How long do you keep them?

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Now, where I do agree with Ben is that if sales stop completely for a period of time and I contact the webmaster and he's not promoting us anymore, sending no traffic and still collecting rebills and has no plans to resume promotions, then I would let him or her know that this will result in termination of their account and they'd be paid what is owed as of that termination date.

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now this one i dont get.. Just becourse they are not sending any traffic and dont plan on doing it in the future either why should they be "punished" for having sent a surfer that truely loves your site and sticks around for a long time ?

Doesnt really make sense..

Badpuppy is still on my todo-list, but now I am going to be afraid just to start with it.
I can understand the feelings of Ben, YOU are doing the work to keep members stay and not the affiliate. But if you offer commissions on rebills, you have to pay them. Otherwise don't offer this. For most of our sites we don't offer commissions for rebills, because of this reason.
On the other hand, for an affiliate it's not very interesting to promote a site without getting payed for rebills.

I like the way Lisa goes. Contact you affiliate and discuss it with him. Many of the affiliates need a little kick and help to be a more active promoter for your program (I am also a kind of this affiliates ;) )

Ok, I'd like to clear this up now before it goes any further.

I ensure that no accounts have been or will be canceled if a webmaster is promoting us no matter how much traffic he or she is sending, or is not promoting us and has active rebills, until such time all rebills are gone and it is confirmed there will be no future promotions.

On the surface Puppy Cash does not even pay rebills. But I always upgrade anyone's account to include rebills if they don't bury us away deep in a links section and add a banner to their pages.

Ben is freaking right now as it was only to get everyone's opinion and he did not expect it to turn into this.

This all came up from a lunch time conversation where Ben had spoke to a webmaster who will remain unknown who does feel that a webmaster should only be kept if making new sales, whether rebills or not, even if they are sending traffic.

We got into a debate about it with Ben thinking that maybe there were more webmasters out there that felt that way. I knew that would not the case.

We've not to date canceled anyone's account with rebills under any circumstance and obviously will not even be considering this, even for those who totally stop promotions and when contacted confirm there will be no more promotions. There rebills will live on forever until such time they simply stop.

When I said I agreed with Ben on that it was basically the only place I could see where maybe other websites might be doing this, meaning canceling only if they were no longer promoting us and confirmed that they had no intentions. But we've not done this and have absolutely no plans on changing the way we currently do business.

Ben's post was not to be taken as a stance that Badpuppy has taken or will take, it was to see what everyone else was doing, stemming from Ben's conversation with that webmaster.

Obviously that webmaster is the only one who feels the way he does. You all from what I see feel the same way that we do as a company and we'll continue to do business the way we always have and not consider changing from the industry standard that is represented here in this thread.

I know of programs that purge their databases on a regular basis, primarily PPS programs and it is mentioned in their T.O.S too.

I would say, if you have someone signed up with BadPuppy who isnt sending traffic for 6 months, there is no reason why you should keep them in your database.

Im also in agreement with Ben that if they arent sending you any new traffic, why should they keep getting paid rebills, when the whole reason behind letting them get the rebills in the first place, was that they were sending new traffic and sales.

As you said Lisa, BadPuppy typically doesnt offer rebills for everyone, if someone gets setup with rebills and stops sending you traffic/new sales, they basically scammed you in to letting them have rebills.

Also, what Ben mentioned about the program keeping the members active, not the affiliate, is true.

Im currently looking at a couple of different revenue models where this could be taken in to account to offer a more flexible/realistic payout option on rebills, perhaps a higher initial percentage with a sliding scale on each monthly rebill whereby the percentage of the rebill gets lowered month after month for the affiliate.

Regards,

Lee

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As you said Lisa, BadPuppy typically doesnt offer rebills for everyone, if someone gets setup with rebills and stops sending you traffic/new sales, they basically scammed you in to letting them have rebills.

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I must admit i fail to see the logic behind that statement.. How did they scam you by sending a long rebilling surfer ?

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Originally Posted by mickey

I must admit i fail to see the logic behind that statement.. How did they scam you by sending a long rebilling surfer ?

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Because, they werent supposed to GET paid on the rebills anyway, the only way they would get paid on the rebills according to Lisa is by special circumstances.

