Live from Shop.org: Affiliating with Success Jan 14, 2004 12:00 PM
, Margery Weinstein
JobZone
Search and post jobs for the Multichannel Merchant. Including jobs for brand & agency marketers, e-commerce, catalog marketers, ops & fulfillment, direct marketing and more.
New York--On Jan. 13, the first day of the National Retail
Federation-sponsored Shop.org conference here, three
cataloger/retailers discussed the challenges of implementing successful
affiliate marketing strategies.
The difference between now and several years ago in the history of
affiliate marketing is a matter of respect gained, explained Prakash
Bharwani, senior manager of interactive marketing at Westbury, NY-based
floral and food gifts marketer 1-800-Flowers.com Bharwani said
that back then, the task of supervising a company’s affiliate
marketing plan wasn't usually considered important enough to serve as a
job in and of itself.
“It started off as an addition to normal
responsibilities,” Bharwani said. “Now we have a team of
people lined up to move the program in a strategic
direction.”
David Rogers, affiliate marketing specialist for New York-based
apparel cataloger/retailer Brooks Brothers, pointed out that
this seemingly simple form of marketing is now in its third stage of
evolution. During the first stage, i.merchants focused on establishing
relationships with big-name partners such as Yahoo! or Excite. The goal
was to make the expense of the affiliate partnerships pay for
themselves, said Rogers.
Around three years ago, the focus shifted to choosing affiliates
with a goal of driving as much traffic as possible to the site. In the
stage we are currently in, Rogers said, affiliate partners are chosen
even more selectively: “We don’t throw money at big
names.”
The importance CEOs place on affiliate marketing is seen in the
financial latitude it is usually given within companies. John Tighe,
director of e-commerce support for Nashville, TN-based men's footwear
cataloger/retailer Johnston & Murphy, said it is a line item
on the e-commerce budget but that senior management quickly excuses the
department if its needs exceed the budget because that means sales are
exceeding expectations.
“It’s now such a large percentage of online sales, that
[top executives'] interest gets peaked,” Tighe said.
Rogers said there is a never-ending need to educate senior
executives about affiliate marketing. “Education is important
because programs are constantly changing. Some of the things we were
doing last year, we are not doing now; some of the concerns we had last
year, we don’t have now,” he explained. “The key to
the future is flexibility and the ability to evolve.”
One of the areas of affiliate marketing that sometimes requires an
open mind is the use of the company’s brand name by affiliates
for the purpose of search engine optimization. On the one hand, a
company wants to help the affiliate attract as many consumers as
possible to its site, so that they will hopefully be induced to click
on the affiliate manager’s featured link. On the other hand,
there is a need not to confuse consumers or dilute the brand name.
Affiliates of Brooks Brothers are permitted to use the brand name
for the purpose of driving traffic to their site as long as they obtain
written permission from the company, Rogers said. But affiliates of
1-800-Flowers, said Bharwani, are not permitted to use the
company’s trademarks or product-specific keywords, such as
"flower cake," to get visitors to their site.
