SteveH made an announcment about the re-instatement of publishers who were banned a few days ago...
At the risk of making this post too long, I've tried to answer a few of
the key questions that have been posted in the thread. Hopefully this
will provide some more useful information to the affiliates who are
concerned about how we're evaluating traffic and how they can improve
their sites and monetization.
What does "engagement" mean?
Among other metrics, we measure the time that users spend on eBay after
they come through an affiliate link, the number of pages that they view,
and their buying activity after coming through the affiliate link.
Hopefully this helps to further clarify what we mean. I know that we
don't provide reporting on all of these metrics, but we're looking at
ways that we can improve that visibility so that you can optimize your
campaigns for them.
Can affiliates affect engagement and conversion?
Definitely. The metrics show that there is a wide distribution of these
metrics between affiliates. To illustrate the point with an extreme
example, a site that helps potential buyers find and research stereo
receivers and then points them to great deals on eBay will probably
drive more engaged buyers with better conversion rates than an eBay
banner on a ringtone site.
How can affiliates improve engagement from their sites?
Many of you are already using these techniques and others, but for those
who may not be, here are some tips to improve engagement.
* Maximize the amount of more unique content to your site.
Create commerce-oriented content for your site that engages the user in
the shopping experience. Conversely, avoid putting eBay affiliate ads
on pages that have little to do with shopping - e.g. ringtone sites,
non-commerce oriented social network sites, e-mail services, etc. Also,
sites that do little other than offer links to redirect to eBay
generally don't perform well. Engage people with content on your site,
and make it clear to them on the affiliate links that they will be
redirected to eBay to shop.
* Use more targeted creatives. If all you have is a simple text
link to eBay or a static eBay banner ad on your site, consider using one
of our flash creatives. Use what you know about your users and your
content: consider using banners targeted to specific demographics (e.g.
male vs. female) or categories - which are also available on eBay
Partner Network. Also consider using our Editor Kit and eBay To Go
widgets, which can be customized to show specific eBay listings for a
given category or keyword right on your page.
* Integrate eBay links within your content. Sites that find a
way to work eBay advertising into the content, rather than just as a
simple ad at a top, side, or bottom of a page, tend to do better
* Optimize your landing pages. Use what you know about your
users to help them find what they want on eBay. If your site is about
tennis rackets, avoid landing your users on the eBay homepage, send them
a search results page on eBay for targeted tennis queries.
* Use our geotargeting functionality. Sending a visitor on your
site who is from the UK to ebay.co.uk (our British site) rather than
ebay.com (our US site), will significantly improve conversion rates and
engagement. You can select this option when you're generating eBay
links in the "tools" tab.
* Avoid simply incenting visits to eBay or registration with
eBay - their primary motivation is typically not interest in eBay or in
purchasing from eBay. If you are going to give your users cash back or
points, tie those rewards to actual valid purchases on eBay.
How can affiliates test & improve their performance?
* Set up specific campaigns to test out any new sites, links,
content, etc., and ideally, test these approaches at smaller volumes in
comparison to your overall traffic. This way you will be able to
evaluate the performance of each new campaign separately, ramp up the
ones that perform the best, and prune the ones that don't perform.
* Leverage the custom ID reports to further segment your
testing. In an upcoming release targeted for September, additional
category reporting will be made available that will help you see the
categories that your users are converting in (at campaign, tool, and
program levels) which should help you further target your content and
affiliate links.
I've seen a few people already stating their accounts were reinstated.
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Aug 24, 2008, 01:34:15 PM