URL

http://www.myaffiliateprogram.com/

Company:

Kowabunga! Technologies, Westland, Michigan

Software Type:

ASP-Fee

Affiliate/Merchant Web Interface

Yes

Pricing:

Pro (v. 3.1) $795 and $50 per month. Lite (v. 2.0) $499 and $50 per month. $50 per month fee is good for 100,000 clicks and impressions.

Commission:

None

Affiliate Marketing & Recruitment:

No pool of affiliates, but includes submission to http://Affiliate-Announce.com (normally a $79 package). Book explaining how to attract affiliates.

Tracks:

Impressions, Click, Lead, or Sale.

Two-Tier:

Yes.

Customize individual payment rate:

Yes.

Carts that support:

Works with virtually every shopping cart, order processing center, order form and ordering system

Payment Systems

N/A

Writes checks to Affiliates:

No. But can use PayPal.

Data Export:

Exports to QuickBooks or other system for check-writing. (Customized for merchant's needs)

Affiliate ID generation:

Yes. E-mailed to affiliates.

Banner/graphic management:

Mutliple banner support. Image is on merchant's site, but displayed to affiliates on Kowabunga's site. 

E-mail to affiliate after each order

Send e-mail to affiliates:

Yes.

Affiliate sign-up:

Automatic and screened.

Redirects to particular pages:

Yes, in Pro version by category of affiliate. In both versions an entry page can be specified for an affiliate. Affiliates are able to link to any page on a merchant's site. You-Track feature shows display of the affiliate's code as a "telephone extension" or "department number" so that telephone inquiries and sales can give proper credit to affiliates.

Average Survey Rating:

8.8

Number of Respondents:

16

Positives:

Full featured, no maintenance problem, low cost.

I particulary like the fact that when used in conjunction with their 'Opt In Pro' system you can utilise database record matching for referred visitors. I.e. An affiliate refers a visitors, they dont buy on the first visit but elect to subscribe to my free report. This report is mailed as a series (handled by opt in pro) using the referring affiliates ID. So if a cookie expires the orginating affiliate still earns their commission. Likewise you can then automate upsell emails for additional products using the referring affiliate id code. I have also found it easy to implement other 'creative' link methods using the software such as interactive drop down banners and integrating witha merchants search facility.

Comprehensive, does everything I need and more

The ownership of our affiliates

It is easy to use and flexible enough to be tailored to our unique needs.

Offers everything that you could want in affiliate software and it integrates with their top-of-the-line email management system OptinPro. Support of the Kowabunga staff is 1st rate!

Very easy to set up for both merchant and affiliates. All the bells and whistles. Highly reliable with responsive customer support. Very affordable.

1) The ability to provide a wide range of marketing tools for my affiliates customized to their audience. From complete pages to search forms and pop-ups. 2) The immediate results returned so affiliates can see in real time the results of their efforts.

Easy to use, play around with, very flexible, allows you to create diffrent levels. User friendly and reliable; supported by a very strong and prompt tech and support team.

Though this will seem a bit biased -- there is a lot I like about the software. I like the ability to categorize my Affiliates into seperate segments for easier management. I like that I have the choice to track sales no matter how they happen - online, over the phone, via fax, by email or even through postal mail. I also like the ability to use the integrated Opt-In Pro Software to send my Affiliate Newsletter, announcements and other information to my Affiliates. The email software also lets me automatically follow up with my Affiliates after they sign up -- which increases my program's activation rate.

Manual validation of every sale, shows click through rates and number of impression, great support (within 24 hours), and easy to use

I own the affiliates. The software is user friendly and easy. The tech support is outstanding.

Very easy to use and the set up didn't hurt to much :-) great stats and online. Very good customer service

1) Able to private label the application. 2) Easy to implement and manage with very little engineering resources

Negatives:

Cannot edit set up once you set up. E-mail capabilities poor. Cannot maniuplate data base not good for month-month statistics.

No real problems -- install not easy, but not unreasonably difficult either

It's only of minor importance but an affiliate can only access statistics on a monthly (including historical) basis. It would be great to enable affiliates to run reports against their specified date selection.

Reporting features

That is actually a hard question. I have looked at others (i.e. CJ, various in-house programs, etc...) and could rattle off what I don't like, most of which would be the lack of customizing to our needs. But I have not have had a single annoyance that could not be fixed on the fly or with a simple custom order to create a tool to meet our needs.

So many new features being added that sometimes they don't always have the online help files up to date -- but this is very minor, most of the updates and improvements are very intuitive.

No problems.

Ideally we would have closed loop tracking where we knew exactly what ad, placed where, produced a sale.

It used to take me a while to scroll to my last affiliate display page because we have so many of them; but I fixed the problem by editing the default type setting, now all my latest affiliations are type 5 , easy to access and in a seperate folder untill monitored, evaluated and moved to the appropriate level.

Can't complain!

No complaints.

Nothing

Some things it can't do like track a second affiliates sale up from the first affiliate.

Like a lot of other applications, the reporting features options/features could be more robust.

Purchase Again?

No. Too many small annoying details

Yes

Yes, in fact I have implemented this software for a number of clients based on my experience with the product.

I would purchase it again and recommend it to anyone.

Yes -- we are content with the program at the moment. It fulfills our needs.

Most certainly.....YES!!! MyAffiliateProgram gives the support of outsourcing our affiliate program, but with the freedom of management as if it was in-house.

Absolutely, highly recommended to anyone.

Yes

Still the best option available as far as I'm concerned.

Yes, better than everything else out there, people who tell me that they joined Commission Junction have no idea....

Yes -- and I'd recommed it to my friends. I know that it is an easy-to-use, powerful and extremely reliable solution. I'm comfortable using it, promoting and placing my name on the line to vouch for it's excellence.

Yes. I feel more comfortable being in charge of what sales are and are not validated, and the support is excellent.

In a heart beat

Yes

YES

Other comments:

I have a detailed case study of my implemenation of the Kowabunga system posted at http://www.affiliatemarketing.co.uk/aacasestudy.htm

Not only is the software excellent, the service is second to none.

I am not one to praise a company that does not deserve it and has not proven themselves in the times we need them most. But, after doing our extensive research in all the major Affiliate programs and software packages offered out there, we found that it was an easy decision to go with MyAffiliateProgram. They are extremely affordable, powerful software, easy management (which cuts down our Admin time and costs), comprehensive tools (both internal and 3rd party, like Opt-In Pro), and excellent tech support. I must say the they have provided us with the best tech support that I have ever experienced, either in business or as a consumer.

OptinPro email system that it integrates with is the best in the market -- bar none! Looked high and low for an email program that integrated with the affiliate software and this is the ultimate to aid in the running of an "automatic" business!

The customer and tech support are fantastic. I get clear and prompt answers to questions and they seem interested in hearing from their customers and improving the product. Even if I wasn't totally satisfied with the product, I'd probably stay because of the service.

The program is so ellaborate that I always learn something new... It is a great selling and marketing tool.

We used to be with CJ. Their change in pricing, lack of support, poor quality affiliates all combined to make for a very poor experience.