By Hakan Lindskog | CEO
Last week, we announced the launch of our new mobile performance marketing practice, MediaWhiz Mobile. While it doesn’t mark our first foray into mobile marketing, it does represent our most significant and dedicated focus on the immense online marketing and advertising opportunities of mobile.
What this launch means for MediaWhiz, however, is insignificant compared to the value we believe it offers our clients. MediaWhiz Mobile will help advertisers more profitably engage, acquire and retain customers across what has rapidly become the most relevant and important digital marketing channel: mobile.
Why the launch now? As I told A4U in announcing the new service, we absolutely believe that mobile lead generation is the future of online marketing.
Consumers are projected to spend $119 billion worldwide on goods and services from the mobile and tablet devices by 2015, according to ABI Research. And with upwards of 70% of online advertising spend in the United States going toward performance-based advertising, it’s clear that advertisers are hungry for performance-based mobile marketing services that do far more than branding. They want mobile marketing services that help their brands profitably engage, acquire and retain customers in the mobile space.
Increasingly, consumers are ditching their desktop computers in favor of their smartphones and tablets. The opportunities these devices offer brands and marketers to reach, connect with and influence the purchasing habits of consumers is beyond what many of us considered possible just five years ago. More importantly, mobile and tablet devices offer advertisers an immense opportunity to acquire customers instantly and to generate leads at the click of a button.
MediaWhiz Mobile is here to service those opportunities across a variety of online marketing channels, including affiliate marketing, display advertising, search, SEO, lead generation and email. (more…)
By Kelly Clay | Digital Communications Strategist | HasOffers
Is your company thinking of starting a performance marketing program? If the concept is new to your marketing team, it’s critical to understand the basics of performance marketing. During last week’s Performance Marketing Insights in New York City, Peter Klein, MediaWhiz senior vice president of media services, gave an overview of what CMOs need to know about Performance Marketing.
In his presentation, Peter defined what performance marketing is, why it’s beneficial for your company, and how to get started. Here are a few key takeaways from Peter’s presentation that can help anyone starting their own performance marketing program:
Performance Marketing Basics
Peter explained that it’s critical to know that “performance marketing is the smartest online advertising investment. It’s no longer nice to have, but necessary to have” as part of an overall marketing strategy. Performance marketing includes advertisers, affiliates, and the networks that sit in-between them. Advertisers pay for performance, while affiliates, who are paid to deliver a specific action, promote the advertiser through various channels (e.g. PPC, SEO, Social Media). The network then acts as a bank, tracking system, client support, media planner, and compliance team. (more…)
By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
Where will you be March 19 and 20? If the answer isn’t LeadsCon Las Vegas, you need to rethink your plans. You can find us at booth #511 at LeadsCon and throughout the conference at a series of events and panels.
Founded in 2007, LeadsCon showcases the best people and companies in vertical media media and engagement advertising. More than 5,000 people rely each year on LeadsCon for unparalleled insights and access to marketing leaders. Click here to view the conference agenda.
RELATED: Read our exclusive interview with LeadsCon founder Jay Weintraub.
Must-Have Information
MediaWhiz will be exhibiting at LeadsCon, March 19-20, 2013. Meet us at booth #511.
Contact Keith Trivitt for more information or to schedule a meeting with us at the conference.
The MediaWhiz booth at LeadsCon East 2012 in New York City.
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By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
Where will you be March 19 and 20? If the answer isn’t LeadsCon Las Vegas, you need to rethink your plans. With the industry’s premier lead-generation conference a month away, we recently sat down with LeadsCon founder Jay Weintraub to get his take on the state of performance marketing, how he got into the business and what marketers can expect at this year’s conference.
Haven’t purchased your pass to LeadsCon yet? No problem. Click here for a discount and receive $175 off the price of admission, courtesy of MediaWhiz. Don’t delay: the discount is only available through March 1. Discount is valid for new registrations only. Refunds are not available for past purchases.
Be sure to stop by the MediaWhiz booth (#511) at LeadsCon to chat with us about lead generation and performance marketing services. We’d love to see you. Email Keith Trivitt to schedule a meeting.
