This year 2012, Affiliate Summit West proved to have grown immensely. Looking at my FeedFront magazine, 2012 conference attendee is at 5087! Amazing growth and lots of new things. When I saw Shawn Collins, I congratulated him on the show growth and also gave him my feedback. With growth there is always changes and the Summit went through them.

As I have done in the past I will write my observations, no particular order:

1. First timer session was HUGE. I didn’t think that there were many first timers, but then again a 1k growth for the Summit is amazing.
2. Meet Market is always packed. Not sure if it is because its the first day, but every Meet Market is so friggin packed.
3. Caesar palace was a great place but the conference area it self was awkward. It was held on 3 floors and it seemed everyone got lost finding places.
4. Comparing Affiliate Summit in 2008 to now, there is a change in the industry. Affiliate Summit is being seen as the place to go to to learn performance marketing and online marketing in general. I am seeing more agencies than traditional affiliates that I knew back in 2008.
5. Our content monetizing panel with John Chow, Steve Hall, Murray Newland (mod) turned out to be impressive. Full House!
6. Q&A was different this year, users would send questions to a text twitter system and questions would appear on the monitor. I think this takes out the interaction from speaker to user. But it does stop certain people from trying to just use Affiliate Summit as just an advertorial and asking dumb questions.
7. Clickbooth party was pretty good – I was a Guest UFC judge
8. I got interviewed by the Hot Dog man – told me ketchup on hot dogs is a fail.
9. Blue man in full spandex running around was weird.
10. Some sessions was very simple. I even heard from some people the advance and intermediate wasn’t that entertaining.
11. lots of women are in love with Ad Hustler. Jealous.
12. Met up with some great past marketers such as Shoemoney, Nicky Cakes, Jonathan Volk, Heavy T, Max T, and multiple networks and advertisers I work with.
13. Mobile Meetup was very productive, thanks Kevin De Vincenzi for the invite! Learned a couple new things.
14. Lots of meetings about some new things I am doing. I hate it when meetings get shifted. Messes up my full day of scheduled appointments.
15. Live “New” as a way of life, if not you will die in the industry you are in – Jon Spoelstra
16. NJ affiliates took over
17. I miss the Eric Thomas and Shoemoney keynote – needed to get out of Vegas. I know their keynotes were probably amazing.
18. Club XS was crazy fun, lost my voice that night.
19. Mr Green and Stack that Money are some crazy people! Great finally chillin with them.
20. Hangover party was hella packed
21. Darren did an amazing job at the Affiliate Ball. One of the go to parties to be at while at Affiliate Summit.

I also want to thanks XRev Media for sponsoring the IANteract Dinner, now called the DotCom Dinner. It turned out to be a great event and great networking with people I want to network with. Connecting and learning is one of the best things to do. I really hate talking business in the club and especially when they insist on talking about it too. It never made sense to me to do business in a LOUD environment.

Also another note is I want to thank Missy and Shawn for an amazing show. It is definitely growing and the change is pretty noticeable. I hope it doesn’t become a traditional conference show. Some of the shows I have been to are just not worth going to. The show for me is a place where I can hangout and catch up with others in the industry. I even caught up with networks that I want to work with on a certain project which will do well I think and will definitely change how our industry performs.

With Affiliate Summit just ending. I am going to start working on my new direction on where I want to be in 10 years. As Affiliate Summit grows so does other affiliates, like I said there are some affiliates that are now networks, advertisers, and lead brokers. 2012 we come!

… and as always it is always great catching up with friends from past shows, networks, ThinkTanks, and just strengthening the relationship. I met a lot of great people in this industry and I enjoy always seeing them at any show or where ever we are.

Some pictures:

More pictures…

Related posts:

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3. Affiliate Summit West is Next Week: Get Ready!

This itself was a great experience as I have never went snorkeling. It showed how beautiful Puerto Rico is with their clear waters, amazing islands, soft sands, and beaming sun. Sailing the open waters itself was just a great relaxation for me, taking a quick break from all the online marketing ventures I have been doing.

We then headed back to the hotel to get ready for dinner. I took a nap for about 2 hours because a day in the sun and activities is tiring.

During dinner we headed off to old San Juan to take a dinner cruise. A night filled with good music and good people. After the dinner, me and some affiliates started walking the streets of old San Juan and did a quick tour of a fortress. It was interesting to see the fort walls and the city within these walls. After a quick run of old San Juan, we met up with the group and headed back to the Ritz.

Even this was a one day meetup, Mike and Ndemand did a great job at organizing a full day of events. Memorable events at that. I personally have never been to Puerto Rico, so the experience of snorkeling, boating, corals, etc was just a great experience. I will be here in Puerto Rico for another 3 days and we will end up doing other activities before thanksgiving.

I wan to thank Mike for having such an amazing meetup.

more pictures…

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1. Affiliates, Don’t Be Scared of Puerto Rican Women
2. NDemand Affiliates Sponsors IANteract Dinner East 2011
3. Oklahoma Affiliate Meetup 2010 – CraZy!

In the past these dinners have been amazing and beneficial. There even have been mimics of my dinner in the past. Ever since my first one in Boston, the IANteract Dinners have been a ritual at every Affiliate Summit. Even at other trade shows, marketers are expecting another IANteract dinner. Just recently at adtech 2012 in NY, networks were asking if my dinner was sponsored and when it was being held.

