IAB Affiliate Council revised Voucher Code Guidelines

[hpops]

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Lee, don't leave the forum, your voice is important. You did say some insanely over the top generalisations which may have offended some. You've obviously felt offended back. Chill out a little, engage with those who are progressive (there's loads of us you know) and move on.
Doug, however much I enjoy your provocative posts, which are right about 50% of the time :-) I do feel that there's a hounding mentality recently which could intimidate some. Your business dealings are only private with an NDA (as I'm sure you know) and as they were directly relevant to your previous post, I think its fair game.
Barbara, your point relating to the IAB isn't fair. The Affiliate Marketing Council exists to represent the industry and define its future direction, it simply isn't beholden to this forum or its members. Rather its role is to steer the industry towards long term success. If a traffic driving methodology is identified that jeapordizes that, appropriate action will be (and has been) taken.

[Leeky]

Ok, after a good nights sleep (i've only just got up) I realise that some of my posts were unfair and insanely generalized, which were written out of fraustration. (so I apologies for those). Even hpops (the best mod BTW) has been guilty of wrongly posting out of fraustration in the past, so im sure a mere mortal like me can be forgiven for that!

It was a bit drastic to say I wasn't going to make any further posts on this forum, but at the time thats how I felt, however I have decided to stop sulking and not to cop out :-)

Although Doug is a well liked member of this forum he thrives on winding up which I find hard to ignore, but i've purchased some 'Anti Doug' specs which make his posts invisible... apparently they sell like hot cakes!

I still say i'm right about 'expired codes' though :-)

Lee

[confuscius]

As I am struggling to rationalise the value in showing an expired code to a punter and from what I have read then it seems that maintaining 'live' voucher codes sites is a lot of work and I prefer an easy life, I have decided to enter the Voucher Code arena. My site will not show any live codes (based on my aversion to work) and will feature just expired voucher codes and lots of explanations of merchants that I do not have any live codes for ( I will have to do this because I do not intend showing any). I will add lots of nice buttons to click that set cookies just in case the punter cannot be bothered to notice that I had said the voucher has expired. I won't have to bother with expiry dates as they will have all expired and I believe that I will be complying with all of the IAB guidelines, given that it is not a requirement to actually have any live codes. I might as well stick up a few sites with the same useless content that is of no value to anyone, just because I can. I must not forget to install my analytics package so that I can get a clear indication of how many cookies I can get set via this new and innovative approach. Wish me luck as I don my shiny new hard hat.

[Leeky]

Great idea and very creative!, if you require an extra parameter adding to our feed to supply you with loads of expired codes just give us a shout :tup

Lee

[dougs]

Love you too Leeky

I actaully sometimes do not understand why we fight, as ultimately I do think we actually sing from the same song book and want to clean things up. We just disagree about the detail

So hatchet buried again for this week but can I please say come to the next meeting/a4u event etc as when you have met someone and actually think they are ok it is much easier to not take their postings as personal.

Doug must have had a good day

[adamski]

Interesting thread!

Leeky, you make some very valid points. I am yet to see as strong a case put forward in favour of keeping expired codes on a site.

Would some of the affiliates who do this please explain the benefit to yourselves, merchants and consumers? In the 7 pages preceding this, no one has done this.

Surely it just creates a frustrating user experience?

Would be interested to get some merchant opinions as well. I know there must be loads reading this, you shouldn't feel afraid to post - it is, after all, your expired codes that are being debated.

[dougs]

Adam

My view is simple, they make no difference, the content will be replaced with gibberish to keep the pages in google. But these issues only effect pure voucher code directory type sites.

It is not fair to penalise blogs/forums for not removing them. How are you going to police these?

So every site other site that offers codes other than a pure code sites will be removed from a program and I would argue that these sites are the ones who truely add incremental sales.

As many pure directory sites are being forced to add more and more content/develop blogs/forums. How are you going to police these?

Blogs/forums/review sites are where the codes need to be and not on pure code sites....and most simple blog/forum sites are not geared to do this.

Ultimately it is not the content that is the issue but how it is displayed

Doug

[poundpunch]

Hi,

Firstly, I just wanted to ask... What is the main difference between a "deal" and an "offer" with regards to the IAB Affiliate Council revised Voucher Code Guidelines?