Below is an edited excerpt of our interview with LeadsCon founder Jay Weintraub.
How did you come about founding and managing LeadsCon?
When I started LeadsCon in 2007 I was living in Los Angeles. I moved there from Baltimore to join the specialty ad network Oversee.net. Its core business focused on monetizing large portfolios of domain names. The company also owned a large portfolio of premium domains, including two marquee names in education and mortgage. Old timers will remember Adteractive and its LowRateSource offer. That inspired me to develop some of the domains using lead gen as the monetization.
Fast forward five years and I couldn’t understand why there wasn’t a conference that focused just on lead generation. After a while, I decided that it was what I wanted to do, and if I didn’t give it a try, I would be forever upset at myself.
For those who are unaware of LeadsCon and its role in the performance marketing ecosystem, what should they know about the conference? Who’s the main audience and how do you cater to them?
I love the term performance marketing. At the same time, it is a very broad term, and it can be co-opted to describe a wide range of marketing activities that may not be very “performance” oriented.
In that wide range of performance marketing lays a subset of brands and advertisers from whom their business relies on connecting with potential customers, being able to begin a dialog that will hopefully consummate in a business transaction. These advertisers have a business process that is at the same time trackable. They are generally service providers within specific consumer focused segments of the economy, e.g., financial service providers. The opposite would be a consumer packaged goods. Their transactions take place primarily offline. While they can purchase clicks and likes they have very indirect ways of measuring advertising effectiveness. (more…)
By Peter Klein | SVP, Media Services
In the fall 2012 edition of Revenue Performance magazine I wrote an article, “The CMO’s Guide to Affiliate Marketing,” that established the basic principles every marketer needs know to launch an effective affiliate marketing program. Now, I’m turning my attention to the entrepreneurial side — the affiliate/publisher.
As an affiliate myself for the better part of a decade, I know that none of the progress of the performance marketing industry would be possible without the entrepreneurial spirit of publishers.
Being a publisher isn’t easy. In the digital age, many major media sources, as well as the State and Federal governments, conspire to make it difficult for publishers to consistently and efficiently market their business. Even if a publisher makes it through all of those pain points and finds a great campaign to scale, it requires significant financial support and a watchdog mentality to ensure everything runs smoothly.
The road to being a successful affiliate or publisher isn’t easy but it comes with many tangible benefits. Over the course of the next two posts I will lay out the reasons why publishers use affiliate marketing, along with a five-step plan they can use to launch their first affiliate marketing program. (more…)
By Ori Carmel | VP, Strategy & Performance
Google announced major changes yesterday to AdWords, rolling out what it is calling “enhanced campaigns.” The changes are designed to help marketers “more simply and smartly manager [their] ad campaigns in today’s multi-device world.”
There are two main parts marketers should consider regarding the impact the AdWords changes will have on their work and client campaigns.
First, the changes open up (or rather brings Google up to speed) with a new and improved revenue and ad distribution model, mostly focused around mobile.
Second, the changes bring the advertising and marketing industry one step closer to a comprehensive inter-connected attribution model of consumption. That’s the Holy Grail that marketers have been searching for since the dawn of modems.
Google AdWords Enhanced should help marketers by providing new bid adjustments, customizable ad formatting and simplified reporting. If you have been hesitant to push towards mobile ad distribution, fear no more. Google will help you adjust ads to fit almost all devices, and report back on performance. All of this, of course, should translate to more distribution, more bids, higher budgets and higher revenues (at higher margins) for both marketers and Google. (more…)
By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
At MediaWhiz, we’re proud of the stellar reputation of MonetizeIt, our affiliate network. Perennially ranked as one of the top cost-per-acquisition (CPA) networks in the world, MonetizeIt delivers consistent, accountable leads and sales for brands.
It’s for this reason that the publication of the annual Online Advertising BLUE BOOK, published by Revenue Performance magazine, is a highlight of the year for us. While it’s one thing for those of us who work at MediaWhiz to be proud of MonetizeIt and recognize its value in the marketplace, it’s quite another when our industry peers do so as well.
