Performics, the performance marketing agency owned by Publicis Groupe, announces the elevation of Michael Kahn to Global President. The appointment of Kahn, who previously led the company’s global account management practices, marketing and sales departments, solidifies Performics’ continued commitment to global business in performance marketing.

As Global President, Kahn will continue to lead and expand upon the advancements in the global accounts practice, client services and business development. Kahn will work closely with the entire global executive team, and report to Daina Middleton, Global CEO of Performics and remain based at Performics’ global headquarters in Chicago.

“Michael’s scope of contribution to Performics globally continues to propel our performance business practices forward,” notes Daina Middleton, Global CEO, Performics. “He is an innovative, passionate and energetic leader. I am confident that he will have a continuing impact in delivering outstanding performance results for our clients.”

In addition to Kahn’s appointment, Karishma Kiri, who joined Performics during the Resultrix acquisition in 2012, will assume the role of Senior Vice President, leading global product development. She will drive integration and consistency across product offerings to a new global standard of excellence. Kiri previously held various marketing roles at Microsoft, and then managed the performance marketing capability at Resultrix. Kiri is based in Seattle.

Jon Wegman, who joins Performics from Moxie Interactive as Vice President Strategy & Planning, will lead participant planning efforts for the organization. Along with the deep analytics practice, strategy and planning is a key differentiator for Performics in the marketplace. Wegman previously led digital strategy for leading brands in the wireless, soft drink and transportation categories, among others.

Performics currently services clients in 26 countries around the world with plans for additional global expansion in 2013.

What had looked like a very good deal for T-mobile is now getting it into the hot water because the State Attorney of Washington has passed orders to the company which states that they make changes to their deceptive no contract ads. Bob Ferguson, the Attorney General entered into an agreement that had been ordered by the court which says that the company is required to change their ads. T-mobile had recently launched their uncarrier plan or the no contract plan which does not knot down their subscribers to a two year long contract just to join their network.

Red flags were raised due to the advertising and promotion that was being done, and Bob Ferguson demanded to know about the details and the information that was going to be shown in the advertisements, so that the consumers are well aware of what is going to be provided to them.

According to the grapevine, people may think that they will have to pay about $100 as a down payment to get the handset and then make payments once a month and finally leave the network without being financially restricted. Take I-phone for instance, the phone costs about $99 down payment and about $20 per month for about two years, but if the consumer wishes to leave the network, it was not stated that he was supposed to make the full payment. The T-mobiles have agreed to sign the contract and make changes in their advertising methods. They are also allowing a full refund to the people who have benefited of the service they have provided from 26th March to 25th April.

T-mobile being the un-carrier of the United States also said that their main goal is to upsurge the comprehensibility with their customers and unleash them from long-term contracts. Even though, their advertising was appropriate and honest, they have purposely entered into the contract with Washington Attorney General in chutzpah.

Wednesday 24th saw the inaugural Mobile Retail Awards take place following Mobile Marketing Magazine’s, Mobile Retail Summit. Affiliate Window took home the accolade for Best Mobile Affiliate Campaign for “Making Mobile Count,” an ongoing project which ensures that all sales generated through mobile devices within the performance channel, are accurately attributed to the affiliates generating those sales.

Affiliate Window currently records in excess of 12,000 handset and tablet transactions a day and the company recognised the need to create a specific mobile project group from across the business to ensure this burgeoning opportunity was optimised.  The team identified two key priorities; enabling technical solutions to ensure revenue is tracked, and mitigating lost revenue to publishers.

“No one can legitimately claim to be the leading mobile performance network without ensuring their existing clients track and record mobile sales and that is precisely what this project was about”, says Adam Ross, Chief Operating Officer at Affiliate Window. “In a market filled with empty posturing, it’s a real honour to win this award for a genuine and honest campaign. We are delighted our efforts were recognised by the judges, and we are fully committed to our pledge to publishers to have 99% of all programmes on Affiliate Window mobile enabled by the end of this year.”

David Murphy, Editor of Mobile Marketing Magazine adds: “We created the Mobile Retail Awards this year to recognise excellence in mCommerce. Affiliate marketing, as everyone knows, has been a massive success online, and looks likely to be equally successful on mobile, if some of the teething problems can be addressed. And this, in fact, is why we gave the award to Affiliate Window, for the company’s efforts to address the problem of attribution in the mobile affiliate market. We hope the company’s efforts encourage others to follow suit.”

