Aden Mott talks about Affiliate Marketing, Music, Celebrities & World News.

We just got back from our first trip to Las Vegas, Nevada for Affiliate Summit 2009.  Thank you much to Shawn Collins and Missy Ward for throwing yet another great event.

Overall I would have to say that the last day of the event was the most useful to me.  I was able to actually get some alone time with a few of the people that I came to talk to and I made a few new connections.

Most disappointing was that we missed the first day on Sunday and by Monday, everybody was hungover and tired and all of the affiliate managers I was hoping to meet with and talk to were not in the right state of mind. For once, I did not go to the conference to party but to work.

Now that we are home, we are swamped with ideas and luckily I only have my business card out to about 10 people who I hope to speak with therefore limiting the number of harassing calls from networks trying to steal my business.

The event was great but I am not so sure about Vegas.  I can say that I am not a fan and it is not what I expected.  We had a blast hanging with Justin and Jonathan on Tuesday night and our hotel at the Venetian was beautiful.

See some of you at AdTech in April!  Enjoy the photos from the Summit below.

Its been 1.5 years since I have updated my version of wordpress.

I have installed the moneymaker theme from the guys at uniqueblogdesigns.com and am going to be having it customized to the colors I like from my last blog, as well as some other neat things.

Seems everyone is changing their blogs so its about time i jumped on it.

Hopefully I can have it customized and my logo designed in time for ASW .

This is my first post of 2009 so I figured that I would write about a priority goal this year and about mistakes I made last year and will never make again in this affiliate marketing industry.

2008 was the best year for me in this industry.  Mostly from PPC. I discovered how to use contextual advertising to its best while spending small amounts in my CPC.  I learned that if you are running on search and you NAIL a great ad copy, you will get a killer quality score and cheaper clicks and then you expand.

Up until about a month ago, I was using tracking software that someone had made for me when I started in the industry.  It was custom, outdated but it had worked wonders for me while it lasted.  Soon enough I bit the bullet and tried out Prosper202 because of all of the hype I heard.  It is probably one of the best tools I have ever seen offered to affiliates for FREE.  If you are an affiliate and you need good tracking then I suggest you install this tool.  If you cannot figure out how to use prosper then you can use the Tracking202 for free as well. It is web based and so simple that any idiot could figure it out.

2008 was great for me but 2009 needs to be better. Affiliate Summit East is coming up this weekend in Las Vegas and Jon and I are excited to go.  I need to expand on my ideas and meet some new people and make some new ideas.  I will never discuss how much I earn per year, or how much I made last year but it was key to achieving every goal I had last year and to help me start my new ones this year.

I have been digging around with the idea of media buying. That is something that is in the works and it takes a chunk of change (minimum of 10k with many of the big wigs such as myspace).  That is pocket change to some people I know in this industry and to others, its a gamble.  My goal is to get this rolling while maintaining my PPC efforts and staying up to date with the newest info and software.  I fell out of the loop in 2008 when I stopped being interactive with the forums and my friends in this industry.  It was still a great year for me, but it could have been better if i figured out things like Prosper SOONER.

One key mistake I made in 2008 which I cannot express to people enough.  If you are new in this industry then you need to make sure that you sign up with TRUSTED networks.  Do some research before you go off throwing your money into a company that is going to screw you in the end. By screwing, I mean shaving leads, stealing your keywords and then “attemptin” to keep your money.

It happened to me with 2 networks in 2008.  One is CJ as I wrote about earlier this year and the other I will not say because it was part of the deal in me getting paid.  What happened was a great campaign popped up on the network. It was one that I had experience in with its niche so I knew I would kill it.  I did amazing with it, about $30k in the few weeks it was active.  Once day I was told that I needed to take down the site, stop promoting it, etc because I was bidding on keyword that the advertiser did not “like” (they had nothing to do with trademark).  I took down the site and waited and to make a long story short, it took me 8 months to get my final payment.

The offer was pulled from the network because they did not comply with the advertisers rules OR put any of the TOS in the campaign for the affiliates to see. In turn, they tried to place blame on the affiliates and hold $$.

The worst part of all of this…. Which pisses me off to no end and I am sure it has happened to many other affiliates that I know…  The keywords that were converting for me that the advertiser demand I stop promoting..

Since the very next day that I took down my site and stopped promoting with those keywords, THE ADVERTISER WHO ASKED ME TO STOP HAS BEEN BIDDING ON THOSE VERY KEYWORDS.

They stole from me. From my idea, unique.  Its sad but it happens.  Which is one point to everybody that you should mask your keywords so that nobody knows them but you.

It has been almost 3 years for me in this business. I love it. My goal is to keep at this in 2009 alongside the other business Jon and I plan on opening and make this a prosperous year. In my 3 years I have worked with probably over 20 networks and I have to say that out of all of them the people at Copeac and Advaliant have been the best.  Danielle at Copeac and Alla from Advaliant have been amazing.  All of the other employees inside their companies including Eddie from Copeac have been informative and helpful in getting me what I need when I need it instead of blowing me off like some other networks do. That is what being a real affiliate manager is all about.

It has been a series of months since I have written anything on here. I figured it best that I wait until I had time to recap and reflect on how great of a year this has been for me instead of trying to cram it all in during the insanity of the holidays.

The beginning of the year started out new as it tends to for me. I moved from my apartment in Cranston, RI to another more modest one near Providence, RI because of problems I was having with a crazy landlord. It was a good start. Within 3 weeks I had found a great PPC campaign that I was running on Google Adwords & YSM and it started to make me a killing with my finances.

