Google Affiliate Network Blog

Affiliate Tax Legislation Update

2009-06-30T12:25:00.000-07:00

While affiliate marketers and industry peers continue to work to oppose 'affiliate tax' proposals around the country, a nexus law passed yesterday in Rhode Island. There are also proposals pending in other states, most notably North Carolina, where a nexus law is included in the budget proposal and could pass on July 1st and Hawaii, where the legislation will be enacted unless the Governor vetoes it by July 15th.

Google continues to work with trade associations around the country to ensure that policymakers understand the implications of these proposals on businesses and consumers. And we encourage publishers who may be affected by these proposals to take action in their home states.

Online sales tax is a complex and dynamic issue and each advertiser must evaluate the implications of any legislation on their business. Google cannot provide counsel on potential implications.

The Performance Marketing Alliance is a good resource to monitor progress on these issues.

Here are some interesting links to some recent press about the proposals:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124605688876763507.html

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-ri-amazon-ri-taxes,0,6524224.story

Posted by Kristin Hall and the Google Affiliate Network team

Google Affiliate Network: One Year Later

2009-05-27T12:26:00.000-07:00

It’s been just over a year since our affiliate business became part of Google. To say a lot has happened seems obvious but I am proud of what our team has accomplished. To name just a few of the achievements: a new brand & UI, numerous platform enhancements, fantastic client and employee satisfaction in the midst of integration and many, many, new customers. Google Affiliate Network is fully integrated operationally within Google. We had an exciting year, but I am even more excited about where we are going.

Our focus remains the same, drive exceptional customer satisfaction through affiliate channel growth; however, being part of Google brings a mindset in how to best achieve our goals. A culture focused on the user and the tenet that ads must be high quality now permeates the Google Affiliate team.

Our goals are clear as we invest in our Platform, integrate our Network and continue to refine and evolve the Practice of Affiliate Marketing. To this end, we recently launched an “opportunities center” in the platform allowing advertisers to more easily identify underperforming relationships. This capability generates growth by improving optimization. We currently are beta testing data feed integration with Google Base which will drive growth with improved category taxonomy and data validation, as well as an improved user experience for advertisers who will only have to send one feed to Google. Publishers benefit from a higher quality data feed. The integration with Google Base is also an example where integration with other Google products and systems enables our Affiliate engineers to focus on affiliate innovation, while the engineers supporting Base will drive that product forward. Our team and our users benefit in many ways from Google’s scale and engineering excellence.

Google brings a focus on making decisions based on facts and data, rather than intuition. Our Practice embraced this focus, and has conducted more than 20 structured optimization projects this past quarter, resulting in measurable lift in program performance. These are just a few of our accomplishments to date, and the possibilities and ideas endless.

There is a lot of hard work ahead. I am sure we will make mistakes and things won’t go as fast as we want. But know that we are 100% committed to our customers’ satisfaction and to bringing unprecedented innovation to affiliate marketing. Our collective futures are very bright.

Thank you for your business and continued support.

Chris Henger

Head of Google Affiliate Network

Searching for Publisher Opportunities?

2009-05-14T18:58:00.001-07:00

We just updated a new feature for advertisers that should benefit both our advertisers and publishers. Advertisers can now view lists that highlight high performing publishers that are either underperforming for the advertiser, or have not joined the advertiser's program.

Advertisers:

My network displays a list of publishers that are doing better on a relative basis in your category than they are for you.

Rest of network displays a list of publishers that are not in your program that have a history of performance in your category.

If you are looking for a way to improve the productivity of your affiliate program, this is a great place to start. The feature can be found by navigating to Publishers > Opportunities.

Publishers:

In order to be visible to advertisers looking for new publishers, you must opt in to not joined opportunities on your communication preferences page. To be visible to your existing advertisers that may be looking to expand their relationship with you, opt in to receive promotional communication for each advertiser to which you want to appear.