Despite claiming initially that they were both pressured by eBAY into performing cookie stuffing, one-time affiliate celebrities Shawn Hogan and Brian Dunning have both plead guilty to wire fraud stemming from charges brought by the US Justice Department in 2010. They had both been arrested by the FBI and indicted on multiple charges of wire-fraud and criminal forteiture, and faced perhaps life in prison if they didn’t plead out.

Both of them had claimed at some time that they indeed did commit potentially illegal acts of cookie stuffing, but only because eBAY instructed them to use the means. However, when the cookie crumbled it revealed that there was absolutely no proof that anyone major at eBAY knew about their methods, and they had no plans in informing eBAY management about them.

The evidence against both Dunning and Hogan showed that, among other things, that they knew exactly what they were doing. The FBI report said that Dunning himself described the people running the eBAY affiliate program as “stupid” and he could easily trick them by inserting 1×1 pixels into his codes, stuffing cookies into browsers. He also admitted in an interview that one eBAY employee knew of this, and was taking a kickback. Similarly, Shawn Hogan admits that he was involved in kickbacks, saying that he paid an employee of eBAY $50,000 to buy a new car, and gave all sorts of other gifts to the employees in order for them to look the other way.

So I guess Hogan and Dunning weren’t lying when they said employees knew of their illegal actions, but they were paying them off.  I guess that’s somewhat good news, that they weren’t total liars, right?

NEW YORK and TEL AVIV (April 9, 2013) — Global performance marketing company Matomy Media Group announced today the consolidation of search and social marketing services daughter company Mediasheva and the search engine marketing (SEM) services of New York-based MediaWhiz under the global Matomy brand.

Mediasheva was founded in 2010 by Matomy Media Group as the search and social marketing arm of the company, and offers a full range of performance-based search and social network marketing agency solutions to its advertisers on Google, Bing, Facebook and local search engines and networks. By 2013, the company had been established as a leading agency, managing direct relationships with international clients.

MediaWhiz’s search capabilities stem from its 2006 acquisition of Global Resource Systems, a Florida-based search marketing company. Following a series of smaller acquisitions, MediaWhiz developed a full complement of SEM services, including paid and organic search, online reputation management, social media marketing and coordinated SEO/SEM campaigns.

MediaWhiz will continue to operate a separate consultative SEO practice for clients.

Mediasheva Co-Founder Alex Kosman has been appointed VP of Search and Social, and will oversee activity in both Beersheba, Israel and the Fort Lauderdale, Fla.- based SEM operations of MediaWhiz as part of an integrated offering to Matomy advertisers. Reflecting on the consolidation of Matomy’s global search capabilities, he said: “We saw a real added value for our clients in combining the search marketing services of Mediasheva and MediaWhiz. Our advertisers trust us for complete solutions and with this unification, each company’s strengths in search and social media complement each other and provide that security.  By providing our advertisers one point of contact for all of these services, we also reduce a significant pain point in their marketing efforts.”

Matomy Media Group includes search and social among its roster of performance-based digital marketing solutions, which include affiliate marketing, display, mobile and video. In 2013, Matomy Media Group acquired 100% of U.S.-based MediaWhiz, and appointed former Neverblue CEO Hakan Lindskog as Chief Executive.

About Matomy Media Group
Working across web, social media and mobile platforms, Matomy Media Group offers advertisers, networks and publishers a range of opportunities integrated through one gateway, including an award-winning affiliate network, display ad network, mobile advertising solutions, search, social marketing, and virtual currency platforms.

With 7 branches worldwide, including U.S.-based performance marketing agency MediaWhiz, and over 400 employees, Matomy Media Group serves 40 billion impressions per month for 500 of the world’s leading advertisers across 7000 publishers in 85 countries, and enables optimizing campaigns across all digital media to ensure cost-effective, controlled and high quality results.

Matomy Media Group is a privately held company. For more information visit www.matomy.com and follow Matomy on Facebook www.facebook.com/matomymediagroup.

CashFly.com is a link shortening service that allows users to enter a longer url and receive a short one as is often needed for social media platforms or when sending SMS text messages. Only, CashFly.com adds a twist in that they pay users each time they share a link with someone. “We thought about the thousands of links you send out to friends or the posts you make on social media platforms and said what if we made it so that people got paid everytime they used our url shortening service?” said company spokesperson Matthew Greene

Backed by an impressive group of private investors who hold an estimated net worth over $100M, CashFly.com aims to become the first mainstream link shortening service that pays users each time they share a (url) link. “Whenever you get that sort of attention from investors, it’s very flattering. It not only says something about the product you’ve built but the vision you’ve articulated to others”. In an economy where funding is harder and harder to comeby, CashFly.com seems to have articulated their vision quite well.

