Question and Response on the NZ vs US affiliate market

I received an interesting (if broad) question today by email and thought it was worth putting the details up;

Question:

Hi,

Found your great site and got your contact details. I’m new to the affiliate mktg game but motivated and keen to get moving. However being based in NZ was hoping to start in the NZ marketplace but it does not look like its happening in terms of merchant availability and motivation to use affiliates. I’ll think i’ll start in the US market? Am i thinking straight? Any advice appreciated.

Cheers…[name removed]

Response:
Hi [name removed],

Good question, although it’s a pretty big one :)

Do you ignore the NZ market given its current lack of affiliate programs and target the US market which has more than one program for everything you can sell or do online or do you stick with the NZ market because it’s what you know best and deal with the restrictions?

Sadly it’s not something I can answer properly as it depends on what you are interested in promoting and how you want to promote it.

Affiliate marketers worldwide tend to work on more than one site at a time. Perhaps the answer is to work on both?

Having exposure to different markets can be a very positive thing as if there is a down-turn in one it does not necessarily mean the other is also heading down.

The key for the NZ market is to make sure you think long and hard about what you’re planning on marketing and make sure there are already promotional options available. There’s no excuse for building a website and then saying “there’s no-one to pay me for it”, your research before you built the website should have included how you are going to fund the revenue from it.

The obvious default answer in New Zealand is to use Google Adsense however this will not always give you the best value for your traffic.

In the US market, the same thing applies. Make sure there is not too much competition in the market you are looking to enter, or that you have a strong enough offer and/or content to beat out the competition. As long as you’ve already seen advertising avenues for whatever it is you’re promoting, then go for it!

Cheers

AP

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Affiliate Marketing and Search in New Zealand - Search Engine Room

I had the pleasure of attending and was a speaker at (although not for affiliateprograms.co.nz) the Search Engine Room conference yesterday and have to say that I was impressed.

The level of expectation from search industry professionals that the search market in New Zealand is ready for double digit growth over each quarter in the next year is a positive step forward for the New Zealand market.

Search advertising is over 40% of online advertising spend elsewhere in the world however in New Zealand it is still under 30%. Online advertising spend as a percentage of marketing budgets in New Zealand is still well under the worldwide norm with New Zealand online spend at around 7% and the rest of the world between 13-15%.

Will affiliate marketing increases impact on this? It surely will.

Many affiliates spend time bringing viewers to their site through search engine advertising. In New Zealand this has always meant Google Adsense however now with the updated Yahoo! Search Marketing tools available it will need to include YSM as well.

As more affiliate programs are created and more affiliates come online looking for ways to source targeted traffic then search advertising spend in New Zealand will only inrease.

As discussed in a previous post, affiliates need to steer clear of search advertising for branded keywords as many programs expressely forbid this in their terms and conditions however search advertising for long-tail keywords in the New Zealand market are still relatively light in competition for the top positions. While this is true at the moment, it is not likely to stay that way for long, as more marketing managers from companies around New Zealand begin to jump on the band-wagon of search advertising.

With companies in attendance like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! as well as innovative New Zealand companies like Eurekster and SLI-Systems. It was great to see the first search conference become a successful and interesting event.

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Commission Monster Application

I’m happy to say that Commission Monster came back with a reasonably quick acceptance of the application with a nicely done information email describing the services.

There are many affiliate programs who do not spend enough time looking at what their affiliates say when they apply and do not fit quite the same setup which the affiliate program is looking for. Commission Monster are obviously not one of these. Good service!

I also received a follow-up email suggesting a couple of programs. They may not have been targeted to what I’m promoting (e.g. New Zealand affiliate programs) but at least they are being proactive about it.

An initial look through their system shows an easy to use interface with a well laid out selection of reports, features and ways to apply or search for programs to apply to.

If you’re interested you can Sign Up to Commission Monster.

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Commission Monster Review

I haven’t discussed Commission Monster in any in-depth way yet as I had not seen many New Zealand affiliate programs using this more Australian based network.

Late last week I came across an NZ shopping affiliate sign-up (stoffels.co.nz) which is using the Commission Monster network as its program so I figured it was time to become familiar with the network.

Commission Monster is part of the Viva9 Group (viva9.com) which includes Commission Monster, Monster Mall, Rewards Palace, Wildkard and Postclick. All groups appear targeted mainly at the Australian online publising market. Lead by Shane Murray (former CEO of BMCMedia Ltd) with Peter Brighton heading up Commission Monster itself, the group has quite a powerful level of experience in building publishing networks online.

They have some heavy weight brands in the online industry that they show as their clients including; InterFlora, Virgin Money, Wizard Home Loans, Nestle, HSBC and AOL.COM.AU.

The network is very slick from the front-end and appears to be quite up-front with who they are working with and what else they are up to online.

I started to apply by going to the Publishers section and came across something I haven’t seen in an affiliate application before. The first piece of information they require is your email address and the following statement follows;

Please note: Commission Monster requires you to use an email address affiliated with the website you have nominated in this application e.g. www.flowers.com = myname/info/admin@flowers.com. If you cannot do this, please place the words ‘Powered by Your Full Name’ at the bottom of your home page or another page you nominate in the space provided below.

This is quite surprising. I understand that the network would want only publishers who have spent the time and effort to register their own URL and have an email address attached to it however that’s not the only reason people may not standardly use an email address which is attached to their URL. Many people now use webmail systems like Gmail and others to bring in all of their email (this may increase now that Gmail have launched IMAP capabilities) and do not have an email address setup on the site they are looking to promote.

It’s quite understandable that they have done this but it definitely must reduce the amount of legitimate publishers who decide to sign-up to the network. I use the email address affiliate[at]nzbase.com for this website and do not have an email address setup under “@affiliateprograms.co.nz” for no particular reason other than I didn’t really need yet another set of email domains.

I’ll register with this standard email address and see what happens :)

If you’re interested you can Sign Up to Commission Monster.

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