Affiliate Buzz | Affiliate Marketing / Affiliate Programs / Internet / Online / Social Media Marketing - James Martell

Affiliate Buzz | Affiliate Marketing / Affiliate Programs / Internet / Online / Social Media Marketing - James Martell

By James Martell: Online Entrepreneur, Speaker and PodcasterBusinessTechnologyEducation
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Affiliate Buzz | Affiliate Marketing / Affiliate Programs / Internet / Online / Social Media Marketing - James Martell episodes

  • AB #353 | Learn to Create and Sell Your Own Digital Products (from Someone who has Made Millions in Online Sales)
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by Miles Baker, ClickBank Affiliate and Vendor, author of Marketing with Miles and host of the ClickScoop podcast. They will be discussing how to create and sell your own digital products to live a dream lifestyle.
    This episode begins with Miles explaining his journey to becoming a top 100 ClickBank Affiliate and vendor. Miles story starts when he signed up to an online system called Cookie Cutter in 1998. During the sign-up process he had to enlist with ClickBank.
    At the time, Miles lived in a studio apartment in a poor city. He didn’t own a computer; instead he worked on his father’s office computer at night.
    Eighteen months later, he received a cheque for seven dollars and thirty-eight cents. Miles didn’t know how he had earned that money and did some research. Soon he realised the money was related to his affiliate sales made with ClickBank. He then recognized how much could be achieved online through a passive income.
    From this point he decided to see if he could take it further. He looked into how to run successful ClickBank campaigns and within two years he was making five figures every month.
    Meeting James For The First Time
    Early in his career, Miles had come across James’ book and read it. He then followed the Affiliate Buzz and burned copies of episodes onto CD to listen to them into the car. Miles had even taken a backlinks course taught by James. This enabled him to create a website that earned five figures of revenue a month.
    Then in 2008, Miles approached James in a bar during an Affiliate Summit. Since this moment the two have had many conversations and built a friendship.
    This highlights one of the benefits of attending conferences, as James has spoken about before in previous episodes.
    Success Continues
    During the podcast, Miles talks about his career and how he built his affiliate business and sold his own digital products successfully. Some of the key moments in his career include:

    * When he found he had maxed out the earning potential of the ClickBank book Secrets of the Big Dog.
    * Creating his own website selling guides on how people could copy DVDs.
    * When a competitor took the movie industry to court to keep the copying business alive.
    * When he turned his guide into a software program.
    * When he had to shut down his DVD copying business.

    Miles also talks about his biggest failures. He has had some PPC campaigns which have flopped but generally he has had a successful career. The key to that was by being confident in his products and knowing how he was going to market and sell them before launching. He believes this minimises the chances for failure.
    ClickBank Statistics
    Prior to the episode, James has pulled some statistics for ClickBank from their site and Wikipedia and shares them with listeners.
    According to the statistics, they are the world leader in performance marketing of digital products. In 2011, they attracted over 1.5 million affiliate marketers, paid out $1.8 billion dollars in revenue to vendors and marketers, processed 35,000 transactions per day and generated $350 million profit.
    Miles has been with ClickBank for over a decade. He believes it is a great platform for selling your digital products. They do most of the back end work for the vendor, from converting currencies to keeping aside tax. They also offer different payment methods for consumers.
    According to Miles, they have excellent customer services to respond to customer queries. If there is anything too technical about the product they pass those questions onto the vendor.
    55 min
  • AB #349 | Ricky Shetty: Secret to Receiving $30,000 in FREE Products and Building a Lifestyle Business Around Your Family
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by Ricky Shetty, Amazon bestselling author and owner of DaddyBlogger.com.
    James and Arlene begin this edition by talking about their attendance at the ShareASale Think Tank 2014, which they have previously discussed. It will be the 9th annual ThinkTank and while Arlene has been able to attend most meetings, James has been able to attend all of them.
    There is a lot on the agenda and it is difficult to decide what sessions to attend. Whichever sessions Arlene sits in, she is likely to take copious notes. James is planning to go to the advanced monetization sessions, which he always enjoys. Included in this will be website reviews and a bonus / incentive sessions.
    James and Arlene are also planning to take the time to have a little breakation. They plan to go to Memphis and visit Graceland, the former home of Elvis Presley. This is the most visited private home in America with 50,000 visitors a month. The private home turned museum has just recently opened a new archive experience, something which Arlene is particularly excited about seeing.
    The ability of being able to take this breakation and this ‘lifestyle business’ is something which James loves about being an affiliate marketer and working from home. The point has been further highlighted by one of James’ friends who was frustrated at not being able to see the Canadian Snowbirds because he couldn’t take the time off work.
    The Dad Who Blogs
    Ricky Shetty then joins the podcast. Ricky is the founder of Daddyblogger.com, which is a site for fathers and has authored a bestselling Amazon book, Wisdom for Daddies, where he interviewed one hundred dads from across the world. Ricky also runs the YVR media group which includes very niche meeting and networking groups including the YVR Bloggers, YVR Foodies and YVR Dads.
    James and Ricky have met a couple of times previously. The first at the Internet Masterminds Meet-up and the other time was at the West Coast Podcasters Network. During this episode of the Affiliate Buzz you will learn:

