12clicks' Position On Cross Sales

Great job making a well-needed distinction clear for everyone

bravo, hope you get some biz out of it ;)

Great thread

Interesting read.

I think your posts are pretty awesome.

Obviously most surfers aren't like that. But I'm just saying...this isn't 1994 anymore and people ARE a lot more savvy than they were back then. They aren't dumbasses who don't bother to read. And even if they are in a hurry and don't read, they do have the ability to cancel and even get their money back.

There are two sides to every coin is all I'm trying to say.

Cross selling has been present in non-adult forever, even on TV through infomercial product ordering, even on your own credit card when you're a current customer.

As for this talk about porn site cross sales - I don't support deceptive cross sales.

On the other hand... seeing a prechecked cross sale on the join form above the signup button doesn't bother me if an affiliate program is PPS or paying 50-60% revshare per sale. Of course I want more money, but the reality of the situation is the affiliate program is paying a lot more. There are processing fees, content costs, technical costs, etc etc etc. If I'm getting 60%, and the affiliate program is getting 40%, well, they pay 10-15% for processing (let's say 15 for easy math) and that leaves them with 25% to use for other expenses before they see the profit.

Promoting a site through revshare, leaving the affiliate program with 25% of the sale to use on expenses before they see their profit, doesn't that make you wonder how long they might stay in business, or how long they'll keep updating the members area consistantly so your customers will continue to rebill?

seriously one of the funniest threads ever - a douche chill a minute - congrats to all who made it possible

What's a "douche chill"? Never heard that before.

Well said Steve:

What the hell are you talking about, cross sales are "accepted" in mainstream too. It is a common thing to screw someone over so stop whining

Thread filled with the same "screw the surfer" attitude people again, who would have thought

Great post!

stick to your own thread. This one is for business people not jumped up TGPers

That's it? Didn't we used to have all this fun years ago (AWI I guess)? When we always attacked you and you were so much more fun.

Preach on "Bro"

Anyone knows where I can get this bumper sticker: I support cross sales.

?

yup, and it's still the same old song from you. Trying to limit the money your submitters make by either telling them what links they can use, stopping they're exits, setting up bogus warnings against their sponsors.
You must spend your nights dreaming of ways to screw affiliates.
Sad really.

stopping they're exits? Whats that "bro"?

no bogus warnings either, they are actually telling the truth and just a waring for our surfers.

You're the man!!!

lol 12clicks writing about ethics

Arent cross sales in fact screwing affiliates since all that money goes to the program owner? Not like you are splitting the money with them

Are you serious?

sexy time 12clicks

Yes? Again I'm only talking about 50% revshare links

I second this ^^^^^my mouth even fell open after I read that post.


Uninformed and ready to take action. It's amazing.

Threads like these are fantastic. You have...


.... those kissing the ass of 12clicks because they make a few bucks cross selling to his horrific members areas, and can't figure out how to do it themselves.

.... those that think surfers need to be coddled and devoid of any personal responsibility to what they sign up to.

.... those that think affiliates should get credit for cross sales, with program reps with cross sales and MUCH worse laughing in their faces all the way to the bank. The same programs that are working day an night to take the affiliates traffic in the first place

.... those completely off topic screaming about tube sites in the middle of a cross sale thread, linking them together.



did I miss anything?

Oh yeah you can be objective.. oh wait whats this in your profile.. crosssellcash..

Yes, the board troll with his clueless interpretation of the world around him

Stating facts = trolling.


Excellent.

If a CCBILL revshare program has legit cross sales promoting their own sites, then the affiliates SHOULD get credit for it.
It is simple to setup with CCBILL and it makes an affiliate want to send more. The affiliates make more money from it and that is what it is all about for them.

WebCashMaker.com has clearly marked prechecked cross sales above the join button and we give our affiliates 50% credit for them.
Our affiliates are making more money with us now than they ever have.

If an affiliate is sending to a CCBILL revshare program and NOT getting credit for cross sales, they are screwing themselves out of money.

12clicks is a cheater

Its very quiet suddenly.

Still uniformed and now missing the boat. Amazing!

Please inform me

I pay more than 50%

You're now informed.

i agree with everything except the retention part. It can'thelp. You don't see Burger king ads inside McDonald's.

also any kind of cross sales has no place in a revshare program like mine, PPS yes, revshare no.

i don't think my affiliates would like that too much, in fact i know they wouldn't

Explain? Keep in mind he said he's talking about revshare only. Go ahead.

agree 1000%

Loryn,

Let me educate you.

Let's say for example you are my affiliate sending one of my revshare programs traffic. All is fine and dandy.

Now all of a sudden say I add some of 12 clicks cross sales..

Now all of a sudden you send a join and also say that join goes for the cross sales to 12clicks sites too.

Now you didn,t make any more money. I did.

Plus what's the chance of that member keeping a membership to my site, plus 12 clicks sites, plus whatever emails he sends them plus whatever up sells are in his members.

Your chances go down. Ray charles can see that.

