David Fiske A subtle blend of affiliate marketing and web development

I was in Cardiff on Sunday (taking advantage of the all-day park and ride for £3 - much cheaper than pay and display parking in Cardiff itself and takes 5 minutes on the bus either way) and was stopped by a salesman.

I tend to avoid people like this who stand in the middle of a town/city centre trying to get you to buy something or have a leaflet for this, that or the other. Anyhow, I didn't spot this one and he pounced.

"How much do you spend on your mobile?"

Given I use a landline 99.9% of the time, I only go through a fiver here and there. That's what I responded with.

"Well for £35 a month, you can have a new phone...."

Eh? I spend a fiver here or there and you are trying to sell me a £35 a month contract?
 
He could should have let me go. I'm clearly not monthly contract bait. Perhaps he thought I was lying. Perhaps this is a common excuse.

Nevertheless, whilst he got the demographics right (relatively young male, fiancée by his side), he presented the wrong offer. As a salesman, he'll be on a commission - just like mobile market affiliates. He was chasing a high payout (e.g. £35 per contract using affiliate payouts).

So what should he have done?

Offer some advice on pay-as-you-go. Despite offering £35 commission on contract phones, most mobile websites offer a commission on pay-as-you-go sales. Okay, so £5 is not as good as £35 but it's better than nothing, which is what this chap ended up with from me.

The morale here is that despite how good your demographic statistics are, you still need to be targeting the right offer to the right person. If your visitor is after a pay-as-you-go deal, they are more likely to buy a handset outright. That's anything from £20 up to £500. Okay, so the deal for affiliates is certainly raw with most mobile merchants offering around £5 for a pay-as-you-go sale but as I said earlier, £5 is better than £0.

Whilst the monetary reward side of affiliate marketing is important, don't let it blind you. If you run a mobile site, concentrate on mobile phone contracts but make sure you cater for pay-as-you-go customers. Not everyone wants/can get a contract phone. The credit crunch is certainly helping with that. As the credit crisis worsens, pay-as-you-go sales would increase due to the ability for customers to limit their monthly spending.

Remember, a high reward is more lucrative than a lower reward, but a lower reward is better than nothing.