    * Where Ricky is from and how that has influenced his choosing of his target market.
    * His teaching career and how it influenced his career so far.
    * About his travelling across the world.
    * Why he decided to become an online entrepreneur and how it ties in with him becoming a father.

    Just like James, Ricky finds that being his own boss gives him the freedom to arrange his own time. James admits he does take it for granted.
    Ricky started daddyblogger.com in September 2012, just before he was going to be a dad for the first time. At the time he had a little fear about being a father because of the experiences he had as a child. Previous to his blog he processed his thoughts in a journal, now he blogs.
    However, sorting out his own thoughts isn't the only reason for the blog. Part of the blog is about discussing things which men rarely do and to keep a journal to remind his children what they did when they were young.
    48 min
  • AB #348 | Vinny O’hare: Hurricane Sandy and Why It Pays to Think Outside of the Box
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by Vinny O’Hare, online entrepreneur, speaker and author. In this edition they talk about why it pays to think outside of the box when marketing your business.
    Vinny has not previously been on the Affiliate Buzz, which was a surprise for James. The pair have known each other for over a decade and been to many conferences, including Affiliate Summit and ShareASale Think Tanks, together. James considers Vinny to be a good friend and an affiliate marketing talent.
    The Start Of Vinny’s Career
    Vinny’s first career was placing adverts in the subway for the New York Transit. While he was doing this he noticed which adverts were giving the best results.
    He took elements from the best performing adverts and used them for buying and selling products on eBay. He then realised if he could write content for an eBay page and make money, he could easily do the same with a website.
    In 2002/2003 Vinny decided to leave eBay and make money from being an affiliate marketer. His first success from affiliate marketing was almost immediate.
    Vinny met James very early on in his affiliate career. It was 2004 and James was getting ready to get on the second Affiliate Summit cruise. On the night before the cruise, ShareASale CEO, Brian Littleton, put on a small event in a little bar in Soho. This is where the two met. This was also Vinny’s first affiliate event.
    Ten years later Vinny has become such an authority on unique marketing activities that he now regularly speaks at Affiliate Summit. This year he is speaking in New York about how last year he published 18,000 blog posts and built a house.
    Many affiliate marketers struggle to create enough content, yet Vinny has unique methods to generate content and attract traffic.
    One method Vinny tried was distributing business cards which had the URL to his website on one side and the URL to an affiliate link on the other side. James liked the idea so much he now has business cards for all his sites.
    Images are another important part of his marketing strategy and he uses them on his sites, social media and in books. Vinny would definitely agree books are better than a business card, as mentioned by Jim Kukral in a previous podcast.
    During the podcast, Vinny talks about many of his successes with the visual medium including:

    * How his photos of a space shuttle grabbed the attention of national news and generated 10,000 visits to his website.
    * Why a photo of a blue bird is helping him generate interest for one of his 30 websites.
    * How he generates some other visual content for his car websites.
    * Why your target audience can be so helpful in generating some of the content for you.