If you think cross sales to 12 clicks sites is going to help your retention on yours and my members on my sites, then well, there is no sense in explaining it further.

especially when you are not making anything off it as an affiliate

I heart cross sales that are credited to the affiliate

Because it is based on the % of people that do not notice it or are to lazy to take the time and bother with it. Refunding all the ones that do is still worth it at the end of the day,

thanks for clearing that up!

BV, let me educate YOU

first of all, don't misrepresent how I operate. we do not email, upsell, extra sell, or in any other way touch the cross sale member. We let the recurring run and that is it.

second, since you've never cross sold you're simply in no position to state how it effects retention. you can guess at it, but you certainly have no stats to back up your claims

furthermore, cross sales help the revshare program survive in this down market. most revshare programs are small. small=less likely to survive. Now people can rail against cross sales all day long but I say more money goes into the affiliates' pocket when the program stays viable and does not go out of business. what is your cut of $0.00 in a 50/50 revshare?

Well, congrats that you don't email, upsell, extra sell and all that. Does that include no upsells in your members areas?

BUT you are a tad mistaken, I have experience with cross sales, as I have done them as far back as 2003, UNCHECKED cross sales that is.

BUT I only did them with reciprocating affiliates. Meaning traffic they sent they got an unchecked cross sale for one of their own sites. None of my normal affiliate traffic got the cross sale join forms.

As far as your last paragraph. You pulled that out of your ass.
What experience do you have running successful revshare sites?
I've done it for 10 years. I'd say I have plenty experience in that department. You can't say that can you?

NOW, Going back to my original post to Lauren (lets try to stick to that example) how are your cross sales on my site going to put more money in Lauren's pocket? Your logic is bullshit and biased towards your current business model.

Furthermore, it could even hurt me. Because if Lauren catches wind that I have cross sales on my site that she gets no credit for, there are 100's of other sites that she could choose from that do not. Hence I would lose an affiliate. or affiliates....

Very simple, this is not rocket science.

Your cross sales have no place on any revshare join form unless the affiliate gets credit in some way.

I'm sorry, that's just the way I do business. and I am still here going strong after 10 years and tons of changes in this biz.

Cheers,
BV

Most of what you have said on this thread is honest, well thought out and absolutely true. The quote as stated above is absolute bullshit at best. There are hundreds of paysite programs. The idea that they need cross-sales on RevShare links without any revenue going to their affiliates 'so that they can survive' is ridiculous. That logic leads to absurd conclusions like 'Wouldn't an affiliate rather have a sponsor who shaves them because it makes more money for the sponsor and therefore makes them a more stable entity for future sales that they can also shave?'

It is not the goal of any Sponsor Program to earn money for any affiliate. It is also not the goal of any affiliate to 'keep a Sponsor in business.' Affiliates and Sponsors have a mutual goal of making money from consumers. Nothing more, nothing less. When an affiliate does something that damages the Sponsor's income they are dealt with in exactly the same way that a Sponsor should be dealt with when doing things that damage the affiliate's income.

Being for xsells or against them can be sensible. Being willing to send traffic to a sponsor who does phenomenal ratios even though they are xselling the traffic and not paying out on that additional revenue may even make some sense in certain instances. However, the idea that an affiliate is better off letting a 'weak' sponsor pay them $12 a sale on a RevShare link while earning an extra $50 on xsells 'so that the sponsor can make money during these tough times'... because in the long run it's somehow better for the affiliate is absolutely laughable.

yes it does. How many more swings and misses would you like to take in my thread?

if you'd like to talk about unchecked cross sales, you should probably find a thread talking about them. this thread is about pre-checked cross sales (that you have zero experience with)
lets not pretend you can speak from any type of experience in this thread.

here's my last paragraph:
furthermore, cross sales help the revshare program survive in this down market. most revshare programs are small. small=less likely to survive. Now people can rail against cross sales all day long but I say more money goes into the affiliates' pocket when the program stays viable and does not go out of business. what is your cut of $0.00 in a 50/50 revshare?
which part did I pull out of my ass again? and which part do you need to run a revshare program to understand again?
I remember when you broke into this business and I'm happy to see you still here.

you never asked that question of Loryn. you simply used the post to attempt to trash my business model (with misleading examples of things I don't do.
so as you say (lets try to stick to that example)

The only bullshit is you coming into this thread and pretending your unbiased. you're business model is being eaten alive by PPS with the help of cross sales so you're in here trying to protect the ever shrinking turf of 50/50 revshare.



all because you say so. why not also throw in there that members area upsells have no place on a revshare program and that any member's mailings you earm money off of must be shard with affiliates, and if you get a bandwidth break from your host you should split that with your affiliates.

you see, BV, you can SAY anything but its nothing more than your opinion.
Personally, I think the fair solution should be to give the affiliates a larger % of the revshare.
But thats merely my opinion as well

having never run or been associated with a program of any kind, I understand your confusion.
you come from the point of view that a revshare program should share EVERYTHING with the affiliate.
Its a misguided point of view that has fooled many.
does the affiliate share in the cost of producing the website? No
does the affiliate share in the cost of the processing fees? No
does the affiliate share in the cost of the hosting fees? No
does the affiliate share in the cost of the employees needed to run the program? NO
so you see, its NOT a true 50/50 revshare, its just called that.
the program owner is absolutely entitled to make money thats not shared beyond the price of membership and rebills.

