Hopefully everyone is aware of the A4U Expo in Amsterdam in April, Existem’s first foray on to the continent. The agenda looks really good and I thought I’d pick out a few potential highlights for the first day.
Day 1 – 9.30
i-level‘s very own Judith Lewis opens up on the first morning. Judith’s always worth listening to and she promises me that this is going to be a good one.
I’d be interested in what Irfon from Coull has to say about performance based video, as although it seems a great idea I’ve never seen very many affiliates actually use it.
Also the talk on conversion and persuasion optimistaion looks really interesting. I always hold affiliates up as masters of conversion and so it will be interesting to see what’s occurring.
Day 1 – 11am
I’ve never seen Joost speak but I’m reliably informed by many people that he is brilliant, and as you can tell my WordPress skills could do with some improvement.
The second one that looks fascinating at this time is the eBay presentation. The bit that stands out is when they say they will be discussing “how not all affiliate sales are created equal, driving incremental traffic and measuring quality”. This is something that we are looking at on behalf of several merchants and will be good to see if a giant such as eBay’s experiences match what we’ve seen.
Day 1 – 12.30
The highlight of the conference – maybe… I’m on with a presentation called “Is Affiliate Marketing Really Worthwhile?” Hopefully you all know the answer already but that’s no excuse not to come along. This is predominantly a session aimed at merchants who are looking to understand what they should be looking to achieve from their affiliate campaign.
I’ll be looking at how affiliate marketing is no longer “one size fits all”, how to differentiate between different types of affiliates and how to get the most effective return on investment from your affiliate activity.
Day 1 – 2pm
I think the talk by Mark Simpson at Maxymyser looks really interesting. Improving your conversion rate is one of the easiest ways of increasing your revenue, for both affiliates and merchants, and so looking at how content can improve conversion sounds like something worth paying attention to.
Day 1 – 3pm
Dan from CJ is speaking with Dave Harding from Argos on what looks as though it will be a case study on how Argos have developed a continually successful affiliate campaign. Argos is a campaign that I often hold up as an example of a company that have embraced the affiliate channel and made it work so this should be a great session.
Day 1 – 4.30pm
Two sessions really stand out here. Firstly Alicia’s session on optimising Social Media. A lot of brands and affiliates have looked at how to take advantage of social media, with limited success to date. Alicia’s Skimlinks is a great technology, which I’m sure she’ll mention, and Miss Navarro is sure to give you some excellent ideas to go away with.
Finally, Hero’s voucher code session will be worth attending. As Chair of the IAB’s Affiliate Council, I’ve been getting very involved with the whole voucher code channel over the past couple of months and whilst it is still a bit of a grey area, there are excellent opportunities for brands to deliver valuable incremental sales through the voucher/coupon channel. Hero knows her onions so I recommend this session for any merchants who are unsure about how they can capitalise on the coupon craze.
If this has piqued your interest and you want to book here’s a link
Day 2 preview to follow…
