About
NYAffiliateVoice does not claim to be the voice of all NY affiliates. This site is only my opinions, and the opinions of others who may post. None of us speaks for all affiliates. No one affiliate can speak for all others but we can speak for ourselves. This blog is not designed to be the ONE voice but merely a voice.
Affiliate marketing, like most businesses, is evolving. Recent events have really shown us that we need to have a voice. We need to have a voice to help control the direction the industry takes. We need to be heard and sometimes, we will need to work together. We need to further improve communication and understanding of what it means to be an average affiliate. For me, an average affiliate is an individual who is making money, one who does not have a staff but is more or less a one person show. Average affiliates may be more affected by certain things simply because of their size; they just lack the staff.
We are making money, we are driving sales and traffic to merchants. Merchants, OPM’s, AM’s and networks are also making money as a direct result of our work. As such, we deserve to be heard and to be respected.
The one single event that sparked me to create this blog was the NY internet tax prompting some merchants to drop affiliates from NY. It was not the mere termination that bothered many New Yorkers, it was the way it was handled. All business have a right to make their own business decisions. Although I am sure the merchants did not lightly decide to terminate thousands of affiliates, we did deserve more notice than some gave. We deserved respect and sufficient notice. I believe that if we had been more proactive the situation would have been handled differently. I understand that there was a lot going on behind the scenes as Affiliate Managers and OPM’s rallied for our cause, but we still deserved to know ealier that our business relationship was at stake. We never asked for definitive answers, but we did ask, and hope, to at least have an idea of what might happen. The next point may not be popular. I believe that we, as affiliates, also made mistakes in our approach and reaction to this issue but I’ll save that for a post.
Feel free to voice your comments too. If you need to reach me by email, please use affmeeting at nyaffiliatevoice dot com
It is time to have a voice, not one voice but many voices.
Melanie Seery
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I have a question. I was thinking of starting a web site using affiliate programs. I have come across the Ny state law and was wondering if merchants that have stores in New York(like best buy, gap,etc.) would be willing to participate with New Yorkers because they already have a ny presence. They have to collect tax anyway, and if so I did not see many of these retailers on your list of Ny friendly affiliates. I am new to this and was just looking for some clarification. This law is very unfair since it only punishes certain states. It should be all states or no states.
I too am thinking of getting started in Affiliate Marketing, but since I live in NY, is this going to be a waste of time? I have not read through all of the posts, either on here or on ABW but, it seems like more and more companies are stopping the affiliate programs. You obviously have a lot of knowledge about this. Should I look for something else to do in NYS? Thanks for your help.