Unlike many other startups, CashFly.com chose to focus their structure around the user base “We know the market place and we know what users want. They want a link shortening service that works well and is convient but they also want to get the highest payouts around. As a result, we decided to bring on only those partners who hold a high strategic value”. With online advertising being the fiercely competitive market space that it is, CashFly.com locked down a major player “We’re very happy that a major investor and partner for the company happens to be one of the largest online advertisers in the world. This allows us to cut out the middle man when delivering ads and payouts. It also allows us to deliver some great benefits to our users which can’t be found anywhere else” stated Greene

Technology was also a factor as CashFly.com chose to integrate a web-plugin which adds an additional layer of convenience for it’s users that traditional link shortening services do not “The Web Plugin just made a lot of sense to us. Users really don’t like having to constantly go back and forth copying and pasting URL’s, so we added a web plugin that does it for you automatically with a click of a button. No more having to fumble between windows and tabs means a greater, smoother user experience” said Greene

With everything in place, it seems CashFly.com is aiming to become one of the biggest websites in the world. But it’s not about any one metric according to Greene “There a lot of different ways to quantify the size of your business and traditional rankings only tell one story, but in terms of reach and volume, we know that we’re in a space where we have the opportunity to really get up there. It’s a long ways away but we know it’s possible.” Greene went on to say that the formula for success from here on out was a simple one but required a lot of hard work “Its straight foward right? We put our users first, whatever they want we do. Whatever they need, we provide. We treat our users like gold by giving them payouts that are about 50% higher than anyone else, we pay promptly, we pay for every impression, we develop great tools, deliver great service and we never stop doing any of it. If we do that, the results will follow. Our users and their satisfaction is everything to us. We track every link, every penny and we do it all in realtime. We’re ready and we promise to make users happy” said an enthusiastic Greene.

To learn more, visit www.cashfly.com

Media Contact: Matthew Greene CashFly, 18004477301, pr@cashfly.com

NEW YORK (April 18, 2013) — Performance marketing agency MediaWhiz today announced the expansion of its affiliate network, MonetizeIt, as part of its cross-publishing capabilities with parent company Matomy Media Group. MediaWhiz now offers a broader selection of domestic and international affiliate marketing campaigns, including game and mobile app downloads, as well as entertainment and dating campaigns. These are in addition to MediaWhiz’s extensive selection of branded campaigns in verticals such as finance, education, health and beauty and insurance.

Approximately 150 new affiliate campaigns will be initially available through MonetizeIt, the MediaWhiz affiliate network. The agency will also expand its base of experienced publishers, allowing advertisers to garner additional traffic to their websites and mobile apps.

“We’re excited to offer new and existing advertisers additional traffic reach” said MediaWhiz CEO Hakan Lindskog. “Publishers will benefit from a more diverse set of affiliate campaigns and verticals, and the ability to monetize their international traffic. This initiative represents an important step in our integration with Matomy and follows the recent launch of MediaWhiz Mobile, our mobile performance marketing practice.”

Benefits for Publishers
Publishers will gain a variety of benefits from MediaWhiz’s new domestic and international affiliate marketing campaigns and verticals, including:

·         Improved access to join MonetizeIt, the MediaWhiz affiliate network

·         Mobile-specific affiliate marketing campaigns

·         3% lifetime referral bonus

·         Utilization of Matomy Media Group’s mobile tracking capabilities for a wide array of mobile campaigns

Publishers interested in MediaWhiz’s enhanced domestic and international affiliate marketing campaigns should contact Kyle Hanzas, director of business development, at +1 212.209.0023 or khanzas@mediawhiz.com.

Benefits for Advertisers
Advertisers will gain the following benefits from MediaWhiz’s expanded affiliate network:

·         Access to a broad range of domestic and international traffic

·         Testing and scale via in-house social media, search and display advertising teams, which generate more than 40 billion impressions per month

·         In-house compliance monitoring

Advertisers interested in monetizing their domestic and international traffic with MediaWhiz should contact Daryl Colwell, senior vice president of business development, at +1 646.442.5513 or dcolwell@mediawhiz.com.

