Affiliate marketing is when a publisher, also known as content provider (i.e. bettyhakes.com; gourmetbetty.com) is paid when a lead or sale happens at the advertisers, also known as merchant, site (i.e. shareasale.com; vemma.com) from an end users (i.e. you the reader) that is redirected from the affiliates’ site.

Would you like to have hundreds or thousands of visitors bring traffic to your website and only pay on actual sales?
That’s every merchants dream, right? Well, you can have that if you set up an affiliate program.

There are several routes to choose from:

• ShareASale.com (affiliate network)
• Commission Junction (affiliate network)
• Buy.at (affiliate network)
• Infusionsoft (software product)

My suggestion would be to start on an affiliate network such as ShareASale.com. Right now, ShareASale.com is the best bang for your buck with only $550 set up fee versus Commission Junction which usually starts at around $3,000. Obviously there are other factors involved, Commission Junction does have a larger affiliate base and you do want to know where your competitors have a program. Both these networks have hundreds, if not thousands of affiliates signed up and much easier to recruit them directly. They have built in reporting features that are easy for you to keep track of your results. Both also have Pay Per Call programs (through Ringrevenue) that allows you to pay affiliates for calls into your call center.

So in summary, if you have a product or service that you sell and you’d like online marketing experts advertising for you, and only paying on a lead or sale, set up an affiliate program. Click on one of the links above to set it up and please tell them I sent you.

Full Disclosure: BettyHakes.com and GourmetBetty.com is an affiliate site (publisher), and is compensated if you purchase product some of the products or services listed above. These sales help support this site (not to mention my upcoming kids’ college tuition! :-0 )

I also work for a full-service marketing firm that manages merchants affiliate programs. If you are interested in learning more on how REV Media Marketing LLC can help you manage affiliate programs, please contact me directly.

Feel free to post any other questions you may have here!

This is the third wave of the study (1999, 2004 & 2009) which indicates a growth of media usage within the youth by about an hour since the study in 2004.

Also interesting to note that most kids are multi-tasking within the mediums, which equals 10:45 hours worth of media usage, compared to 2004’s study which was 8:33 hours worth of media content.

Well, this is really no surprise to most parents today, we know are children are consuming more media today than they did in 2004. I believe we are more aware of the usage during winter months when sports season is over and it’s a little chilly outside.

As a mom of a teenager and tween, I see it and live it. After all, I work in the digital media space, I run my life, and our family events, using technology and digital media.

I found it interesting the report states: “Youth who spend more time with media report lower grades and lower levels of personal contentment.” The participants in the study were grouped into three categories based on number of hours they consumed media content in a typical day:

• Heavy users: +16 hours (21%)
• Moderate users: 3-16 hours (62%) << betty’s notes: seems like a really broad range
• Light users: – 3 hours (17%)

Study states that nearly half (47%) of all heavy users say they usually get fair to poor grades (C’s & lower), compared to 23% of light media users.

The study goes on to say it “cannot establish whether there is a cause and effect relationship between media use and grades, or between media use and personal contentment.”

So what does this report mean to parents & how do we use it?

Should we be concerned that our youth is spending their time in front of electronic devices? I don’t believe the answer lies in shutting down all digital media away from our kids.

I do believe we can use this study to remind us of some fundamental parenting skills:

• Know what your kids are being exposed to
• Greet your kids with a hug and kiss each time they go off to school and when they come back home (that’s a tip from the Cuban mom in me)
• Know who they are “hanging out with” online and offline
• Have open communication and understanding that is it your right as a parent to look through text messages, emails & computer history files. Hopefully, this isn’t necessary if you have an open communication with your kids, but they should know you have that right.
• Attend teacher parent conferences even if your kids are doing well in school, it’s amazing   what learn about your child with only 10 – 15 min’s with their teacher. (and I was told by a teacher, they actually appreciate the face time with the parents.)
• Find ways to openly communicate with your children. Suggestions are:
• Turn off music during drive time and talk to your kids
• Schedule regular family dinners and turn off ALL media (i.e. don’t answer phone, cell phones put away, TV off, etc.)
• Schedule family game time, board games and outside activities (additional note: they might fight you on this, but will usually end up having fun. Plus we also include their friends in games, great way to get to know everyone.)
• Do chores together

I’m sure you all can add a few more to the list … please do & comment them below.

What does this study mean for marketers?

It’s a goldmine my marketing peeps! Study shows us stats like video game playing is more popular among 11 to 14 year old’s and music becomes increasingly popular as teens get older. There’s all sorts of demographics and statistical goodies for marketers marketing to our youth.   You can read the entire study at: http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/8010.pdf

One last tip from this mom of 2: Don’t be afraid of technology, embrace it, learn it and engage. If you don’t engage into what your kids are doing, they’re less likely to engage into what you’re doing.
xoxo

But how do you we know what’s making a difference? We must monitor and measure the data.

Web Analytics Wednesday’s Cincinnati chapter is holding its next meeting today, January 6th at BlackFin in downtown Cincinnati.

Join me in attending as we listen to Greg Smith, assistant professor of the MIS department of the Williams College of Business at Xavier University. He will be presenting his thoughts on the role and impact of web analytics on business intelligence practices and thinking.

Additional details can be found at: Web Analytics Wednesday meeting website.

This is the question I’m asking myself as I’m joining, what it seems to be, every online social networking site on the ‘net.

I’m going to start monitoring how much time I spend on these sites and then analyze the increase (if any) hits to my site(s) and any additional business that is closed through these sites.

Anyone have any comments – suggestions out there?

Bring it on.. and oh by the way.. follow me on twitter http://twitter.com/bettyhakes