On behalf of the affiliate team,

Larry Adams

Sales Tax Legislation

2009-03-24T11:06:00.000-07:00

In 2008 the State of New York enacted legislation which expanded the definition of sales tax vendors. There are currently several state legislatures, most notably California, considering similar proposals. Online sales tax issues are a dynamic and important issue for our industry. It is important that we not only stay abreast of these issues but work together in the best interests of our industry and consumers to educate policy makers on the dynamics of digital marketing.

Google and several other California based companies submitted a formal letter of opposition to the proposed California legislation. The Google Affiliate Network team and other teams at Google are working with trade associations across the country to ensure that policymakers understand the implications of these proposals on businesses and consumers.

Google cannot provide counsel on potential implications. We encourage businesses to follow the situation closely and evaluate any potential impact on your particular business.

Following are some relevant links regarding the situation in California:

California Chamber of Commerce:

http://ct2k2.capitoltrack.com/BillInfo.asp?inarchive=true&org=all&measure=AB%20178&ss=413calchamberbillinfo.xsl

California Taxpayers Association Fact Sheet:

http://www.caltax.org/SalesTaxNexusFactSheet3-2-09.pdf

Performance Marketing Alliance:

http://www.performancemarketingalliance.com/2009/03/19/the-fight-against-california-assembly-bill-178/

New Notification Features Released

2009-03-12T20:45:00.000-07:00

The ads provided by our advertisers are often time sensitive and require replacement by publishers on a regular basis. We have been told by many publishers that they have a hard time keeping track of out of date ads present on their site(s). To help alleviate this challenge we will now display notifications on the publisher home page whenever we detect traffic on links (ads) that have past their end date.

A new message center, featured prominently in the top center of the publisher home page, provides a daily summary with the number of clicks recorded on out of date links. Users can view a detailed list of the ads generating these clicks including the creative, if applicable, and a link to a list of current ads for each advertiser associated to an out of date link. Notifications may be dismissed, but will continue to appear daily if traffic on out of date links is detected on subsequent days. The first notifications were generated as we pushed out the feature, so publishers may see a notification upon their next login. Please note that while a promotion may be past its end date we will continue to track clicks and conversions, and commissions will accrue for any conversions recorded for an active but out of date link.

Google Affiliate Network provides multiple features to help publishers keep up with these frequent changes; we offer daily updates of promotional ads (via email or FTP) and advertiser product catalogs (FTP only). We strongly encourage publishers to try out these features by visiting Links > Link Subscriptions and Links > Product Feeds.

Finally, we have added a feature to automatically send an email notification to publishers when a change to commissions specific to an advertiser/publisher relationship is made; advertiser users will also get a copy of the message. Publishers must opt in to receive these notifications on the Settings > Communications Preferences page. Please note that notifications are not yet available if advertisers change their default commission rate, or if the advertiser is using Category/Product Level Commissions. We are working to provide coverage for these types of changes too, and will be making improvements based on your feedback as we enhance this feature.

As a reminder, we have altered the naming convention for Link Subscriptions. Files will now come in the form Link_Subscriptions_YYYYMMDD.txt. Beginning March 13, all files will follow this convention.

Larry Adams
Product Manager

Maintenance Window Thursday, Mar 12: Changing Filename for Link Subscriptions

2009-03-10T21:23:00.000-07:00

The Google Affiliate Network UI will undergo maintenance this Thursday, March 12 between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. CDT.

In addition, publishers please take note that the file naming convention for link subscriptions will be changing to:

Link_Subscriptions_MMDDYYYY.txt

If you are a publisher and are not currently signed up for link subscriptions, it is highly recommended. You will receive a nightly feed via email or FTP of new ads created by your advertisers in the Google Affiliate Network.

You can subscribe via the UI by navigating to Links > Links Subcriptions.

