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Now in the heart of holiday shopping season, the prices found online this year are irresistible when taking a glance at the virtually unheard of deals. Almost all of the best deals that I have come across, are part of the Bing cashback program. In the Bing cashback program, consumers are rewarded for making purchases online by receiving a percentage of their sale back as a rebate, varying among retailers. This allows online retailers to spend their ad dollars on the high ROI, cost-per-action (CPA) basis. With Bing charging advertisers on a CPA basis, the ad revenue generated from the CPA sale allows Bing to reward consumers by giving a percentage of the revenue back, thus cashback. This cash incentive for the consumer helps advertisers increase conversions on their site’s, and subsequently higher ROI.

Now, the remaining question is how can advertisers afford to payout such a significant portion of the sale to Bing? The answer lies in the fact that the advertisers/retailers no longer have to run PPC campaigns on Bing, which previously ate up a significant chunk of their ad spend and often delivered lackluster results. Advertisers can then payout between 2-25% of each sale to Bing, who then pays the consumer for participating in Bing cashback. Additional perks include advertisers with a cashback campaign receiving higher organic placement in the search rankings, which ultimately increases sales.

For most of the retailers participating in Bing cashback, it is their first advertising campaign based on the performance driven model. So far, the results have been impressive with eBay drawing attention for the most initial success in this case study. With Bing cashback, everyone wins, but most of all the consumers who receive great deals and great products, which hopefully improves their quality of life. Additionally, advertisers increase their ROI with more sales and Bing increases advertising revenue. In other words, this is a performance marketing win!

Setbacks worth noting:
– Only available to users based in the United States
– Cashback may not be paid for up to 60 days.

More information on Bing cashback for consumers and advertisers.

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.