From An Affiliates Standpoint....

[Lee]

What would you consider the absolute minimum a program should launch with these days are in terms of sites, content, promo tools, etc, etc?

Do you feel there are certain products and features that a program must have from the off-set in order to be taken seriously by affiliate webmasters looking to join new programs?

Hosted promo tools, galleries, free sites, rss feeds, etc, are these a must have for a new program just launching or is simply offering their paysites with banners, buttons and free content enough do you think?

Regards,

Lee

[sunfunbill]

I'll go and give ya my 2 cents. There are some payment processors I will not touch, Verotel is one of them. So I make sure they have ccbill or nats. I look to see if they have more than just 5 movies done if they are new. Even when your new, you've got to have at least bonus feeds or something.

I love FHG, that's a big thing. I almost never use a sponsors pre-made banners, I always make my own out of a FHG pic or free content. I also will not push a sponsor that does pre-checked up-sells, unless it's very clear.

The rest of it I just go with my gut feeling of how the site looks and if the damn English writing makes sense. I swear most designers use Japanese writers! :crazy:

[StunnerJesse]

Some of my favorite sites do not offer anything but banners.

I do not promote them.

I'd love to, but nobody is going to sign up for a site because I say they should. They want content examples before handing over their credit card number.

Also, if a sponsor isn't using CCBill or NATS then it is very likely that I am not even going to bother with them.

Also, as a blogger, I get frustrated when the only FHG material I can get is via an export. I just want to click a link, get the content with the tracking code built into the URL, post it and move on.

[gaybucks_chip]

Interesting to me that two different people mention ccbill and NATS but nobody mentions Epoch/MPA.

I've come to believe that CCBill is the more "together" processor (not to mention their service is outstanding) but I'm somewhat surprised at how much Epoch has fallen out of favor -- probably rightfully so -- in the past year or so.

[StunnerJesse]

LOL, it's interesting that you said that, as I just signed up for my first Epoch program today.

[Maryflixxx]

I've heard so many affiliates say they don't really care about the material in the sponsor program, just give them access to the members area and let them pull from it to promote the site.

Especially with smaller programs, I've heard that again and again.

[StunnerJesse]

I've heard that, too.

From a sponsor standpoint, I think that is a dumb business move.

The thing about providing content as a sponsor is that you get to pick and choose what's out there.

Give access to enough affiliates and they are all going to eventually gobble up your content. There will be no need to subscribe if affiliates have all of your wares out there. Or, worse yet, an affiliate that downloads everything and then pirates it or does other nefarious things with it.

If you're going to have to give away your content to shady people, at least get a one month membership out of them. :groovy:

Edit: I am not saying that affiliates are shady. I am talking about pirates. If they are going to leak your content all over the net, at least get a membership fee out of them for it. Otherwise, a pirate will just join as an affiliate and get it all for free.

[gaystoryman]

I've heard that, too.

From a sponsor standpoint, I think that is a dumb business move.

The thing about providing content as a sponsor is that you get to pick and choose what's out there.

Give access to enough affiliates and they are all going to eventually gobble up your content. There will be no need to subscribe if affiliates have all of your wares out there. Or, worse yet, an affiliate that downloads everything and then pirates it or does other nefarious things with it.

If you're going to have to give away your content to shady people, at least get a one month membership out of them. :groovy:

Edit: I am not saying that affiliates are shady. I am talking about pirates. If they are going to leak your content all over the net, at least get a membership fee out of them for it. Otherwise, a pirate will just join as an affiliate and get it all for free.

And yet, many affiliates demand it, and sponsors give it. I wonder, if we have lost sight of just what is the relationship here. The affiliate is just a sales representative, that gets a piece of the pie, IF they sell anything.

Too many affiliates seem to believe they are somehow PARTNERS with the sponsors, even though they bear no responsibilities for the costs of production.

And sponsors aren't really much different in how they provide pictures, where the only difference between picture one and picture fifteen, is that the arm is higher, or the face tilted a bit differently. I mean come on, why bother at all, if you are so tight assed, you wont release fifteen different, unique images?

:catfight:

[StunnerJesse]

Oh yes, do not even get me started on production quality. I have seen companies get the best models and then not know what to do with them. Directing is an art. It's not as simple as saying "get naked, jerk off, suck, do this, do that." Everyone has strengths and weaknesses and if production isn't one of your strengths then you should let someone else be doing it.

(When I say "you," I mean no one in particular, other than those people I am talking about.)

To me, allowing someone to go in and rip whatever they want is laziness on the sponsors part. A part of getting sales is marketing. You can only rely on affiliates to do so much marketing for you. At the end of the day, as a sponsor, it is your responsibility to get it to convert.

Sales and marketing are very different things and I think a lot of people do not realize that. Treat affiliates as sales people and back them up with great marketing materials. Even the best salesman in the world needs good marketing to back them up. Whether that be brand, pretty packeting, sales sheets, or in porn, the hosted gallery template.

I am surprised that the average sponsor hasn't realized that the big dogs in the industry have hot models who are well directed AND great marketing materials. Their websites use the latest CMS, their template is cutting edge and they add VALUE wherever and whenever they can. Anyone can pick up a camera and shoot some porn. The business side of things is what separates the amateurs from the pros.