    Vinny also discusses the advantages of Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing platform and Createspace for creating books which you can sell and use in your marketing. When Vinny started out using books he only sold digital books, but he found some of his market wanted physical copies.
    Hurricane Sandy And Vinny
    One of the defining moments in Vinny’s career is when Hurricane Sandy hit his home town. Vinny’s home is situated with about another 1000 homes on a small island. They constantly have hurricane warnings and in the previous year they had a false alarm. So when news came of Sandy they were not so worried.
    57 min
  • AB #347 | Matt Frary: Retargeting, Real Time Bidding and the Evolution of the Affiliate Marketing Agency
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by Matt Frary, the CEO and co-founder of SmarterChaos. In this edition they discuss the evolution of the affiliate marketing agency.
    Matt begins this edition by giving a good description of who SmarterChaos is for those who missed his last interview on the Affiliate Buzz.
    It is a little agency with 14 employees and 70 clients based behind a coffee shop in Castle Rock, CO. Matt wanted the affiliate agency to infuse large organizations with small hometown values. Part of that goal is for SmarterChaos to keep the felling of a personal, small hometown agency.
    Recently they have announced some important news that they had joined forces with Digital First Media who own 60 newspapers around the world. This has allowed them to expand what they can offer their clients as they've become a Google Premier SMB.
    There are only 20 Google Premier SMBs in the world. Any company with this honour gets unprecedented access to Google. This includes the ability to run campaigns on beta products and use ad extensions unavailable on regular accounts such as product feeds.
    As Matt states, there are a lot of advantages for aligning themselves with such a big company. Another benefit Matt explains is the access to 19 live bidding exchanges which access 100,000 websites with their inventory of ads. Then they can bid on those impressions to aid clients targeting specific customer profiles at the right time in the right place.
    This means that SmarterChaos can now handle almost any part of the customer journey.
    The Evolution Of The Affiliate Agency
    Back in the late 90s and early 00s there were consultants who were good at running affiliate programs. They would go to an advertiser and say they could run their affiliate program and employ best practices, etc. The consultant would then run a couple of campaigns. They would partner with networks such as Commission Junction, LinkShare and BeFree to build a program and become a program manager.
    Then the role evolved so they became Outsourced Program Managers. These individuals had deeper relationships with the previously mentioned networks. They had preferred pricing and access to relationship databases to aid the programs they ran. An OPM would manage between 75 and 100 programs but on different platforms.
    SmarterChaos has evolved even further. They create proactive recruitment campaigns to build direct channels. They consider themselves agnostic, which means they will work with networks, but they prefer to work direct.
    They have an outbound team who make calls to match the right affiliates with the right advertiser.
    During the podcast, Matt also explains the following:

    * What are Real Time Bidding exchanges and how do they work?
    * How does SmarterChaos track the service journey?
    * How does SmarterChaos ensure they are advertising to the right market group?
    * How Impact Radius supports the monitoring of internet campaigns?

