Shannon has been the driving force in building relationships with publishers and our clients that have built her client’s programs into powerhouses.  She works on our philosophy, drop.io and Elance accounts.  She has quickly demonstrated a natural ability to manage high performing programs for large brands and small, while at the same time, protecting clients from brand poachers and the like.  Shannon continues to prove herself an asset to each client she works with.

I sat down with Shannon for an interview before Affiliate Summit to get to know more about her.  Check out the video below:

You can also follow her on twitter @jebssimmons

Here is some info I grabbed from the FeedFront website:

“This issue of FeedFront Magazine includes The Importance of Branding in Affiliate Marketing by Rae Hoffman, How to Recycle Your Affiliate Blog Content by Justin Premick, and FTC Endorsement Guidelines by Gary Kibel.

Also, people to follow on Twitter, affiliate marketing statistics, and the program for Affiliate Summit West 2010.

Issue 9 of FeedFront can now be viewed online, downloaded, and printed from Scribd.

Get the FeedFront RSS if you’d like to get all of the articles as they are published to the feed.

If you haven’t subscribed, you can get the magazine for free at http://feedfront.com/free-subscription/.”

Not only that, but this issue includes an article by our very own Shannon Simmons, affiliate manager here at JEBCommerce! Shannon wrote about Affiliate Program’s New Years Resolutions on page 63. Check out the article. Shannon will also be at the Affiliate Summit in Vegas on January 17th, 2010. If you’d like to meet with her, please email her at Shannon AT JEBCommerce.com.

“

If you are working with any of the affiliate programs we manage (included below) or want to, please let us know and we’ll set up a time to meet with you.

You can email us at:

Shannon AT JEBCommerce.com
Jeff AT JEBCommerce.com
Stephen AT JEBCommerce.com
or Jamie AT JEBCommerce.com

We’d love to meet you and see what we can do together in 2010!  Check out all our managed programs below.

“On Elance, companies gain instant access to 100,000 rated and tested professionals who offer technical, marketing and business expertise. With well over $200m in earnings to date, independent professionals use Elance to meet clients and get paid for delivering great results.” JEBCommerce is thoroughly excited to be working with this amazing and dynamic company. We are working on many exciting things so watch our blog for upcoming news. For now, learn more about the program and sign up by clicking this link.

“philosophy’s promise is to bring its customers products that inspire them to live a better life by being better to themselves. our products care for your skin and your overall well-being. we take a mind, body, spirit approach to personal care and believe only when you feel good can you truly look your best.” This skin-care and make-up affiliate program is on the Google Affiliate Network and is currently producing amazing results for affiliates. Learn more here and join here.

“No matter what your flooring need, we have the solution. We offer the widest selection of quality flooring in the USA. We have the largest collection of hardwood, bamboo, cork, laminate and area rugs. We shop the world to source the best products available in the market today. Our extensive selection of colours, styles and patterns can satisfy every design need, budget and lifestyle.” iFloor is the premier online flooring retailer and one of our highest producing clients. Their affiliate program currently resides on the Google Affiliate Network and you can sign up by clicking this link. Payouts range from 2-10% depending on the product.

“Founded in January 1999, LuggagePoint.com has grown to be one of the most successful online e-tailers of luggage, handbags, backpacks, business cases, laptop cases, travel accessories, and other travel products. At LuggagePoint.com we provide our customers with fast customer service, reasonable prices, and high quality products. We carry a full line of products from many name brand and designer manufacturers.” LuggagePoint.com celebrated their one year anniversary of their affiliate program in September of last year with one amazing Q4! The program is available here on the Commission Junction network.

“Doba provides a place where suppliers can list their product inventory, and you can find items to sell. These different suppliers will drop ship products right to your customers, so you never have to handle or ship products. If you’re a retailer looking for products to sell we have a service package that will work for you” We have a long history with Doba starting years ago when we launched their program on the Kowabunga network all the way to today where we have several programs to choose from: Commission Junction and In-House.

“OverstockDrugstore.com, an eCommerce leader that specializes in brand name diabetic, over-the-counter and health and beauty care products direct-to-the-consumer. We help our customers shop smarter by offering them a wide assortment of top-quality brand-name merchandise in one convenient online store. OverstockDrugstore.com is a trusted retailer of Diabetic, Over-the-Counter and Health and Beauty products with over 14 years industry experience.” You can learn more about the OverstockDrugstore.com program here and sign up on the Google Affiliate Network.

