Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins

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There is a new publication, Project Black Book, that has launched in conjunction with Ad-Tech San Francisco. They tout themselves as “the Journal for Interactive Marketing,” but the content is a lot saucier than the mundane tagline.

The initial Letter From the Editor (Thomas Hynes) is titled, “The Journal of Disruptive Thinking,” and that more aptly describes the content in this publication.

According to Brandon Shalton, CEO of Project Black Book, “the core mission of the journal is to allow companies currently in the affiliate marketing space and those thinking about entering the space, to fully understand the issues involved, as well as to provide transparency and truth.”

Some really neat information in here (not sure if the affiliates will agree), such as the following stats on AzoogleAds, ClickBank, Commission Junction, LinkShare, RegNow, and MYAP:

• Total number of links found

• Number of unique merchants
• Number of unique affiliate IDs
• Number of affiliate domains

This data has been compiled from a data base of over one billion records that spider the Internet to map out linking relationships. I’m not exactly sure of the methodology here - are programs with private domains being associated with MYAP (i.e. ClubMom uses clubmomlinks.com for their affiliate links - no reference to MYAP in the click sequence)?

Project Black Book also reveals the top merchants being promoted by affiliates for the networks covered in the first issue.

Also lots of articles covering control of ad placement, patent issues, and commission shaving (an issue I think is a reality in the adult space, but not with big consumer brands).

The premier issue is available as a PDF at http://www.projectblackbook.com/.

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