Lets Stir Things Up...

[Chris Douthit]

Craig, how did you know I was talking about you?

There are a lot of competition out there for launches, love it when I saw another one pop up the same day as mine :-\

[Amber Jalink]

Hi Guys, ;D

I'll jump in for a sec.

As for JV Partners / members here being less active...

I too don't get to pop in as much as I'd like - I do tend to lurk more.

A good portion of the reason for this is because I'm usually swamped building my business (literally the products, I do 80% of it - lol - I know, I know, outsource... but been there done that and had lousy experiences).

I had found a while ago that when I was participating (in other forums too, not just here), that too much of my time was taken up and not much was being accomplished on my end.

So I became the 'lurker'. :

Doesn't mean I don't care ;D

Also...

Another way to look at things - we all get hit with a lot of JV requests. I do - outside of here a lot too. I'm really picky about what I'll recommend for several reasons, and its not that I don't WANT to participate in a lot of JVs, sometimes its just too much. (Aka: my member's survey responses told me that - but I knew it even before they confirmed it).

As for the discussion at hand...

As for

"what do you think of product launches where the product owner simply has a squeeze page on their main page? I've seen it a few times where in order to see the main sales page they have to opt-in in return for some benefit, but I know this can put a lot of JV partners off (understandbly)."

I've been turned off from these myself for a few reasons.

First - its been (sometimes) proven, that once on the list, the referrals seem to be no longer yours. i.e., it didn't track the affiliate part properly in the autoresponder. So the JV partner loses financially.

Second - and this is one thing that seriously determines whether I will participate in ANY product launch (including the ones with just the squeeze page for a report), I subscribe and watch what happens.

... how many times a day / week am I hit with emails from them, that are *NOT* related to their product or not providing at least useful
information, example more teasers about the product coming?
... how many times a day / week are they hitting me up with the same emails every other marketer is doing for the "Launch de jour"?

The problem is,

(I've been doing this for 11 years - I'm very very very well familiar with launches)...

FAR too many are happening at the same time...
and FAR too many are hitting their lists with "YAPR" (Yet another product release)

It actually makes it difficult for people to be getting sales with their own products to their own lists because so many are starting to turn a blind eye to them.

The other thing about some of the squeeze pages before a launch that I've found (only a few times, but I have).

I monitor what I sign up/subscribe for. I read privacy policies on EVERY site I put an email address into.

And even though some say they "respect my privacy"...

Suddenly I get 2-3 different people (from different email addresses), contacting me - telling me I "opted in because of... "

So I guess I test these myself and monitor what happens - and if its abused pretty quickly, I don't bother to promote the JV.

LOL - Sorry for the rant.

Just my thoughts from a usually quiet lurker :P

Amber

[affiliaterockstarx]

I totally agree with you.

You don't want to loose good customers.

It would almost be better to have a sales page with no opt in.

But part of a launch is about building your list.

Maybe just a small opt in at the header might be a compromise.

[Amber Jalink]

Here's another thought:

Put the Opt in there (obviously yes it should be on your pages).

But you could also (i.e., if you're giving a free report) have a link below the opt in box, that says,

"prefer not to opt in yet? Please click here for the report".

(then of course ensure there are other places they can opt in after).

Also, "some" autoresponder systems allow you to track who the referrer was.

That might reassure jv partners.

Just more ideas.

Amber

[affiliaterockstarx]

Which ones track the refer?

[Richard Legg]

You can actually track with almost any AR that allows custom fields.

I'm not much of a programmer, but I managed to write a line of code before using PHP that gets the affiliate ID from the URL and then places this as a custom field in the autoresponder.

So the name and email would be the normal fields with a text input, and then the affID would be another field as a hidden input.

This way, with every email you send out you can send out a link with the custom tag at the end so it always displays the affiliate URL of the original referrer.

i.e. if you write the email as:

[[firstname]],

Go here:
www.yoursite.com/?id=[[affid]]

This would show up as:

Craig,

Go here:
www.yoursite.com/?id=1234

... or whatever

I'm sure there are easier ways of doing this, and probably some ARs have the capability built in, but I did this with GetResponse and a line or two of PHP without too much trouble.

Hope this helps (and doesn't confuse anyone more! :-\ )

Richard

[agbeyegbe]

Which ones track the refer?

Getresponse does, when you are trying to create an e-mail capture from, there is a
place where you would see a 3 digit tracking number. I think the default is always 000
it is called tracking code (REF), but you would need to have different squeeze pages for
this to work

[davidaarono]

I think also people get caught up in their own lives & work. They get so involved with themselves that people forget the best way to gain is by giving away.

That's kind of a hard concept for new marketers to really understand. To not be hypocritical, I have fallen into that trap myself many times. Especially when I'm getting close to a deadline...

[Sean Clark]

I can see where you are coming from David.

It's hard to not get caught up in your own life, in terms of work and social activity.

For example, I am currently in the process of

- Launching a new project
- Creating two new projects;
- Performing a JV every week;
- Designing a web site for a good friend....

And of course the usual every day tasks of answering queries, phone calls, and evaluating staff. Sometimes my social life only begins on the weekends hehe my Fiancée doesn't necessarily like it.

However, we've only ourselves to blame, for putting ourselves in such demanding positions.

To be honest, I like it. I like to test my limitations and further my skills, while also enjoying life of course.

[RichardJones]

Yep, we are all in the same boat... But the nice thing about how we are is that we will most likely be able to retire before everybody else and finally enjoy the time off after the hard work!

Richard