    More Than Just The Last Click Attributor
    One of the biggest changes which has happened in the market during recent years is the change from the last click attributor model. Now companies are realizing they have to monitor the rest of the customer journey and the corresponding ROI.
    This is one of the reasons why SmarterChaos has joined forces with Digital First Media. It allows them to offer their clients tracking of their customers across the ...
    5 min
  • AB #346 | Jim Kukral: How to Grow Your Brand with a Book (and Build Your Dream Lifestyle)
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by Jim Kukral, internet pioneer, author and speaker. This week they are discussing how writing a book can help your brand or business gain extra online exposure.
    Jim Kukral is a successful entrepreneur who has written several books aiming to teach others how they can achieve their dream lifestyle through their own business. This is something which aligns with last week’s edition about having the lifestyle you want.
    He has helped both small and large businesses achieve success. These businesses include FedEx, Sherwin-Williams, Ernst and Young and Progressive Auto Insurance. Each one he has taught how to build a successful online business or supported them in re-energizing or refreshing their brand.
    He has developed creative marketing campaigns, new products and advised on how businesses can increase their bottom lines while working less. Because of his work, Jim has been featured in numerous publications including: The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Forbes and Entrepreneur Magazine.
    Jim Kukral’s Journey To Success
    Jim wasn’t always his own boss. In 1995, Jim worked for a telecoms company designing Yellow Pages advertisements. One day a friend called him and asked if would bring his graphic design skills to a new web agency they were starting.
    On his first day he was given a book on HTML and was told to learn it. This was a time when the internet was new and no-one really knew how to best use the internet. It was also the year that Sergey Brin met Larry Page; both would go on to found Google.
    The new company Jim worked for had big connections with some top brands and none of them had websites. Jim was able to design the first websites for Ernst and Young and Sherwin-Williams. According to Jim this was an exciting time.
    The company boomed and within a couple of years had over 150 employees. Then Jim left to start his own agency – FenderTech. This company set out to automate the manufacturing processes for manufacturers.
    Still the business was successful and from the five that it started with, the business grew to 160 employees. Then the dotcom bubble burst and the funding for the majority of their start-up clients disappeared. Jim’s business lost clients and they went from 160 employees to just 16.
    This was the point where Jim decided to get out and never own a big business again.
    James also talks about the effect the crash had on Vancouver, often considered the Silicon Valley of the north.
    During this part of the podcast, Jim discusses some of these points:

    * What his biggest regret has been.
    * Why he didn’t want to work for someone else or own a big company himself.
    * What part Iquit.org played in his career and how Amazon Affiliates helped.
    * How the Google Florida update in November 2003 changed his business.

    One of the most important aspects of being in business, as Jim puts it, is getting yourself out there. There was a moment when he read a book by Shawn Collins and decided to send him an email stating he had a business and asked if he could help Shawn in any way. Within 30 minutes Shawn replied back saying he needed a logo and from there their relationship grew.
    A Book Is The Best Business Card You Can Have
    James remembers listening to Jim as a keynote speaker at Affiliate Summit. Jim at the time had published one book, now several others have been published.
    9 min
  • AB #345 | Arlene Martell: Carving Out a Lifestyle Where You Can Raise Your Kids as a Stay at Home Affiliate Marketer
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by his wife Arlene Martell. This week they are discussing the possibilities for your lifestyle if you start an affiliate marketing home business.
    This is something which is really close to the hearts of James and Arlene. Both of them have realized that you can be in control of your lifestyle by running your own home business. This improved lifestyle has allowed them to have the benefits of a stay at home parent while also being able to earn a good income from home.
    Arlene has particularly valued the ability to raise their children from home.
    Life Before Affiliate Marketing
    Before they were running an affiliate marketing business, James and Arlene were running a telecoms business. The business was doing well and there was a lot of work. However, the money wasn’t good, certainly not enough for what they were doing.
    Arlene was also suffering with balancing her work with home life. Unlike many families nowadays, where the average family has two or three children, Arlene and James had four children. Therefore home life was very hectic.
    There were also the health concerns with Adam their eldest son, which made it difficult for Arlene to leave the house on some days.
    During this time, James and Arlene had very little money. They had no credit card, their car was old and the planned holidays were camping and visiting family.
    The Jump To Affiliate Marketing
    Then in 1999, James and Arlene decided to make the jump to create an affiliate marketing home business. It was during the fall that the first cheques started to arrive. As they stumbled their way through the dot com crash, their income picked up and so did their time with the children.
    This is one of the main reasons why both men and women want to run their own home business. A good example of this would be Chris Molnar. His goal was exactly this, to earn money while staying at home to be with the children.
    During the podcast James and Arlene discuss the following:

    * How going to work can cost a family significant amounts.
    * How a parent’s time can disappear after returning home from work and at the weekends.
    * Why affiliate marketing is one of the easiest businesses to run from home.
    * What other benefits parents can have by running an affiliate marketing home business.
    * How the children benefit from having stay at home parents.
    * What the motivations are for running a business from home.

