As an affiliate manager I often get asked if we have mobile optimized offers.  Many payday lead buyers are buying mobile traffic, and many payday publishers are advertising via mobile.  Unfortunately mobile advertising has some catching up to do when it comes to fraud detection.  As it stands our in house offers are optimized for mobile.

I have received many emails over the past few days from networks concerned over mobile traffic.  Some networks are requesting that mobile campaigns be removed or paused.  Today the Online Lender’s Alliance highlighted an announcement from the Hill.  In the article it states that the FTC has released a guide to protecting consumers against fraud during mobile transactions.

The report prompts mobile companies to incorporate “privacy by design practices” that outline “strong privacy practices, consumer choice, and transparency into their products from the outset.” Doing so, the report says, “increases the likelihood of consumer trust in the mobile payment process.”

 

What practices are you implementing to help customers avoid fraud on their mobile devices?  Let us know.

If you would like to become a payday lead buyer contact us today!

We Affiliate Managers sometimes forget how complicated setting up new advertiser campaigns can be.  When you sign up, we want your traffic now, but you still need to set up campaigns, target audiences, create keyword lists, upload creatives, etc.  As a media buyer and email marketer I know how much time Adwords and email platforms take up.

As an affiliate network, there are certain things that we can provide to make the process easier for you, the publisher.  At Round Sky we have recently launched our new platform, making it easier for affiliates to navigate their way through reporting and link set up.  In addition to these platform changes, affiliate managers have been instructed on the needs of individual publishers, and how to best serve you.

When creating our new platform we considered these basic affiliate needs:

Ad copy: content that is approved by our network for your advertising campaigns.

Advertising Guidelines: established rules that define how a publisher can advertise our brand.

Offer Stats: conversion rates and epcs for offers.

Updates: information on what offers are performing best, and which offers are closed to traffic.

Unique URLs: ability to ask your affiliate manager for your unique URL.

Our affiliate managers can provide you with campaign optimization.  Who knows our payday offers better than us?  We can provide you with information like which days of the week convert best, which times, and geo-targeting data.  Reach out to your affiliate manager today to optimize your campaigns, or sign up to become a Round Sky Publisher here.

We’re excited about our new platform, and fulfilling publisher needs.  Contact us today to learn more.

I read an article today that hit home for me. At Round Sky we pitch new ideas every other day it seems like. There is always something we haven’t tried yet, want to re-try in a different way, or experiment with. The only way for a company to truly grow is to test new things.

That being said, most of these pitching “meetings” aren’t as formal as they probably should be. If you aren’t careful about the way you present an idea, it can easily be dismissed. I’m sure there are hundreds of great ideas that are disregarded everyday due to a lack of preparation.

Here is a list of the worst things you could see during a presentation as was posted by Imedia Connection:

“The way we’ve been doing this is ridiculous.”

“I haven’t thought that through yet.”

“No one has ever done this before.”

“I wouldn’t be the person responsible for this.”

“We’ll figure out how to gauge the success of this later.”

“We need to do this because so-and-so did it.”

“No.”

To read why to avoid these sentences visit Imedia Connection.

The Value of Transparency

When you require transparency from your affiliates you strengthen the relationships you have with other networks, advertisers and publishers.  The result is higher conversion rates, commissions, and quality leads.  Will traffic decrease? This should only take place if your affiliate is partaking in black hat tactics.  It is my experience that affiliates acting on the up and up are willing to share where their traffic is coming from, and how they generate it.  When you provide transparency to your business partners, you can earn new business, grow current business relationships, and prevent fraud issues.

The Resistance

When you manage a network many times it is necessary to work with other networks.  You may have in-house offers, but you may also acquire offers from outside networks.  Disclosing all matters and practices leaves many networks feeling uneasy since this can include commission structures and margins.  Others resist in fear of being snaked by the competition.  Providing domain or publisher information gives the competition direct access to your source of traffic.

Round Sky Network

At Round Sky we disclose what is necessary to conduct legal and ethical business while protecting the identities of our publishers and partners.  We take lead quality seriously, so fraudulent leads are always addressed promptly.

To learn more about the Round Sky Network Contact Us Today! To sign up as a publisher fill out the form here!

Working with publishers you become instinctive about what works and what doesn’t.  You can determine what offers will work best for their type of traffic, what ads/creative will work best for their campaigns, etc.  One thing I have learned to do is to identify if an affiliate should be running an offer or hosting a form on their landing page.

Selling payday leads is easy with Round Sky once you determine how you want to go about it.  I can’t tell you how many times a call has started out as a conversation about CPA offers, and led to a conversation about posting leads into our ping tree.  Some affiliates don’t initially know the difference, and others just aren’t aware of what their options are with our network.  Round Sky buys payday leads from affiliates, and you can generate those leads in a variety of ways.  One way is through our affiliate network.  A publisher signs up at roundsky.com, and they gain access to our CPA offers.  Another way of generating leads is by posting leads into our ping tree.  What’s the difference? How do you know what’s right for you?

If you want to place banner ads on your website, or include creatives in your email marketing campaigns, you should be looking for CPA offers.  At Round Sky we have a variety of payday loan landing pages you can link to.  The customer follows your unique URL to one of our payday websites, and fills out the application.  If you choose to run a “short-form” then you will be paid when a customer fills out the information on the first page.  If you run a “full form” then a conversion happens every time a customer fills out and submits the complete application.  The payout for short forms ranges from $6 to $14, while the payout from a full form runs between $35 and $100.  Affiliates are paid monthly for the commission they make off of leads submitted. Sign up to run our offers today!

