We have now added support for the Google Affiliate Network on ECU, and have added their merchants which have product feeds.

Once you have joined Google Affiliate Network, you will find your publisher ID in the top right hand corner of the affiliate platform. You need to insert this onto our My Details page (minus the K) in order for your links to track, and so that you can select products from their merchants. A handy feature, is that if you already have an Adsense account, then things are made simpler, all your commissions are paid to you via Adsense.

Merchants we’ve added to ECU:

Best Bathrooms
Toys R US
Crooked Tongues
Skechers UK
Cheapsuites.co.uk
Perfume Click
Duracell Direct UK
Into the Blue
uk.foto.com
Hudson reed
Golf gear Direct
My Tool Shed

If there’s a demand, we’ll add this network to our US platform. If this would be of use, please let us know in a support ticket.

We have been really busy behind the scenes at ECU HQ over the past couple of months completing various housekeeping jobs which were in real need of doing. This resulted in a lockdown yesterday, so that we could roll these functions out to the live platform. This is mostly complete, we worked hard to make sure that everything worked after the upgrade, however if you do notice a bug, please let us know on a support ticket.

So what did we do?

Well the boring bit for you guys at least, is a complete rebuild of our entire platform. Since first releasing ECU we have added over 100 features/functions/requests which have all been ‘bolted on’ to the platform. By rebuilding from the ground up, we have been able to integrate all these, thus cleaning the code which has resulted in a much quicker, resource friendly platform.

This, we hope will provide stability and expansion to allow for new features and functions.

We have rolled out a few new features which we hope you will like:

Stats

An area which we have been lacking in is the stats area. Well, we have given this a make over, and included some useful information. You can now see at a glance your top 10 units by impression, by clicks and impression to click. All of these are clickable to drill down to daily totals. We have lots more planned for the stats area which will be rolled out shortly.

My Units Page

My Units page has had a make over too, with groups collapsible on load, making the page quicker, and easier to navigate. You can now also use the search function to search by unit ID number, making it easier to find a specific unit.

Vouchers/Offers

We have been beta testing a new vouchers and offers platform, which has been successful, so we have decided to open it up to the masses. It’s in public beta at the moment, and so is available to everyone, it will likely become a Pro feature when it exits beta (not this side of Christmas). We’re happy as always to take on your suggestions and recommendations and will try our best to accommodate. Send in requests via a support ticket please.

Coming soon

merchant reporting, API, unit display enhancements and more!

Updated for 2012.

Back by popular demand is our Best Price Toy Unit, which features the Dream Toys of 2012. We will update this unit daily with the best price/availability found from a selection of top toy merchants as listed in the box below. Please note we have updated last years unit, so if it’s still on your site, we have now updated it to show this year’s products, and there’s nothing more for you to do.

Please make sure you’re signed up to all the toy merchants to ensure your links will work:

*Toyday via Webgains
*Smyths via Linkshare
Character Online via AffWin
Hamleys via AffWin
John Lewis via AffWin
Play.com via AffWin
thetoyshop via AffWin (Search for The Entertainer)
ToysRus via AffWin
Tesco Direct via TD (otherwise known as tesco.com)
Mail Order Express via Webgains
Argos via CJ
Amazon
Asda via AffWin
Sainsburys via AffWin
Woolworths via AffWin
Very via AffWin

*These are new for this year, make sure you are signed up.

Remember you can style this unit any way you like, and we’ll control the products for you. So if you want a skyscraper unit, you can change the width/layout so that it fits, you can change the colours, and also what is shown on the unit. To add the unit to your account, visit this link and follow the instructions.

Here’s an example of the unit:

If you need any help, please let me know, and I will be happy to help out.

Lakeland are excited to announce a new competition for our content affiliates to demonstrate the best use of Easy Content Units. We’re offering 3 x £50 Lakeland gift vouchers plus a 2% commission increase for 3 months to the 3 best uses of Easy Content Units

How the competition works
To enter the competition simply email a screenshot or URL to affiliates@navigatedigital.com showing a live content unit on your site. Three winners will then be selected each receiving a commission increase and Lakeland gift voucher.

The competition closes on the 30th November any entries after this day will not be included. Winners will be contacted by the 7th December.

If you feel your site is relevant to Lakeland and you are not signed up to the program please email affiliates@navigatedigital.com to discuss working with us.

Here’s our best sellers managed unit which you may like to add to your account, and put on your website, and forget about it. Managed units are updated by us, so that they always feature the top selling products, which you can add to your account, and style in anyway you choose to fit in with the theme of your site:

Click here to add this unit to your account.

Maybe you’d like to create your own? To give you a little inspiration, we’ve put together the following units:

This one showing off a range of speciality cookware:

Or maybe this one for making cupcakes:

Easy Content Units has teamed up with KJ Beckett to offer affiliates a chance to win £250 worth of designer accessories packed into an Oakley bag!!!! Simply promote any www.kjbeckett.com product or products using Easy Content Units and get your links live by the 31st of November to go into an Easy Content Units / KJ Beckett draw to win the prize!

The winner will be selected at random. All you need to do is simply link to KJ Beckett using Easy Content Units on your site and send KJ Beckett’s affiliate manager (Liam) an email at affiliatemanager@kjbeckett.com with the URL address of where you are promoting KJ Beckett.

