I spent all day yesterday at the LinkShare Partnership Summit here in chilly San Francisco.

As usual, the folks at LinkShare put on a top-notch event. It was the fourth LinkShare Partnership Summit (the second held in SF). The sold-out event featured six very informative sessions, a cadre of high-caliber merchants and affiliates (LinkShare claims there was a 1-to-1 ratio of merchants to affiliates) and even more networking opportunities this time around.

The previous day was comprised of workshops for merchants and affiliates that focused on learning specific LinkShare technologies and more about its service offerings. Attendees told me those sessions were hugely valuable. However, many on the merchant side joked that they were envious of the constant stream of laughter emanating from the affiliate training rooms. The event concludes today with a special charter bus trip to the Napa Valley wine country for selected VIPs.

For me the event really was about the networking. It was great to catch up with many people I hadn’t seen in some time. In many cases some faces were familiar, but the people had changed jobs. I also got to meet some new folks doing new and interesting things.

Plus, it’s always good to get some sense as to where one of the largest players in the performance networking space is heading (LinkShare’s RSS syndication is now up and running in Japan and coming to the U.S. this year, and new international LinkShare offices will open in 2007). LinkShare President Steve Denton did a good job of putting that all in context.

The theme of the conference was Innovation and that was the focus of the keynote from Michael Schrage. His talk was thought-provoking and everyone I spoke with afterward seemed to embrace something they could do nearly immediately to spur innovation within their own business.

The biggest takeaway from the keynote seemed to be that innovation is not what companies do, but rather what customers adopt, and that innovation is the conversion of novelty into value. However, that value doesn’t necessarily need to be monetary.

I’m not going to get into detail about the other three sessions that I attended since super-affiliate Vinny Lingham blogged about most of the same sessions.

My only beef with the event was that there was no coffee at any of the many networking breaks between sessions. That meant I did much of my networking in the coffee line at Starbucks downstairs in the hotel. I only go to Starbucks in an emergency (I’m a Peet’s gal) but like many other attendees I was desperate for some java.

However, LinkShare was redeemed at the end of the day at the evening cocktail reception by providing a great spread of beverages and food that included delightful fare from San Francisco’s most famous dim sum place – Yank Sing. And in my book, fabulous Dau Miu Gow and delicious Siu Mye trump a cup of hotel coffee anyday.

Next stop: Affiliate Summit. See you all in Vegas, baby. lisap@revenuetoday.com