February 2008 was the month that would change everything for me. I had my first $1k earning in a single day having spent only $50 in advertising on Google Adwords. It was a great campaign but it was not run properly from the network and the merchant pulled it. I have learned that THIS HAPPENS. No good offer will stay the same forever so you need to make sure that you have another one that works for you or another network to run it on.

During the first week of Feb, I met the man of my dreams. Who would have thought this would happen to me? I had been through hell and back with putting my trust into people that were not the ones meant for me and I guess the karma paid off for me. Jon and I could not be happier and I plan on spending the rest of my time on this planet with him. He is the best person I have ever met.

We spent every waking moment together aside from when Jon had to go to work m-f 9-5 and then I went to San Fransisco for AdTech. This was the first time we had been apart for so long and it only showed that something real was going on. When I got home we decided to go on a vacation which did not turn out as great as we had hoped and then we got down to business.

Jon had to decide which college he was going to for grad school. I told him that I would leave Rhode Island and go (almost) anywhere with him. I fell in love and figured that if he were leaving, then I would be leaving with him. He decided on Washington University in St. Louis, MO and he would be attending for law.

I had never been to Missouri but I researched it and we started looking at homes to buy. After months of applying for loans and getting finances and paperwork together it almost failed. We could MORE than afford the house, in fact it would be cheaper than what I have EVER paid in rent and utilities on the east coast but the fact that we were both now “self employed” and Jon being a student, the banks were not liking it.

In the end, it all worked out. We got the house in July and moved in August. Right around the beginning of July Jon has asked me if I would marry him. Earlier in the year I had given him a commitment ring just to show him that I was serious but I never intended on marriage and I also never really cared for gay marriage. The whole topic bothered me a bit because I always thought that it was pointless unless you lived in a state where it was recognized or legal.

My opinions changed once it was done. I think that because he is the first person I have ever been with whom I have really been IN LOVE with. That came and went and we have since moved here to Missouri.

The first few months were depressing for me. I missed my friends and my family. I had never spent such a long time away from New England and never lived anywhere but MA and RI. Jon had lived in Canada for years when he was going for his Bachelors Degree so it was not something new for him. So I concentrated on the house. We came up with so many plans and ideas and have been working on them ever since.

I never thought that I would be able to gut out an entire wall of a bathroom, install new drywall and then tile. Well, I figured it out and did a great job! We have been replacing many of the appliances which has become fun. I never thought I would be excited to have a new front load washing machine or a refrigerator with an ice dispenser and fresh filtered water but I was.

Jon deferred school for a year so that we could get settled into the house and work on it. We have inherited 2 new kittens who appeared on our lawn one day when we were sitting at our fire pit. Now the house is full with animals. We have Legend my dog, then 4 cats. Fruitcake, Funky, Fuzzball & Fiddlestix. The great part is that we have no cat box. Jon and I installed a cat door in the basement so they can go outside instead of in a box.

We have been making all of our food from scratch. I make a lot of breads and vegetarian meals and Jon makes amazing things like fresh pasta and ravioli. It gives you a good feeling when you make something so good that people ask for more. One thing I have been making a LOT of is a vegetarian chili recipe that i invented a few months ago using a crock pot. One day I was in the supermarket and I just started grabbing a bunch of things that I thought would taste great in a chili and 8 hours later it was done!

Of all things I am proud of this year, it is that we quit smoking. It was really hard because everywhere we go, every bar or restaurant here in MO it is legal to smoke in. We go bowling a lot and the place is full of smoke. We learned to suck it up and after a few months it got to the point where we got grossed out by the smell of it. I can handle being around it now but not smoking is a pretty great thing and I am so glad that we decided to do it.

Jon and I have talked about opening a business here in STL. We registered our business name with the state and it is called Hot Bod, LLC. There is a place near our house called the U-City Loop and it is historic. It is where a lot of the tourists go to eat and shop at famous places where some celebrities used to spend their time. There are hippy shops, tattoo shops and it is right near the colleges. There is not a single tanning salon and being a fanatic of having a tan I figured we should maybe give it a shot and open one up. That is perhaps our project for the beginning of 2009 but we need to do a bit more research before it will happen. It would be a nice secondary source of income next to my affiliate marketing ventures and the best part is that I would be able to run that place and work my marketing out of it. I am really bored with working from home.

Our second project will be a massive garden that we are both excited for. We have a giant yard and are going to be planting every veggie and herb known to man and what we cant keep at the end of the season we plan on drying it out or canning it. This will help with our working out goals, yoga and our limiting drinking only to red wine. Its all about being healthy.

Today is the last day of the year and we will be spending it with friends. I could not think of a better new year and I cant wait to get the FIRST real kiss I have ever had by somebody I love at midnight.

Next step is off to Vegas in a week and a half for Affiliate Summit West and then it is down to business. We wake up every morning at 6 and I think with all that is lined up to do I will have some long days ahead of me but I cant wait.

This has been the best year of my life. I am still making music and will always make music but it is not my first priority anymore. I want to be settled down, work hard, write, learn and live and moving here was the best start.

I want to wish everyone and I love and everyone a I don’t a happy, healthy and successful 2009. Here are a few photos from Katy’s wedding.  The baby is her beautiful little girl Adelaide! HAPPY NEW YEAR!!