Stuffed into in the Oakley bag (worth £100) are prizes including… a French Connection wallet, Burlington socks, Simon Carter cufflinks, a Rip Curl beanie hat, Tateossian money clip and much much more! All the prizes would make perfect presents this Christmas.

KJ Beckett have over 7,000 products from 100s of brands making them ideal to promote via Easy Content Units. They also offer customers free UK shipping and returns, as well as the lowest international rates (from £1.50). They offer affiliates a market leading 11% base commission (increasing to 14%), a 90 day cookie, and have a great conversion rate (which peaks at Christmas), so great commission can be earned… so why not get promoting KJ Beckett now?

There’s even a managed unit which is regularly updated with our best selling products for you to use. Just add it to your account, and customize it, pop it on your site, and forget about it.

You’ll find KJ Beckett on Webgains, which means that free members can add their products to any of your content units, and know that your ID will be used all of the time, 100% commission for you!

The Gift Experience have released their Christmas incentive, which offers our members a special bonus.

Incentive:

We are offering a tiered incentive scheme based on the sales value you can generate, running through November and December.

• Everyone starts on 10% commission – Include The Gift Experience products in your ECUs and you will start at 11% commission
• Once you have generated £1000 you start earning 11%
• Once you have generated £3000 you start earning 12%
• Once you have generated £6000 you start earning 13%
• Once you have generated £10,000 you start earning 14%
• Once you have generated £15,000 you start earning 15%

You will need to inform Steve (details below) that you are using ECU and show him a unit on your site to be added to the 11% tier.

Managed Units:

There are a number of Managed Units available for The Gift Experience which you could use on your site.  Remember all our managed units are updated by the merchant, and can be styled to completely integrate with your site.  Here are some of the units you could choose from, if you’re signed into ECU, simply tick to add to your account, then edit them to your liking:

The Top Christmas Unit:

About the Program:

Network: Webgains – Find out more on their  Program Page

Affiliate Manager:

Steve Yates
email: steve@thegiftexperience.co.uk
msn: Steveyates1981@googlemail.com

Marks and Spencer (via Affiliate Window) are running a special incentive for content affiliates, which as most of our members are, I thought would be worth a special mention. In particular they are offering £50 gift cards for the best features or articles on their products or ranges.

This incentive involves creating a page/article featuring any of their products or ranges, and emailing (sandra.oconnor@affiliatewindow.com) a screenshot or URL to the page. They will select 3 of the best to win the £50 gift card each.

With ECU this will make things a lot easier for you, not only will you be able to show off their products to their full potential, but in a stylish way too. Couple this with your own content, and I am sure you have a winning entry. With over 16000 products, I am sure you will find some way to include Marks & Spencer products within your site.

There are other categories to enter too, including most improved affiliate, best new affiliate and Most Creative affiliate as well as top performing affiliate too, each will reecive a gift card as a prize.

Here’s some ideas for you to create your units:

Lego Range:

Boys Clothing Skyscraper:

Kenwood Selection:

Good luck with your entries! Email Sandra O’Connor with your screen shots and URLs to enter for this affiliate competition – sandra.oconnor@affiliatewindow.com

You have until 19th August to get your entries in

I have had many questions about how this effects users of Easy Content Units, so I thought I’d write a quick post about it.

Over the coming month(s), buy.at merchants will be migrating to the Affiliate Window platform. Switching of networks is usually a right royal PITA, but hats off to Affiliate Window, they have spent time developing a neat little tool, which means there’s very little affiliates need to do to – however there is one thing, and that is to map your Buy.at handle with your Affiliate Window account. Once this is done, you will not need to do anything else, their migration tool, ensures your buy.at links continue to track in your Affiliate Window reports – simples.

Here’s the step by step to ‘Mapping’ your accounts.

• Log into Buy.at
• Click on Affiliate Window
• Click on Mappings
• Enter your AffWin account details
• Link the accounts
• Job Done

You will notice that those merchants for which migration has started, will appear on the mappings page, and it will show their progress, until they are fully mapped and tested, when it will confirm that the process is complete.

Very simple process, thanks to Affiliate Window who put in a lot of development time, to ensure a smooth transition for affiliates!

As for ECU, in the short term we will be adding the programs via Affiliate Window, so that new products added to units will come through the new network, however existing products will continue to work fine through the Buy.at tracking.

We have been busy rewriting various areas of ECU, the first to get a public airing is our new Search. We appreciate, that our search has been fairly slow at times to look through all 13 million products, with this new rewrite, you should see significant speed improvements.

In addition to the cosmetic differences, the new engine will load your results, all of them, and then allow you to move between pages, adding products, without recalling the search, which speeds up the unit creation/edit process considerably.

We have also added a couple of new filters into the mix, which will help you narrow down the products for your units.

Keep an eye out for future developments coming soon.

Thanks for your patience!

A selection of Managed Units have just gone live covering these two exciting brands available via Webgains. You can choose from Best selling products, most reviewed or top picks for each of the brands. The units will be updated regularly by the affiliate manager, ensuring you are always displaying the best selling products on your site.

Remember with our managed units, you can style the units in any way that you like, with the merchant controlling the products for you, a simple case of put up and forget creative.

Hawkins Bazaar:

Letterbox:

Example of Letterbox Managed Unit:

If you want to contact the affiliate manager with any questions, here’s the contact details:

Letterbox: affiliates@letterbox.co.uk
Hawkins Bazaar: affiliates@hawkin.com

If you have any questions on our Managed Units, please contact us.