Failing Industry?

[maxpower]

If you're going to take it upon yourself to be so critical, at least doing some research would help. We don't, nor have we ever, started affiliates off at 35%. Our minimum has always been 50%, and many webmasters with whom we have a close relationship make above that.

Quite frankly, there ARE nuisances among affiliate webmasters. There are very valuable and helpful ones as well, but no shortage of nuisances and webmasters who drain a company's resources rather than benefit it.

The webmaster using spam to promote us is a nuisance.
The webmaster posting misguiding links and descriptions to try and trick people in to visiting our site is a nuisance.
The webmaster who batters their traffic with popups and viruses while directing them to our site is a nuisance.
The webmaster who demands unlimited access to free content while sending almost no traffic in return - and the many, many such webmasters who collectively risk diluting the value of the content we spend a great deal of money and effort in creating - is a nuisance.
As we see a great deal of success in adjusting our entire site to show almost no hardcore material outside of the members area and abandon the use of xxx update previews, an unlimited number of webmasters freely distributing hardcore samples of our material through an unlimited number of channels is a nuisance.

Again, you fail to see how things can be a business decision and not a personal decision. None of us are entitled to any favors from anyone else, and at the root of even many of the closest friendships formed among people in this industry are shared business interests. That's how each of us know that any of the rest of us even exist. Were it not for business, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. Business.

When we make decisions that are in our best interests - and also happen to greatly benefit the affiliate webmasters we are retaining, mind you - it's a decision we're entitled to make as a business and a decision we're obligated to make in the interests of our employees and their families. If the occasional weekend webmaster gets burned in that, such is the nature of the game. That's the real world. And even many of those weekend webmasters seem to understand that concept a great deal better than you.

When an affiliate stops promoting us because we don't convert for them, I don't take it personally no matter how much effort and energy I've spent on them or free content I've provided them. I see it as a decision they have every right to make in the best interests of their business. Are you saying I should take it personally and feel like they're out to get me?

Well was not sure about what you give affiliates, why I asked but it must have been another site that looked like yours that does offer 35%. Their is like 3 of these Frat sites now days that are very similar. Well to someone that promotes twink content anyway.

I really do get how affiliates and submitters can be a big pain in the ass, and how you guys could begin to look at them the ways you do. But I think this begins to effect your thinking, and even more importantly this is effecting how LL’s look at submitters.

As far as people changing members sites for better numbers after they have ran you though their traffic. You should hold yourself to a higher standard than some affiliates who’s job it to rotate affiliate programs. That’s like a apples and oranges thing, members sites should be more stable than that. I am sure many of these week-end webmasters you removed to make your reports look cleaner, where in fact members of your site. I don’t know man, it would take allot for me to remove a affiliates account, and not being the worlds largest suppler of traffic would not be up on my list.

I have always found many sites, will small amount of traffic do convert every well, would also think even though some of the week-end guys might not send 5000 clicks a day, yet I would think their conversion numbers would look good even if its on a small scale, if the sites very convertible that is.