I often look for similar sites when I am searching for affiliate programs to promote, so I can get the best commission, and compare other elements of the affiliate programs.

Typically, I use Google to search out sites, but I came across SimilarSites.com, which makes the process more efficient, since it enables me to enter a domain and get results of similar sites.

The queries are not limited to searching the domains themselves. For instance, I searched the URL for the Amazon affiliate program, and the results included CJ.com, ClickBank, LinkShare, eBay Partner Network, AzoogleAds, ShareASale, and Google AdSense.

This could be a good tool for affiliate managers to find similar niche sites, too.

And if you’re using Google Chrome, there is a Similar Sites add-on.

Check out Similar Sites.

I was riding the subway in New York yesterday, and the car I was in was covered in ads for the Panasonic Lumix camera.

There were a variety of ads, but the one that jumped out to me read, “HAVEN’T HEARD OF US? GO AHEAD. SEARCH LUMIX ONLINE.”

So OK, they didn’t exactly challenge affiliates to outrank them, but they’ve created an environment where affiliates should want to outrank them, so they can leverage this ad campaign.

I searched for Lumix and most of the organic results are either from Panasonic or reviews of the camera.

For now.

If I were involved in that ad campaign, I would have registered the name on social media sites to lock down the name.

When I just checked on the KnowEm UserName Check, lumix was still available on most of the hundreds of social media networks listed on KnowEm.

Then again, if I were working on the campaign, I wouldn’t point consumers to Google results, since they are not in my control.

I wonder if any affiliates will pounce on this?

VeriSign, the registry for .COM and .NET, will be increase domain registration prices on July 1, 2010 – .COM will go up 7%, and .NET by 10%.

So naturally, as the increase is passed on to domain registrars, they will pass it right on to us.

I’d suggest taking care of them now to save some cash – I have about 150 myself.

While this isn’t a big deal if you’d just got a few domains, it will add up if you have dozens or hundreds of domains.

Set your reminder to register and renew your domains by June 30, 2010.

Scribe is a new WordPress plugin from Brian Clark, publisher of Copyblogger, that helps writers optimize content.

I have never been much of an SEO guy, so I was excited when I heard about this tool to improve my blog posts. I’ve been using the All in One SEO Pack plugin for quite a while, but I’ve wanted more.

Anyhow, Scribe certainly delivers more. The software analyzes blog posts before you hit the “Publish” button, and the Scribe API reports back to the WordPress interface with details on tweaking the content to get more search engine traffic, while maintaining quality reader-focused copy.

When I’ve used some other SEO tools, the process didn’t feel natural, where I’d be asked for a keyword phrase and then guided to construct content around it. That method felt forced to me.

Instead, with Scribe, I write the content naturally, and then it’s analyzed, so my natural flow is preserved.

Also, Scribe reveals what search engines will think I’m writing about, and it suggests changes to better reflect the language searchers are using. The software also guides me through remaining content elements based on SEO best practices.

I’d highly recommend Scribe – I’m using it on all my blogs now.

The only downside is that Scribe makes me neurotic when I write short posts, because the software recommends a WordPress post be 300 words or more. Otherwise, great stuff.

I was reading “Top 10 WordPress Plugins That Affiliate Marketers Need” at MarketingElf.com the other day and came across a really useful WordPress plugin I wasn’t using.

The plugin is called Pretty Link, and it enables affiliates to shrink the huge affiliate links and get a branded URL with the affiliate’s domain name. Plus, the plugin enables affiliates to track clicks, specify the redirection type, and nofollow the link.

The plugin has an interface within WordPress with all of the options, and it also adds a quick Pretty Link took in the WordPress dashboard.

The basic Pretty Link plugin is free, and there is also a Pretty Link Pro version with lots of added features.

Pretty Link Pro provides keyword and URL replacement options, auto creation of Pretty Links to post to Twitter, customization of your Pretty Link base URL and more.

I’ve been using .htaccess redirects for my affiliate links for years, but I really like this slick, easy, time saving functionality.

Time for a change.