When a publisher owns a payday loan website they can drive traffic to a form they create themselves.  As long as the form contains the required fields, the leads can be purchased by Round Sky lenders.  The advantages to hosting your own form on your website rather than send traffic to one of our landing pages, is that the customer never leaves your website.  The leads are sent to our ping-tree automatically, and payday loan lenders bid on the leads based on pieces of information we provide them with.  The lender is not able to see the entire lead before they purchase it.  When a lender purchases a lead from your website, a pixel fires, and the amount shows up on the network in your account. Sign up to sell your leads today!

If you are a publisher interested in working with Round Sky, contact us today!

CPA offers: Michelle McKinley

Michelle@roundsky.com

Ping Tree/Hosting a form: Harvey Sherifield

Harvey@roundsky.com

Battle of the display networks.

WordStream recently did a study on which was more effective, Facebook or Google.  With my own disappointing experience with Facebook marketing, I wondered what the data showed.  The study graded the two networks based on: advertising reach, revenues/growth, advertising performance, ad targeting options, and ad formats.  According to WordStream, Google Display tied or beat Facebook on every account.

In terms of advertising reach, Google Display and Facebook both earned an A+ for advertising reach.  This could be attributed to Facebook’s one trillion page views per month, and Google’s 180 billion ad impressions served.  Google reaches 90% of internet users, while Facebook reaches 50%.  Facebook is the world’s largest social network with more than 845 million active users.  Google Display is the world’s largest online display advertising network consisting of YouTube, Blogger, and gmail.

In the revenues and growth category Google Display earned an A, while Facebook earned an A-.  Although Facebook earned $1.06 billion in revenues in the first quarter of 2012, they were down from the 4^th quarter of 2011 by 6.5%.  Facebook profits also fell by 32% between the 4^th and 1^st quarter.  On the other hand, Google Display earned $2.9 billion in the first quarter of 2012, up 1% from Q4 2011.  Google Display network profits also went up 0.7%.

Advertising performance is a major determining factor.  In this category Facebook earned a B+, while Google Display earned an A.  The shady news: Facebook isn’t publishing it’s average CTR.  Statistics show that the average click through rate for banner ads in the U.S. is .1%.  The average CTR for Facebook is 0.051%.  According to the Webtrends report, this is down 0.012% from 2009 showing a downward trend.  Google Display has an average CTR of 0.4%, higher than the U.S. average.  In some cases the CTR for Google Display is up to 36 times higher than Facebook’s.  Advertising rates rose 40% on Facebook in Q1 of 2012, while click through rates fell 8%.  On a side note, Google advertisers collect 20% of their conversion from the Google Display Network.

When it comes to ad targeting options Facebook received a C, while Google Display earned a B.  What is the reason for Facebook’s low grade?  Facebook lacks: mobile advertising options, retargeting options, partner sites, keyword-based contextual targeting.  If you’re anything like me, you check your Facebook page from your phone when you get a notification; however, there are no ads on the mobile version of Facebook.  Google Display lacks the ability to target consumers based on user’s memberships and interests from an established profile.

Google Display really trumps Facebook in terms of ad formats.  While Facebook provides only one way for ads to be viewed, Google Display provides four.  On Google Display you can choose to run text ads, image ads, ads in YouTube videos, or even ads in mobile or on games.  Variety earns Google Display an A in this category, while Facebook earned a D.

This detailed report while interesting didn’t really convince me of anything my own experience hadn’t already shown me.  As a media buyer I have used both networks, and seen the superior results that come from Google.  While I am all together not a huge fan of display, Google does seem to have the edge over Facebook.

If you haven’t tried Facebook marketing yet, did this blog sway you? Let us know.

If you have ever attempted lead generation using social media you know how difficult it can be.  Social media traffic can be unpredictable, and lackluster.  The page views are there, the clicks are there, but what about the conversions?  Despite personal experiences, and industry intel, there are businesses that have made social media traffic work.

What are these businesses doing that you aren’t?  Those who have been successful with social media lead generation are able to identify and solve consumer problems.  They use the popular marketing principle of “What’s in it for me?”  In this case all that matters is that the advertiser is able to provide a solution to an existing problem.  The text communicated in the advertisement is clear, concise, and genuine.  It’s important to establish trust with the customer.  Solve their problem once, and they’ll come back.

Above all else, it’s important to deliver on what you have promised.

When you work directly with payday lead buyers you understand the significance of quality over quantity.  It is the publisher’s job to send traffic, but it is the payday lead generation company’s job to sift through leads, providing only the best quality leads to buyers.

Lead quality can make or break your company’s reputation.  Generate too many poor leads, and you will scare away payday loan lead buyers, which is why confirming traffic types is so important.  As a payday lead generation company we do not accept any co-registered or incentivized leads.  The reason for this is of course to preserve the quality of our lead pool.  When looking to buy payday loan leads, a buyer needs customers with the right credit, but they also need customers already in need of their product.  By only accepting search, display, PPC, or email traffic, we are ensuring that our applications come from customers actually seeking payday loans.

Our publisher approval process is extensive.  Anyone can apply as a publisher at Roundsky.com, but affiliate managers must approve each application via a phone conversation.  There are a list of qualifying questions each publisher must answer before their account can be approved.  Publishers cannot gain access to our offers without manager approval.  These questions are to ensure that the publisher has experience in the field, and is sending accepted forms of traffic.

Unfortunately, you can grill your publishers, make them jump through hoops to join your network, but at the end of the day there is always going to be a certain percentage of fraud.  It may come in the form of co-registered or incentivized traffic, or it may come as straight fraud from systemized bots.  That is why we utilize fraud detection technology to filter our leads before they ever make it to lead buyers.  Fraud is detected, and then tracked by our affiliate mangers who can block any publisher at any time for sending fraud.

At the end of the day reputation is everything, and that is why we work so hard to preserve the quality of our leads at Round Sky.