In the print version of Revenue magazine we cover all the issues, trends, topics and news that are near and dear to the hearts of affiliates marketers and those in performance marketing. But when it comes this column, make no mistake, it’s all about me.

Hey, I have to weave together this collection of words twice a week, so every now and then I’m going to spew on about things that interest me. Honestly, some days it’s hard to come up with a column that is witty and worthwhile. Other days, I’m just overwhelmed by deadlines. This week, frankly, I’m just tired from seeing four live bands (Weezer, Snow Patrol, ColdPlay and Moby) in the span of 6 days. Don’t you hate work gets in the way of life? You can call me cranky pants today.

I’m extra cranky today because I was up late after arriving home last night a little after 11pm. I had a lot of Tivo’ed programs to watch – but most notably The Apprentice. It’s essential that I be up to date on a handful of the reality shows that I watch so that I don’t spoil the outcome as I go through my daily crawl of news sites and blogs, or when I’m listening to the radio in the car, instant messaging with my friends and chatting it up with co-workers.

The last thing I want is one the Revenue sale guys delivering the news that my favorite would-be apprentice or Idol singer got the boot the night before. And having to invoke the cone of silence or a full media blackout for the day is just not realistic.

So in order to get through show as fast as possible I skip all the commercials, however I often go the Web the next day to check out the companies that are shamelessly shilling throughout the show. I know, paid product placement is the correct term. Excuse me. Anyway, yesterday I received some information from Hitwise, which analyzed the traffic to the websites of sponsors for the current season of The Apprentice.

Hitwise found that, like me, there are an increasing number of consumers skipping commercials due to the popularity of digital video recorders. The Internet measurement firm claims that as reality TV product placement increases, advertisers should leverage the interactivity of the Web by employing this new type of cross-media advertising and promotion.

Hitwise’s data shows that the most successful episode thus far featured Dove Body Wash, and the market share of Internet visits to Dove.com increased 1,512 percent the week ending Feb. 12, 2005 versus the prior week. No thanks to Kristen. Traffic to Dove.com from search engines also increased during the week of the show; the level of Internet searches on the term ‘dove’ increased 1,062 percent for the week ending Feb. 12, 2005 versus the prior week.

In another episode, the show featured a link to Pontiac.com where users could pre-order the vehicle, contributing to a 180 percent increase in visits the week ending April 16, 2005 versus the prior week. In addition, the share of searches for the terms “pontiac solstice” and “pontiac” increased by 190 and 369 percent respectively, for the same week. That’s the episode where tobacco chewing Chris was finally fired.

This data shows that people will go to the Web from TV when there are “compelling” reasons to do so. I, apparently, am among those lemmings. At one of my previous jobs, I was responsible to help intergrate the TV and Web components of the company and we called these folks swivel potatoes.

And if you made it all the way through this column and thought, “what the heck is the connection between The Apprentice and affiliates?” Check out who spoke at LinkShare’s Executive Marketing Summit at the start of this year.

Finally, here are some handsome Revenue magazine honchos with The Apprentice first-season runner-up Kwame Jackson.

Now forget about The Apprentice and remember your Mom.