We launched Pepperjam Store Builder last year as part of our next generation product feed technology.
If you are an advertiser with an affiliate program or an affiliate marketer not familar with Pepperjam Store Builder this post will provide you with a bit of insight into our thinking and the benefits of the technology versus what you’d find on other leading affiliate networks like Linkshare, Commission Junction, or Google Affiliate Network.
Rationale Behind Pepperjam Store Builder
As many of you know we launched Pepperjam Network in January of last year as a “Next Generation” affiliate network.
In short, the momentum behind launching an affiliate network was to leverage Pepperjam’s 10 years of affiliate marketing experience, while also engaging leading advertisers and affiliates to build an affiliate marketing technology that addressed many of the shortcomings that existed at the time (and continue to exist outside of Pepperjam Network) across the affiliate marketing industry.
The two drivers of Pepperjam Network were a goal of (1) increasing affiliate transparency and (2) improving communication between advertisers and affiliates. Aside from those two goals…we set out to improve the user experience, provide substintive educational tools and resources, speed-up reporting functionality, build a better couponing technology, and release a product feed technology geared to both novice and expert product feed affiliates.
Before we started to build the actual product feed technology we conducted in-depth interviews with leading product feed affiliates the likes of Scott Jangro (i.e. Costumezee) and Connie Berg (FlamingoWorld), among others.
At the same time we spoke with less technical affiliates who were frustrated with their inability to easily manipulate static product feeds.
See…on networks like Commission Junction and Google Affiliate Network you are required to download product feeds in a flat file format (i.e. CSV) and manipulate the feed on your own – this requires a skillset enjoyed by very few affiliates. In short, 99% of affiliates don’t have the technical skillset to download, manipulate, and integrate product feeds into their Web sites – as a result, product feeds have been traditionally used by a very small portion of affiliates, which we have also felt was a shortcoming of being an affiliate on the big three affiliate networks.
Pepperjam Store Builder was built to cater to both advanced affiliates and non-technical affiliates thereby opening up product feeds to all levels of affiliate marketers, regardless of technical skillset.
Our advanced affiliates told us that a next generation product feed technology would provide additional product information that is not typically required in data feeds. These affiliates suggested that they still wanted to manipulate the actual product feeds on their backend and were happy with downloading the feeds into a flat file format.
Our non-technical affiliates gave us examples of “Store Builder” technologies like Build a Niche Store (BANS) and GoldenCan – these affiliates were most interested in a system that allowed them to manipulate the product feeds without needing advanced technical skills. In addition, the non-technical affiliates wanted to be able to easily build stores including products from one or more Pepperjam Network advertisers at the same time.
From the first line of code to the last line of code we incorporated the interests of both advanced and non-technical affiliates.
We also kept in mind the needs of advertisers such as NetShops that have over 150 niche stores on Pepperjam Network with tens of thousands of unique products – imagine if every affiliate had to download individual product feeds for each NetShops store and then manipulate those feeds – that would require a significant allocation of resources. The goal here with Pepperjam Store Builder was to provide a solution to NetShops affiliates that allowed them to easily and quickly build stores using NetShops products….and / or efficiently download feeds in a flat file format (their choice).
Finally, the rationale for Pepperjam Store Builder followed a similar rationale to PepperjamAds in that our goal was to allow affiliates to easily MIX and MASH products from one or multiple advertisers. I’ll talk more about this concept in a second, but in short….with Pepperjam Store Builder affiliates can select multiple Pepperjam Network advertisers, filter results by things such as color or type, and build a store within 60 seconds – the same is true for PepperjamAds, but in the case of PJ Ads the affiliate is creating widget-like contextual ads from one or multiple advertisers….in less than 60 seconds.
What is Pepperjam Store Builder?
Now that you have the general rationale and approach to Pepperjam Store Builder I’ll discuss what it’s all about. After I provide a high level overview the best way to give you a sense of the technology is through examples (see below).
With Pepperjam Store Builder an affiliate has the ability to access real-time inventory (product feeds) from all Pepperjam Network advertisers – the only requirement is that the affiliate must first be accepted into the advertiser’s affiliate program on Pepperjam Network.
Once accepted the affiliate goes to the dedicated Pepperjam Store Builder section of Pepperjam Network (here’ what that looks like):
From the Pepperjam Store Builder console the affiliate can easily select any one or more advertisers they want to grab products from. This page includes a real-time demo so that the affiliate can see what the feed / store looks like. Affiliates can then manipulate the feed through a series of filters. Filters refine the feeds to allow the affiliate to showcase specific products or types of products. In addition to the filtering technology the affiliate can also customize the feed to agree with the look and color scheme of the Web site or blog that the feed will reside. Let me show several examples.
Example #1: This is a feed with the default color and for only one advertiser (Nutcracker.com)
Example #2: This is a feed with five products from one advertiser (Nutcracker.com) instead of two like Example #1 and a red border color instead of the default color
Example #3: This is a feed with seven products from five advertisers (GiftBaskets.com, Dressers.com, ChristmasLights.com, BeanBags.com, and Benches.com) and a blue border color
Example #4: This is the same feed as Example #3, but products are refined by the keyword “Gift” and the background has been changed to black
As you can see Pepperjam Store Builder allows affiliates to easily manipulate product feeds and build storefronts all within 60 seconds or less – it’s really that easy. At the same time, advanced affiliates can use the Pepperjam Store Builder system to manipulate one or more product feeds and download them as flat files to either be uploaded into the affiliate’s Web site or manipulated further (although that shouldn’t be necessary) on the affiliate’s backend.
In addition, affiliates can select any one or multiple advertisers to select products from (we call this MIXING and MASHING) – like the other networks there is no need to make requests, wait for e-mails or flat files to appear in your e-mail box or be available via FTP – not on Pepperjam Network. The affiliate can ultimately do anything they want to build a product feed using Pepperjam’s technology – the end result makes them look and feel rather sophisticated, but the tool is as easy to use for beginners as it is for advanced product feed experts.
This is a pretty long post so let’s end it with a “Top Five” list of Pepperjam Store Builder feaures.
Top Five Features of Pepperjam Store Builder.
With Pepperjam Store Builder you can quickly and easily:
(5) Build a store front with millions of products.
(4) Select products from one or more Pepperjam Network advertisers.
(3) Filter products so that your feed / storefront displays only the products you want to display.
(2) Customize the look and feel of the feed so that your storefront blends in with the look and feel on your existing Web site.
(1) Unlike other affiliate networks you’ll always have two choices – download your feed as a dynamic storefront or download your feed in a flat file format. If you select a dynamic storefront you no longer have to worry about products appearing out of stock on your Web site since our dynamic technology will automatically update your site with the most current inventory available.
BTW – did I mention that you get paid on every sale you generate through your Pepperjam Store Builder product feeds? Absolutely – it’s that easy and the benefits of using the feeds are easy and clear. Your users will love the feeds!
If you have any questions about Pepperjam Store Builder post them here, Tweet the Q’s to me @pepperjamceo or attend an upcoming advertiser or affiliate Webinar (www.pepperjamnetwork.com)
OnlyAreaRugs.com (8%) Launches Affiliate Program on Pepperjam Network