Regards,

Larry Adams
Product Manager

System Maintenance Saturday

2009-02-27T09:43:00.000-08:00

We will be performing system maintenance this weekend, during our normal Saturday maintenance window. During the maintenance, the Google Affiliate interfaceswill be unavailable beginning approximately at 10:00 a.m. EST (3:00 p.m. GMT), Saturday, February 28th. The interfaces will be restored no later than 6:00 p.m. EST (11:00 p.m. GMT).

Please note: tracking will NOT be affected during the maintenance period.

2009-02-02T14:59:00.000-08:00

Update Your Google Affiliate Network Sign-in to a Google Account

You can now update your Google Affiliate Network sign-in information to a Google Account. This will let you access all your Affiliate Network account and Google products with a single sign-in. After you update to a Google Account, you’ll be able to:

Use the same sign-in for Google Affiliate Network and other Google products, including AdWords, AdSense, Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar, Personalized Search, and much more.
Switch among Google Affiliate Network and other Google applications without having to sign in again.

The following image provides an overview of the process to update to a Google Account.

Please note: We cannot update the Google Affiliate Network sign-in pages until all users have updated. Therefore, we recommend that you bookmark the Google Account sign-in page for Google Affiliate Network.

Users who have updated to Google Accounts have the option to bookmark their new sign in page or select the link marked Already Updated? Sign in with my Google Account from the legacy sign in page. In addition, if you are already logged in to your Google Account (via another product) and navigate to either of these pages, you will be brought to your Affiliate Network dashboard (no need to enter login information again).

Users that choose to not update to a Google Account at this time can continue to log in with their existing credentials from the legacy sign in page.

For more information about the benefits of migrating to a Google Account, please visit our Advertiser or Publisher Help Center.

Sheila Parker
Product Manager

Google Affiliate Network User Forums - Ask questions, share ideas and search for answers

2009-01-20T09:02:00.000-08:00

We are pleased to announce the addition of user-to-user forums within the Google Affiliate Network Help Center. And we invite you to join the discussion!

Our Help Center now hosts a unique user forum where you can feel free to ask questions, share ideas, search for answers and talk to other Google Affiliate Network advertisers and publishers.

This is not a moderated forum but we have "Google Guides" who may clarify factual errors and/or provide product help if required.

You do not need a ConnectCommerce login to access the Help Center or the forums. You can access the forums with a simple click. If you want to ask or reply to a question, simply sign in with any Google Account and create display/username for the Affiliate Network forum.

Google Affiliate Network's adoption of the user-to-user platform is an example of the value of the ongoing integration with Google's powerful systems. The forum has an innovative interface, clear categories, and robust search capabilities. Since this is a user forum the content will only be as good as the questions that are asked so we encourage all Google Affiliate Network users to participate.

The forum is part of the Google Affiliate Network Help Center where you will find product documentation and answers to product related questions.

We invite you to participate in the Google Affiliate Network User Forums. Check it out!

Posted by Kristin Hall

Product Feeds Only Available Via FTP Starting January 15, 2009

2009-01-14T09:18:00.000-08:00

Attention Google Affiliate Network Publishers:

Starting January 15, 2009, advertiser product feeds (also known as data feeds) will only be transmitted via FTP.

If you currently receive your product feeds via FTP, this change does not impact you.

If you currently receive your product feeds via email, please go to your Google Affiliate Network account and change your product feeds settings.

You can now sign up to receive product feeds through the Google Affiliate Network interface. To sign up for product feeds, sign into your Google Affiliate Network publisher account, go to the 'Links' section and click on 'Product Feeds'.

For more information, see this from our Help Center.

Dan Filowitz

Affiliate Publisher Support

ConnectCommerce scheduled maintenance

2008-12-11T14:51:00.000-08:00

We will be performing routine maintenance on Friday night December 12, 2008 8:00 P.M. EST through Saturday December 13, 2008 4:00 A.M. EST.

Although you won't be able to log in to ConnectCommerce during the maintenance window, tracking will NOT be affected. However, reporting data may be delayed for a few hours after the interface comes back online.

