Clientside Affiliate Managers

[BeringerTame]

A question from a recruitment agent:

Has anyone else noticed the number of adverts popping up in the press this year for merchant's wanting to recruit in-house affiliate managers? Nothing new for some of the bigger merchants but this year it seems that every man and his dog has decided to create an 'affiliate manager' position in their marketing team.

We have firms banging on our door for affiliate managers but it has been difficult to find people who want to work clientside. We even posted a couple of the jobs on this site and I think we had the grand total of 2 people contact us!

Are clientside roles less attractive than working for a network?

Patrick@BeringerTame

[marky]

I am just guessing here, but when there is a demand supply issue, the price has to move first.
It may also be an image issue in that people perceive these jobs to be lower payed (which is amusing if so as it is usually a marketing department)
Again I am presuming, a network may employ people in more of a sales function with a real performance related pay ?

What were the key points of the jobs you offered that would make people want to apply ?

[Gavinio]

Not as fun as working inbetween in an agency, and getting to deal with all manner of different affiliates and clients, is it?

I genuinely believe that agencies can offer synergies that make them better than having an in-house manager, but there are advantages the otherway too.

You're always going to struggle recruiting in a market where experienced staff are low in number - how many are there in the UK? Less than 100 I would've thought, easily. Still, it makes me a valuable commodity I suppose...

[Ste]

It all boils down to location and pay. If any vacancies which were local to me, sure I would go for it, in fact I wanna become an Affiliate Manager sometime! I don’t make as much as some of the chaps or chapesses on here but it is still in the K’s per month. So either the pay would have to reflect this being given up or being allowed to do both, the later preferable.

I don’t do long distance travel, so it counts me out for a lot of things I want to do, I have been offered quite a few posts down yonder (south) which is where all the jobs seem to be. I might originate form there but I don’t want to go back!!

[BeringerTame]

Some good points and thanks.

I think there are two ways of looking at this, a clientside affiliate role can be viewed as narrow in that it is only dealing with one business but the opportunity is there to move beyond affiliate management.

Basically, if you are an affiliate Guru and affiliate marketing is your career, agency's/networks offer more variety. However, if it's a case of working with affiliate marketing at the moment but wanting to go on to look at other types of online marketing, say, SEO or PPC or email marketing etc then clientside marketing departments will give you the opportunity to develop and get wider experience. More strings to your bow, more tools in the mental tool box (and other recruitment metaphores!)

The other element is one of ownership. Whilst a clientside affiliate role is only looking after one business, that's an attraction for some people. If you can increase sales by x% and generate x hundreds of thousands of pounds revenue, that's your achievement (and reflected in your bonus too). The network can claim it but ultimately the p&l is held by the client company.

You're right that demand is outstripping supply right now so the money needs to increase.

If anyone wants to drop me a line directly with reference to this I'm on: patrick@beringertame.com and 08452 606010

I am also going to get along to Bristol to see how many of you I can tempt across to 'the dark side'!

Patrick

[BeringerTame]

By the way - the current jobs that I'm looking for people for are all based in London.

Two roles at 18-22k looking for a recent grad. No real experience neccesary though a bit of affiliate understanding would help. Should be good on the phone (nb this is NOT a sales role

One role at about 25k, less than 2 years experience in online marketing needed, affiliate knowledge an advantage.

One role at 35-38k, either a candidate with good all round clientside online marketing experience or account handling experience from a digital agency. Affiliate exp a bonus.

Last two are with well branded pureplay e-tailers.

That's the current list as at Feb 9th