Lots of people repete that having a great affiliate manager aswell as a good relationship with them is important...Getting along with your manager is all about personalities, but what makes a great am? What expectations should we have? When do you know it's time to get a new one, even tough it's a cool person?
Affiliate Managers...How should they be?
- Thread starter jsmbiz
- Start date
I've worked on both sides of the business, from a publisher standpoint and (currently) as an affiliate manager myself. I'm not saying I'm a great AM, but one thing I've noticed in this industry is that transparency is very important to cultivating relationships. Being transparent with advertisers is especially important. If an advert says an offer is exclusive and they want it run on your internal platform ONLY, specifically not to be brokered out/ put on another network, then don't do it. I know enough now to realize that brokering offers out that shouldn't be is commonplace in this industry, but it is something I refuse to do. To me, maintaining a long standing relationship with your advertisers is not worth risking. Being accountable to your pubs, paying them on time, and being available in a timely fashion are really important as well. Also, knowing your shit and knowing the going rate of specific offers across multiple networks is important imo. I strive to be competitive with my pricing, and I know the going rate for offers I have on my network that aren't exclusive to me. I recently dealt with another network AM who offered me a particular campaign that he claimed was exclusive/ had an awesome payout, etc, but I knew EXACTLY where he ripped the offer from and how much I could get for it going elsewhere. Not only that, ALL his offer payouts were shit and it was obvious he wasn't getting anything direct/ exclusively as he claimed. Point being, don't insult my intelligence by offering me shit prices, especially if claiming something is yours exclusively and it is not. Other than that, as far as personality goes, if your AM is cool or not should just be icing on the cake. Some of the best AM's I deal with are complete assholes, but they know their shit and know how to get things done.
I've posted about this many times before. AMs to me are very important. I will easily fire one if I don't find them responsive, knowledgeable, and persistent. The best ones to me are the ones the work really hard for you. Be knowledgeable about the traffic sources, give tips and advice, talk to them daily about their needs. You wanna earn their trust and loyalty, because usually they have 12 other AMs breathing down their neck. I personally liked to be hit up daily, some do not, figure them out.
Here's a big tip, one some networks may frown upon. Make some of your own LPs for some of you networks top offers, and give them out to your pubs who wanna test out the offer, basically give them the whole package, without risking losing your loyalty to your pubs ofcourse. That and knowing your traffic for certain verticals will help out a lot, but remember don't snake your other pubs sources, be more general and give at half-informations.
I won't say names, but most networks only allow their AMs to talk offers and payouts, , bug your pubs, and only allow them to give out vanilla advice. That to me, doesn't help out anything. But also remember if he knew how to profit on all the campaigns, he wouldn't be an AM he'd be an affiliate, so pubs, don't always expect the world from you AMs.
I'm too hungry to type anymore, you need any more info, just ask. -v3ne
Here's a big tip, one some networks may frown upon. Make some of your own LPs for some of you networks top offers, and give them out to your pubs who wanna test out the offer, basically give them the whole package, without risking losing your loyalty to your pubs ofcourse. That and knowing your traffic for certain verticals will help out a lot, but remember don't snake your other pubs sources, be more general and give at half-informations.
I won't say names, but most networks only allow their AMs to talk offers and payouts, , bug your pubs, and only allow them to give out vanilla advice. That to me, doesn't help out anything. But also remember if he knew how to profit on all the campaigns, he wouldn't be an AM he'd be an affiliate, so pubs, don't always expect the world from you AMs.
I'm too hungry to type anymore, you need any more info, just ask. -v3ne