Jorge Zapata
Online Sales & Operations

Google Ad Planner Data Now Available in Google Affiliate Network

2008-11-17T11:04:00.000-08:00

This weekend we introduced new site profile links in our interface to provide users with better information about the traffic profiles of their marketing partners. Advertiser and publisher users will now see "Site Profile" links in a variety of locations in our interface. Advertisers can view them from their list of approved publishers or from any individual publishers account profile. Publishers may view this information on their not joined, approved pages as well as in the interface to retrieve links (ads).

The links will produce an overlay containing data provided by Google AdPlanner. The profile contains information on unique visitors, page views and visitor demographic profiles; data may not be available for sites with smaller audiences. For more information on Ad Planner, please visit their support site.

Larry Adams
Product Manager

New Google Affiliate Network Features: Data Feed UI, Link Subscriptions and Batch Creative Uploads

2008-10-13T07:54:00.000-07:00

We deployed some new features over the weekend that we hope will help our users manage some important day to day tasks.

Product data feed setup in the UI

Publishers can now sign up for data feeds from through our user interface by navigating to 'Get Links > Product Feeds.' The page will be populated with your approved advertisers that offer a data feed, establishes a file naming convention for all of the feeds the you select to receive from Google advertisers and validates your FTP information. If you have previously set up feeds via our support team your existing settings have not changed, but any settings you adjust in the interface will override previous settings.

Link Subscriptions (formerly known as OrangeLinks)

We've also made a minor name change to our service that delivers feeds of promotional data to publishers. OrangeLinks will now appear in the interface as Link Subscriptions. The functionality has not changed; publishers who sign up for link subscriptions receive a daily file of new ads that their approved advertisers have created in the system. If you are already signed up, you should be aware that the filename format will be changing to "Link Subscriptions_MMDDYYYY.xls". If you haven't signed up, you should navigate to 'Get Links > Link Subscriptions' to get started; many publishers use this feature to quickly review every promotion their advertisers offer.

Batch Creative Upload

Advertisers may now upload creative assets in large batches. Loading creatives one by one is time consuming so we've added a feature to creative management that allows advertisers to upload zip files containing multiple creatives. We expect this will be a huge time saver in the busy Q4 season for many of our users.

Help Center

In case you missed it, we recently announced that we've launched a new help center. There is a lot of great content in there and we'll be adding more in the future. If you haven't checked it out yet, please take a minute to browse the advertiser and publisher docs.

Regards,

Larry Adams
Product Manager

Google Affiliate Network Scheduled Downtime

2008-10-10T12:47:00.001-07:00

We will be performing system maintenance beginning Friday evening, Oct 10 at 9pm CDT. We expect the interface to be back online at 5pm CDT Saturday. Tracking is unaffected during this time but the affiliate network interface will be unavailable during this time.

Have a good weekend,

Larry Adams
Product Manager

Google Affiliate Network Help Center Launched

2008-09-29T18:20:00.000-07:00

We are pleased to announce the launch of our new Help Center for both advertisers and publishers. Content includes basic information on account settings, running reports and performing common tasks. In addition, you will be able to submit questions directly to our support team via the Help Center in the event that you are unable to find the information you need. Please be sure to check the Help Center for all your support questions on current and new features.

Sheila Parker
Product Manager

Google Affiliate Network Scheduled Downtime

2008-09-19T07:33:00.000-07:00

Dear Google Affiliate Network Users:

The interface will be unavailable, beginning Friday, September 19th, so we can perform system maintenance. This outage may last up to 20 hours, from 10:00 p.m. EDT (2:00 a.m. GMT, September 20th) to no later than 6:00 p.m. EDT, Saturday, September 20th (10:00 p.m. GMT). You will be able to log in again when the maintenance work is completed.

Thanks and have a good weekend.