    James also talks about a previous podcast where he and Robert Kottke discussed how home business owners can save money on their taxes. James also mentioned a few other well known stay at home personalities including Matt Frary and Don Campbell.
    The Power Of Focus
    One of the important aspects of working from home is the need to focus. That doesn’t just mean working hard. There is a common problem, as James explains, of affiliate marketers broadening their audience too quickly.
    This problem was highlighted with new clients of James and Arlene. Both individuals loved the health sector and wanted to set up a website, blog and podcast talking about various health topics and selling supplements online.
    The issue was that talking about different health problems might have alienated their audience. For instance, those who tuned in to listen to their podcast on cancer one week might have been disappointed if the next week they are talking about how to quit smoking.
    Therefore the pair were advised to focus their topic. So they decided, due to personal and work reasons, to focus on diabetes.
    50 min
  • AB #344 | Breakations, Meetups, Podcasting and a Refreshed Format for the Affiliate Buzz
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by his wife Arlene Martell. This episode is full of information to help you make the most out of your online marketing with advice on breakations, attending meetups and running your own podcast.
    James and Arlene also discuss this week, the newly refreshed format for the Affiliate Buzz and there is even a quick look back at the very first couple of episodes.
    Step Away from the Computer
    Last week had been a bad week with some issues in the business getting them down. James and Arlene therefore realised it was time to get away from it all and take a breakation. A breakation is time for you to reward yourself for all your hard work and for doing a good job.
    Yet in this instance, it helped James and Arlene to unwind from the troubles they had experienced.
    During the weekend away they barely looked at their laptops. James admits he may have posted some photos from his phone, but had not looked at any business stuff the whole time they were away.
    James and Arlene highly recommend breakations to those who are perhaps spending long hours in front of their computer but not getting a satisfactory amount of work done.
    For this breakation the couple went to Hope, BC which is considered the gateway to holiday land. They consider it a beautiful area with homes dotted around the lake. They had been there before, with one of the first times being almost 30 years ago. During this trip they happened to find the original cabin they had stayed at and talked to the owner about some of the changes he has made.
    The area has an interesting history, being the location for the movie Rambo, and every year fans flock to the area to see where the film was shot. There is also the Kettle Valley Railway which goes from Hope to the centre of BC. It was built in the 19th century but was closed down because they couldn’t maintain the tracks with all the snow.
    After Hope, BC they went to Yale where Arlene’s mother has a trailer. Yale is beside a beautiful river and is a location where individuals can own their own camping spot.
    After spending some time in Yale, James and Arlene headed off to the Harrison Hot Springs Resort. They were initially disappointed with the room they had and Arlene was able to get them an upgrade using a tried and tested method.
    Arlene’s tip for getting an upgrade is to take a $20 bill and fold it up with a credit card you give to the person behind the counter and then ask if there is a chance for an upgrade. Arlene says this has worked at many hotels including the Paris Hotel in Vegas.
    This is a method which James has tried at the Mirage with great success.
    Meeting With Fellow Online Marketing Businesses
    James and Arlene had to leave their breakation on the Monday in order to go to the Internet Masterminds Meet-up in Vancouver. This is one of the largest in the world with over 36,000 subscribed to the event.
    There are meet-ups all over the world and James really recommends that if you have a chance you get yourself to one. Matt Astifan does a meet-up every Monday in Vancouver, except through the summer.
    Any meet-up is a great place to learn, find, and drive business. It is also an opportunity for you to get away from your machine and speak to people face to face. Arlene really enjoys the meet-ups as there is such a diverse group of people to talk to.
    41 min
  • AB #343 | Joel Comm: NY Times Best Selling Author Shares Strategies to Build a Business that Pays and Pays
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined by Joel Comm, the successful internet entrepreneur and Times Bestselling author. During this episode they discuss creating and running an online business and how business success can help you lead a rich and rewarding life.
    Understanding Joel Comm
    Joel is a very prolific entrepreneur. He has 80,000 Twitter followers, 37,000 fans on Facebook and 27,000 followers on Google Plus. He has written books on Adsense and has expert knowledge of affiliate marketing. He continues to develop and release his own products and books and he offers consultations for businesses at $10,000 for six hours.
    Joel’s first business started when he moved to Dallas, Texas to become a DJ. He established his first website in 1995 and his first online business success was in 1996. It was at a point where he was about to run out of money and his partner had left Joel to go work with Microsoft.
    Joel prayed for a solution to his problems with the website. Within a week, a man representing a Japanese group of businesses wanted to licence his content on WorldVillage.com. They offered $5000 a month, which was a life changing moment and it turned his fortunes around. This domain is still owned by Joel.
    In 1997, his webmaster pointed to a site springerspan.com. The owner had developed the foundation for one of the first multiplayer game sites using java. Joel approached the owner to do a joint venture and this became Classicgames.com.
    It wasn’t long before some big brands became interested and Joel was able to sell the site for a seven figure amount. Classicgames.com became Yahoo! Games.
    Joel speaks a lot about his online business career. Included in the conversation is:

