Timothy Jones is an Internet marketer with a passion for Mickey Mouse and Politics.  Most would think these two diverging topics would not be found easily co-existing within the same person, but Tim Jones is an exception among many rules. Tim is passionate about conservative politics and at the same time exuberant as he can be about the artistic and creative land of Disney. Tim has found the best of both worlds merging them into a lifestyle and career.

Many of my regular readers may remember an article I wrote about Tim’s eBay business and how it was effected by the digital download reversal at eBay in the Trading Assistant Journal. Digital Delivery on eBay - A Crime or Just Bad Wording?

Tim has moved onward and upward with his business since eBay put a very major kink is his previous digital delivery information marketing business plan.  We chat almost daily on Twitter and since Tim was able to attend Affiliate Summit 2008 in Boston I put aside my obvious jealousy and asked him if he wouldn’t mind bringing back a report for our readers about the event?  Of course Tim jumped at the chance to bring our readers news from his travels, as he is a travel based writer of some renown…

Without further adieu, here is Timothy Jones Guest Blog report on Affiliate Summit 2008 - Boston

Affiliate Summit Recap

My first Affiliate Summit started as a long, full-day sprint.  Things definitely slowed down after the first day, but this conference requires an amazing amount of energy and stamina.  During the day, you have two or three sessions going on at any one time.  Choosing the appropriate session sometimes created a dilemma for me, however, knowing that videos of all the presentations would be on the Affiliate Summit site gave me comfort.  At night, there are dinners, parties, and social events that go on into the hours of the next morning.  Then, you get up early to start the process over, again.  This goes on for at least three days, after which you need three more to recover and process everything you encountered on the previous three.

The sessions covered all aspects of the affiliate marketing business to appeal to all members of this wide and varied industry, including publishers, advertisers, and networks.  Additionally, the Meet Market and Exhibit Hall provided voluminous possibilities for networking.

My goal for the conference was to learn as much as possible, so networking was not one of my focuses, however I did get to meet an amazing number of people that I’d only spoken to online, prior to this event.  It’s always interesting to meet people face-to-face that you’ve only “seen” online, before.  For those attending the conference in the future, I feel this may have been one of the mistakes or “lessons learned” from this conference; take advantage of every opportunity to meet and network with everyone.  Nothing will jump-start or expand your business like knowing the right people to help you along or make that introduction to the right person for your business.

A couple of the more interesting sessions were the Performance Marketing Alliance session and the Ethics in Affiliate Marketing session.  Both of these sessions sparked significant emotions and vehement opinions from both the panels and the audience.  As the affiliate industry grows, both the need for an association and adherence to ethical standards will become more apparent and necessary.

One of the issues that concerned me going into the conference was the number of merchants, vendors, and businesses presenting information at the Summit.  Oftentimes, when businesses present at conferences (especially a conference for marketers), you tend to hear sales pitch after sales pitch.  This was definitely not the case for Affiliate Summit.  While there were a couple of exceptions, I was impressed with the quality of the information presented, without a hint of a sales pitch.  Some presenters even went so far as to ask for discussions about their own business to take place outside the session, to avoid any impropriety.  One of the founders of the conference, Shawn Collins, told me they do not tolerate presentations that are nothing more than sales pitches.  I think this policy is invaluable and separates Affiliate Summit from the crowd.

Overall, the conference was very laid-back and enjoyable, but also very informative.  I am still processing through the lessons learned and action items from the conference, even weeks later.  A couple tips for future attendees that I took away from my experiences:

1. Arrive the day before the conference.  I tried to come in the first day of the conference and while I did not miss anything, it just caused too much stress and worry to make it worthwhile.
2. Go with goals in mind.  As I noted, I wanted to soak up as much information as possible.  You may have an idea to pitch, certain people you want to meet, an idea you want to develop.  Don’t just float aimlessly down the river - paddle and make a difference.
3. Give and take business cards, but most importantly, follow-up with those people when you get home.  Most people never follow-up with the people they meet at a conference and the connection is lost.  I am looking forward to Affiliate Summit West 2009 in Las Vegas to build on these lessons and the friendships I made at Affiliate Summit East 2008.

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Link Bait

Link Baiting - Oh, it sounds somewhat sinister…

The term just reeks of something less than ethical yet it is one of the best tactics new and seasoned bloggers alike can use to build up the page rank and visibility of a blog.

What is link baiting?

Our friend and client, Keith Bloemendaal, has just given the world a perfect example on his newly finished blog website Raleigh Fence Contractors LLC.

Keith’s latest post is titled Friday Blog Link.

