Wiseaff

PMA Illinois Lawsuit Victory Upheld

The PMA has announced today that the Illinois Supreme Court has uphelp a lower court ruling making the Illinois Affiliate Nexus Tax unconstitutional.  Not sure what this mean for affiliates yet.  Stay tuneds.  Nice work PMA.

 

http://thepma.org/pma-illinois-lawsuit-victory-upheld/

 

Here is a link to the opionion:

http://www.state.il.us/court/Opinions/SupremeCourt/2013/Summaries/114496s.htm

 

 

Google Taking Privacy Policies Seriously Now?

 

I've been working with a particular client for several years now doing their SEM on a performance basis.  Early this week, out of the blue, I received an email from Google with the following Subject:

    Your AdWords account: Site violation

Here is a short excerpt of the message:

We've reviewed your account and found that one of your sites is in violation of our Landing Page and Site Policies.

      Customer ID: XXX-XXX-XXXX

      Display URL: <client-url>.com

Please note that ad traffic to the above URL will be suspended and all new ads pointing to this URL will be disapproved.

This is the client's own website that has been running for years.  After reading the Google guidelines....AGAIN... I could find no reason for a site violation.

I contacted Google and was told that the "violation" was due to the lack of a "Privacy Policy."

I know that Google has always said they are in favor of Privacy Policies but I had never heard of an AdWords campaign being shut down for the lack of such a policy.

On top of that, the site in question DID have a Privacy Policy.  However, the link was not labeled "Privacy" or "Privacy Policy" it was simply labeled "Our Policy."

I was able to clear this up pretty quickly, but I thought it was interesting how seriously Google it taking Privacy Policies these days.  Perhaps this was part of some new algorithm?

Anyone heard of anything like this? 

 

 

Affiliate Tax Propaganda - Affiliates Continue to be the Human Shields

Well this tax issues continues to made news and most of the time it is misinformation and/or partial truths. 

Sadly this issue has continued to be branded as the Amazon Tax and as such has been positioned as a David and Goliath issue:  The Big Bad Online Only Retailer v. Mom and Pop America 

The problem is, this has nothing to do with Mom and Pop.   

In a recent issue of The Directors Letter, the following was written:

Goose and Gander  We recently wrote about Amazon's aggressive battle with various states to avoid collecting and paying sales tax. Amazon's technique is to eliminate relationships with local affiliates so that it can declare no presence in a specific state. In the latest development, competitors including Wal-Mart, Target and other large retailers have joined up to form the Alliance for Main Street Fairness. The Alliance is lobbying for legislative changes that would require Amazon to pay state sales tax.

Let’s analyze this a bit….

First this part:  “Amazon's technique is to eliminate relationships with local affiliates so that it can declare no presence in a specific state”

This isn’t just Amazon’s tactic.  Several online retailers have chosen this path.  What needs to be nailed down is that this isn’t just a tactic……doing this total absolves then from having to collect the sales tax that was the intent of these Bills.    

Here is how it works everywhere it has passed (except NY solely because of pending legislation)

1) Bill Passes

2) Nexus is created for Online Merchant

3) Affiliates Get Fired --- In many cases #3 actually precedes #1!

4) Online Retailer no longer has Nexus since it no longer has affiliates 

5) Online Retailer Collects $0 sales tax - no Nexus, no Sales Tax

6) Affiliate Loses Revenue

7) State collects less income tax from small business that have been financially hurt or put out business by passage of the Bill

This is pretty black and white….

Use Affilates to Create Nexus, Affilaites Fired, No Nexus created, Bill is useless............please tell me what I’m missing????

Second: “In the latest development, competitors including Wal-Mart, Target and other large retailers have joined up to form the Alliance for Main Street Fairness.”

So let me get this straight….The Big Box retailers that KILLED the Mom and Pop stores all across the country in the first place have now joined forces to create the Alliance for Main Street Fairness?   There is nothing Main Street about this fight.  A look at their website, which I will not link to, or course says nothing about Big Box Stores….it trots out a bunch of local business that have supposedly been hurt by the online retailers. 

For the record, I understand that sales tax issue.  It won’t be easy to solve, hopefully legislators will see it for what it is. 

It’s clear what this is.  It’s a fight between behemoths….Online Only versus The Click and Mortar.......

In the meantime,  it’s a shame that Affiliates continue to be the Human Shields in the war between Online Only Retailers and Big Box Retailers.

What’s Holding the Affiliate/Performance Marketing Industry Back?

The PMA (Performcance Marketing Association) has a great section on their website called "Ask the Expert."

Recently Rebecca Madigan asked me what I thougth was holding our industry back from greatness.   I thought about this for a while and sent her the following answer which they posted under the Ask the Expert section. 

What are your thoughts?

 

What’s Holding the Industry Back?

That question was posed last week.  A hundred answers ran through my mind when I read this.  But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that there are many symptoms, but only few root causes.

1)     Lack of Understanding

2)     Continual Focus on the Negative

3)     No unified industry voice

First, let’s talk about the Lack of Understanding.  For whatever reason, all things Internet related often seem to be relegated to the world of “technology.”  This has been going on since the beginning and seems to be getting better, but still exists.  The online channel is usually not the largest sales channel an organization has.  Couple that with its inherent black sheep aspect of being online and many companies just do not give it the focus it deserves.

Imagine walking into a CFO’s office and explaining Affiliate Marketing, not in Internet terms, not in Marketing Terms, but in the language of the CFO…..NUMBERS.  I imagine the CFO’s answer goes something like this:

“So, let me get this straight….you are selling our product (or service) on our behalf, but I only have to PAY you IF and WHEN we actually sell something….AND I only pay you at a predetermined percentage of the sale that I get to set at the beginning of the relationship.

