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There is always a time and place for everything, but c’mon now, are affiliate links about to enter into Twitter for high volume profit? Mitch Joel wrote a post today on how poor of a choice it is to market on Twitter, here: Affiliate Links In Twitter Will Sink Marketing To A New Low

For sure, there are now thousands of mainstream Twitter users thanks to Oprah, Barbara Walters, etc. All of these new mainstream users are susceptible to being marketed traditional products they would see ads for anywhere else on the web. Please keep it real, Twitter is a place to converse via public messages. Twitter is one of the strongest platforms to speak and connect to the world. It is not a place that needs to be infected by a few dozen users who are looking to make a quick buck. So, please prove me wrong, affiliate links on Twitter are abuse, not an opportunity to spam more people.

In an earlier blog entry, Joel said:

And here’s the kicker: we really are speaking to each other, and that is way more powerful than marketers telling customers what they want them to hear.

Across the web there are countless platforms that enable “paid” media. In other words, you pay for the exposure of a brand/product that you want to be promoted. The problem is that it is harder to achieve earned-media, due to authentic time and effort, but the rewards are much greater if executed right. Earning your media has become a more popular marketing strategy for brands because it’s very cost effective compared to paid media. Recent innovations such as Twitter, Facebook, and other social media properties give a stronger leverage point for brands to earn their media.

When I read marketing news sites, I usually see something like “Advertising Revenue Predicted To Decline”. Yes, this is correct. Meanwhile, I continually see headlines such as “Social Media Advertising Revenue Increases Amid Recession”. Advertising agencies face the challenge of switching from traditional paid media, to “earned” media. So, with the marketing industry flipped upside down, only handful of agencies have been able to make money with this new marketing mentality. One of which is Crispin Porter + Bogusky, they were the master minds behind Burger King’s “Whopper Sacrifice” Facebook un-friending campaign.

Now, all of that is great for major advertising agencies and marketing executives to know, but how can that trickle down into affiliate marketing? If the appropriate social media/crowd-sourcing tools are used, a long term affiliate campaign can be successful with earned-media. Just take a look at already successful earned-media campaigns, and build your own from their. Just be aware that a lot of the time earned-media is involved with offline marketing strategies, so campaigns with strictly online actions would work most efficiently. Get started now with an earned-media affiliate campaign, performance pays!

Since the inception of virtual goods on Facebook, in Februrary 2007, the demand has rapidly increased. Facebook apps users play many of the thousands of apps available. Often the games that the users play are games that have shops that require points to purchase virtual goods. Why do the users want points? Simply to have something that will make the game more enjoyable, or enable them to attain a higher score. Why do app owners/developers offer virtual goods? The apps make money solely from either advertisements, or the better monetezation method: virtual goods.

Plus, users love virtual goods since many times in-game advertisements are eliminated, making a more user-friendly experience. Thus, users are happier, and more likely to engage in the virtual offers presented to them.  Virtual goods are becoming the preferred way to monetize social network applications. This is awesome news, considering that just last month (April) Facebook reached an astounding mark of 200 million active users.

So great, another growing opportunity to advertise online, but why is this important? The most important part is that the virtual goods/offers are largely coming from performance marketing advertisers. The same offers that are offered in Facebook apps are being published by affiliates elsewhere on the web.  However, most affiliates are unaware of this new trend or don’t see the volume. Performance marketing is already there, now just find your publishing spot in this growing market!

An example of virtual offers in the Are YOU Interested? Facebook application-

Down the road-

“The virtual goods economy faces hurdles. For starters, many of the offers themselves reek of scams — like ringtone sellers who don’t tell users that their mobile phones are going to be billed every month even if they don’t buy more ringtones. A longer-term risk is that people who take offers now might not want to take them later. There are only so many credit card offers that any one person is going to want.

But the dynamic at play — incorporating payments and offers into games — looks like it’s here to stay. For users, offers can be a win-win. I might think that getting a new pistol in Mob Wars will make my friends think I’m cool, and help me beat them at the game, so any way I can get that pistol is potentially good for me. If getting that pistol means signing up for some Netflix rentals at the same time — and if I already want to rent some movies anyway, then so much the better that I do it in the process of getting the pistol. More advertisers are looking at offer-based advertising, and if these companies can really nail the consumer-goods market, you can see how offers might get a lot more valuable. Teenagers might re-up on acne medication as they re-up on ammo, one day.”    – Eric Eldon of VentureBeat.com

I hope that isn’t too sententious, but really get involved with virtual offers in apps now, because they are serious money and a viable performance marketing opportunity.

Oh and by the way, “Facebook Money” is now the #2 Trending Topic on Twitter right now.

I was inspired to write this post after a recent talk with the MediaTrust CEO Peter Bordes about innovation within the internet marketing industry.

Online advertising spending is projected to reach $25.7 billion in 2009, and $42 billion by 2013. A 78% increase over 2008’s $23.6 billion in online spending.(emarketer.com) For an industry that is growing at astonishing rates, most of the companies that are heavily profiting have not put much back into researching and devloping new tools to capitalize on this growth in the coming years. To all affiliates out there, please name 3 recently released tools that allow you to be more productive, your campaigns to be more efficient, and ulitmately more profitable. Not so easy, huh? This lack of innovation will only hurt affiliates in the future. This is because the few networks that are investing in developing better ways to market online now, will blow past competition when growth slows. The affiliates who are associated with the networks that are investing in the right places will benefit tremendously, no doubt.

There are a few reasons for a lack of innovation by both affiliate networks and advertising networks. First, a lot of affiliate networks don’t care because there isn’t a lot of competition, and today they are growing strong. Their antiquated tracking systems work, and affiliates continue to promote their hot offers, which not to mention always “higher payouts than anyone else”. Secondly, advertising networks keep seeing gross clicks and impressions increase as the web is used more and more. So, advertisers will have cheaper rates and the publishers will make more and more money. In other words, the mentalitly of the affiliate and advertising networks is that people will continue to go where the money is. That’s definitly not a sound long term business strategy.

So, the question is which people are setting the right example and more importantly, are setting themselves up for strong business in the future? Most certainly Advaliant/MediaTrust, Motive Interactive, and Wes Mahler/Prosper202. Both Advaliant and Motive posses the leading affiliate interfaces that will soon posses algorithims to match offers with an affiliates past history promoting other offers, and maximize the relationship between affiliates and advertisers. Wes Mahler is worthy of being thanked by every single successful affiliate today, thanks to his opensource PPC tracking system Prosper202.

On the flip side, the companies that are lacking in the innovation department (among others): MaxBounty, and almost all networks using DirectTrack. Take a look at MaxBounty’s homepage, when I applied at first I thought  I was in the wrong site. Their site is straight out of the dot com bust. Seriously, would you feel safe putting your PPC budget into very technology developed 9 years ago?  Remeber that’s like 100 internet years. To the networks using the DirectTrack interface, great, you are making lots of money. However, DirectTrack serverly limits the amount of customization in the affiliate interface. Not good when it comes to 2010 and several other netowrks have more powerful tracking sytems and limitless opportunities to help out affiliates even more. Props to Ads4Dough for initiating their own switch over to their own custom tracking platform.

So, to the affiliate networks out there, take the hint, you will be ahead of the competition down the road if you invest now. As for the advertising networks, first make an effort to be friendly with some of your biggest spenders, then innovate. Watchout in the coming months for industry leading changes by Advaliant. They are brewing up some pretty neat features for affiliates, not seen anywhere else.