“Simple real-time sharing, collaboration, and presentation.Use drop.io to privately share your files and collaborate in real time by web, email, phone, mobile, and more. Create each drop in two clicks and share what you want, how you want, with whom you want” drop.io is the premier file sharing and collaboration tool on the net. We use this service in a hundred different ways and are excited to offer this opportunity to all affiliates. You can learn more by going to the drop.io affiliate center, grab creative (including video) in our asset drop, and join our Commission Junction powered program here.

QualitySmith connects homeowners with prescreened contractors nationwide for projects like HVAC, Roofing, Siding, Windows, Kitchen Remodels, Basement Remodels, and Painting & Flooring. QualitySmith is looking to partner with affiliate sites through Share-A-Sale to drive qualified homeowner leads. We have several options for promoting QualitySmith: ShareASale; Commission Junction; PepperJam. You can also learn more at our affiliate education center.

Glass.net provides an innovative way to bring customers and auto glass installers together. Glass.net is the only online auto glass website that allows customers the ability to get 3 auto glass quotes with 1 request. We are one of the largest and most respected auto glass replacement sites on the Web. You can sign up for the affiliate program here.

“The Get Away with GMA Contest rewards individuals who have done something extraordinary for their community, making friends and neighbors thankful for the effort.”

From Todd’s  press release:

Alex’s Coupons (http://www.alexscoupons.com) was launched by the Martini Family in October 1999 to raise money for their daughter Alexandra’s medical treatment. Alexandra was diagnosed with Leukemia in November 1998 at the age of 10 months and underwent life saving Cord Blood Transplants in 1999 and 2003. Now that Alexandra has completed treatment, the Martini Family has continued to remain active supporters of charities that benefit seriously ill children and their families. You can help Alex’s Coupons continue to support seriously ill children and their families by using the coupons on their website to make purchases at over 1200 online stores.

Great job Todd and enjoy your cruise!

We discussed each area covered in an affiliate audit, frequently asked questions regarding our audits, success stories and testimonials. We’ll also answered a few specific questions listeners had.

You can also learn more by going to www.affiliate-audit.com.

If you’d like to join our next call live, simply email us here.

Affiliate Audit Testimonials:

We were very impressed with the thoroughness of JEB Commerce’s audit. They left no stone unturned, and handed us a number of new opportunities.” - Jason Bernloehr, E-Commerce Mgr, Rockler Woodworking
“We have a very mature affiliate program and have been fortunate to see growth year over year for many years, but we felt like there was more we could do and that it was feeling a bit stale. We hired Jamie as a new set of eyes and we got so much more! In addition to his professionalism, responsiveness and expertise we walked away with a list of 15 action items that we could implement right away. I would highly recommend his services to any company considering, implementing or managing an affiliate program.” - Gina, Gardeners.com

Equip Your Affiliate Program for Explosive Growth in Q4 and 2010!

Is your affiliate program optimized to ensure your best possible opportunity for success? Is your affiliate program as effective and efficient as possible. Most programs have room for improvement, and in most cases, a complete analysis, appraisal, and audit of your affiliate program can identify opportunities to significantly increase your performance right away.

Join Our 15 Minute Preview Call
On Tuesday, November 3rd, Jamie Birch and Stephen Robinson will be hosting a 15 minute preview call to show you how our Affiliate Audit service can help you increase the performance of your program right away. The call is free and starts at 1pm PST.

We’ll be discussing each area covered in an affiliate audit, frequently asked questions regarding our audits, success stories and testimonials. We’ll also be on the line after our call to answer any specific questions you might have. You can also learn more by going to www.affiliate-audit.com.

To join our call, simply email us here, or dial 712-432-0080, conference room 286753 and hit the # key. If you’d like us to send you a meeting request, or you would like to listen to this call at a later time, simply email us here.

Here is some info I grabbed from the FeedFront website:

“Issue eight of FeedFront will also be distributed at ad:tech New York, Blog World Expo, and PubCon.

This issue of FeedFront Magazine includes a recap of Affiliate Summit East 2009, as well as articles on auditing affiliate programs, productivity, pro digital video camera formats, PPC, email, advertising tax, and the death of an affiliate network.

Plus, interviews with Loren Feldman of 1938 Media and Joel Bauer from the “Your Business Card is CRAP” video.

Issue 8 of FeedFront can now be viewed online, downloaded, and printed from Scribd.”

Stephen wrote an article that you can find on page 4  titled “Importance of Auditing Your Affiliate Program”.  Every affiliate manager should be auditing his program at least every quarter.  Stephen outlines some of the ways that he, and we, audit our programs to achieve maximum performance.  We hope you enjoy the article. If you have questions relating to auditing your program, you can visit www.affiliate-audit.com, or contact us for more information at jamie@jebcommerce.com.