    * What place in Joel’s history do Dealaday.com, drugstore.com, staples.com and pets.com have?
    * Why is Google’s Adsense important for Joel at this time?
    * How was Joel’s income changed by the use of Adsense?
    * How this has progressed into a successful career as an author, spurred on by advice from Chris Pirillo.
    * How his book sales picked up with the help from Paul Myers.

    Joel has written specifically about Twitter, a subject that James himself has covered in other podcasts.
    A Diverse Career Path
    James and Joel first crossed paths when Joel was at a convention, after he released the app Kerching button, something which regularly makes an appearance throughout the show. The KaChing button has now become important for some individuals as a way of ringing in online sales.
    This isn’t the only app which has been developed by Joel. Recently he has created an app which was used by everyone including George Clooney and Demi Moore: the iFart mobile app.
    The app has netted Joel a total of $0.5 million and was number one on the iphone app store 12 days after its release. The novelty application however has not had a completely easy ride. At the same time another ‘farting’ app was released called Pull My Finger
    57 min
  • AB #342 | Matt McWilliams: Creating Your Own Product (An Inspiring Success Story)
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell, is joined first by Kimberly Juchnowski and later by Matt McWilliams, President of Matt McWilliams Consulting and a 2010 Affiliate Manager of the Year at the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Awards.
    In this edition they will discuss a number of different topics including reminding listeners of Elance and how creating your own product can add an additional revenue stream from your blog traffic (tweet). James also gives a brief overview and his first thoughts on PostPlanner.com which he has been recommended by @ScottAyres from the Facebook AnswerMan podcast.
    James starts however by talking about a recent email he received from a student. In the email the student inquires about coaching from James for his online business but first he wants to learn a series of tools including WordPress, graphic design and a host of others.
    This method is something which James has always recommended against. He believes that you should "do what you do best and outsource the rest". He points out there are many professionals on Elance who are willing to do the job for you at a reasonable price and far quicker.
    Elance Central to Business Operations
    Kimberly is then invited to speak about her work using Elance. Typically, James and Kimberly have three types of projects: graphics, writing and technical. Of these categories there can be anything from 8 to 30 projects open.
    Kimberly states the essential component of Elance is team building. They go out and find writers who are good in their niche and give them related projects. Due to the style in which they hire freelancers some have been working with them for two or more years.
    During this section of the podcast Kimberly and James give advice on the following:

    * Remembering that freelancers have other clients with deadlines.
    * How you can ensure that your work remains a priority with the freelancers.
    * How to get the best price and deals from freelancers.
    * How a couple of projects James is working on at the moment, using OptinSkin, are to be supported by services acquired through Elance.

