A lot of the reviews I get are with companies that I don’t actually work with.  Not that this is a bad thing as I’ve mentioned before, I really enjoy testing out new networks, but it is nice when I get a review request from a company that I’ve either done stuff with in the past and had good experiences or I’m currently working with.  Tatto Media is one of those affiliate networks that I have!

I’ve worked with Tatto Media on a couple different occasions and was thrilled to write up a review about their network.  They have a lot of great offers and features and you definitely should check them out if you’ve never used them.  Well, enough promotion, it’s time to get into the review since that’s what they paid me to do!

Features

The first thing I’d like to mention is the software they use to run their network.  They really went out of their way to make sure the system was built for affiliates.  They run their own tracking software that was built from the ground up, meaning that you don’t have to worry about them using a software like Direct Track that is known for shaving leads, and you can ensure that it’s accurate!

Another great thing about their system is that it was built to be a self-serve platform.  What this means is that instead of having to contact your manager for little small things like placing pixels, you can do all this stuff yourself right from inside your account!  This is an excellent feature that allows you to quickly get your campaigns up and going without constantly waiting on your affiliate manager to do something as simple as placing a pixel.

Also, recently Tatto Media completely redid their reporting and statistics pages which from personal experience I can tell you has made them faster and more efficient!  This is another thing I like about Tatto Media, they are constantly working on improving their systems and are constantly applying new updates to their network.  Some other things I’ve notice them change recently…

• Added a new report called Conversion Tracking Report – This report provides specific lead/sale information, including sub id, tracking info, transaction id, ip address, and payout, allowing you to quickly run sub id reports. While “info” in current tracking links will continue to work, it has been replaced with “aff_sub”.
• Updated Tracking Links – They’ve updated their tracking links making them easier to understand and have added a Source Name  which allows you to specify a name and easily analyze performance in reports that you run.
• Added Tiny URLs – This is something that seems so simple, yet you don’t see many networks doing it.  This allows you to change your long affiliate URLs to something shorter, thus stopping visitors to your sites from seeing long ugly URLs that your own grandma wouldn’t trust!
• Browser Targeting – This allows you to send visitors that may come from a browser that the offer your using isn’t for.  For example, maybe someone pulls up your affiliate site using their iPhone… Now you can send them to an offer that is tailored specifically for an iPhone user which will increase your conversions.

As I said, they are constantly adding new features and working on improving their affiliate system from the feedback they are constantly receiving from their affiliates which is something that I think makes Tatto Media really stand out!

Getting Paid

Tatto Media has several ways to get your money including Checks, Paypal, or Wires.  This allows you to get your money the quickest way possible in order to keep your affiliate campaigns going. There is nothing worse then running out of money when you have a campaign that is successful!  Which leads me to the next thing…

Tatto Media offers net30 payments meaning you get paid once a month, they also offer bi-weekly payments as soon as you build a bit of a relationship with them.  If you’re doing over $5000 dollars a week, they’ll gladly increase that to paying you weekly!

Refer a Friend

Tatto Media also offers a Refer a Friend section to their site and when you log into their publisher system, they put the link right on the publisher snapshot page.  This allows you to grab it quickly and start making money by referring friends to their network.

While I think it’s great that they offer a way to make money by referring affiliates to their network, I will say that I believe their payout is a little low compared with other networks.  They pay 1% of what the affiliate earns that you refer.  Most networks are now offering at least 2% with a couple offering even more than that!  Still, it’s nice that they offer it as once you start using Tatto you’ll definitely want to let your friends know about them and you might as well make some money while doing it!

Bottom Line

The bottom line is that I’ve used Tatto Media a couple times in the past and still use them once in a while now and they are definitely a great network.  The affiliate managers are good, they know what their talking about and it’s a network that really seems to not only help the big affiliates, but also work with building up new affiliates so that they become huge publishers for their network as well.

I would absolutely 100% recommend that you check out Tatto Media.  It never hurts to be signed up with many affiliate networks in this business as you never know which one will have the best offer when you enter a new niche!

I was contacted by White Fire Media  a couple weeks ago and they requested me to write a review of their network.  One thing I love about this business is working with new people and looking at new networks when they pop up so naturally I accepted!

One of the greatest things about checking out new affiliate networks is when you find one that really stands out and does a great job, has great staff, and offer some awesome payouts on their offers!

When you first sign up for White Fire Affiliate Network and log in you’re presented with the a standard looking user dashboard.  It’s actually quite a simple interface which I like.  It doesn’t add a ton of fluff and is pretty easy to navigate.  At the top there are five links, Home,  My Account, Request Offers, My Offers, and Reporting.  In the sidebars there is Featured Offers, New Offers, News, and your affiliate manager contact details.  That’s pretty much it!

