BIZ THREAD: Good House Keeping Seal of Approval Type Company for Affiliate Programs?
I was reading another board where the age old question of trust came up again regarding the programs you promote.
In an ideal world, these wouldn't be issues but obviously we don't live or work in Utopia!
10+ years in, and this is still an unregulated/unchecked business based on trust. With that comes great opportunity and also a lot of potential unscrupulous activity and shady business practices.
Whether you should or shouldn't, webmasters have to trust you are getting all their clicks and signups counted just like you trust that 6 minute long distance phone call isn't being charged at 11 minutes by the phone company or you weren't over charged and under pumped at the gas station.
Having people like XXXJay and Marc from hoes.com reveal their stats and create processes for their own checks and balances is good for them and also a nice public service which is appreciated by many ... but still, it doesn't allow for you to KNOW you aren't getting shaved or "SoAndSoCash.com" has all of their 2257 in order.
Truth is, there's obviously no checks and balances and no well known, widely respected third-party "good house keeping seal of approval" type companies that can audit and monitor Affiliate programs and reliably report that "SoAndSoCash.com" is completely clean, has all 2257 in order, counts all clicks and signups and has a record of paying on time every time since XYZ year.
I was reminded that there was once a company that did provided such services for a couple affiliate companies - but I don't remember their name and it seems they've vanished due to lack of participation by program owners ... if I?m not mistaken.
Someone that can convince site owners and webmasters that they can BE THAT right now/TODAY will have a great business model on their hands and help foster the trust that seems to be lacking among many.
Problem is, program owners aren't going to hand over their data and open up their processes to a third party company like that for a number of reasons, IMHO.
What do you think?
In an ideal world, these wouldn't be issues but obviously we don't live or work in Utopia!
10+ years in, and this is still an unregulated/unchecked business based on trust. With that comes great opportunity and also a lot of potential unscrupulous activity and shady business practices.
Whether you should or shouldn't, webmasters have to trust you are getting all their clicks and signups counted just like you trust that 6 minute long distance phone call isn't being charged at 11 minutes by the phone company or you weren't over charged and under pumped at the gas station.
Having people like XXXJay and Marc from hoes.com reveal their stats and create processes for their own checks and balances is good for them and also a nice public service which is appreciated by many ... but still, it doesn't allow for you to KNOW you aren't getting shaved or "SoAndSoCash.com" has all of their 2257 in order.
Truth is, there's obviously no checks and balances and no well known, widely respected third-party "good house keeping seal of approval" type companies that can audit and monitor Affiliate programs and reliably report that "SoAndSoCash.com" is completely clean, has all 2257 in order, counts all clicks and signups and has a record of paying on time every time since XYZ year.
I was reminded that there was once a company that did provided such services for a couple affiliate companies - but I don't remember their name and it seems they've vanished due to lack of participation by program owners ... if I?m not mistaken.
Someone that can convince site owners and webmasters that they can BE THAT right now/TODAY will have a great business model on their hands and help foster the trust that seems to be lacking among many.
Problem is, program owners aren't going to hand over their data and open up their processes to a third party company like that for a number of reasons, IMHO.
What do you think?
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