Larry Adams
Product Manager

New Google Affiliate Network Features: Rising Stars, Recruiting Tools and Links UI

2008-08-18T09:39:00.000-07:00

This past weekend we launched several enhancements to our platform for both publishers and advertisers. First, we introduced a new level of publisher recognition to enhance our successful Affiliate VIP program. Our network quality and publisher development teams collaborate to identify and champion up and coming, quality publishers in our network. This designation, Rising Stars, is now visible in the interface and we're happy to announce over fifty rising stars have been identified in the network to coincide with the launch of this feature. Publishers who have attained this designation will be presented to advertisers with an icon next to their name.

Advertisers may now utilize our recruiting features (Publishers > Recruiting) to retrieve lists of Rising Stars and Affiliate VIPs in their program, or those with whom they do not yet have a relationship. As a reminder, if you are a publisher and want to be "found" by advertisers looking for new publishers, be sure to update your communications preferences (existing publishers may click here, or navigate to Settings > Communication Preferences) and opt in to "Non Joined Advertiser Opportunities".

We have also released improvements to the features publishers use to retrieve ads from our interface. We have had a new UI available in beta for a little over six months; during this time we've heard from users that it was much easier and faster to find and publish links than in our old interface. Based on feedback from the beta period, we have added some functionality and improved response times. Publisher users can now:

View ads for multiple advertisers at a time by showing recently published ads from all advertisers or only approved advertisers
Filter the multi-advertiser page by advertiser category
Filter the multi-advertiser page by hiding specific advertisers from view
View a list of all ads for each of their joined advertisers
Filter single and multi-advertiser lists by ad type (banner or text), size, promotion type and expiration
All pages include an export feature that will enable the user to save the list, including any applied filters, to a csv file

Bookmarks to the old versions of "get links" pages will be redirected to the new UI. If you have written scripts to retrieve links from the old pages they will no longer work; instead, you should sign up to receive daily automated feeds of new ads for all your advertisers by navigating to Get Links > OrangeLinks.

Posted by Larry Adams, Product Manager

ConnectCommerce Update

2008-07-07T19:32:00.000-07:00

We are pleased to unveil a refreshed ConnectCommerce user interface. We have made improvements to overall navigation and usability and have updated colors and styles to reflect the new Google Affiliate Network brand. This update should leave the interface simpler to understand and navigate. Please note that we are not currently integrated with Google Accounts and you must continue to use your ConnectCommerce username and password to log in.

Google is dedicated to providing the best possible user experience. This release is another step toward our goal of improving user experience and delivering value for our partners.

ConnectCommerce is the reporting and tracking platform that powers Google Affiliate Network.

Kristin Hall, Industry Marketing Manager, Google Affiliate Network

DoubleClick Performics is now Google Affiliate Network

2008-06-30T12:33:00.000-07:00

We are pleased to introduce Google Affiliate Network . Effective Monday, June 30, 2008, DoubleClick Performics Affiliate will operate as Google Affiliate Network. The integration with Google's brand is a reflection of efforts to quickly assimilate our business and teams, as well as reinforce Google's commitment to the Affiliate channel. Together with our new colleagues at Google we are creating new opportunities for monetization, expansion and innovation in Affiliate Marketing.

Within the next couple of weeks you will see some exciting changes to the user interface reflecting the new brand. The platform will continue to be hosted at www.ConnectCommerce.com, but will eventually migrate to a google.com product url.

As noted in earlier communications, DoubleClick Performics' Search operations are being spun off and sold to a third party. While many advertisers have relationships with both DoubleClick Performics' Affiliate and Search, there have always been separate account teams and product-specific specialists servicing clients' search and affiliate programs. These teams remain intact. While the formal separation will occur when the Search business is sold, the businesses are functionally separate today.

We are proud of what we achieved as Performics and this name change signals a new milestone. Google provides world-class resources and enables us to continue to attract the best talent to support our advertisers and publishers. Now as part of Google we have an exciting and unprecedented opportunity to advance our industry. We remain committed to ensuring you receive the quality service you have come to expect from us.

We appreciate your business and look forward to doing great things together.

Posted by Chris Henger, Group Product Manager