Always on the lookout for new marketing tools and services I found a pretty slick tool that allows me to publish my blog posts and static web pages to all the major social networking sites.  It’s called OnlyWire (maybe you’ve heard of it) and I’ve been successfully using it for about a month now.

OnlyWire syndicates your content and articles to the web’s top social networking sites with a single button click.  OnlyWire makes it EXTREMELY easy to get your message out to the broadest possible audience in the shortest amount of time while improving readership, backlinks, search engine index speed and web-traffic.

Currently, the OnlyWire API is compatible with the following social networking sites:

ask bebo bibsonomy blinklist bookmarksync connotea delicious digg diigo facebook bluedot googlebookmarks jumptags linkatopia misterwong

mixx multiply myspace newsvine plaxo propeller reddit simpy slashdot spurl stumbleupon technorati tumblr twitter yahoobookmarks

Here's an example of the one click publishing provided by OnlyWire. Please click on the image for better resolution.

So how does this benefit you?

Obviously you’ll want to use this on your own websites but it also helps your listings on Top Affiliate.  When OnlyWire users visit your affiliate program page on the directory they’ll have the option to instantly publish your page across their selected social networking sites.  More exposure always means more traffic.

Click on image for better resolution.

The OnlyWire button is found at the bottom right of all Top Affiliate directory pages.  One click publishing!

Is OnlyWire just another social bookmarking application?

Well….yes but the problem with many conventional social bookmarking applications is the time it takes to manually publish web pages to each social network.  They can only do one at a time.  Who wants to sit there and manually bookmark web content across 20 different social networks?  Not me! This means a good portion of web pages out there are never bookmarked, it’s just too much trouble.

So how much of a hassle is it to set up?

Registering for OnlyWire and setting up an account takes a little over an hour if you’re not a member of all the social networking sites.  Registering can be a hassle with some social networking sites but it’s worth your time.

So how much does it cost?

OnlyWire offers FREE and paid services.  If you select the free service you’ll have to:

“agree to add the OnlyWire “Bookmark & Share Button” on your website or blog within 24 hours or your bookmarking ability will be temporarily disabled.  The Button will immediately drive traffic to your website by providing your users the ability to simultaneously bookmark your content across multiple bookmarking sites. The Button also allows your users to share your pages via email with their friends and collegues.” – Onlywire

I purchased a year up front to use their automated content distribution for $24.99 but you can also pay a monthly fee of $2.99.  My time is worth a little more than $24.99 or $0.07/day if you want to do the math!

Tax season is here, are you ready?  I hope so because there is a hungry market out there searching for e-File authorized online tax preparation services.  Just how many?  Well here’s some interesting facts and figures the IRS released on November 2, 2009 in regards to e-filing in the 2009 tax season.  (See IR-2009-99 (Nov. 2, 2009) for the entire release.

1) in 2000, 27.57% or 35,412,000 returns were e-Filed, whereas in 2009, more than two-thirds–67.18% or 94,980,000 our of 141,376,000, were e-Filed;

2) The total number of returns shrank, however, from 153,650,000 in 2008 (a drop of 8%);

3) More taxpayers were doing their own e-Filing–almost 20% more prepared and e-Filed their own returns rather than using tax preparers to do so;

4) The government gave $303.069 billion back to taxpayers in refunds this year, an increase of more than 20% over last year’s refunds; and

5) The 73 million taxpayers who got electronically deposited refunds got them at least a week sooner than those waiting for a paper check, and cost the government less at the same time..

Since the IRS e-File system meets the needs of nearly all taxpayers, no matter how complicated or simple their returns are, more and more people will turn to online tax preparation services.  Using e-File helps taxpayers take advantage of the tax credits available to them to maximize their refunds during these tough economic times and provides key benefits such as:

* Faster Refunds
* Greater Accuracy
* Secure and confidential submission
* No paper return to mail
* File now, pay later
* Quick confirmation

This is great news for affiliate marketers because there is a a variety of tax software products available commercially that offer e-File.  Here’s a selection of the top e-File authorized tax affiliate programs across some of the major networks:

	e-File authorized tax preparation services on the buyat Affiliate Network.
	Commission Value: $25 per completed filing Cookie: 30 days
	Commission Value: $3.30 per registration Cookie: Same Session Only

