Merchant Madness
August 14, 2008 No CommentsI logged into Affiliate Window the other week to check commission and noticed two new programs. One was Your Money Your Market and another eHarmony. This is funny. I read the copy on Your Money Your Market and it advertised YMYM.com right at the start, I thought that’s clever and looked it up… not theirs or it doesn’t seem to be live in any case, I didn’t check whois, however being a domainer I checked the .co.uk and it’s free or was.
I now have YMYM.co.uk yet the program on AWIN still advertises YMYM.com failing to completely understand what they’re doing. I really can’t comprehend merchants who employ companies that haven’t got a clue how best to look after their client. I have ymym.co.uk and regged that, no tm issues, four letters, it’ll do. I however didn’t reg yourmoneyyourmarket.co.uk – I could have done but I decided to inform both affiliate manager at Arctic Sunrise and the network of their mistake.
They haven’t replied or resolved the issues so I’m blogging about it, need a space filler. What annoys me is a company, YourMoneyYourMarket.com has given £6000.00 to AWIN to use their system and to be introduced to thousands of affiliates so as to turn a decent income yet at no point has it been suggested that they should cover their arse by regging the .co.uk
Equally the same with the company Arctic Sunrise, what kind of employee takes on an account, invites business then doesn’t do their best to look after their client, by failing to reg the .co.uk when entering the uk market in an arena where the majority will enter .co.uk as the extension upon recalling an advertisement, why do they fail as a company to gain the free traffic, no instead pay £6000 plus the set up fees with the agency and forget all common sense, maybe it’s the heat.
It’s still there on AWIN, advertisting YMYM.com – maybe it is theirs… and they still haven’t registered YourMoneyYourMarket.co.uk so they’ve spent several thousand pounds and failed to spend £6 on covering their uk traffic. I’d reg it but I’m not into TM issues, never was but you can, I’m sure after several months of affiliate marketing that there will be some financial traffic on the .co.uk domain.
On the face of it, I’d give Arctic Sunrise time to grow, they’re not too clever – and in the mid term I’ve offered Squillions as a consultation service to Affiliate Window – I recall suggesting to AWIN two years ago or more that they should have a check list before they send a merchant live, so what is it? a case of they know best or them think regging a .co.uk is a worthless proceadure? Still no merchant checklist in place. Why?
Meanwhile further down and eHarmony. It rang a bell, a colleague caught this a year or so ago and was caught up in a DRS, it’s good seeing domains come back and see their life continue their rocky road, the DRS was important to their company but this wasn’t known at the time. It’s interesting, if you have domains that are similar albeit without extension to the .com they’re worth looking after, not all are tms and I’d have to read the full DRS to see if that was too.
So merchant, get wise, drop the agency and reg the .co.uk or pay your money to someone who really does look after your interests beyond their own financial concerns, how can you not reg the co.uk? how? why? Yes affiliate marketing is about more than a domain however buying the domain for the uk is a bloody good starting point.
