Turning Down Requests To Become An Affiliate...

Well, not really... if you consider there are many unknown "warriors" here who would apply to be an affiliate just to buy your product and asking for a refund immediately after downloading.

There was even a WSO selling some crazy script that automated this "applying" - to as many sellers as possible. Digiresult, another popular instant payment system was hardly hit by this idiots: I still get tens of 'affiliate applications' from people like swhtfgxy@yahoo.com.

And no, I do NOT approve everyone; I - to quote Willie - routinely decline them.

Part of what you say is true, but many affiliate networks turn down
many more affiliates than they accept. I've been turned down
numerous times because my website didn't fit in with the
product that I proposed promoting. The last affiliate program
that I recall turning me down was one that rents private jets.
I actually have clients who are their ideal customers and they
said no, and said no again when I appealed. So not all big
companies say yes to everyone.

It's also at times a matter of having deep pockets. If you
have the resources to chase down and prosecute rogue
affiliates, then perhaps you can afford to be a little less
cautious, but one really bad affiliate can kill a lot of small
players.

It's a balancing act, and a personal choice, but I don't
typically risk having affiliates that aren't even serious
enough business people to let me know who I'm doing
business with.

When I work as a joint venture broker, about HALF of my
clients have closed affiliate programs, where each affiliate
has to apply, and they do review who will be representing
their brand before saying yes.

Willie

Sounds like a good idea at first, until you realize that all it takes is one shady "affiliate" to blast your offer to a safelist (or any other super-low conversion traffic method), and your overall conversion rate will drop like a rock. And when your conversion rate drops, you will attract less of the better affiliates.

So it's definitely not a good idea to approve just anyone!

I think we all start out thinking this way...

As I can see you haven't been here long - so you probably haven't released a WSO yet and also probably haven't had to actually approve any affiliates...

I used to think every affiliate was a 'good thing" right? the "more the merrier"?

but the truth is - it's simply not the case...

First - the majority of your affiliate sales will only come from about 10 or 20% of the total affiliates... Meaning a handful of guys will send a good number of sales and the rest will be 5-15 sales (if that)...

So - how does it hurt you?

Here is a few ways...

1. Decreases EPC's and Conversion rates (decreases your chance at WSOTD)
2. If an affiliate refuses to pay a refund - it comes out of your pocket - and you still may have to chase the affiliate down
3. If stuff like #2 starts happening someone could complain to Wplus or PayPal and you get shut down altogether...

In fact this is happening right now to a very well known Warrior friend of mine...

He has had several WSOTD's (5 to be exact) and on his last one a semi-well known marketer (you likely at least heard the name) made about 120 sales for my friend but he had a disagreement with my friend and is now refusing to process any refunds (he says they are serial refunders) and so now my friends (two of them partnered on this WSO) are getting emails from these customers saying the affiliate wont give them a refund...

And the problem is - its on the vendor to make it right - so my friends will have to pay these refunds out of their own pocket (they paid 100% commission to affiliates front and back) in order to keep their customers happy and keep their reputation from being soiled...

So - the moral of the story is - not all affiliates are good affiliates. In fact, my sales literally tripled once I started being more selective about who I allowed to be an affiliate for me and the main reason was because the EPC's and conversions stayed high because of the quality traffic sent by the "good" affiliates

Some day you will understand Webpromotion...

There are people who probably spend all day every day trying
to figure out how to scam product owners, and other affiliates,
hijack sales, make a ton of sales that they get paid for, and
then somehow generate a ton of refunds that the merchant
has to eat, etc.

You would think that if some of those people put half as much
effort into just offering value in exchange for money, it would
actually be easier for them... but they don't see it that way.

Some don't even think that it's wrong. I've had people actually
ask me in all seriousness for example, if they could just buy
a product, upload it to their server, and then copy the sellers
salespage and swap out the payment link. We might think
that's crazy, but to a desperate person it's not.

The boldest ones would hotlink to you site and let you
pay for the bandwidth as they steal your products and
resell them!

I was most concerned though with affiliates who don't want
to be identified because they dedicate themselves to
dirty tricks full-time.

It's not as simple as we would hope.

Willie

There was a time Mark when someone requested to be my affiliate, I approved them, and then they started trashing my stuff in public, even though they had never seen my stuff.