Secondly, the only reason we believe it might be useful to display expired codes (although we currently don't!), is to provide the user some indication how often a particular retailer provides discounts and what kind of discounts/offers that particular retailer offers. Although... if that is the case, there wouldn't be much need for any links within the expired codes!

[adamski]

Adam

My view is simple, they make no difference, the content will be replaced with gibberish to keep the pages in google. But these issues only effect pure voucher code directory type sites.

It is not fair to penalise blogs/forums for not removing them. How are you going to police these?

So every site other site that offers codes other than a pure code sites will be removed from a program and I would argue that these sites are the ones who truely add incremental sales.

As many pure directory sites are being forced to add more and more content/develop blogs/forums. How are you going to police these?

Blogs/forums/review sites are where the codes need to be and not on pure code sites....and most simple blog/forum sites are not geared to do this.

Ultimately it is not the content that is the issue but how it is displayed

Doug

Hi Doug

I'm sure Leeky already addressed the point about it being replaced with gibberish. It could just say this merchant has no active codes.

On your point about the blogs/forums/UGC - perhaps these could be exempt from this specific ruling. Maybe just the pure directories should be the ones asked to not display expired codes?

With the forums/blogs, I think there is less of an issue with users being misled as the dates when things are posted are quite clear and users can easily make simple judgments about whether or not something will still be active.

On the directories though, the display of expired information doesn't seem to have any valid purpose, although I'm happy to hear any argument that says otherwise.

Whilst keeping it there for SEO purposes maybe a valid reason for the affiliate, what are the reasons for users and merchants?

Adam

[adamski]

Hi,

Firstly, I just wanted to ask... What is the main difference between a "deal" and an "offer" with regards to the IAB Affiliate Council revised Voucher Code Guidelines?

Don't think there is much difference between a deal/offer. They are pretty much synonymous.

The main point is that 'Click to Reveal' or similar tactics shouldn't be used when the affiliate is presenting a deal/offer as this is quite misleading.

[poundpunch]

Yep sure, makes sense. Thanks Adam.

[renegade]

Leeky, you make some very valid points. I am yet to see as strong a case put forward in favour of keeping expired codes on a site.
Would some of the affiliates who do this please explain the benefit to yourselves, merchants and consumers? In the 7 pages preceding this, no one has done this.

Since you asked nicely I will BUT there's a significant rant element as well I'm afraid!

I've kept my reasons for preferring to display expired codes to myself (although I shared them privately some time ago with a few trusted IAB members) because it's taken me years to figure out why displaying expired codes is sometimes a good thing which ENHANCES the user experience and, as a consequence, why I want to retain the OPTION to display a few expired codes AND why as a matter of course I won't explain exactly what I do and why I do it on a public forum.

For the record our admin backend now removes expired codes by default unless we explicitly override that setting and decide to display an expired code which appears on site as:

Greyed out
Struck-through
Unclickable
With a clear expiry date

So this clearly IS NOT a cookie burning excercise, as has been suggested several times in this thread. It is a service for our site visitors, which is always my focus.

In my blog I give my alternative take on why many affiliates fail and I've also talked about thinking outside the box and trying to do what other affiliates aren't doing QUIETLY (see above). This expired code thread and the reactions from quite a few of you demonstrate you're so caught up fighting the moral high ground and knocking over the next domino that you can't conceive there could be even a single good reason to display expired codes. It seems to be fuelled by thinly veiled jealousy of rival/leading sites under the crusading pretext of "cleaning up the industry".

OK, it really isn't rocket science but since some of you seem incapable of thinking for yourselves, knock yourselves out:

1) Merchants often re-release the same codes again and they change the offers and expiry dates without informing affiliates so expired codes often continue to work and sometimes magically reactivate themselves. We know from experience which merchants do this so displaying these expired codes is a useful service to our site visitors.

2) Some merchants (Tribal, Bennetts, etc) expire their codes at the end of the month end yet don't release new codes until the first week of the following month - sometimes longer if they're busy. Often the expired codes still work so again this is useful information for our visitors.

3) It's often easy to guess the current or related codes from expired codes which appeals to a whole group of Countdown and crossword loving bargain hunters who (sometimes obsessively) explore lots of code sites to get a bargain the next person didn't. We're been catering for bargain hunters and compers on our sites for years so again it enhances our site visitors experience.

