You like shoes, no? Well, you will like this contest I’m having with my friends over at Zappos.com. Five people will win a $100 Zappos.com gift certificate to buy anything they want on their site. And all you have to do is… well, watch the video. It’s easy to enter, believe me.

Oh yeah, and are you a blogger or webmaster? You should sign up for the Zappos affiliate program and earn bucks for referring sales. Great program that converts well. And don’t forget to follow @Zappos on Twitter.

Anyone here planning to go to the Search Engine Strategies Conference & Expo? If you’re interested in learning more about optimising your blogs, sites, and online shops, then you might want to take part in the SES Expo. They run one every few months in different cities.

The latest one will be in San Jose, from 18th to 21st of August 2008.

While I’ve never been to SES, I’ve heard some good things about it.

If you’ve been to SES before and would like to share your experiences about it, do share them here with us at JMMO. If you’re planning to go for the first time, I’d love to hear your thoughts too.

Tags: conferences, ES, expos, search engine optimization

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Just got back from vacation in the sun and surf! Wow, look at my non-tan. Hey, I used 50 spf. I don’t like getting burned. Anyway, while I was on vacation I grabbed the USA Today every day and well, it got me thinking about a theory that’s called consistency of quality.

Watch the video for my full explanation, but you get the point already? Brands like the USA Today continue to produce high-quality content, over, and over, and over, and over…

It makes you trust them, and crave them. It makes you comfortable with them. And most importantly, it keeps you buying them. $$$

I can’t believe I found another old Internet geek like me! Yep, today’s conversation/podcast is with Jeremy Epstein, a hard core internet geek and now word-of-mouth marketing and social media strategist. Wow, I’ve been having a lot of people like this on the show lately haven’t I?

Jeremy and I do some venting about clueless customers and how to approach them and educate them about social media. We also talk a lot about customer evangelism and at the end Jeremy gives his picks for the top social media tools every small business should be working with right now.

Here are the show notes.

Chatting about customer evangelism. How do you convince a business to embrace evangelists?
Direct marketing traditional model of measuring ROI is a problem for most marketers.
How do you convince giant brands that social media is worth spending on?
How do you educate them? The key is starting small.
You cannot control the message anymore, but you can influence it.
Small business owner walks into your office and says social medis is b.s. How do you answer that?
What are the top social media tools I can get started with right now?
How are you measuring social media for your clients?

Fast cars, fast internet and fast food… like everything else, we want it fast, and if your affiliate network isn’t delivering fast monthly (or weekly) payouts… they are way behind. While many affiliate networks are just starting to offer payment methods outside of the traditional checks by mail, many others have been sending faster payments through paypal, Direct Deposit and wire transfer for a while now. Like many affiliate networks, big programs like Google Adsense and Yahoo Publisher Network, both offer payments by Direct Deposit. There are several advantages to receiving your earnings by direct deposit or paypal vs. waiting on your monthly check. Here are a few reasons why…

Payment by Direct Deposit / Wire Transfers
- It sounds simple enough… and it is! Provide your affiliate network with your bank account information and instead of receiving a check each month, the company will directly deposit your payment every week or month depending on the programs.
PROS: No waiting for checks and having to deposit them at the bank.
CONS: Some banks charge a fee for direct deposits and wire transfers. However, if you have a contact or a big enough account at the bank, you can usually have these fees waived.

Payment by PayPal
- Even though paypal has been around for years and used by millions, it still isn’t accepted or used by all affiliate networks. Payment through paypal is instant, but as the receiver of money, you will have to lose a percentage to use their service.
PROS: Instant money. From paypal you can send the payment directly to your bank account, or send it to another advertiser or location of choice.
CONS: If you are going to accept large earnings through paypal, you are almost better off waiting for a check looking for an alternative method for payment. Premiere Business paypal accounts are charged around 1.9% to 2.9% + $0.30 USD per transaction.

Direct Deposit and wire transfers may seem like the bets options for affiliates, but it doesn’t come with out a cost. Most affiliate networks will only pay out on a weekly/monthly basis through direct deposit, if you are pushing some nice volume through their network. Here are a few of the networks minimums for wire transfers.

Market Leverage	Wire Transfers $1,000 Weekly
Copeac	Wire Transfers $1,000 Weekly
NeverBlue Ads	Wire Transfers $1,000 Weekly
RocketProfit	Wire Transfers $10,000 Weekly Wire Transfers $5,000 Monthly
Hydra Network	Wire Transfers $20,000 2x Monthly
Rextopia	Upon Request / Approval

What type of experience have you had with affiliate networks and making the change over from CHECKS to Direct Deposits and Wire Transfers?

