Affiliate programs

Does linkshare pay?

[keeley]

Cj pays. BeFree seems ok. Anyone have any comments on Linkshare? It seems getting a check from them is quite difficult. Because I only have two merchants, I can't determine if it's Linkshare that has delays in payment, or if it is the merchants. Comments?

[JamesR]

I have heard a lot of bad reports about Linkshare...it could be the merchant but LS doesn't seem to go after them and really fight for a payment. I have dropped Linkshare a long time ago and now pretty much only use CJ and BeFree as far as networks go.

[rcjordan]

Ditto. I have just taken on my first Linkshare affiliate, and I only did it because this particular merchant fits my site perfectly.

I think that CJ's centralized system is the best out there, but if you use the "fringe" merchants you're going to get burned by no-pays or dropped programs. Befree/reporting.net seems to have many of the major internet "brands" and I have more confidence that they'll pay what the reports say they owe. Note that even these big programs are not immune from slashing the pay-out rates; NBCi just cut their ppc by 50% with a single announcement.

[Drastic]

You have to treat LinkShare as just a tracking mechanism. Evaluate each merchant individually. I have promoted many LS programs and had success with only a few.

When evaluating a program I usually do these things:

Find a site already promoting the program and email the webmaster about their experience with them.

Promote the program until you earn enough to generate a payment. Switch back to a program you already know works until you receive your payment. Then you can continue to use them with a certain degree of trust.

For CPA programs, if you send a merchant 100 clicks or more, and you don't see any referrals, drop them. Your traffic is not targetted to them, or there is a problem with their own conversion/tracking/honesty.