Why Do We Never Hear About Sponsors...

Actually lowering their payouts?

I actually cant think of any affiliate program that has taken the bold move to actually lower their payouts to affiliates who werent offering additional features such as no console tours, custom join pricing etc, etc?

With all the recent economic issues and now that Mastercard (and likely Visa to follow) banning cross sales, do you think we will see more sponsor programs lowering their affiliate payouts over the coming year to more reasonable structures?

Your thoughts, if an affiliate program lowered their payouts, do you think it would actually impact their bottom lines in terms of those individuals who promoted them, especially if it were done for reasons other than just wanting to keep a bigger share of the pie for themselves?

Regards,

Lee

There was a period a few years back when a lot of programs lowered payouts. The TGPs were pissed about all the popups, sponsor profitability was dropping, and a bunch of sponsors went from 40-35 to 30-25.

Last year the trend was towards increased payouts, to attract the whales from one program to another.

Some put the ball in the wms court.

Take out the pop/console and payout drops.

Take out the xsells - drops again.



Advanced link codes generators give so many options to all.

Actually, as a webmaster I think I would trust a sponsor more that had always paid and lowered payouts for those reasons - would have more faith in the legitimacy of their business model... :teacher:

I would think affiliates would switch programs. Since it's a hard economy for all that would mean lowered pay checks.

I know if i was at a job that tried to lower my pay I'd be on Monster.com looking for a new place.

Actually, I was just notified that an affiliate program I use is dropping its payout from 50% to 20% with up to 30% based on monthly sales. This isn't a porn paysite, but still shows that yes, programs will look at what their payout method is doing to their bottom line, and make adjustments.

Many sponsors chose the route of spending the bulk of their money on what's outside the members area and some even went as far as spending the minimum inside the members area. The results are plain to see, content that is the same as 100 other sites, poor content that lacks imagination, the belief that anyone with a camera and naked people can produce porn and sales getting harder and harder to get. Did I mention ratios?

The answer should be, "I don't care what the % figure is, I want to know what the $ figure is and the long term effects of promoting that business." Yes I don't promote Gay and I do little affiliate work, but I'm still in the business of what is the $ figure and long term effect.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by paul markham

The answer should be, "I don't care what the % figure is, I want to know what the $ figure is and the long term effects of promoting that business."

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And that's why you'll be in for the long term...2009 is going to be the year of market share and a lot of programs will be going out of business or absorbed. There may be changes in what's freely available, and successful webmasters may finally change mindsets and go for exclusive stable programs where they can make more on rev-share than PPS - the upside down affiliate model may finally shake out and programs that have focused on retaining members will be the programs remaining in December...