I would like to think that we already know this, but based on a lot of what I see out there, apparently a lot of people do not.

As for affiliates, they are nobody. And I say this as an affiliate myself. At the end of the day, I am not out of too much if nothing "sticks." Sure, I have some hosting costs, perhaps some script costs. There is my time. I may even have an LLC and do things as a business (I do).

I do not, however, have thousands upon thousands of dollars invested in CMS. I do not run mission critical servers because I will have a shit-ton of chargebacks if I don't. I am not under pressure to find the next model willing to work within budget for my next update, that I have to provide even if I do not have the sales this week to justify the cost in doing so.

In other words, there are a ton of things I do not have to worry about as an affiliate. My biggest worry is driving traffic.

[MiamiB]

I've heard so many affiliates say they don't really care about the material in the sponsor program, just give them access to the members area and let them pull from it to promote the site.

Especially with smaller programs, I've heard that again and again.

THANK YOU!!

That is what we do...certainly an affiliate knows what he/she can use so why not give them access to the RAW material and let them do what they do best with it for their traffic!!??

Lee

[StunnerJesse]

THANK YOU!!

That is what we do...certainly an affiliate knows what he/she can use so why not give them access to the RAW material and let them do what they do best with it for their traffic!!??

Lee

Lee,

First, I've been a fan of your content since forever. Great stuff.

So you haven't had any problems with all of your content ending up everywhere because different affiliates are all going for different things?

My biggest fear as a sponsor would be 300 affiliates going in and each of them taking something different.

Especially if they go in and rip the most recent update and publish it everywhere.

Or do you combat that with guidelines and trust?

I hear of so many bad affiliates out there.

[StunnerJesse]

Wait, Lee, I just thought of something...

I've been a fan of your content forever but I have never once paid for access to it.

I guess, in a way, that proves my point, right?

I just don't want good sponsors getting ripped off by shady affiliates. Anyone can slap up a site and sign up for an affiliate account.

I guess the flip side of that is that anybody can pay for a month of access, rip everything and then torrent it and put it up on a bazillion tube sites.

Perhaps there is no winning. My viewpoint is that if I were a paysite owner I wouldn't want to have yet another way for someone to rip me off of my content.

[Jeff@UKSLads]

FHGs, decent banners or good pics to make my own with, good quality descriptions of each scene, and some good movie trailers are what I prefer when it comes to promo tools. I'm a blogger at heart, love to write, and really like to get into the scene textually. As much as the visual is a large part of this business, great text can make or break whether that surfer clicks on your prompt link. That's my strong opinion.

I do very much like CCBill, and love the support I get from them. NATS has never done me wrong, and I used to like Epoch. Lately though....I don't know. We can save that for another thread. LOL.

GayStoryMan put the sponsor/affiliate relationship into perspective in my opinion. Then there are the Affiliate Managers like myself. My job is to provide the material for affiliates to promote with. Having said that, affiliates shouldn't have to go into a site and grab whatever they want. Yes, a few sponsors have let me go into their site and get what I wanted as an affiliate. I can't say I didn't appreciate it. But I certainly didn't take complete advantage of such an offer either.

Right now we offer 640x480 quality flash trailers at 1:30min long with some good hardcore content in them (no cum shots), a Free Hosted Image Gallery with each update, lots of text of the scene, 15 images of the lads actually moving in them - LOL - a flash embed code for each scene, and lots of banners etc. Other things are in the works in regard to a blog and RSS Feeds etc, but as it stands, I feel we offer more than enough to give surfers a good indication of what we offer inside our members area. That's all the surfers and affiliates need from my point of view.

Smaller sponsors can't afford to hire someone like myself. Granted. But if you own a paysite and have an affiliate program, you must offer some decent images at least, and supply the affiliates with what they need to promote you.

Everyone has their limits. Some are stricter than others. C'est la vie. We're getting into a day and age where large videos are a big thing. I don't know how I feel about that. I hear some people do really well with them. In conclusion though, giving the surfer a good indication of what you offer inside your site and some great text can go just as far as a 10 minute video if done right. As the great Forrest Gump once said - "That's all I've got to say about that."

[Lee]

Sales and marketing are very different things and I think a lot of people do not realize that.

Its refreshing to see statements like this, usually its me making them and i agree, i would say that a good 90% or more of affiliates have no clue about sales or marketing.

They think they can slap a banner, text link or picture up and sales will magically happen overnight and when they dont, its the sponsor programs fault.... Not theirs.

Regards,

Lee

[Lee]

just give them access to the members area and let them pull from it to promote the site.

The problem with that is, a lot of programs are not allowed to do that because they use content that is only licenses for use on their domain names.

Im always getting affiliates asking if they can login to the Condom Cash websites to get promo content and i tell them no, then they get shitty with me... Even after i have explained that the content licenses i have DO NOT allow me to just arbitrarily give the pics to anyone to use for whatever purpose they want.

It seems when it comes to logging in to members area to grab images and videos, affiliates really dont care about content theft, just so long as it makes their job easier to make a sale.

I cant even count the amount of affiliates i have had to terminate because they were stealing licensed content and not removing it when asked to do so because it was a violation of MY content license when i purchased the sets they stole these pics from.

Regards,

Lee