By stopping sending traffic, the special circumstance no longer exists, so the rebill deal should no longer exist either.

Regards,

Lee

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Originally Posted by Lee

Because, they werent supposed to GET paid on the rebills anyway, the only way they would get paid on the rebills according to Lisa is by special circumstances.

By stopping sending traffic, the special circumstance no longer exists, so the rebill deal should no longer exist either.

Regards,

Lee

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ahh so its a give and take away kind of situration ... i see -- still sounds stupid to me as the webmaster did you good by bringing in the member otherwise you wouldnt have offered the "special circumstances" in the first place..

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Originally Posted by mickey

ahh so its a give and take away kind of situration ... i see -- still sounds stupid to me as the webmaster did you good by bringing in the member otherwise you wouldnt have offered the "special circumstances" in the first place..

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But a typical conversation with an affiliate to get raised payouts (which is what this scenario is) goes like this....

Affiliate: I want higher payouts.

Program: Why?

Affiliate: Because i can send you a lot of traffic.

Program: Traffic i have, i want new sales.

Affiliate: Then i can send you a lot of sales.

Program: Okay then lets raise your payouts.

The second new sales stop coming in, the payout should be lowered, because the affiliate is no longer holding up their end of the deal.

Regards,

Lee

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Originally Posted by Lee

But a typical conversation with an affiliate to get raised payouts (which is what this scenario is) goes like this....

Affiliate: I want higher payouts.

Program: Why?

Affiliate: Because i can send you a lot of traffic.

Program: Traffic i have, i want new sales.

Affiliate: Then i can send you a lot of sales.

Program: Okay then lets raise your payouts.

The second new sales stop coming in, the payout should be lowered, because the affiliate is no longer holding up their end of the deal.

Regards,

Lee

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well they might no longer send many sales or new traffic etc but the membership generated in the time frame where you offered the "special payout" should be honored till they run out..

Now if you wanted to lower payout on new members or only offered the "special payout" for membership generated within a month where more than xxx amount of joins where sent, thats a totally different matter but the memberships generated within the period covered by the deal should remain under the deal and you should honor payment imo..

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Originally Posted by mickey

well they might no longer send many sales or new traffic etc but the membership generated in the time frame where you offered the "special payout" should be honored till they run out..

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Even when the 'send new sales' which was the primary reason for offering the raised payout is no longer happening?

Thats like Coca-Cola offering a 2-4-1 deal on their products all the time, not just when they want an increase in sales.

It doesnt happen in the real-world like that, why should it happen online?

If i buy a bottle of Coke while they are running the promotion, i expect to get 2-4-1 on that purchase only.

If they are still running the promotion and i decide next time to buy a Pepsi product instead of a Coke product, the NEXT time i walk in to the store, if Pepsi is on 2-4-1, i wouldnt expect to be able to buy Coca-Cola on 2-4-1.

The affiliate stopped sending traffic/sales and shouldnt expect to still be making the '2-4-1' offer on sales.

If the affiliate doesnt like that, they can send their traffic elsewhere.

Cant you see how unfair this is to the program, affiliates can do pretty much what they want, when they want to in terms of sending sponsors traffic, the second a sponsor does something that the affiliate doesnt like, they get bitched at, even if the affiliate is NO LONGER promoting that sponsor.

Regards,

Lee

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Originally Posted by Lee

Even when the 'send new sales' which was the primary reason for offering the raised payout is no longer happening?

Thats like Coca-Cola offering a 2-4-1 deal on their products all the time, not just when they want an increase in sales.

It doesnt happen in the real-world like that, why should it happen online?

If i buy a bottle of Coke while they are running the promotion, i expect to get 2-4-1 on that purchase only.

If they are still running the promotion and i decide next time to buy a Pepsi product instead of a Coke product, the NEXT time i walk in to the store, if Pepsi is on 2-4-1, i wouldnt expect to be able to buy Coca-Cola on 2-4-1.

The affiliate stopped sending traffic/sales and shouldnt expect to still be making the '2-4-1' offer on sales.

If the affiliate doesnt like that, they can send their traffic elsewhere.