Isn’t that really a no-brainer?  Imagine elevating the conversation above the internal politics and looking at the real numbers.

Second, is the continual focus on the Negative side of our industry.  I’ve never seen an industry that was so vocal about its own negatives that the noise actually drowns out the good things that we can do.  How many blog posts do we need about affiliate fraud, TM bidding, etc?  Between the Work At Home, Get Rich Quick messages and the fractured message of a vocal minority who insist on shinning a light on the few unscrupulous people in the industry, it creates a “Guilty until Proven Innocent” mentality, which we have to overcome on an almost daily basis.  The message of the hard working and ethical affiliate is lost.   You can’t have the conversation necessary to solve the issue in number 1 above until we can change the message of our industry.

Third, there is no Unifying Voice.  This is a direct effort to address Number 2.  There are a lot of people talking, but what they are saying is so chaotic that there is no message.  As marketers, we should be able to create a powerful marketing effort that educates companies on the value that the industry brings to the table.    Many industry groups have tried to form and I salute the PMA for getting farther than any of the others.  Let’s try to get out of the hamster wheel of fighting about “cookie stuffing” and start talking about all of the good things that we as an industry can bring to the table.

We have an industry filled with great people and great companies.  We just need to tell the world!

 

 

Amazon Tax (Affiliate Tax) Revenue Generator or Small Business Killer?

I've been watching the issue of the "Amazon Tax" ever since it snowballed through New York.  In some cases, it has passed and in other cases (either publically or privately) it has been defeated.

For those of you who may not know what I mean here's a recap: 

Online businesses are ONLY required to collect sales tax in states where they have a physical presence, called a Nexus.  Recently New York, in its infinite wisdom has stated it is losing hundreds of millions of dollars because of sales to online businesses like Amazon.

As such, the state legislature has redefined nexus to not only include brick & mortar stores, but also to affiliates.  Affiliates are in essence commission only sales reps...they are small business run by entrepreneurs trying to make a living.  And guess what they pay TAX to the state on their income.

When NY enacted this tax, Amazon, instead of figuring out how to collect sales tax, simply discontinued working with all of its New York affiliates.  The same has happened in other states as well. 

Result?? 

1) States see $0 - THAT'S ZERO - new tax revenue from the people it went after like Amazon, Overstock etc.

2) Small Business is hurt badly since they can no longer market for companies like Amazon and Overstock which results on lost revenue.

3) States sees LOWER actual business revenue from these Affiliate Businesses who would pay taxes on business income.

There are a couple of thoughts and realizations I have come to:

1) Politicians tend to operate in sound bites and press releases.  What do I mean by this?  Well it's easy to propose a *new* tax when you are crying foul against a large retailer like Amazon and holding up a sign with a Giant Number like $220 Million.  The reality is that once these taxes pass, Politicos are not accountable to what the end result it.  Did it work, Did it hurt small business?  We don't know.  They don't go back and look at results.

2) Taxes are VERY RARELY repealed once passed.

From the Providence Business News:‘Amazon tax’ has not generated revenue

The Performance Marketing Association has done a good job of fighting these issues when they pop up, but one begins to wonder......should we be fighting this one state at a time?   The current administration has put focus on small innovative businesses perhaps there is a course of action there?

Excerpt from state of the Union 2010

 ....is there a way to take this fight to the federal level and oppose it ONCE rather than 50 times?  Perhaps our industry needs to engage some policy experts.  One thing is certain, with almost all 50 states facing huge budget deficits, this issue is sure to raise its ugly head everywhere this year. 

Bottom line:  This tax hurts (and is some cases Kills) small business. 

Google Forgiveness... hard to achieve?

A few weeks ago I received an email from Google suggesting that 1 or more of the ads in an AdWords account were disapproved.  In looking at that account, I discovered that they were showing disapprovals for ads that had been deleted.

As anyone who works with Google knows, their notices can be somewhat ominous and sometimes suggest that upon any further disapproval that your account will be suspended.

Obviously concerned, I contacted them and was told that this notice was sent regarding ads that were disapproved in 2007.  

Now, I'm no rocket scientist, but I think it's now 2009…almost 2010?  Why in the world would I be getting this email for ads that had been disapproved 2 + years ago?

I dig further......

So these ads were in fact disapproved in 2007, and paused, where they sat until May 2009.  In May 2009, they were deleted (well at least the best delete you can do in AdWords).

So here it is 5 months later and the ads were: paused 2 years ago, DELETED 5 months ago....why in the world would the policy team even be looking at these in a review process?  They are gone, deleted, not active.  Well here is the response I got:

…Thank you for your email. I understand that you are concerned about deleted ads resulting in a policy warning. Please be assured that our policy team and I understand completely that the ads from 2007 that violated policies were later deleted.

Our policy team reviews accounts based on past disapprovals: the fact that you paused and deleted the ads from 2007 does not erase the fact that the ads were submitted and violated policies in 2007.

If our policy team did not look at all disapprovals, and only looked at undeleted disapproved ads, then it would create a situation where advertisers could violate policies and effectively delete the fact that they violated any policies.

Our policy team will look at the full history of an account when issuing suspension warnings as well. The fact that two years have elapsed since the violation does not remove the policy violation from our policy team's consideration….

Never mind, that this was 2 years ago,

Never mind that the ads have since been deleted

Never mind that there have not been not other since then

Apparently any disapproval you may received, just sits out there…forever and at any time, paused, deleted or not, you can be forced to pay for past sins.