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	e-File authorized tax preparation services on the Commission Junction Affiliate Network.
	Commission Value: 20% per completed filing Cookie: 120 days
	Commission Value: 20% per completed filing Cookie: 45 days
	Commission Value: 15% per completed filing Cookie: 30 days
	Commission Value: 15% per completed filing Cookie: 45 days

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	e-File authorized tax preparation services on the LinkShare Affiliate Network.
	Commission Value: 50-65% per completed filing Cookie: ? days

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	e-File authorized tax preparation services on the ShareASale Affiliate Network.
	Commission Value: 30% per completed filing Cookie: 120 days
	Commission Value: 60% per completed filing Cookie: 30 days
	Commission Value: 20% per completed filing Cookie: 120 days
	Commission Value: $2.00 per completed filing Cookie: 30 days

Valentine’s Day is right around the corner and is one of the highest grossing holidays for online sales.  Back in 2009 consumers planned to spend an average of $102.50 on Valentine’s Day gifts and merchandise, versus $122.08 per person in 2008 according to the National Retail Federation’s 2009 Valentine’s Day Consumer Intentions and Actions survey.  Although times were tight the total Valentine’s Day spending in 2009 exceeded $14.7 billion.  That is a huge pot of money!

Regardless of the economic climate people will always spend their hard earned dollars on traditional Valentine’s Day gifts which include:

• jewelry
• flowers
• greeting cards
• and candy

Furthermore, the above survey indicated the majority of people (90.8 percent) spent the most on their spouse ($67.22), with other family members such as children getting about one fifth of their budget ($20.95).  Consumers also spent on friends ($4.74), children’s classmates/teachers ($3.59), coworkers ($1.94), and yes…even pets ($2.17).

So how do the numbers look this year for us affiliate marketers?  Well this past holiday season, online sales jumped 18 percent from Nov. 27 to Dec. 24, according to SpendingPulse.

“People were more comfortable doing last-minute shopping online, especially with the bad weather,” Kamalesh Rao, director of economic research for SpendingPulse, said in a telephone interview yesterday. A snowstorm on the East Coast the weekend before Christmas closed some malls early on Dec. 19 and kept shoppers at home….Jewelry sales rose 5.6 percent for November and December, while luxury retail excluding jewelry gained 0.8 percent.”

This is comforting news to online retailers and affiliates.  So here’s a list of some Valentines Day affiliate programs you may want to promote via pay per click campaigns and niche website marketing.  I broke them down by affiliate networks and the Pepperjam Network programs were compiled by my network manager Gina Nardone.

A good network manager will/should work directly with you in order to custom tailor selected affiliate programs to suit your marketing needs and preferences.  They’ll also often dig up affiliate programs that you’ve overlooked or find programs that are not heavily saturated with other affiliate marketers.  This close relationship with your network manger offers you the best opportunity to carve out a nice market share in that specific niche.  These in my opinion are just a few areas both Pepperjam Network and ShareASale have always excelled at.

So here’s some programs you may want to consider promoting:

Valentines Day Affiliate Programs on Pepperjam Network:

Flowers 48LongStems.com FlowerStore.com Teleflora.com Jewelry, Clothing & Pampering Gifts DanforthDiamond.com -*Open-Search EternalSparkles.com Ziamond.com IDoNowIDont.com -*Open-Search SuperJeweler.com Swarovski.com Tuccini.com MyFragranceRoom.com -*Open-Search Cookies, Chocolates, Wines & More GJCookies.com -*Open-Search igourmet.com GiftBaskets.com Patchi.us MonthClubStore.com TheWineMessenger.com

Valentines Day Affiliate Programs on ShareASale:

Flowers PickupFlowers 2Flowers.com Flowers Fast Flora 2000 Jewelry, Clothing & Pampering Gifts Design it Yourself Gifts and Baskets Gifts Baskets for Delivery FragranceShop.com Gifting Inc. Timeless Message HipsandCurves.com Wicked Temptations Panties.com Intimate Wholesalers SassyBax Cookies, Chocolates, Wines & More Savannah Candy Cookies in Bloom Harry London Clever Cookie Brownie Points

Valentines Day Affiliate Programs on Linkshare:

Flowers 1-800-Flowers.com (personal favorite) Martha Stewart for 1-800-Flowers.com 1-800-Baskets.com GourmetGiftBaskets.com Honest Florist Fleurop.com Just Because Baskets Flowers.com Blooms Today GiftBaskets.com, Inc. Internet Florist Jewelry, Clothing & Pampering Gifts Memorable Gifts DiViene.com Pear Tree Greetings James Allen Her Room The Body Shop Zales Vermont Teddy Bear Frederick’s of Hollywood, Inc. Perfume Worldwide, Inc. Diamonds International Mondera (personal favorite) Bare Necessities JewelryWeb.com, Inc. Cookies, Chocolates, Wines & More Chocolate.com My Wines Direct Wine.com