One of the weird things though was that whenever I clicked on any of the Featured Offers or New Offers links, I got taken to a page that said “No Offers Found”.  Definitely something they need to get fixed asap!

Again, the interface is pretty simple and straight forward.  It doesn’t seem to have a ton of bells and whistles but I actually think it’s quite nice that a network isn’t focusing on eye candy and instead on their network.

In order to add offers to the My Offers section, you actually have to first go to the Request Offers section.  If you click on Request Offers you’ll be presented with a page like the one above.  It will have the offer names, the average rating, what countries you can promote the offer in, the payout, etc.  Again, pretty simple and self-explanatory which is nice.

Additional Details

I actually had an extremely hard time finding any details about how they pay and when.  This is definitely something that they need to address.  They need to make a page, either include it on their publisher section of their site, or create a frequently asked questions section which lists this and other important information.  It definitely will prohibit affiliate from signing up if they don’t’ understand when and how they will be payed.

Also, they need to include information about whether or not they do wires, if they cost anything, if there is a certain amount the affiliate must make before they’ll get paid, etc.

Payment details is probably the single most important thing that a network needs to have in an easy to find spot on their site!

Another nice feature is that they pay 4% for life on all referrals to their network.  Since I was paid for this review, I didn’t include my referral link in any of the links to their site, but you should definitely take advantage of it!

Bottom Line

Overall, White Fire seems like they have a quick, simple interface with some great offers!

They definitely need to supply some more information for their publisher’s in an easy spot like a FAQ.

The owners really seem to know their stuff when it comes to affiliate marketing and have always been quick to respond to me when I had a question or concern.

They are still in their infant stage, and sometimes this may be the best time to jump on with a network as you’ll get a ton of one on one support from the guys that really know their stuff!

I’d definitely recommend checking them out, and if you have any problems contact Jeff and tell him I sent ya!

It seems like every day new affiliate networks are popping up.  It becomes almost impossible  to weed your way through the overload of networks in order to find those that truly stand out.  I’ve worked with countless networks throughout my career as an affiliate marketer and most times I find that smaller networks can actually be better than some of the bigger networks if they run their network correctly.  The reason for this is because they normally don’t have as many crap offers in each niche as the big networks sometimes have. Instead, if they are a smart network, they keep the number down to a good few select offers in each niche that they know converts through testing that they themselves have done.  This doesn’t mean that they don’t have loads of niches and plenty of offers within these niches, it just means that they cut out the crap stuff!  This is where Profit Kings Media comes in..

Profit Kings Media is a small network in terms of the number of actual affiliates they have compared to some networks like Market Leverage or AzoogleAds, however, this is not a reason to dismiss them and not try them out.  In fact, it’s quite the opposite.  Profit Kings Media does a phenomenal job at treating all their affiliates like super affiliates even if their not!  There are a couple ways that they do this…

• They Pay Weekly!  Whether you’re making $3 dollars a week or $300,000 dollars a week!
• They Offer Cheap Wires ($12 US, $20 International) and also offer free ACH’s or Checks

Another reason that I believe sets Profit Kings Media apart from the competition is that several of the affiliate managers have been or currently are affiliate marketers as well and they’ll work with you to rip apart your ad copy, landing pages, work with you on scaling and testing new traffic sources, and pretty much everything else that comes with being a successful affiliate.  The guys at Profit Kings Media actually know what the heck they are talking about unlike most affiliate networks you work with.  Again, it’s another benefit of working with a smaller network versus a larger network.  Unfortunately larger networks can’t always give you the same amount of help, because honestly, most of the affiliate managers at larger networks have never run a single affiliate campaign in their entire life!

There are a couple other points that I should mention but instead of writing a huge post that most of you won’t finish, I’ll list some of the major points in a bullet list!

• Most of their normal payouts beat what most other networks bump affiliates up to!
• They have a diverse range of offers within just about every vertical that you’d want to run as an affiliate!
• They don’t send you tons of crap offers begging you to promote them…anyone know a network that sends you a daily list of top converting offers…please!
• They are extremely personable and it’s not uncommon to even talk to the owner about an offer or campaign your running and get special treatment!

Some Things That Could Be Improved

There are a couple things that I think the network could improve, mainly with their main website.  The overall design is okay, but there is a lot of information missing that I believe should be on every serious network’s website!

First, I believe they need to have a privacy policy linked to from all the pages in the footer.  Believe it or not, a lot of people (especially affiliates cause we know how this stuff works) wants to know how their personal information is and can be used.  At least I know I do.

I’d mentioned on the homepage under the publisher section that Profit Kings pays weekly, that’s a huge benefit for most affiliates and I only noticed it after searching through the site for a minute.