Rant Alert! Of course we're making good money in the code sector - which is why so many of you have steamed into the code sector but we've been working with codes longer than most of you have been affiliates and I've worked bloody hard to establish our sites and will continue to do so. If you want a slice of the action think for yourselves and don't be so quick to condemn things you clearly don't fully understand.

I don't believe any automated feed driven code site will ever be as successful as our site which goes the extra mile for our visitors so if you think you're going to set up a leeky/Doug feed and sit back and make a fortune think again - the only people ever likely to get wealthy in that arena are... leeky and Doug - which also helps explain why they're both keen to keep everything robotically simple - codes are as diverse as merchants are creative and that's the way I like it.

I've deliberately stayed away from the SEO side of this issue but I recall Kieron posted his rationale for retaining expired codes in site copy a while back so go away and read that before you kick off again.

[tijan]

Click to reveal deal or offer is not misleading in any way, When you click it reveals the deal or offer on the merchant site, i want to assume the IAB would not be biting too much by telling every website on the internet what color his button should be, how bright it should look or how rounded it should be or how deal and offer should be spelt. (Just looking at the future from the current market trend, it seems to be the next focus for debate in the near future). I personally think IAB and the affiliate council did not even address the issue very well in the first place. When the fish starts to rot it starts from the head so if you wish to address such issues you need to start by giving us a concise definition to the terminologies. The resolution doesnt seem to have any Forward message that is deserved in a professional presentation, i dont want to believe it was intented to give voucher codes site more loopholes. We are affiliates from all works of live, affiliates by accident and affiliate by profession. while it is easy to say that 1 + 1 =2, some people will tell you 1 + 1=11. So why didnt the council just tell the clear diff between deal and offer, voucher codes and discount codes, money off voucher and promo codes, sales and offer.
These applies to the trianlge of affiliate marketing, confussion with affiliates, confussion with merchant and confussion
with the networks. That is why we still have confussion from the daily mails affiliates receive from networks and Merchant. And also why some merchant steal affiliates sales in the name of non commissionable items in the affiliates stream. Does the countil represent the interest of the triangle?

Back to your question Pound punch: Below is what i would do

While you can classify an offer as a deal, some deal may not very well pass for an offer
When a merchant mention offer in the context of a description, it is always good to tag it as an offer. e.g:
Tijan Penpee offers you buy 1 get 1 free---- Tag (Offer)
latest deal at Tijan Penpee is buy 1 get 1 fre--- tag (Deal)
2 for 1 at the clearance sale -- I will either tag as ( Offer or clearance)
Clearance, sale--- I will always tag as an (Offer)
Deal could be discontinued while the product is steal in store while offers always pass for product that would be out of
stock at the end of the clearance, sale, bargain. Unless a merchant mention a deal in the context of clearance, sale, bargain
i always tag them as ( Offer)
Looking at it from another school of thought: I will say, voucher codes, discount codes, promo codes, sales, offers, clearance are all subset of the universal set-Deal.

If you flip a coin its either gonna be the head or tail, so everyone will have diff opinion to what is a voucher code or promo code, deal or offer and thats the biggest flaw in the resolution without the much needed Forward.

Tijan

[dougs]

Joe

Yes I want to clean things up, but that is simply to make the user experience better. I have no issue with anyone putting anything on a site as long as it says what it does.

As for automated solutions yes we do offer a white label and an xml solution, but as you know the data is a complete mess. So it makes sense if we have sorted it to offer it out.

Hopefully we do make a fortune out of this But as we both know sorting out codes/offers etc is an abolute nightmare and anyone who sorts it out deserves to make a fortune

Many people are stepping on the bandwagon of code sites and trying to make a fortune by doing some simple seo....my advice is simply stop. We get requests all day from people who want our data to do that and I tell them don't bother, there are too many people in this space like yourself Joe who have been doing it for years and have established knowledge and understandng and rightly deserve the revenue they are making from it. Some people are taking the p**s, but mosts aren't.

Doug

[aaclapham]

I have a whole host of fashion blogs and usually I mention there is a discount code at the end of an article. Fair enough I could remove that one line when the code expires however there is no automated way of sifting through hundreds of posts every day.

The user still gets a good experience as they can read the article, look at the images, and they would probably click through to the merchant whether there is a code or not. In fact talking to some of the merchants hardly any ever use the discount code.

There is a big difference between a discount voucher site/ blog, and a content site/blog that adds discount codes as an extra. people seem to forget this.