Valentines Day Affiliate Programs on Commission Junction:

Flowers GiftTree Organic Bouqet JustFlowers.com USAFlorist.com 1-800-Florals FlowerDelivery.com FloraQueen Jewelry, Clothing & Pampering Gifts Ross Simons James Avery Diamond.com Ashford.com Buyz.com Body Candy StrawberryNET.com FragranceX.com My Jewelry Box WaySpa.com USA and CA Couture Candy Cookies, Chocolates, Wines & More Wine Access Gevalia Ghirardelli Chocolates Vosges Chocolates RICHART Chocolates Wine Basket zCHOCOLAT.com

This is obviously not an all inclusive list.  While each affiliate network has a wide range of products suited for a solid Valentine’s Day marketing campaign, I really like the premier clientele on LinkShare to include: 1-800-Flowers/Baskets, Vermont Teddy Bear, Mondera, Bare Necessities Chocolate.com and Wine.com.

However, these are just some Valentine’s Day affiliate programs you may want to take a look at promoting via ppc marketing campaigns or whatever marketing campaign you’re developing.  Be sure to contact your affiliate or network managers and inquire what’s hot and new this season.

Incidentally, don’t stress out if you haven’t set up your Valentine’s Day campaigns already.  Valentine’s Day is predominantly what I call a perishable holiday.   Perishable in that the majority of products bought and sold during the holiday are flowers, candies and other consumable items.  This means the majority of sales occur approximately one week before the holiday.

Best of luck to you as you create/develop your Valentine’s Day marketing campaigns.  I hope this brief Valentine’s Day affiliate program list helps speed up your time to market.  Aloha!

With Christmas right around the corner Linkshare has seen an increase of online fashion retailers joining their affiliate network.  A few are well established retailers you know by name with a few new up and coming retailers.  Here’s a few new fashion retailers to get you started on the Linkshare UK affiliate network:

Faith – A leading UK fashion high street retailer specializing in affordable women’s and men’s luxury footwear and accessories.

• Up to 8% commission on net sales
• 30 day Cookie period
• Newsletters sent on a regular basis to inform you of our best sellers, new items, offers and trends
• Access to product imagery and content to ensure your visitors are the first to know about the latest must-have fashion items and accessories
• Instant access to sales reports and tracking
• Affiliate page – http://www.faith.co.uk/faith-affiliate-programme-artlaffiliate_programme/

Jigsaw – Jigsaw is a British company that has been involved in the design, manufacturing and retailing of clothes and accessories for over thirty-five years. The first store opened in Hampstead in 1972 and the company has steadily expanded to currently operate over 40 stores in the UK. In 1996 Jigsaw Junior was established to extend the product range from purely women’s fashion. The brand has also seen international expansion in the USA, where it currently trades from 7 stores on the West Coast.

• Affiliate page – http://www.jigsaw-online.com/affiliates  (Affiliate program structure not listed on website.)
  

Fenn Wright Manson -Since the launch in 1974 Fenn Wright Manson has established itself as a leading British ladieswear fashion brand and has acquired a reputation for innovative and timeless collections. An emphasis on chic and feminine styles and cuts, in exhaustible and versatile range of prints and textures, have given the seasonal collections it’s distinct profile.

The Fenn Wright Manson London based design team produces inspirational and quintessential styles season after season, appealing to an ageless fashion aware woman who wants to invest in effortlessly sophisticated and everyday flattering pieces. Every style has attention to detail and are suitable for all aspects of life – from work and day and right through to evening and occasions wear.  

• 5% Commission on all goods
• Ggenerous 60-day Cookie Window
• (Affiliate program offering not listed on website.  Had to dig up the details.)

Matches – Since the first Matches store opened near Tom and Ruth Chapman’s home in Wimbledon in 1990, it has become a brand in its own right – an iconic retail experience, trusted by London’s most fashion literate clientele, offering the best of the best in established and new international labels.  (Good website and generous affiliate structure.  Definitely worth taking a closer look at.)

