Are Affiliates a Bunch of Victor Meldrews? March 6th, 2008 10:45 am

A report has been published (and if I can find it I’ll add a link, but the news snippet was on Teletext) that suggests that about two thirds of Britains are happy half glass full type people and not of the grumpy complaining Victor Meldrew ilk. The other third probably work in affiliate marketing!

As mentioned before on this blog (somewhere) we do tend to focus on negative aspects of the industry and rarely flag wave about what is good. However, on the same score it’s important to not wallpaper over the cracks - there are issues that are causing problems and it’s vital people speak out.

The mystery ‘Bob’ commented on What Would Make You Call It a Day? with the answer “simple all the moaning, people moan about 100% cashback or a particular merchant as in Next”. And there are lots of people not happy with Next (over 100 backs). There’s one, very brave, slapper of Frostie’s Next blog as they believe it “almost comes across as playground tactics”!

Perhaps then affiliates shouldn’t moan or complain? Perhaps we should just remove links and get on with the business of running our sites? Perhaps we should tug our forelocks, say “yes sir, no sir, three bags full sir” and be pleased we’re allowed the privilege to try and generate sales?

A few years ago affiliates complained about spyware! Imagine if they hadn’t?

Rocking the boat isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it needs to be done on occasions. Switching links to another merchant or network might work to a point, but sometimes that is not enough to make a merchant or network sit up and take notice. Silence rarely changes anything in this industry and it’s good that there are people willing and bold enough to stand up and try and improve things for everyone.

Instead of being unhappy about people moaning about Next or whatever, ask why are they moaning? If they’re using “playground tactics” ask what has brought them to resort to those tactics. Let’s not dismiss these legitimate issues as the fault of the affiliate - blame the reasons and cause on those who brought them to take that stand!

As an affiliate you can remove links, drop merchants, move networks… but by doing so it doesn’t mean you have no voice. If people don’t speak out then nothing will ever change. From the smallest to the biggest, affiliates need to discover their vocal chords a lot more.

But let’s put this moaning in a different light…

Over 100 people supporting Frostie is actually a very positive sign for the industry - yes someone complaining about an issue resulted in a number of affiliate industry people being united as one. Merchants, affiliates, networks and agencies all supported this issue - and all because someone dared to speak out.

That is an amazingly good thing for affiliates and affiliate marketing - finally a bit of solidarity across the board.

And yes, you guessed what comes next…. I don’t believe it!

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