[This post is covering part one of the “Five Reasons Your Affiliate Program Sucks” series, and is focusing on “Direct Deposit / Wire Transfer & Paypal“.]

Don’t forget to visit www.ZacJohnson.com and comment on new posts! Top Commenters are rewarded with fun prizes every month!

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Seriously. Stop sending boring press releases that don’t work. It’s a huge waste of money. Grab a copy of Peter Shankman’s book for a few bucks and learn why, and how you’re going to save thousands.

Book title: Can We Do That?! Outrageous PR Stunts That Work–And Why Your Company Needs Them

Peter is the guy who brought us HelpaReporterOut.com (HARO), which is a great resource if you haven’t signed up yet, go now and do it. Back to the book…

This is a must-read book for you as a small business or brand that’s wants publicity, and you should. Spend the money and read this book and thank me later. And yes, those are my affiliate links in the video widget below. If you buy from clicking on them I get like 10 cents or something, lol.

Check out Pete’s blog too. Good stuff.

If you run an online business - a blog, a forum, an online shop, a coaching service, a virtual assistant service or freelance work - you’re welcome to promote it in this post. Looking forward to reading all about what you do!

Image Source: Microsoft Stock Photo; Edits: Shai Coggins

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You know I love fun, don’t you? You should also know I love having fun marketing. In fact, that’s what I’m all about. So it was pretty cool to have a couple named Kim and Jason on the Daily Flip to talk about their “fun” marketing efforts.

The conversation (play podcast below) I had with Kim and Jason is about how they market “fun” as a product. But more specifically though, I asked them a lot about how they market their own business. Here are the show notes. This is a great interview that I think you will enjoy.

Newsletters work.
How to do marketing without a ton of money?
Cross-promotions work.
How to contact people to interview?
Is starting a podcast easy?
Kids are never afraid to fail. So start small and just do it without worrying about failing.
People have different ways of learning. Some listen to podcasts, some read blogs.
Club K&J is a subscription program. $4.95/month. Exclusive content. Going for volume. Using amember subscriptions and paypal for payment processing.
What’s the funnest thing you’ve done lately?
Can you eliminate not having fun completely from work?
Is it easy to sell fun? People are dying for permission to have fun. They’re afraid to have fun.

If writing is one way you wish to make money online, then eHow might be one place you’d like to look in to.

How to become an eHow Writer:

1) Register at eHow.

2) Sign up for their Writer Compensation Program.

3) Start uploading articles.

How eHow Writers Get Paid:

According to the site: Writers make money on the articles they submit. Payments are generally based on traffic the article receives and the quality and uniqueness of the content.

eHow Writers get paid via Paypal on a monthly basis. Please note, however, that while registrations/sign-ups are allowed internationally, payments are available to US residents only*.

Some Advantages for eHow Writers:

• Available article template which enable easy formatting and uploading of articles. Site instruction: Just choose the title and write the body of the article by filling in detailed step-by-step instructions. Add any tips or images readers will need to complete your How-To. Then pick a category, and you’re ready to submit.
• Writers can publish articles on the topic of their choice.
• Contests and promotions are available, which enable writers to make more money.
• Tapping in to the eHow Community of Readers and Writers
• Promoting your own site/blog.

Since I’m not a US resident, I haven’t tried this service yet. If you’ve already given eHow a go, I’d love to hear from you. Do you like the program? Why or why not?

*Yes, this is definitely disappointing for non-US residents. Hopefully, they will soon change this policy.

Tags: content, eHow, writer resources, writers, writing

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Remember the .ME landrush? Well, that’s all done now and tomorrow, the auctions will begin. Yes, it looks like there were several people who became interested in similar domains, so now GoDaddy’s going to auction the popular domains off.

I reserved 5 during the landrush. And, all are going on auction. I’ve decided not to bid on them.

Why?

Well, 3 reasons:

1) At $49.99/year, those domains are already too expensive for me to maintain.

2) GoDaddy made it a bit difficult to participate in the auction, having to come up with different logins and all that; and

3) The whole domain auction thing just doesn’t suit me.

So, chances are, I’ll lose those domains. That’s fine with me. I’m just looking forward to getting my initial deposit back and investing the money elsewhere.

I’m curious to see, however, if any of these domains will eventually take off and make money for those who end up investing in and owning them.

What do you think? Did you buy some .ME domains? Are they going on auction? Are you planning on participating in the auction?

Tags: domain names, domains, godaddy, investments

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