• £5 bounty on full-price orders placed by new customers’
• 45 day cookie length
• Up to 10% commission
• Instant access to sales reports and bestsellers
• Daily automated product feed
• Regular newsletters to ensure you’re up to date with the latest trends and must-have buys for the season
• Access to the product catwalk imagery (Nice touch there!)
• Affiliate page – http://www.matchesfashion.com/fcp/content/JoinUs/content

Fossil – Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past 25 years you’ve probably heard of Fossil.  Fossil is a design, development, marketing and distribution company that specializes in consumer products predicated on fashion and value.  The company’s principal offerings include an extensive line of fashion watches sold under the company’s proprietary and licensed brands.  The company also offers complementary lines of small leather goods, belts, handbags, sunglasses, jewelry and apparel.  The company’s products are sold in department stores and specialty retail stores in over 90 countries around the world, in addition to the company’s e-commerce website at www.fossil.com.

• 17% commission on all of our products, on every referred sale (One of the largest percentages I’ve seen for this particular market.)
• Highly recognizable retailer
• Free shipping on every order over $75
• Checks cut monthly
• Also listed on Performics and Commission Junction
• Affiliate page – http://www.fossil.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Static____affiliateNetwork_custCareNav

Radley – Radley was founded in 1998 by Lowell Harder, our Creative Director. Radley is a great, creative British brand, which makes beautiful handbags and accessories  for women to own.

• Baseline commission: 6%
• Cookie window: 30 days
• A full Merchandiser product feed is available on the program
• JPG, Flash banners and text links for all promotions
• LinkBuilder also allows you to link to any page on the Radley site.
• (Affiliate program offering not listed on website.  Had to dig up the details.)

As you’re tweaking your Christmas affiliate marketing campaigns be sure to keep an eye out on new affiliate programs your preferred affiliate networks may have recently launched.  Stay ahead of the pack and always look for new unique niches you can easily dominate.

When Pepperjam launched Pepperjam Network earlier this year I was still in Iraq and only had a chance to sign up for the new affiliate network.  After returning back from my deployment and getting around to catching up on an obscene amount of backlog I finally got around to poking around the Pepperjam Network.

Logging into the affiliate control panel I was immediately impressed with the technology and detail.  Everything you need to run a successful affiliate marketing campaign is immediately at your disposal in an aesthetically pleasing layout.

Pepperjam has secured some HUGE merchant/retailer names.  Looking through their list of advertisers you’ll see many of the same wildly popular advertisers you love to promote and some interesting new advertisers in very specialized niche markets you may not be familiar with like Andy’s Airplanes.

In my opinion one of the best features of this affiliate network is pepperjamADS.

“pepperjamADS is an affiliate marketing widget that you can use to serve customized contextual ads from one or multiple Pepperjam Network advertisers at the same time. The ad units come in various shapes and sizes. You can mix and mash ads from any of your merchant partners. For instance, you can create a fashion widget by selecting various ads from multiple fashion merchants. Likewise, you can create a specific widget with ads from any one merchant.”

If you haven’t already signed up for the Pepperjam Network…what are you waiting for?  Pepperjam’s 2008 Inc. 500 ranking is #70 with three-year revenue growth of 2,447.5%.  Pepperjam ranks as one of the top 100 fastest growing privately-held companies in the United States of America!

The below article by Michael Wong, owner of Mikes Marketing Tools, offers some excellent advice for old and new hat affiliate program managers.  Take a look and see if your affiliate program may be breaking one of these 5 cardinal rules.  In my opinion Mikes number one mistake, “Competing With Your Affiliates”, is probably the biggest problem I see with many affiliate programs today.  Enjoy!

Affiliate Managers: Your Top Five Biggest Affiliate Program Mistakes

In this article I will show affiliate managers the mistakes they should avoid if they want to build a successful affiliate program.

I felt compelled to write this article after seeing the same mistakes made by most of the hundreds of affiliate programs I have joined since I started promoting them in 1997. I have made a nice living from affiliate programs over the years, so I know a thing or two about them. I would dearly love to make more money with affiliate programs, but affiliate managers don’t make it easy for us affiliates. So hopefully this article will do a bit for the cause.

Here are my top five biggest affiliate program mistakes that I find today:

1. Competing With Your Affiliates.

This is by far the worst mistake made by companies that offer affiliate programs. I often see companies for products I am trying to promote compete with me in the search engine rankings and pay per click advertising programs.

Why companies invest money and resources in competing with their affiliates is beyond me. By competing with me, you’re trying to put me out of business. Have marketing directors ever thought of it in that way? Because if you succeed, you will no longer have an affiliate network to speak of.