I asked Mike Lantz to reverse the affiliate approval on that person. He obliged, but said in no uncertain terms that he did not want to make a habit of that, especially if he thought the person who was an affiliate had already promoted the product.

Shortly after, the notice started appearing on the affiliate approval page.

Coincidence? Maybe.

I routinely turn down affiliate requests, if they are not forthcoming with extra information that lets me confirm their online business activities. It's my reputation and more than that.

I've had a few bad affiliates scam me. They have their accomplice - or themselves with another PayPal account - buy the product trough their affiliate link. The commission gets paid out automatically. Then, the sly *******s put through an unauthorized purchase dispute, which holds everything up long enough for the affiliate to take the money and run.

So, yes, it does pay to be diligent with who you approve.

Okay...shows how much attention I pay to details on my own profile... my username was changed from vonnamia to my REAL name about 12 hours ago! Thank you support! That was quick

Thank you Yvonne. Now I have a new appreciate for your side of the
equation too.

I personally probably wouldn't disapprove a person for a low post
count, but I do look at how long they have been a member, if they
have a fairly complete profile, and then go with a gut feeling. I've
learned to trust my intuition.

There ARE plenty of good product for you to promote, so if I were
denied, I'd just look for another product that grabbed my attention,
probably noting conversions rates first, then price and percentage
commission.

Willie

Let me give it to you from the vendors point of view.

I too, just like you, are very busy and have a lot on my plate. When I am getting 5-10 affiliate requests every day then I need a quick way of separating the wheat from the chaff. When an affiliate whom I have never heard of before contacts me, I have very few pieces of information on which to base my decision. Join date and post count are about the only two pieces of information I have at my disposal so when a quick decision needs to be made, I will look at those two pieces of information and make an educated guess. Obviously someone who has been a member of the forum for years, has a War Room membership, and a high post count is more likely to be a reputable affiliate - not always, but more times than not.

Obviously you can't get it right 100% of the time HOWEVER because affiliates in the Warrior Plus system are responsible for processing their own refunds, I would much rather get it right more times than not -- which inevitably means turning away some affiliates who may have had good intentions. Just like you don't have time to jump through hoops for me I don't have time to spend doing background checks on all of my affiliates and so I will usually pick the best of the bunch. As Coby rightly pointed out it is usually only a small percentage of your affiliates who make the big sales for you anyway.

Yes, there are plenty of other products for you to choose from but from our point of view there are plenty of other affiliates to choose from as well. When I decline an affiliate it is not because I think they are unethical or not good enough to promote my course but it DOES mean based on the information I have, I have determined they are a higher risk than other affiliates I have approved.

My one word of advice from the vendor point of view, always contact the vendor again if they decline you and you really want to promote their product. Don't take it personally, we have a lot on our plate too and more times than not, if you contact the affiliate again and explain your exact intentions for promotion, they will approve you. This initial decline is used by many to flush out all the time-wasters.

On the other side of that coin, I insist upon looking at a product,
before I promote it, but I won't set aside a LOT of time to learn
about most products. So, I expect the product owner to be able
to explain it to me succinctly so that I CAN make a decision
to look deeper.

I get a lot of product owners who want to do a 2-hour GoToMeeting
presentation to explain a fairly simple product. About the only time
that I'll do that is if I'm contemplating partnering with the product
owner.

It is often a time factor that keeps people from looking deeper at
great products that they would fall in love with. As you're seeing
it's a challenge to get them to just slow down long enough... so you
need to have the elevator pitch ready

Willie

Hi Dr. Benny.

Nice to meet, you and from looking at your profile I could instantly
tell a lot about you including that your a fellow aviator.

The only things that I would add would be a short sig file, that
shows up under your posts. Just a line of two with a link to
one of your websites. That lets people who read your posts
and want to visit your site or blog do so directly from your
posts. It also helps with search engine optimization since the
search engines see another external link pointing to your
website.

Willie

I'd also like to ask them... however, they don't let me

When they apply I am sending automatically a message asking them to write me how they are going to promote; methods, websites etc. I also warn them that without replying they will NOT be approved.

Approx. 1% bothers to write back an email.

(clarification: this is not only about W+ but in general about affiliates at different sites: JVZoo, Digiresults etc.)