I’ve just read a blog post by Kirsty whos a bit of a leg-end now in the affiliate world and has a great blog. She’s basically been stung by a one sided contract, and at the recent a4u expo there seemed to be a big divide of affiliates who are companies and affiliates who are one man bands and proud of it.
For example the last session I went to at the expo was ‘meet the super affiliates’ of which Kieron was on the panel. Hes had staff, I think hes even had an office but now remains as a one man band, because that’s how he likes it, at the other end of the table we had Jamie Harwood who runs UK Web Media. Is Jamie more professional than Kieron?
This stems from Kirsty’s post so ill go back to that, she asks the question – is affiliate marketing the only industry where contracts can be one sided? Im fairly sure she already knows the answer is no. Terms and conditions, contracts etc are designed to protect the person asking you to sign / agree to them. Check the network standard terms, you wont find any promise in there saying that if tracking goes down or their links break they will cover you for loss of earnings. Most networks these days will do something, but its not compulsory and if the actual loss was a lot (talking 100’s of thousands, id put money on them suddenly falling back on their registration terms).
Standard terms and conditions are that, standard. Kirsty was offered a closed group opportunity and asked to sign a contract – I commented my thoughts on her blog but basically I think she should have put more time into the contract and negotiated it. Im sure she’d agree, but it usually does take getting stung to realise people / companies can do this if your not careful. If she’d have put a clause in stating X days notice on any changes to be confirmed in writing, agreed new terms on payment and commission validations she wouldn’t have lost as much.
So – how professional are affiliates? I work with a wide range, some send me mutual NDA’s, contracts, want signed copies of terms, buy the company accounts from companies house and others just want a link. Does it make a difference? How far do you go to protect your commission?
Dan, full of mash potato