“The addition of new affiliate marketing campaigns and verticals through our partnership with Matomy is a great benefit to our advertisers and publishers,” said Peter Klein, senior vice president of media services. “New affiliates have more opportunities to join our network, while our advertisers benefit from additional domestic and international traffic sources.”

About MediaWhiz
MediaWhiz is North America’s leading performance marketing agency. The agency helps clients engage, acquire and retain customers more profitably through the combination of performance marketing capabilities, proprietary technology and digital-media expertise. Practice areas include: affiliate marketing, mobile, search, social media, display advertising, email and data acquisition.

MediaWhiz is part of Matomy Media Group, a global performance marketing company.

For more information, visit www.MediaWhiz.com and follow MediaWhiz on Twitter at @MediaWhizInc. 

About Matomy Media Group
Working across Web, social media and mobile platforms, Matomy Media Group offers advertisers, networks and publishers a range of opportunities integrated through one gateway, including an award-winning affiliate network, display ad network, mobile advertising solutions, search and social marketing, and virtual currency platforms.

With 7 branches worldwide and more than 250 employees, Matomy Media Group serves 40 billion impressions per month for 500 of the world’s leading advertisers across 7,000 publishers in 85 countries, and enables optimizing campaigns across all digital media to ensure cost-effective, controlled and high quality results.

Matomy Media Group is a privately held company. For more information visit www.matomy.com and follow Matomy on Facebook www.facebook.com/matomymediagroup.

SARASOTA, Florida (April 17, 2013) – The Google Affiliate Network has announced they will officially be closing their doors in the coming months. For CPA Advertisers that may feel left out in the cold while seeking a Google Affiliate Network alternative, Clickbooth welcomes them with open arms and is happy to offer up to $1,000 in free traffic with proof that they are a current Google Affiliate Network customer. We hope this may ease some of the inconvenience of the transition. As one of the most stable and reliable networks in the industry with over 10 years of solid experience, Clickbooth is ready to pick up the slack where other networks have fallen or failed.

The Affiliate marketing industry is one of the fastest growing industries in the world and it’s only projected to get bigger from here. While Google’s Affiliate Network door may be closing, Clickbooth is ready to invite you into a network on the leading edge of the Affiliate industry. Recently named the #1 CPA Network in the World, Clickbooth is an established industry leader in affiliate marketing. Advertisers have access to exclusive premium quality traffic with no risk pricing models and Affiliate Partners see access to exclusive top performing campaigns at the industry’s top payouts with consistent, guaranteed payments. As an industry leader, Clickbooth is prepared to not only assist Google affiliates and partners but more importantly they are prepared to maximize, scale and grow these displaced businesses.

Don’t risk your brand with just any network. The Clickbooth Network has the longevity, experience and support necessary for success. Contact us today to learn more about our network and free traffic offer or apply online at www.clickbooth.com and position yourself for Affiliate marketing success and growth.

With absolutely no press, no notice, absolutely little attention, Google will be closing it’s affiliate network, GAN. This was completely ignored by the mainstream press and as of this writing, no one had even noticed that the scuttling of the network — and if the company hadn’t had a small blog post about it, perhaps no one would have noticed or believed that it was happening.

To that end, we’ve made the difficult decision to retire Google Affiliate Network and focus on other products that are driving great results for clients.

In fact, even Google News as of this writing had absolutely nothing whatsoever about its closing. We even called their press line and tried to speak to someone, and a spokesperson told us that they hadn’t heard any news about this, and that they had no comment. Seemingly, it was closing, but no one actually knew about it closing, even at their company.

That being said, it seems that the network was being closed not just because it wasn’t producing much at all for the company but had been plagued with numerous problems for clients and creating extensive client complaints.We spoke to a few people in the industry and found that the most common issues involved Google itself producing competition issues for it’s own affiliate network:

1) GMAIL consistently blocked any newsletters that contained affiliate links to Google’s own affiliate network for some unknown reason.
2) It was virtual impossible to buy ads on Google for products on GAN, killing a top possible source for traffic. Why? Probably because they didn’t want to compete with PPC sales?
3) There was no support for other PPC engines, such as Bing as they were seen as competitive and GAN didn’t want to promote media buying via Bing.

Still does this matter? Will anyone actually miss GAN?  If an affiliate network closes, and no one notices, does it matter?

Note, for all the people that stole this article, wouldn’t it be nice if you sourced your blogs?