[audio:http://geekcast.fm/podpress_trac/web/2778/0/affiliateabcs19-history-affiliatetip.mp3]

I had a fun chat with Deb Carney on her AffiliateABCs podcast the other day about my early days in affiliate marketing.

This discussion came out of a link I Tweeted recently for an article I wrote in 2000 on the history of affiliate marketing.

We touched on the origins of the industry, as well as my start as an affiliate and an affiliate manager in 1997 at Medsite.com.

Back when I started as an affiliate, I joined the Amazon.com affiliate program and created a horrible site on AOL, which was a shoddy guide to New York City. I got my first domain, velocitynyc.com, on August 25, 1998.

This was an online version of a zine, Velocity NYC, that I was publishing offline for a few years.

“The writing was on the wall for Shawn Collins when he named his year-and-a-half-old quarterly zine, Velocity N.Y.C. Walking past a stairway, Collins noticed graffiti spelling out the title of his soon-to-be zine. Like the graffiti, Velocity N.Y.C. is a spontaneous expression of one life in the urban jungle. Collins ruminates on bachelor parties, stuff in his mailbox and the zine’s most reprinted feature, movies that affected his life.” – FOLIO

“A wonderfully sophisticated zine that captures the energy and style of New York City life. Shawn has done a lot, experiences a lot, and has a lot to say. He doesn’t come off as preachy or pretentious, just genuinely friendly.” – Factsheet 5

This domain is now used for the Velocity NYC Press, a book publishing imprint from Affiliate Summit.

My second domain, babylounge.com, was registered on July 19, 1999, and the initial purpose was to manually create online birth announcements, after lots of friends and family enjoyed the one I created for my first daughter months before.

These online birth announcements were available in a free version (with affiliate ads) or a few paid versions.

As of today, I’ve got 152 domains, and I couldn’t even tell you how many have been affiliate sites, or are currently affiliate sites. Plus, there are many domains that I grabbed for a year or two for projects and let go.

Anyhow, the podcast also gets into my experiences in the early days as an affiliate manager and it’s a fun trip down memory lane for the resources and such from back then. Have a listen to episode 19 of Affiliate ABCs to hear how things used to be in affiliate marketing.

Audio: Affiliate ABCs #19 History of Affiliate Marketing with Shawn Collins

Do you know which site is the next Twitter? Me neither, which is why it’s essential that we get usernames locked down on as many social media sites as possible, so we are protected.

If not, there are other people who will take our names.

So far, I’ve been creating accounts as I have come upon sites, but that’s getting too clumsy and burdensome.

Recently, I came across a service called KnowEm and set up my profile. I’ve currently claimed 44 social media profiles, but somebody else has grabbed my username ten times.

I figure I’ve got two options for the balance of these sites. I could go and create profiles in a few hundred places, which sounds brutal, or I could pay KnowEm to do it.

KnowEm has a couple of packages, and the pricing is well worth it, compared to the time to do it myself.

There was a post on Search Engine Journal a few months back, No Precedence For Social Media – Amazon Hangs Us Out To Dry, that railed at Amazon.com’s affiliate program, because “Amazon.com refused to pay any commission on a link that I distributed through Twitter and Facebook.”

There was a lot of buzz about the issue, so I figured I’d use the Amazon.com Associates Central Contact Form to ask about promoting affiliate links on sites I didn’t own and included my Twitter name:

I understand that you prohibit including affiliate links in Twitter, since an account there is not owned by the affiliate.

Just wondering if you can clarify where the line in the sand is drawn – if I have a blog on WordPress or Tumblr, where it’s my site, but on their servers as a subdomain, is that my site?

I got back the following reply the same day:

I have reviewed the Twitter site and approved its addition to your Associates account. Links established through this URL to Amazon.com will qualify for referral fees. We ask that you add this URL to your account online. Please follow these steps after logging into http://associates.amazon.com.

1. Click on “Account Settings” in the upper right-hand corner of the main page.
2. On the following page, choose “Edit your Web site information.”
3. In the description field titled, “Briefly describe your web site” in the center of the page, add the new URL(s). Be careful not replace your existing URL displayed in the box titled, what is the URL of the main web site.
4. Click on the “Save Changes” button at the bottom of the page to save your changes.

