Prospecting: Teach an Old Trade New (and Not so New) Tricks

“We carry several thousand SKUs,” says Craig Flax, vice president of marketing at art supplies cataloger FLAX art & design. “So we concentrate our efforts on the most important products. Done right, optimization of the copy is subtle enough not to look obvious or to upset its selling ability.”

NOT Working: Set ’em and forget ’em affiliate programs. Put half a dozen catalogers in a room and you can start a fight over whether affiliate programs are worthwhile. But even the most fervent advocates insist that you must keep a close eye on your program. Otherwise, it’s quite possible that a subset of your affiliates will be bidding on your brand keywords, posing as your company or even sending spam e-mails.