Stephen at our booths at CJU Expo

Last week I went to CJU in Santa Barbara with our owner and CEO Jamie Birch. This was my first trip to CJU and the event certainly lived up to all of the hype.  This was an exciting conference since it was my first since accepting a full time position with JEBCommerce.

If you were there, you may have noticed that we take a different approach to these conferences by inviting our clients to join us.  We do this for a couple of reasons; it allows us to spend more time with them and they are also able to meet the publishers that promote their products and services.  This increased level of transparency has paid off for us in strengthening our partnerships.

Jamie and I went to CJU with several goals:

• Meet new publishers and potential partners
• Meet with our current partners to continue to grow these relationships
• Spend more time with merchants that joined us at the event and introduce them to our affiliate partners
• Look for new potential merchants

In addition to a full slate of meetings, we also hosted four of our merchants, Ned from 6pm, Brandon from Doba, Sumit from Luggagepoint.com and Steve from drop.io. We found that our affiliates really enjoy meeting our merchants and we really enjoy hanging out with them.

Brandon from Doba talking with mycoupons

Tuesday afternoon Sumit hosted his table for Luggagepoint.com and Brandon hosted Doba’s table at the CJU Expo. This was a great networking event and we even gave away some luggage courtesy of Luggagepoint. We were excited to see some of our current publishers as well as meet some new ones that have a lot of potential to do well for us.

After the CJU Expo, we hopped on buses and headed over to the Dell Welcome reception where we enjoyed some delicious appetizers and drinks while continuing to network. Pictured below on the right is Steve from drop.io giving a brief demonstration on the stop to TrialPay. Who needs wifi when you have an iPhone and a Mac?

Steve from drop.io walking Trial Pay through a drop.io presentation

Wednesday started interestingly enough when  Jamie woke up and realized he had no voice.  No matter how many times I told him to stop talking, he just kept on talking.  He was a real trooper.  Too bad Jamie doesn’t have an iPhone or he could’ve just used the “bump” app to network.  (A special thanks to Sumit from Luggagepoint for showing off this really cool app).  In fact, I suggested a 5 minute Bump networking session for CJU 2010.

We had a busy day full of sessions and meetings. Sumit, Brandon and I split up and covered some ground at CJU Connect, this was a unique networking opportunity where the publishers had tables and we came to them. I think Brandon and Sumit would agree that we had some very fruitful meetings during this event. The CJYou Awards Dinner was a classy event, great food and excellent conversations.  After dinner it was time to relax at the Cocktail Party at Tonic in downtown Santa Barbara.

With a full agenda of goals for this event, we wanted to be as efficient as possible. Therefore we created a special drop using one of our merchants, drop.io, to help us stay organized for this event. This drop allowed us to access our list of potential targets at anytime during the event. We also utilized the voice mail feature to leave voice notes after every meeting we had to make sure we didn’t forgot any action/follow up items. This proved to be a vital asset to the success of this event for us.

Sumit from Luggagepoint and I meeting with Marie from CJ

Thursday we wrapped up the event with a few meetings and lunch with our great team at Commission Junction. Thanks to Marie and Laura for treating us to lunch. This event wouldn’t have been as successful if it weren’t for the hard work of Marie and Laura who spent their days tracking down affiliates on our target list and introducing them to us. We are fortunate to have such a great account team at Commission Junction.

I came away very impressed from the event and anxious to follow up with many new publishers and old friends I met at the event.  This year’s event was a great success for us and we are definitely looking forward to CJU 2o10.

Isn’t that the truth? When the economy starts to drop off, then drops off a ledge, we are all tasked with doing more with less. Companies begin to layoff employees and marketing dollars begin to shift from higher priced campaigns.

“The study found that fully 75% of respondents reported a decrease in their marketing budget in 2009, while 67% agreed that marketers are now being expected to drive more sales with the same or lower budget.”

“With the economy still struggling to find its way out of the doldrums, marketing accountability has moved from the category of ‘nice to have’ to ‘must have,’” said Douglas Brooks, SVP and marketing officer for MMA. “Management and finance are getting on board in increasing numbers, and becoming enthusiastic champions of marketing accountability as they see the results in black and white.”"

Lower budgets and more accountability… This is a great time to be in affiliate marketing. Your costs and you only pay when sales/leads/needed actions take place. Your risk is low, costs are low and accountability - well you know your exact ROI daily. A well run affiliate program can help you use our budget more effectively, gain more accountability and increase sales during this slow period.

If you need help or have any questions about how this can be done, just give us a call.