Affiliate Marketing Conferences – Your Doorway to Success With Affiliate Programs

By Lori Wilkerson

Once you’ve decided that affiliate marketing is in your future, a few affiliate marketing conferences should be on your “must do” list. There are books, websites and lots of helpful, informative newsletters available, but there’s nothing that compares with face-to-face time with marketing industry leaders.

With the huge interest in Internet pay-for-performance programs, there are several affiliate marketing conferences currently being offered that can give you exceptional information from some of today’s top affiliate marketing gurus.

Attending a conference gives you a real feel for the dynamic nature of the industry and networking with others who are in affiliate marketing can give you valuable support and insights. There are also basic questions that can be answered by attending these in-depth conferences so that you come away with a real understanding of what you want to do with your own marketing plan.

If you’ve already established yourself in the affiliate business, attending a conference can garner you additional merchants and help you develop ways to improve your site traffic. There are also constantly changing commerce and legal issues that you need to keep up with in the industry, and the conferences are the best way to do this.

When you attend one of these conferences, keep a few questions in mind:

• Should I set up my affiliate status through a third party provider?

• What types of merchants are currently seeking affiliate providers?

• What are the various pay-for-performance options and how do they work? (check out our article on this for some basics)

• Are there merchants here who are just starting up with affiliates? If so, how can I get my foot in on the ground floor?

Some of the Best Affiliate Conferences Around

• CJU stands for Commission Junction University. This three day seminar brings together advertisers, webmasters, affiliate specialists and marketing specialists for networking, forums, discussion groups and keynote speakers from the industry to find ways to improve site traffic and conversion rates. Each year, CJ also presents the Horizon Award at the conference to one affiliate marketer who has exemplified the highest standards in affiliate innovation.
  
  CJU is usually a fairly even split between merchants and affiliates, which means exceptional networking opportunities. The affiliates/publishers are also spread across a broad demographic, from loyalty sites to strictly retail, so all bases are covered.
   

  CJU 2004 - An Event To Remember (8:31 sec)

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• Affiliate Summit offered their 2004 conference aboard a cruise ship to mixed reviews on the facilities, but great appreciation for the content. E-mail lists, Spamming, and SpyWare were all addressed by industry experts. Networking opportunities included round table discussions and open forums. The attendees included every type and level of merchant and affiliate imaginable, and keynote speaker Fredrick Marckini of iProspect was one of the highlights.
   

  Affiliate Summit 2004 - Cruising The High Seas (2:42 sec)

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• LinkShare Symposium is the most exclusive event – an invitation only summit for those in the online marketing industry. The 2004 conference focused on managing brand syndication properly and improving customer care in the affiliate marketplace. The LinkShare conferences are deliberately kept small and private, with case studies presented and Golden Link Awards for outstanding achievements in affiliate marketing. The attendees at this event tend to be the big-name merchants and their affiliates.

When conferences draw the biggest names in the industry as well as the biggest merchants and affiliate leaders, you’re sure to learn plenty!

About The Author

Lori Wilkerson is a full-time freelance writer who loves her work because it gives her the opportunity to learn more about the world every day. Right now, she knows a little bit about almost everything, and a lot about earning income with a homebased business. She has two dogs who are spoiled and one teenager who is not.

Related Topics

• Affiliate Marketing Training
  The growth of the affiliate marketing industry has been astounding as of late, and that means that many new people are making the plunge every day.

• Affiliate Marketing Newsletters
  It can be a long, lonely road, and a good affiliate marketing newsletter can sometimes be your only way to combat the isolation.

• Affiliate Marketing BootCamp
  James Martell, author of the Affiliate Marketers Handbook, will be holding a BootCamp on October 3rd, 4th, and 5th, 2005 in White Rock BC Canada.