In this post Keith mentions he plans on using this tactic every Friday, what tactic you say? Link Baiting is the artful and somewhat creative method of bringing attention to yourself and your blog by linking to respected blogs and bloggers. When writing a link bait article the intention is to be complimentary to peers in your niche and o slightly out of your niche in an effort to get these same bloggers to either write about or link to you and your blog in return.

In his article Keith has linked to no less than 6 blogs and bloggers he respects and he continues the link parade with no less than 7 additional links to other pages and articles within sites owned by these bloggers.

See the example paragraph below

Darren Rowse’s ProBlogger, Chris Brogan, Connie Benson, and numerous SEO and marketing blogs, I always keep a close eye on my mentor, and close friend Scott Pooler and his writings on iBusinessLogic and Trading Assistant Journal. I want to focus every week on Fridays to the blogs I read and discover. We will cover many topics over the coming weeks, this week we will focus on a home improvement blog I subscribe to called Helpful Advice for Home Construction Improvement:

For a guy who is relatively new to the blogging world, I must say that Keith never ceases to amaze me with the grasp he has on social networking. This link bait article of his was done with style and with real respect for the people he is hoping will return the link love he has extended.

Obviously in my case it has worked - this article is my way to return the favor to Keith and the Raleigh Fence Contractors Blog. I am sure I will not be the only one returning the favor.

This is really the point… exchanging links is a primary goal for most bloggers, this endeavor is something traditional website owners do not have as much of a grasp upon. Without inbound links to your site, from relevant sites, you will not climb in page rank. Search engines love to find new links and they love you more if those links end up on your site somewhere.

The best part of link baiting within blogs is it is almost completely automatic. This is because when you place a link to a blog on your blog, the blog platform (Wordpress, Movable Type, Blogger etc) automatically sends a message to the other blog called a trackback. This informs the other blog you are mentioning them in your blog. That’s how I found out Keith had mentioned me in his blog, from a trackback. In essence, it is really bait… You send out the link bait into the blogosphere and just sit back and wait for the fish to come back and read what you said about them.

So go ahead, Link Bait Away… Its really not sinister or rude… Just a way to say hello… look at me, I like your blog, do you like mine?

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Successfully selling physical goods online requires the creation of an image of your brand that will make buyers trust you and your company. Trust is the number one issue for buyers online, while newer (and younger) Internet users are more accepting of eCommerce shopping, making sure your presenting the very best image to each and every person who lands on your products is key to any kind of online success plan.

eBay – Option 1

If your plan is to expand an existing business, or start a new online business starting with eBay is usually the first option. eBay is not the only method of Internet merchandising available but it is the easiest to start with as a new seller. Certainly other options exist and we will detail those options in later articles, for now, lets look at eBay as a strong starting point for online sales.

Initially several steps are required to sell on eBay. First you must register as a seller and then you must register a PayPal account and confirm the account. This process is not difficult, but may take a couple of days to complete. Part of the process involves providing a credit or debit card verification and bank account deposits from PayPal to your bank of minimal amounts, this verifies your identity in an effort to minimize fraud and protect buyers.

eBay Tools

eBay provides many tools in the basic “sell your item” form used by most new sellers. This is a step by step process meant to take new sellers through the process of making all of the proper decisions when creating a listing.

While the “sell your item” form is certainly easy, it is not the most efficient or cost effective way to manage eBay listings. Several other listing management options are available both within eBay and by third party providers. Some of these third party listing and inventory solutions are even offered to the public as free solutions to use. These solutions make their money in other ways and they do not always focus on your needs as a business owner when providing you with “free” software. If your intention is to create a real online business, finding free solutions is not always the best option for your business plan. I recommend finding a solution which fits your future business plans.

Growing Beyond eBay - Multi-Channel

If you plan on growing beyond eBay, a multi-channel solution may be key as you will not want to change your listing procedures and workflow prior to taking the next step. If your business involved specific requirements of a solution, such as consignment capabilities or intensive inventory control, I suggest you find the right solution to start. This will allow you as a business owner to manage your business, not micro manage your solutions.

Once you have “tested the waters” by listing a few items on eBay with the basic sell your item form, as a business person you should have a better idea of the requirements you will have when looking for a long term solution to scale up your business on eBay. Considerations such as pre-formatted text options which allow each listing to present the same standard information, inventory management and re-listing options, live revisions of listings with mistakes or pricing changes, template options, fee calculations options, employee compartmentalization and more. All of these considerations become the basis for an online business solution selection process.

Lets look at the different steps involved with making an eBay Listing: Read More→

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