Hello, I am working for a fashion e-tailer. The business was recently sold for a second time and I'm working with the new owner to revive a neglected affiliate program.
Background if interested: I actually worked hand-in-hand with the original owners since about 2004. We went from an idea to a multi-million dollar e-commerce store. Started with Commission Junction in 2008 and sales skyrocketed. I managed all of their marketing efforts until late 2012 when they sold their business (it was planned: build it up and sell it). They decided to partner with the new company instead of an outright sale. The new company was big and owned many online e-commerce stores. They moved from hands-on management to automation. Everything began a downward spiral until now. It was sold for peanuts to a new owner. So, I left in 2012 and am now back in 2016 trying to help the new owner bring it all back including a once thriving affiliate program.
As of now, the retailer is using two networks, Commission Junction and Pepperjam.
I'm going through trying to make heads or tails of what happened. Looks like all of our old relationships with shopping sites are dead and most of the tiny amount of sales left are from affiliates such as FatWallet, Ebates and the like.
Questions:
1) CJ and Pepperjam? Is this redundant? I'm tempted to recommend cutting ties with Pepperjam and going back to what worked in the first place.
2) Untangling the Mystery: I'm trying to prepare a picture of the current program. Aside from outlining a historical performance from each network, do you recommend anything else to get an idea of the current state of the program? (We are getting little help from the previous owner.)
If anyone has experience taking over an existing affiliate program with little information, I would love to hear how you did it! I do have a history but with a four-year gap.
Background if interested: I actually worked hand-in-hand with the original owners since about 2004. We went from an idea to a multi-million dollar e-commerce store. Started with Commission Junction in 2008 and sales skyrocketed. I managed all of their marketing efforts until late 2012 when they sold their business (it was planned: build it up and sell it). They decided to partner with the new company instead of an outright sale. The new company was big and owned many online e-commerce stores. They moved from hands-on management to automation. Everything began a downward spiral until now. It was sold for peanuts to a new owner. So, I left in 2012 and am now back in 2016 trying to help the new owner bring it all back including a once thriving affiliate program.
As of now, the retailer is using two networks, Commission Junction and Pepperjam.
I'm going through trying to make heads or tails of what happened. Looks like all of our old relationships with shopping sites are dead and most of the tiny amount of sales left are from affiliates such as FatWallet, Ebates and the like.
Questions:
1) CJ and Pepperjam? Is this redundant? I'm tempted to recommend cutting ties with Pepperjam and going back to what worked in the first place.
2) Untangling the Mystery: I'm trying to prepare a picture of the current program. Aside from outlining a historical performance from each network, do you recommend anything else to get an idea of the current state of the program? (We are getting little help from the previous owner.)
If anyone has experience taking over an existing affiliate program with little information, I would love to hear how you did it! I do have a history but with a four-year gap.
