David Fiske Affiliate Marketing & Web Development

Every year for as long as I can remember, Red Letter Days rolls out a killer Christmas affiliate incentive, outshining pretty much any other incentive run this time of year. It's usually topped off with a prize of a holiday to a far and distant land such as Bali or Beijing. Well, it's clear where the inspiration for this year's top prize has come from (think about the handover ceremony during a certain major sporting event hosted in England's capital during the year MMXII - how was that for not mentioning it by name?!). That's right, this year Red Letter Days is paying for someone to visit Rio de Janeiro, the second largest city of Brazil!
 


Grand Prize: A Week in Rio

The top prize is a week long holiday including (deep breath) return flights for two people, return transfers for said two people, 7 nights accommodation at the Astoria Palace Hotel in Copacabana, an 11 minute helicopter ride for you both lying over the beaches of Copacabana & Ipanema, as well as past Sugarloaf Mountain and the Christ the Redeemer statue, a tropical island boat tour for the two of you, £500 spending money (that's around 1,630 Brazilian Real right now) and to top it all off some standard travel insurance too.

This is a prize draw and there will be a variety of ways to get tickets throughout the next three months. It's not purely sales based so smaller affiliates have a chance at scooping this prize (which could explain why I love the RLD incentives so much!).

Runner Up Prize: A Mac Book Air

Flex your creative muscles and you could win a creative prize! To enter this particular draw you need to submit either a Landing Page/ Blog promoting Red Letter Days, a Landing Page/ Blog promoting the Red Letter Days Affiliate Programme (ooh, like this blog post for instance!), or showcase a novel use of social media promoting Red Letter Days.

Decided by a judging panel, they are looking for creative ways to promote the brand. Remember to enter this one you have to email them relevant links as per this post.

Runner Up Prize: A Luxury Break for Two at Flemings

Fancy a one night stay in a £500 London apartment? If so then this prize has your name all over it. This draw is limited depending upon performance. Red Letter Days takes the top most improved Affiliates from last year (based on uplifted sales from 1st October to 31st December 2011), the top best new Affiliates (signed up after 12th September 2012), the top 5 most improved affiliates YOY (based on uplifted sales from 2011) plus any affiliate that makes over £500 in sales between October-December 2012. With all these names in the hat the prize is randomly drawn and one lucky winner will receive a £500 Red Letter Day gift voucher for a Luxury Break for Two at Flemings in Mayfair, London.

Christmas Hamper Giveaway

This is open to absolutely anyone driving sales to RLD. Drive £750+ worth of sales between 1st October and 30th November to them and you will receive a hamper full of Christmas goodies delivered by Christmas. Plus, the higher sales revenue you achieve by this date, the bigger and better the hamper you will receive.

Q4 Incentive

No really, there's more! On top of this, Red Letter Days are running their quarterly incentive so you can win something in this too. Drive at least £1,500, £3,000, £5,000, £7,000, £10,000, £15,000, or £20,000+ and you can win your choice of prize from that tier's selection. It's just you playing for this, so you don't need to slog to get a ticket with a remote chance of winning something. Hit any of these sales revenue tiers and walk away with a prize!

Each quarter Red Letter Days changes the prizes so every 3 months throughout the year you have a new chance of winning another prize. I've not seen this offered elsewhere and I know Red Letter Days have been commended for such a novel and successful on-going affiliate incentive.

Do I stand a Chance?

Many other affiliate programs use major incentives to make the smaller affiliates work harder but ultimately reward the bigger affiliates. Some might think that's cynical but in a prize draw based on sales volume, if I work flat out and generate 10 entries from sales but a corporate affiliate (I've re-branded the term "big affiliates" or the "big boys"!) generates 10,000 without much effort, statistics say that there's more probability in me losing out.

The best thing about the RLD affiliate incentive is that they try and make it as fair as possible to everyone. The main holiday prize is based on tickets gained from achieving certain tasks. Plus, winners of the main prize or runner up prize can't go on to win other prizes. You can see the 2011 winners here and the 2010 winners here (ah, the memories of being serenaded in a gondola) and as you can see they are a real mix of small, medium and large affiliates without bias.

If you're a seasoned Red Letter Day affiliate then there's plenty here for you, and the same goes for brand new affiliates too. Just sign up for the program on Affiliate Window or Affili.net (full details on the Red Letter Day website) and start promoting!

Where Should I Start?

You can start today with nice and simple tasks.

You can get 5 entries to the Rio competition by adding a Christmas banner. If you're displaying the rotating banner then Joshna and Gemma at Red Letter Days have already done the hard work for you. You just need to email them a link to claim your 5 tickets.

During Q4, if you sell two Boutique Escapes for Two you can get 2 bonus entries and if you sell a Savoy Break for Two you can get 3 bonus entries, so it may be worthwhile featuring these experiences on your website if you can.

It's worth blogging about Red Letter Days and the affiliate program if you can as this gets you entries for the Mac Book competition. An article on why people should shop with them would be good, as would an article explaining to fellow affiliates how they can enter the competitions ;-) Check out my top tips from last year, albeit for different prizes, as they are still relevant this year (hmm, bonus entry?!)

Lastly, try an generate as many sales as you can. To receive a hamper you need £750 worth of sales in three months (around a £62.50 sale each week). Nudge that up to £1,500 (circa £125 a week) and you'll also receive the first tier prize in Q4. Plus keep an eye out for various small challenges to gain extra entries into the Rio draw.

Good luck everyone!