    Increasing Facebook Interactions With Post Planner
    James has been experimenting with a new tool, which was recommended by the Facebook Answerman podcast with Scott Ayres. The promise of the site is that in just 10 minutes a day you can triple your engagement.
    It seems to James that this could be possible. However, his first impressions of the tool were negative. When he clicked on a photo a popup appeared stating only ‘gurus’ could add photos. James followed the link provided and it took him to a signup page for a $29 per month subscription. James feels the instant up-sell is a poor strategy.
    Instead James thinks that a strategy like BaseCamp where users get a free trial before adding in credit card details would work best.
    Despite this, the tool has impressive functionality despite the continuous popup.
    Handcuffs and Trophies
    Matt joins the podcast later to talk about creating your own product. Matt is an award winning affiliate marketer who has talked about his awards in episode #253, "A Day in The Life of an Award Winning Affiliate Manager".
    Matt always introduces himself with the line: “Hi I’m Matt an...
    57 min
  • AB #341 | How a Google Applied ‘Manual SPAM Action Penalty’ was Successfully Removed
    In this edition of the Affiliate Buzz, host and Instructor of the Affiliate Marketers BootCamp, James Martell is joined by his wife Arlene Martell. In this episode, they talk about how a Google Manual SPAM Action penalty was removed from a student’s website.
    Beginning the episode, James speaks to Arlene about the flexibility she enjoys from owning her own business. Arlene was recently able to fit her work around having a great morning making birthday cards with her grandchildren.
    The Changing Rules of Google Algorithms
    James recounts the recent changes Google has applied to its search ranking algorithms. These have included the Penguin and Panda updates which have now been amalgamated. For some people this has changed their site’s page rank for a variety of reasons, not always for the best.
    Sometimes James and Arlene receive emails from their students asking for help and on one such occasion there was an email directly connected to this problem. The subject of the email was: Please Help Google Applied Manual Spam Action To My Site.
    Re: Please Help. Google Applied Manual SPAM Action to My Site
    Hi James, I need your help desperately. I received the attached email from Google and have not been able to figure out how to resolve this. I've posted it in the School's facebook page but got conflicting advice from what I've found through my own research. So out of frustration and fear that I may really mess things up, I decided to send you a quick message to get your advice.
    Basically, Google has applied a manual spam action to my site. To be honest, I'm not even really sure what that means. My site has been built by the book. I've always followed your advice and done things right. I don't spam, I don't participate in link exchanging, I don't list my site on any link farm type sights. No games at all.
    First, I was advised to go back and add nofollow tags to all of my affiliate links on my site. This way the spiders will not follow my affiliate links off to my merchants and will not flag my site as an artificial or unnaturally linked site.
    Second, I was advised to replace all of the affiliate links of my landing pages with a link to a secondary page that contains more "detail" of the product, and have that page contain my affiliate links. The thinking is that Google will see visitors clicking through to another page on my site before leaving vs landing on my site and clicking through to my merchant.
    Do either of these sound like a good way to resolve this?
    When Google applies the Manual Spam Action, they’re essentially removing the site from their index. This can be a scary prospect for the website owner.
    James and Arlene have had this happen twice. Once was in 2001 and the other was in 2004. James says he always worries when it comes to December 27 as both cases happened on this date.
    However, unlike in the old days, receiving this notice is not a death sentence for the website. Previously a manual spam action meant the only solution would be to start over. This is why some affiliate marketers would give up.
    James thinks Google’s change in policy allowing website owners to adjust their sites to have these penalties removed is a positive step forward. After all we all make mistakes and sometimes their webmaster guidelines can be vague. For instance the exact definition of a link sharing scheme is not concrete. Google has also caught some web owners out with a change in their rules.
    A Student With A Problem
    Continuing on with this student’s predicament; James and Arlene discuss the email he received. In it Google informed the student that his site was to have a penalty imposed. Google specifically stated they had found artificial or unnatural outbound links on his website.
    33 min

About Affiliate Buzz | Affiliate Marketing / Affiliate Programs / Internet / Online / Social Media Marketing - James Martell

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Since 2003, James Martell has been keeping affiliate marketers inspired, informed and motivated to succeed with affiliate programs. The Affiliate Buzz is the first and longest running podcast in the…