Where the focus is everything about online marketing, including key business strategies, innovative marketing methods, effective online advertising techniques, emerging advertising trends in technology and much more.
Kellie Stevens wants to ensure that Affiliates get a fair shake, and that
often means taking on spyware giants.
Kellie Stevens is the president of AffiliateFair- Play.com, which is committed
to providing a better understanding and interpretation of the behaviors that
impact the affiliate marketing space. Stevens' goal is to create a fair
and competitive marketplace, and she does this by focusing on the actual behaviors
– not the technologies – leading to unfair competition and abuse
in the marketplace. Her tireless efforts, which started in 2000, have won her
the respect and affection of many in the industry as well as the ire of those
who are looking to skir t ethical practices. Regardless, Stevens vows to continue
her mission to provide the community with resources for striving toward fair
practices in affiliate marketing.
Lisa Picarille: What motivates you to find out who is using adware
or acting in an unethical manner?
Kellie Stevens: Many of the behaviors I research and document go beyond
just ethics. They are behaviors which I strongly feel impact negatively on the
affiliate marketing channel as a whole. Affiliates who are automatically redirecting
the merchant's own traffic (both organic and paid traffic) as their own
commissionable traffic, devalue the channel overall. Affiliate links showing
extensively in adware security companies have deemed that security risks have
contributed to blocked affiliate links and tracking cookies flagged as security
or privacy risks. This impacts on everyone. Those are just a couple of examples.
It's the overall impact on affiliate marketing, from a business perspective,
that is my main motivation.
LP: How did you get started pursuing those exhibiting bad behavior?
KS: Back then there was very little information available. Security
companies weren't researching these adware companies and their software.
You couldn't go to a security site and search their database. Only a few
people were even talking about how some affiliates were driving sales and revenue.
So I installed a few applications to see for myself. I began talking about what
I saw in the community. The day came when I had a couple of applications installed
on my computer and I went to my e-commerce site checking on a customer issue.
When I got to my shopping cart, I received a pop-up with a blatantly false message
encouraging the customer to buy a product from the adware company. That was
very personal. I contacted my State Attorney General's office and found
out they knew very little about adware, but they wanted to hear more. I talked
with them about six months later and they had a much better understanding; they
didn't like the practices at all but felt there were no existing laws in
place to prosecute. Things gradually evolved over time as I continued testing
for myself to understand what was going on out on the Internet and reporting
back to the community on a somewhat ad hoc basis.
LP: How much of your testing is done without being paid?
KS: When I first started, and for quite some time, it was all done
for free. As the demand for the information and my expertise grew, I gradually
increased the amount of time I spent doing research and reporting. I'm now
doing this full time, so of course it's not all for free now. I still try
to balance my time, providing some amount of information for free because the
issues are too important to the industry. I haven't sat down to put numbers
to how much of my activities are devoted to free content and revenue-generating
information.
LP: How much is consulting? And do you work with the big networks?
If so, how often?
KS: I do private consulting as well as the subscription service through
AFP. But again, I haven't sat down and put numbers to the time (hour-wise)
I devote to each area. I know I put in a lot of hours each week because there
is always something that needs addressing.
I don't disclose my clients' identities for confidential
reasons. I will say that over the years I have had contact and
dialogues with all the major affiliate networks to varying
degrees, whether that contact was paid or otherwise. I
always welcome the opportunity to discuss the issues facing
the industry, whether I completely agree with the
points of view or not. I have always appreciated when the
networks have approached me asking, "Kellie, what do
you think about…?" Dialogue is extremely important if
constructive change is to happen in the industry.
LP: Why do you think that there are individuals like yourself
who pursue adware folks, but that there are no formal entities to police these
rogue behaviors?
KS: There are probably many reasons. The idea of some type of formal
entity has been brought up several times. It's something I've had requested
of me on numerous occasions. In fact, I am continuously educating people that
AFP doesn't do any type of "certification." The largest stumbling
block to having some type of formal entity is probably the fact that as an industry
we have yet to come to a universally (or close to universal) accepted agreement
as to what behaviors are and are not acceptable. You have to define what you
will be policing before you can police.
LP: You are performing a very valuable service for the industry,
yet you seem to maintain a low profile. Why?
KS: I don't think I maintain a particularly low profile. I am out
and about in the community. I don't use my research findings to just sensationalize
and garner PR for myself. I think the information is too important to dilute
with such tactics. And doing so marginalizes my ability to bring about change
towards more fair business practices in the industry.
I have found that I have been more able to achieve
change by working quietly "behind the scenes" when it
comes to specific issues/incidents at times. Continued on Page 2...
Print
Email
Digg This