Also, you should not only have the join now button on the homepage, but also under the publisher page.  A lot of affiliates may click the Publisher link to get more information or whatever, and then in order to sign up, they have to go back to the main page…

Again, overall Profit Kings Media seems like a great smaller network that has a ton of potential to grow if they keep up the hard work.  It’s definitely worth looking into them for your needs as a publisher.

So, I receive in the mail a couple weeks ago, a huge package.  Inside this package was a giant Sumo Bean Bag Chair.  I really like it and I think it’s great that SumoLounge sent me the bean bag, so I figured I’d write up a little review about it.  It’s a great bean bag for using the laptop on or watching a movie!

Disclaimer: Before I get started, I wasn’t to let everyone know that I wasn’t paid to write this review, however, I did receive the chair for free!  However, I wasn’t forced to blog about the product or anything.  I just really liked it!  Just wanted to disclose that to everyone.

Anyways, so I opened up the package and I have I was completely shocked.  Mostly because I have been actually looking at this product for a while, ever since I saw it on Shoemoney’s Blog.  I never did purchase it, because to be honest, just didn’t seem like it was worth $200 dollars that it was selling for at the time.  Note: The price has now dropped to $149 for the Omni Bean Bag Chair.  If I had to do it all over again, would I of spent the $200 bucks for it?

Absolutely!  I love this thing!  For the first couple days I have to be honest, I thought it was nonsense, I couldn’t seem to get the feel for it, and I just couldn’t see using it to replace the nice furniture that I already have…  Why sit on a bean bag when I have a comfy $3000 dollar couch, however, after a couple days and looking at their site for a couple different setups and positions to use it as, I found out that I actually really enjoy it.  It’s great for throwing on the floor to watch a movie, or setting it straight up and using it as a chair to use the laptop on or whatever.

It’s extremely comfortable, unless you just throw it out flat, then it seems to not really work, at least for me.  It’s really better if you kinda model it as a chair.  Anyways, so I’ve now been using the thing for a couple weeks, have kinda broken it in, and I find myself going into the living room and sitting in it instead of my normal furniture.  It’s a lot of fun, people love it when they come over, especially the teens from my church when they come to hang out and play some Xbox, so I definitely think it’s worth the price if you are a fan of Bean Bags.

It’s not like other bean bags that you can buy from the store, first off, this thing is huge and secondly, it’s defintly a lot higher quality than those that you can purchase at walmart, target, or kmart.  I don’t see the thing getting torn up to easily!

Anyways, you should check it out, if you’re a fan of bean bags, I definitely think it’s worth the investment as it seems like a good quality bean bag that would last for quite some time without wearing out!

HasOffers is changing the game when it comes to starting your own affiliate network, and the best part… You can get started for free.

Starting your own affiliate network has always been extremely costly, requiring you to have money to pay for employees, pay your affiliates while you’re awaiting your initial payments to start coming in, and paying for a platform what will allow you to manage all of your employees, offers, just to name a few!

There are few options out there besides creating your own platform including the ever popular DirectTrack which can cost you $8,000 – $12,000 dollars!  So this is what makes HasOffers awesome, you see, it’s free!  Well, at least up until you reach over 250,000 clicks a month (more than that most people will need to get started) or want features that may not be included in the free version (which there aren’t many that aren’t included already!).

Even if you need to be able to process more clicks than 250,000 a month, the next other editions are still a steal compared to anything else out there!  The Pro edition costs a whopping $99/month…yep, that’s it!  for $99 bucks a month you get access to just about every feature there is and can process a whopping 500,000 clicks a month!  If you’re needing unlimited click volume a month, the Enterprise edition costs just $799/month and that’s the most you’ll pay with the plans they have!  Now compare that to the $8,000 – $12,000 that DirectTrack costs and you can see why everyone is talking about HasOffers.

So, enough about how much it costs and why I think it’s so great, let me tell you guys about some of the features of HasOffers and you can see for yourself!

Browser Targeting

So what exactly does this mean?  Well let’s put it this way, let’s say that you’re an affiliate and you’re promoting an offer for a product that checks computer registries and cleans them up…however, let’s say that I found your site while browsing the web on my iphone…  Now obviously you can’t sell this product to me on my iphone, so with HasOffers, it can automatically detect that and redirect me to an offer that is made specifically for my needs, thus increasing the chance that I’m going to convert for you, which in plain English means… More Money For You!

Already Signed Up

Let’s say you’ve already had a visitor to your site that has signed up for your offer, however, for whatever reason, they found your site again and went through your links again, HasOffers technology will automatically redirect them to a new offer that is different so that you can still make the sale and get your commission.