If you would like to add your WordPress page or Tumblr, you will need to provide us with the URL so we can review the sites and okay their addition as well.

That is certainly reasonable to me. Affiliates should list all URL’s they will be using to promote an affiliate program, so the affiliate manager can review them.

Anyhow, I’d forgotten about all of this until an email came in today in response to getting a rejection email for the Affiliate Summit affiliate program.

That is fine, I really did not care for the attitude anyway ! This is good example of stupidity ! You have no idea what web site I going to promote it on, what blogs I may have, what social sites or forums I have a following on, so how do you know if I am suited to your snooty program ??

Exactly. We had no idea about this affiliate’s relevant sites, because they were not in their profile. There were a handful of other sites and descriptions listed, all of which were for a vertical that has absolutely nothing to do with our affiliate program.

Moral of the story… if you’d like to participate in the “snooty program” for Affiliate Summit, please include your sites in your profile.

You’ve probably heard by now that the Federal Trade Commission announced new rules yesterday regarding disclosure of freebies and financial interests by bloggers.

But what does that mean to you when it kicks in on December 1, 2009?

I am fortunate to be a part of a secret cabal, and I heard about the new rules early on from Dan Murray, Internet Marketing Strategist and Founder of Ravenwood Marketing, Inc.

There was a lot of discussion about the new FTC rule, and Tim Carter, nationally-syndicated newspaper column Ask the Builder and the founder of AskTheBuilder.com shared his disclosure policy.

I read through that disclosure policy and grabbed some elements to add to my own disclosure policy, which is now linked from the bottom of all of my blog posts on the site and in the RSS feeds.

Now please note that if you choose to be “inspired” by either of these policies, you should do so at your own risk. Neither of us claim to be lawyers or anything like that. We’re just trying to do what’s right here.

I am hoping to get some direction from affiliate programs and networks, but I’ve only gotten information on the FTC issue from ShareASale, so far.

When I was logging into my affiliate account with ShareASale earlier, I saw a notice reading “New FTC Rules surrounding sponsored blogs, tweets, reviews … Important read: – click here to view ShareASale Blog.”

I’ll keep an eye out for more news from affiliate programs and networks.

I’ve been hearing a lot about AffiliateReporting.com, but hadn’t had a chance to dig into it until this week… and I am very impressed.

If you’re not familiar with AffiliateReporting.com, it’s a search engine marketing (SEM) software platform designed for affiliates. The suite of SEM tools come from m o v e software, and the software was developed for m o v e marketing, a Commission Junction Performer and winner of the CJ Horizon Award For Innovation, that generated over $20 Million in affiliate commissions from over 500 advertisers using these SEM tools.

After playing with their tools, I touched base with the folks at AffiliateReporting.com, and they were willing to provide an extended free trial – usually it’s 14 days, but if you use this link you’ll get 30 days. Please note, this 30 day trial offer expires on October 16th at midnight PST.

Anyhow, some of the features I really liked…

• AutoSYNC: loads reporting data from the most popular search engines and affiliate networks.
• AutoBID: intelligent systems use key performance metrics to automate bidding, so no human intervention or setup is required.
• AutoCOPY: replicates campaigns across multiple search engines in a single click.
• Alarms: monitors changes in CPC, click volume, and other key metrics as often as every 5 minutes.

These are automated or backend processes, so there is nothing to really show you, but there are also aspects of the interface I like a lot, too…

The dashboard (see below) provides critical information at login, such as Daily Profit & Loss Graphs, Biggest Winner’s and Loser’s Summary, and Alarms.

There are dozens of reports for affiliates to analyze profit by ad, site, search engine, campaign, ad group, and keyword. Keyword level reports like the Biggest Winners and Losers (see below) bring attention to the keywords that need immediate attention.

And then the Keyword Manager (see below) allows affiliates to drill-down into detail on a single keyword to analyze performance, change bids, or modify alarm settings. It also houses a number of useful SEM management features.

Check it out at AffiliateReporting.com for more details and to take advantage of the free 30 day trial.