The money would be better spent on supporting your affiliate network by creating a better product, providing more referral statistics, higher commission payouts, faster support, and more, fresh promotional creatives.

So if you’re an affiliate manager reading this article, tell your affiliate director at your next meeting to STOP competing with your affiliates, and support them instead!

2. Not Providing Your Affiliates With Useful, Real-Time Statistics.

All marketers rely on statistics to measure the effectiveness of any marketing campaign. Yet most affiliate programs only provide their affiliates with basic statistics such as number of visitors sent, number of sales, and commission earned. These statistics aren’t much help to affiliates who want to measure the effectiveness of a particular pay per click campaign.

Affiliate managers – please consider providing these useful statistics so that I can market your products effectively:

• Archive of daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly statistics and by date range.
• Commission earned, broken down by product or service, and how the customer was referred to the site.
• Daily email update of all affiliate statistics.
• Instant email notification of a new affiliate.
• Instant email notification of a new free trial sign up.
• Instant email notification of a new sale and all relevant statistics. I love getting new sales notification emails!
• Number of free trial downloads or subscriptions.
• Number of returns and all relevant statistics.
• Affiliate links with trackable IDs, so that affiliates can tell exactly which site, or ad campaign is sending the referrals and sales.
• Unique clicks – which refers to the unique number of visitors referred – in addition to raw clicks – which refers to the total number of click throughs.
• A list of top performing affiliate statistics, so that affiliates can compare how they’re doing and which areas they can improve on.
• Include the most important statistics at the top of the email and subject line. There’s nothing worse than having to scroll down to see what the referral purchased or how much commission I have made.

The following only apply if the affiliate program offers more than one level of commissions.

• Commission earned as a result of referrals sent by 2nd-tier affiliates.
• Commission earned, broken down by commission level.
• Number of 2nd-tier affiliates referred.

I’ve been promoting products and services via affiliate programs since 1997 and I have yet to come across an affiliate program that provides anything close to these statistics.

3. Not Compensating Your Affiliates Fairly For Their Hard Work.

The #1 incentive for any affiliate is cold hard cash. Money sells! So tell your marketing director to fire the search engine optimization firm and advertising department, and redirect the resources to paying your affiliates a higher commission rate.

Another thing I hate is seeing my commissions go down the drain because someone I had referred signs up to the affiliate program and purchases the product via their affiliate link. It almost feels like I’m being robbed blind! I highly recommend affiliate managers deter this practice by making it harder for affiliates to pocket the commission from their own purchases, at least the initial one.

4. Not Providing Enough Fresh Promotional Creatives.

Most affiliate managers seem to give their promotional creatives little thought. All they offer is a handful of 468×60 banners, buttons and text links. What happens is that affiliates end up using the same ads on hundreds, even thousands of web sites.

Affiliate managers – what about these promotional creatives?

• Articles and tips with embedded affiliate links
• Classified ads
• Customer testimonials
• Direct email ads
• Email signatures
• Newsletter ads
• pay per click ads
• Pop-up/under ads
• Product photographs
• Product reviews
• Product screenshots
• Rich-media ads
• Skyscrapers
• Staff interviews

Listen up! Different ads perform better on different sites. And ads generally have a life span of a carton of milk. So offer your affiliates a greater variety of ads, more often.

5. Not Providing Fast, Quality Support For Your Affiliates.

This is the 21st century. Don’t make your affiliates wait longer for an email reply than it takes to send a letter by snail-mail post.

Don’t outsource your affiliate support work. If you have to, then at least train your support staff so that they understand the ins and outs of your products and affiliate program. I’m often dumbfounded by affiliate support staff who can’t give me answers to simple questions.

Well there you have it – my five biggest complaints about affiliate programs today. I hope affiliate managers take note and take strides to better support their affiliates, because if you don’t, affiliates will find other ways to make money on their site.

Affiliate marketers – if you agree with what I’ve said, send this article to your affiliate program managers!

About The Author: Michael Wong is the editor of GoDefy.com – the world’s first online marketing comparison shopping search engine and Mike’s Marketing Tools. Michael is also the author of the leading Search Engine Optimization Guide and numerous marketing tips. Publishing Rights: You may republish this article in your web site, newsletter, or ebook, on the condition that you agree to leave the article, author’s signature and photograph, and all links completely intact. Full instructions on how to copy and upload my photo to your server.