ok may be a dumb question regardinf affiliate managers

[deadgoodundies]

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Ok this might sound like a dumb question but what exactly does an affiliate manager do???

Reason I ask is that as a merchant with the networks we have always gone self managed - mainly because of the cost involved in using the management facilities of the networks - but im starting to wonder if we might benefit greatly from a manager , but im not sure exactly an affiliate manager would do for us.

Like I said dumb question maybe but i gotta ask.

[Eathan]

The answer is going to vary greatly from program to program. Err, sorry...programme to programme (must remember what board I'm on).

Some "Affiliate Managers" are little more than specialized customer service people, while others actively recruit new affiliates and work with existing affiliates, both in support and efforts to increase productivity, while some go so far as to manage the program as a whole. I've worked with companies to design programs, build them, recruit affiliates, manage the program, act as sole liason with affiliates, handle affiliate payouts, etc and still been called an "Affiliate Manager" or "Program Manager" while some people operating essentially a glorified second tier use the same name.

I guess it's really going to come down to what you want them to do. At a minimum, you probably want somebody who will take ownership of your program (or at least a sub-set of affiliates), recruit new affiliates, increase the productivity of the affiliates they work with, represent the company in a positive light in public settings (forums, etc) and handle affiliate support, so the affiliates keep doing what they do best.

Best of luck!

[pricethat]

Thought i would take some time to answer that in full before jess gets to the post

Having an affiliate scheme live doesnt mean that you will get any sales, and even if you do most of the time affiliates only pick up merchants quickly and promote simply because its a strong brand or suits what they are doing at that moment in time. From my experience as a network manager it takes a long time for a program to build just like any business and having a dedicated affiliate manager to do the job is the singe thing you can identify as the difference between an affiliate program and being your core channel to market.

I know some will disagree but in this little world having a name and a face to a merchant helps greatly, especially when affiliates are putting their money up front to promote you as a merchant. Providing a dedicated affiliate manager firstly provides confidence to affiliates but more importantly help. If something is wrong or could be better there is a contact point, someone to shout at if you like and get things done. Affiliates work in the real world, when they need to do things they need to do them there and then, not three or four days later when the networks get round to asking you to sort things out.

I think another reason is that it takes time to build relationships, and that is really what affiliate marketing is, its creating relationships on an affiliate basis, an affiliate manager is always looking for ways to increase their relationship with affiliates, pushing for higher priorities or placements on the affiliates webspaces. As well as that they are identifying affiliates that havent seen your program yet, or hadnt thought of adding you.

A good affiliate manager also is looking at ways to improve your affiliate scheme, listening to feedback and pushing for changes, without one your not really getting a feel for the little things that make a difference between making a sale or not.

Affiliates always ask, some take the piss, but without a face for people to ask how are you going to make that little difference? Affiliate marketing is so finite these days that some will not be marketing your products because someone else sells the same thing and provides a good relationship with them that they are confident with, how will you as a merchant overcome this when your competition is going the extra mile to make use of this channel.

A perfect example of an affiliate scheme in my mind is Figleaves, they have always provided enough staff as far as i can remember to run their affiliate scheme in house and you can see the benefits after a lot of long hard work. If we were to use Jess as an example, she worked for a long time on the ASOS program as an affiliate manager, whilst she did an amazing amount of hard work the main point is that people knew her, or at least got to know her over a period of time which made the difference, combining the fact she worked her socks off and the fact people liked her was a winner, not so many affiliate managers live up to that kind of example but having something is more than nothing for sure.

If you have the funds to employ a decent affiliate manager and can support those wages for a three or four month period so they can get their feet under the table then you will start to see results, far in excess of their cost but you have to work at it, its a huge investment nowadays when you have a lot of merchants going that extra mile to support this channel.

One last thing you have to consider is your not so much competing against your competitors nowadays online as far as gaining affiliate business, your competing against every single affiliate program on offer and theres more than 1000 of them with all the different networks, what makes yours special and who is telling people it is special?

Im rambling now, which is why i never took a job in PR but if that doesnt convince you then maybe i ask Jess nicely to edit my post into a more constructive meaningful experience. If that doesnt work then i guess its down to Budden

[deadgoodundies]

Cheers for the explanations i've certainly got a clearer picture on what their roles are now, I'll have to work out some figures on how we might be able to afford a manager as at the moment between constantly improving the site, providing customer support and dealing with the orders it only leaves me a about an hour a day to talk to affiliates and keep them updated on offers, new feeds etc.

[pricethat]

Well i hope that was some help, but if you dont mind me saying these badboys are nasty:

http://www.justhom.com/HOM-archi-mini-pr-277.html

Matt

[deadgoodundies]

heheeheh you would be surprised on how many of the Archi range i've sold since i put them live on Saturday - Good thing about those is that they have never been released in the UK before (along with a of the other pieces of swimwear that i put up the other day) so we have them exclusivley for the UK market.

Im still waiting for the copywriter to give me the product descriptions on a couple (hence why i havent done a new feed that includes them yet) like for this one http://www.justhom.com/HOM-pirate-micro-pr-273.html

[pricethat]

And i find myself wondering why theres not many selling them, i know what it is. It must be my subconsious yearning for the return of battleship grey Y fronts!

Oh how the ladies loved me then

[jess1]

Pricethat: What was that bit about b4 Jess posts? Huh…. Lol
What you say I agree with but there are a few other elements that I would look at first before even thinking about getting an affiliate manager. If the website is not working or converting b4 a program, then no amount of affiliates or their visitors will increase sales.

[pricethat]

Jess i think you were missing my point, which was rather disguised. It doesnt matter whether the program converts or not, just tell him to get some cute lady affiliate manager and then i can dazzle her with my sexy pants