Cant you see how unfair this is to the program, affiliates can do pretty much what they want, when they want to in terms of sending sponsors traffic, the second a sponsor does something that the affiliate doesnt like, they get bitched at, even if the affiliate is NO LONGER promoting that sponsor.

Regards,

Lee

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i must admit that i dont see how this example is relavant to the online issue we are debating here.. There is a big difference between being a loyal customer to a product like pepsi and being an affiliated webmaster sending traffic.. so its an invalid argument imo..

The matter boils down to one simple fact, the member that continues to rebill on your program was sent to you by the webmaster and therefor he should continue to get paid..

Imo its just the programs luck that the webmaster was promoting them and not some other program when he sent the enternally rebilling surfer.. Just because he has since then moved on for some reason or another doesnt make the surfer less valuable to the program and the guy who sent it should be paid..

It can one step even further. We have affiliates that send very little traffic but the traffic the do send is converting at a incredible rate. MY concern is that the material (images and video previews) is diluted in value to those affiliates that are actively promoting Manifest Men vs. those that take the images, stick them up on a blog and do nothing to work the program. Does this not lessen the value of the material to those webmasters that do work with us to promote Manifest?
But of course once an affiliate makes a sale, the rebills are indeed their for life.

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Originally Posted by Alex_Manifest_M

It can one step even further. We have affiliates that send very little traffic but the traffic the do send is converting at a incredible rate. MY concern is that the material (images and video previews) is diluted in value to those affiliates that are actively promoting Manifest Men vs. those that take the images, stick them up on a blog and do nothing to work the program. Does this not lessen the value of the material to those webmasters that do work with us to promote Manifest?
But of course once an affiliate makes a sale, the rebills are indeed their for life.

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thats a good question and imo it does devalue the content but its a totally different matter.. in mainstream there is a program ATK, i think it is, that doesnt allow their content used on tgps and galleries etc...

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Originally Posted by mickey

i must admit that i dont see how this example is relavant to the online issue we are debating here.. There is a big difference between being a loyal customer to a product like pepsi and being an affiliated webmaster sending traffic.. so its an invalid argument imo..

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Excellent, that is exactly the thing i wanted someone to say because there is no difference whatsoever, its all about that word you just used LOYALTY affiliates get raised payouts to build loyalty to a specific program, if they no longer send that program traffic, sales, etc then the loyalty bonus should go away.

The problem is, affiliates expect these loyalty bonuses, raised payouts, points, prizes, whatever they ask for, then once something happens with conversions, even if it their own problem, the program is automatically at fault and they stop sending traffic/sales... But STILL expect to be getting the loyalty bonuses.

As i said, it doesnt work like that in the real-world, it shouldnt have to work like that online.

At the end of the day, if you are no longer loyal to a program that is paying you above and beyond what everyone else is getting paid, expect that bonus to be taken away, and re-instated when you start sending traffic/sales again.

Regards,

Lee

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Originally Posted by Lee

Excellent, that is exactly the thing i wanted someone to say because there is no difference whatsoever, its all about that word you just used LOYALTY affiliates get raised payouts to build loyalty to a specific program, if they no longer send that program traffic, sales, etc then the loyalty bonus should go away.

The problem is, affiliates expect these loyalty bonuses, raised payouts, points, prizes, whatever they ask for, then once something happens with conversions, even if it their own problem, the program is automatically at fault and they stop sending traffic/sales... But STILL expect to be getting the loyalty bonuses.

As i said, it doesnt work like that in the real-world, it shouldnt have to work like that online.

At the end of the day, if you are no longer loyal to a program that is paying you above and beyond what everyone else is getting paid, expect that bonus to be taken away, and re-instated when you start sending traffic/sales again.

Regards,

Lee

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And again as i said earlier it all boils down to one really simple thing.. The member wouldnt be with your program if the webmaster hadnt sent him in the first place..

So if you want to take his loyalty bonus from him on new join thats your right but the once sent while you loved him, he should get paid for..

what you are trying to do is bacially reintroduce the feudal cast system just with the programs being the dukes and the affiliates being the pesants.. The webmasters wouldnt be able to move on out of fear of loosing their accounts and the rebills they worked hard to generate..

it was wrong back then and its wrong now..