The recent unveiling of the 2013 CPA network rankings marked another milestone for MediaWhiz. Our No. 5 ranking marked the fourth-straight year that we have been rated among the top-20 affiliate networks and the second-straight year we have been in the top-5.
Peter Klein, senior vice president of media services, sent the following note to MediaWhiz staff to address this year’s rankings.
Team,
The 2013 Blue Book Top-20 Networks rankings have been released. I’m proud to inform you that MediaWhiz ranks No. 5, retaining its status as one of the world’s top affiliate networks. This is the second-straight year MediaWhiz has ranked in the top-5 and the fourth-straight year ranked in the top-20.
Our new partners at Matomy Media Group rank No. 12. (more…)
By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
The release this week of a major report on the growth of the online performance marketing (OPM) industry in the United Kingdom represents a seminal moment for this young industry. The facts and figures it provides are evidence enough that performance marketing is here to stay; that it is a mature, growing online marketing channel that provides significant value to advertisers and publishers.
As Chris Johnson of A4U details in an excellent analysis of the IAB / PwC OPM study, the affiliate marketing industry in the U.K. has been valued (alongside lead generation) as a £9 billion ($1.43 billion) revenue generating industry.
Key Highlights
- There are c. 3,000-4,000 advertisers and c. 10,000 publishers actively engaged in Online Performance Marketing in the U.K. (in this instance — Affiliate & Lead Generation).
- Advertisers expected to spend (through commissions, management fees, bonuses and other marketing spend) £814 million on Online Performance Marketing in 2012, generating c. £9 billion of sales for advertisers.
- This spend was achieved through at least c.100 million transactions and an additional c. 70 million leads generated.
- This is equivalent for c. 7-9% of U.K. digital marketing spend, and drives c. 5-6% of retail e-commerce in the U.K.
- The largest end-sectors include Finance, Retail, Telecoms & Media, Travel & Leisure.
- Market growth of c. 14% p.a (2008-11) and c. 7% p.a in 2012 (expected).
- Cashback, voucher, loyalty and price comparison websites are the leading publisher types.
- Sites designed specifically for mobile and tablet account for c. 4-5% of advertiser spend on Online Performance Marketing. (more…)
By Peter Klein | SVP, Media Services
With the holiday marketing season closing, many performance marketers have already turned their attention to 2013. Inevitably, their thoughts turn to what they should do to finish the current year on a strong note and ensure the new year is an equal success. Here’s a checklist of what you should do:
Finish Q4 2012 strong. Lead-generation marketers must ensure their budgets have enough leeway to meet seasonal offers for the holidays. The holidays are the best-performing season for cash-advance offers. It’s important to keep existing clients happy, as they will undoubtedly present additional budgets at the last minute. Lead-gen marketers need to do their best to meet clients’ year-end demands to ensure inclusion in advertisers’ 2013 budgets.
Assess staff and optimize processes. As the year closes, and more people tend to take time off, now is the time to ensure your org chart and process are maximized. If you are able to move the business forward without some of your employees, then you need to cut ties or upgrade their positions. If you can’t succeed and are inundated with tactical maneuvers, then it’s time to get job specs together for the positions you need and seek out the right staffing level. (more…)
By Peter Klein | SVP, Media Services
Editor’s note: This is the second post in a two-part series on predictions in performance marketing in 2013.
In my last column, I offered my 2013 predictions for companies in the performance marketing industry and potential new regulations. This column addresses predictions for performance marketing media channels in the new year, as well as how certain vertical markets will fare.
Media Channels
Given all the opportunities and challenges, it will be critical for the performance marketing community to help educate and drive media-channel-specific results for clients.
Perhaps the easiest growth prediction is that mobile marketing will become a much larger piece of the advertising market. eMarketer forecasts 138 million mobile phone users in the United States in 2013, or 43 percent of the total U.S. population. That number will increase by 20 million users per year through 2016, reaching almost 200 million Americans (74 percent of the U.S. population). It will be critical for advertisers to optimize websites and lead-generation forms for mobile devices.
Agencies will continue to focus on branding and awareness for their clients in the digital space. This will mean the farming out of more performance marketing budgets to trusted networks. (more…)
