you can’t figure out what in the heck happened. Dedication and passion will get you through the hard times but always pay close attention the four variables I talked about today. Remember to test and optimize until you cannot possibly eek out another penny.

I’m off to Dallas tomorrow to go see my Dallas Cowboys go to battle with the Washington Redskins on Sunday in my first trip to Cowboys Stadium. I’m sure I’ll have at least one interesting blog from the trip so stay tuned. Have a great weekend!

It’s Friday the 13th so I figured it would be the perfect time for a fun post. This one is just for a laugh, so don’t take it too serious. Without any further ado:

YOU KNOW YOU’RE A SUPER AFFILIATE WHEN…

You drive a nicer car than anyone in your family.

You read AffBuzz more than your local newspaper.

You cringe every time you hear or see anything about the FTC.

Random people message you on Facebook looking for employment.

You’d give up your girlfriend before your traffic sources.

You’d rather scale a campaign than go out on Saturday night.

You hire your parents to work for you.

Your neighbors think you’re a drug dealer.

Your parents think you’re a drug dealer.

You think Oprah Winfrey is a greedy bitch.

You’d like to see Dr. Oz’s medical degree.

You know what “Slingin’ da berries” means.

You can make a bank teller’s jaw drop.

You smoke the eCig and think about what a missed opportunity.

You replace all your friends with Affiliate Managers.

You understand this sentence: Based on our spend we think that’s an adequate EPC given the CTR.

Your credit card bill is 6-figures on a monthly basis. (or 7)

You think $100,000 isn’t that much money.

You think $200,000 isn’t that much money.

Hell, you think $500,000 isn’t that much money.

Your girlfriend has to hide your iPhone to get your attention.

You travel to a major American city at least once a month.

Feel free to add your own in the comment box below. I had several more but I figured I had to stop at some point and get some work done. I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Ryan and I returned home from Ad Tech: New York late Friday night. The trip was very busy for us but very successful as well. It was great meeting everyone and if I didn’t get to meet you, I hope to see you in Las Vegas in January for Affiliate Summit West. I uploaded over twenty pictures on Saturday on the Photo Gallery page so be sure and check them out. Always looking for a good blogging opportunity, I had several observations from the trip. Check them out below:

Watch out, I’m an AFFILIATE!
If you’re a high volume affiliate then you already know that we are stereotyped by advertising networks. Either they love us or they hate us. There doesn’t seem to be much in between. I could figure out within the first minute of our conversation where they stood on our offers. If they didn’t like us, I was polite (in most cases) and let them finish what they had to say before moving on. Thanks to the folks at Convert 2 Media for the ?Super Affiliate!? tag I put on my badge. I figured I might as well just put it out there to avoid explaining who I was at every booth. You can check out my badge at this link. Personally, I do not understand what is so bad about affiliates. I understand there are some complaints with what we run, but there are complaints with any advertisement. As long as what we are running is legal and compliant, I don’t understand why the advertising networks don’t want our money. Nonetheless there are plenty of traffic sources out there willing to work with us and it was a pleasure meeting with them.

Different Niches Work for Different Affiliates
Ryan and I met with several other Super Affiliates and it is funny how what works for them doesn’t necessarily work for us. It seems like everyone has their niche combination’s that do very well and the ones they continue to work on. That’s affiliate marketing for you. There’s no ?winning formula? as you figure out something that works and you blow it up. You can copy everything you do for a particular niche and take it to another one and it tanks. Success depends on every variable from the traffic source to the ad copy to the landing page. It’s always important to keep plugging in different things for every niche to make it work.

Affiliate Networks Have the Best Booths
Some booths were more pleasant than others to visit but I have to give it to the guys at Copeac and Convert 2 Media. Copeac had cold Coors Light and Convert 2 Media had Amstel Light. I was too busy to enjoy it, but what a great way to build relationships with new affiliates. It was a completely different vibe at the affiliate network booths and much more relaxing.

AT&T Sucks in New York City
I’m not sure what happened but Ryan and I had almost no cell phone service while we were at our hotel (the W Times Square) or the Javits Convention Center. This made for some very interesting moments when trying to get a hold of people that we had setup meetings with. I heard everyone that had AT&T had problems with their reception at the show and while the lines must have been jammed with all the iPhones, they really need to do something to get that fixed. I didn’t know I needed to learn how to send smoke signals in 2009 in New York City.

Super Affiliates Party Like Rock Stars
From a stretch Hummer limousine to fresh McDonald’s food being served with an open bar, the parties done by both Copeac and Azoogle were amazing. It was great to meet with everyone in a relaxed environment and just have a little bit of fun. This trip was exhausting for us because we had so many meetings setup but it was really nice to be able to relax with all of our friends in the business. Thanks guys for the great times!

To wrap it up Ad Tech: New York 2009 was a great trip. We ate a lot a great food, got a ton of work accomplished and made great memories with a lot of fun people. I hope to see everyone in Las Vegas in January!