Just want to point out that most of my ccbill sponsors do split the fees.. and having to pay employees? plenty of programs can run without an affiliate manager

Its funny how people seem to think 12clicks opinion matters. He runs a shitty sponsor program that nobody pushes with some bargain content from the 90's.

I can have 10 sites like that by tomorrow. Plus he talking about ethics is the funnies thing i read all week. Everyone who knows his history knows exactly what im talking about. We all know how me made his money back then. And well all know the only sales he does know is surfers clicking crossells because noone in his right mind would sign up for his sites if he actually saw them.

Plus the best evidence what a clueless clown he is is his program and site names. The guy is so full of himself he uses his name for surfer sites. Can you fucking believe that? Can you imagine the 3 accidental visitors he gets per day when they read the site title. 12xbigcocks.com Lets say hes really fucking drunk and by accident thinks about signing up and then thinks twice about the site title and figures there are only 12 movies inside and moves on

12clicks is a joke and so is this thread. Lets discuss it with a real program owner. Not some idiot with a massive ego, a shitty program and a very shady past.

Hey cybermike...there are some fees that they are not splitting with you. When a chargeback occurs you lose the money you made off the sale. So if it was a $34 revshare sale, and a chargeback happens...then you get $17 deducted from your affiliate pay. But that's NOT sharing the fees like you might think.

On the paysite end...the paysite gets charged $55 on TOP of their half that they lose when the chargeback occurs AND don't forget the $6 to $7 in processing fees in the beginning. So when a chargeback happens you don't split anything. It's all the paysite owners' risk and loss. And that doesn't even get into the hosting and paying to either produce (as I do) or buy (as many others do) content. Plus man hours building the site and updating the site.

I've been an affiliate for over 10 years (I was ampland.com until Nov. of 2006 and I'm still grampland.com and shavedgoat.com) and I have never expected to make anything other than my share of the website that I sold a membership to. I'm not saying that my opinion of it should over-ride yours. I'm just saying that I have always worked as an affiliate to make revshare (and I have NEVER asked for more than 50% like Freeones did). I feel that 50% of a sale is MORE than generous and is far more than the 3 to 5% that mainstream pays.

As a paysite owner...I can tell you right now that I put 100 times more hours and effort into the paysite than I ever did or do as a TGP owner. I still run 4 TGP's by hand...and over the years I've gotten good enough at it that I can maximize my time down to about 3 hours of work a day to do all 4 of them. The paysite, on the other hand is an 8 to 10 hour a day job everyday. If I'm not shooting, or talent scouting, or editing, or printing and filing paperwork (model releases, id, in triplicate, and then shipping one copy out to another location), or updating, or working on photos, then I'm probably doing support.

It's a LOT of work. And I think I earn every penny I make at it. Especially compared to the amount of work I do as an affiliate which isn't even close. And "no" I don't run bullshit tgps'. My shit is a labor of love with a lot of stuff that I built and maintain: Check out http://www.grampland.com/mmpage.html and you will see what I mean.

My opinion is...as an affiliate I expect to do revshare. I don't expect 70, 80, and 90%. I am grateful for 50% revshare of the site I SOLD. Nothing more, nothing less.

As a paysite owner I expect to pay out to my affiliates 50% of the sale to my paysite. They get $17.49 After I pay the processing fee, I get $11.38 After all my work, risk, and expense. Anything after that that I do to monetize my site is my business.

I'm the one who has to eat any chargeback. I'm the one who eats the processing fee. I'm the one at risk of the govt. kicking in my door to "inspect" my 2257 files. I'm the one who bought 30 grand worth of gear and software to film, light, edit, and produce the site. And I'm the one who hosts the whole thing.

If I can make more than $11.38 it makes me a happy person.

And think about this...IF that sale chargesback...Then I lose my $11.38. Plus I lost the processing fee (they don't give that back). So I'm out of my half. THEN I lose $55 more dollars on top of that!

And here's another fee that you may not have thought about and that you do not share in: Declines. If you send a surfer and they try to sign up, but their card isn't accepted for any reason...I get charged for a "decline". Don't know if you're aware of that or not.

Anyway, I'm not trying to argue. I'm just trying to show you what it's like on the paysite side. I know as an affiliate for all these years, I always thought the paysite owners were greedy scumbags. But I didn't understand what it's like on this side until I did it myself.

Now I can see both sides pretty clearly.

Don't see why people would bash freeones. Sure he may hurt his submitters, but it's his site, his rules. Those rules have helped build his site up to a top 300 alexa site (and more traffic than just about anyone here can boast). Some sites rely on returning traffic (such as Freeones), while others don't. Just different styles.

And I agree with the original post on cross sales. However, some sites don't promote those sites because of the return visitor issue.

great post Robbie