Simple Yet Powerful Interface

One of the biggest things I liked about this software while messing around with the demo account they sent me, was the fact that it was easy to find everything I needed to get things going.  However, even though it was simple to find everything and navigate through the software, there are a ton of powerful features packed in there like the two I mentioned above!

Customization

You can very quickly and easily customize HasOffers so that your network has it’s own look and feel.  You can very quickly change the colors, upload your own logo, and more, in just a matter of minutes.  Customizing this software to make it your own is simple.

So does HasOffers make it completely simple to get your own affiliate network running?  Well, yes and no, it’s very expensive starting up your own affiliate network, but it does help take a huge cost away allowing you to spend that money on better stuff, like paying your employees or advertising your new network!  If you’re wanting to start up an affiliate network, realize it’s expensive, but also realize that HasOffers will help you out tremendously!  Why not give it a try, it’s free?

One of the first impressions that visitors will get when they visit your site comes from your logo.  Your logo plays such a huge role on your website or blog, however, most webmasters don’t even pay much attention to it or even worse they try to make one themselves when they actually have very little or no design experience at all!

This is where LogoMyWay comes in, they are a service that allows you to put up a prize ranging from $200 dollars to $1000 dollars in cash + a 10% fee of the prize money that is paid to LogoMyWay (for example if you put up a prize of $400 dollars you’d actually pay $440 dollars to LogoMyWay).

After you put in all the details of what you are looking and pay LogoMyWay (They kinda act as a sort of Escrow, requiring you to put up the payment first so that the winner receives it from them.) you then have tons of designers that start submitting designs for you to judge.  After the time is up, you choose which one you like best and LogoMyWay pays the designer the prize money!

One of the biggest problems I face when I’m looking to get a logo designed is the fact that I myself have absolutely no design skills whatsoever!  In fact, normally I don’t even have the slightest idea as to what I want the logo to look like or include.  This becomes a huge problem for me when it comes to working one on one with a designer.

This is where logo contests have played a huge role in my business.  95% of the websites I create, I hold a logo contest offering money to the designer that designs the logo I like and choose.  I receive so many different options that I’ve yet to ever hold a contest and not find a design that I liked!

So what makes LogoMyWay so great?

As I stated above one of the greatest things about LogoMyWay is that you get to choose from tons of designs from tons of talented designers giving you a great mix of styles, ideas, and types.  This allows you to really get a good feel of what and where your site could go!

Another great feature of LogoMyWay is that you get to choose the price you are willing to pay in order to get your design from the range of $200 dollars to $1000 dollars.  I actually like that the minimum required is $200 dollars because this allows you to get some really top notch designers on the site.

Also, you get to start seeing designs coming in within a couple hours and you can provide feedback and constructive criticism to the designers so that your logo comes out perfect in the end!  If you see a design you like, but you’re not quite digging the colors, simply state that and most often the designer will submit a revision to your liking!  So now instead of one designer submitting you multiple revisions (and most only allow so many) you now have tons of designers submitting you as many revisions as they want in hopes of winning the contest!  Talk about awesomeness!

So what’s some of the bad stuff about LogoMyWay?

I have to be honest, I read about LogoMyWay before they approached me about doing a review for them, and I had read a couple other reviews on some others blogs including John Chow’s blog and Tyler Cruz’s blog, and one huge point stuck out to me when I was reading Tyler’s Post about LogoMyWay and also it stuck out when I was reading the pricing guidelines on LogoMyWay.

That is the fact that you can only give a prize amount up to $1000 dollars.  I think it’s absolutely crazy to put a cap on the amount that a person can put up as prize money and I honestly think it needs to be removed asap!  There have been several times when I’ve offered $1500 – $2000 dollar prizes for logo contests because I really needed and wanted something that was extremely top notch!  Also, it may of included not only a logo for the website, but a t-shirt design and business cards to go with it and to me it just wouldn’t make sense to run three separate contests as normally you want the logo to kinda go hand in hand with each product.

Also, this isn’t really a negative for me, but for some people it may very well be…  That is the fact that you must choose a winner once the contest is over.  If you don’t get a submitted logo that you like, you still have to pick one, however, I’ve never personally held a logo contest and not liked one and I also understand why LogoMyWay does it, although if you are extremely picky when it comes to choosing a winning design, this could pose a problem for you!  However, I don’t recommend that LogoMyWay changes it!

Bottom line:

The bottom line is that in my opinion, holding a design contest is one of the best ways to get a logo, business card, or t-shirt design done!  In the past this was mostly done on forums till these types of sites came around, and honestly, these type of sites have made the process so much quicker, easier, and better!  So if you’re looking for a design, I highly recommend giving LogoMyWay a chance!