But I am doing away with the IANteract Dinner and have renamed and will continue the ritual as the DotCom Dinner. The reason for this is because of some new moves I am doing in the online space. I feel DotCom is more fit for what I am moving into and its easily remembered.

The DotCom Dinner will be held during Affiliate Summit West 2012 in Las Vegas and will be sponsored by XRev Media. We will be having the dinner at BOA at the Caesar Palace Hotel. If you have been to one of my dinners before then you know how exclusive these are and how beneficial they can become. Past attendees have networked with programmers, new business partners, new ventures, etc.

More info and Location about BOA SteakHouse

These dinners are to intimately network with everyone that are on the same level. Sometimes clubs and bars are not a great place to network, it is always better to network and talk big money over food.

I want to thank XRev Media for sponsoring the DotCom Dinner. They recently had a wicked dinner at adtech NY this month.

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I started IANteract dinner to be a place where everyone can network. Sometimes loud music doesn’t really establish a strong relationship with affiliates and members of the industry. The dinner is taken place during the first night of Affiliate Summit and before all the parties. Food in stomach before alcohol is always a good idea.

This time my IANteract dinner is being sponsored by NDemand Affiliates. This network has grown rapidly over the years and I am glad to be Mike friend during those years. This network has been growing and they have been growing strong. Even getting great branding since they are also hosting the Puerto Rico Meetup!

This dinner will be no different from the past dinners – I chose a place to eat, we network, talk business, have a drink, and enjoy the great company. From my first IANteract Dinner to my most recent, each dinner is meant to create a strong and reassure existing relationships I have with friends in the industry.

Everyone makes money online differently and my goal is to learn how. I am always in a learning mode and that is my goal with this dinner, to learn and network. This year, the IANteract dinner will probably be near the Hilton for easy commute for affiliates and of course a great restaurant.

Here are the past IANteract dinners…

• Crazy Movable Walls in Vegas – West 2011
• Capital Grille in New York – East 2010
• A Massive Dinner for the Masses – West 2010
• Popping Bottles of Dom all Night – East 2009
• Reserved the Whole Restaurant – West 2009
• My First Baller IANteract Dinner – East 2008

I want to thank NDemand Affiliates for Sponsoring this years IANteract Dinner.

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2. Elite Clicks Media Sponsors IANteract Dinner
3. IANteract Dinner 2011 Sponsored by Executive Fortunes

Just these past couple days, Rich Gorman of DirectResponse.net, invited me to hangout with him Cliff and Tom Cohen, a legal affiliate attorney, to grab some drinks. Rich was actually in the city attending the DMA conference in NY, so we decided to meet up. Glad we did.

We ate and had some drinks and while we did I tweeted my followers what questions they would like me to ask the FTC lawyer about the affiliate industry. We talked about where the industry was 3 years ago and where it is now. Tom Cohen was one of the lawyers that was on Smaxor’s Ads4Dough FTC Q&A webinar a couple months back. An amazing Q&A webinar.

Since I had the opportunity to ask him direct questions, I did. I asked him about international affiliates, networks vs affiliates, whose fault it really is, evasions, etc. It was a great dinner with great people and friends.

So after all this, I talked to Rich about starting my own products and we were in discussion about this for a while. He gave me great pointers, a rough estimate of how much an investment would be, design, type of offer, CRMs, merchant processing, etc. He gave me a lot of answers to my noob questions.

This is my first step getting to that space and it feels like it is my first time jumping into the affiliate space, not knowing anything and just doing things as they come. Even though I some what know how that space works from the affiliate point of view, it still has it’s own ‘environment’. There are a lot of things to consider, especially if you are doing your own biz opp, health offer or whatever it maybe.

Things from regulations, to testimonials, to support, to CRM, charge backs, etc. There are a lot of things that can go wrong and which you as a business need to support. Rich has helped me and told me what it takes and how he does it. Taking this information and then using it to my own knowledge definitely puts things into perspective on how I need to look at it and cater to my business.

So far, I have research merchant processing and fulfillment. The best part is there is a local fulfillment service by my house and I met with the owner of the service. She gave me some great insights on how things work and how we can work together. Besides that I also was thinking about investing in a product already out there. I was actually approach about this too, we met and discussed his numbers – then I brought this attention to Rich and he gave me what would be the best move in my situation.

I also talked to my buddy that I met at DK’s San Diego ThinkTank and see what his thoughts are about the whole advertiser world, since he also started being the advertiser. He gave me some great insights and resources to read up on, his mistakes, and what to read up on.

So far the help and resources Rich has provided to me has been great – Thanks Rich! This is going to be exciting for sure, make sure to stay tuned for more updates on my blog!

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I started this because I wanted to surround myself with friends that are in the industry and where we can share the same insights of marketing, especially affiliate marketing. I don’t mind hanging out with my friends, but I can’t discuss money with them. For example, if I tell them I had a bad day because I lost an X amount in a week. Their remarks are not supportive and it then becomes a joke, “You could have given me $X,XXX”. Some of my friends respect what I do and I def enjoy their company, others is a different story.

The mindset of my friends are totally different from an entrepreneurs mindset. I love my friends and no disrespect to them, but sometimes it is hard to discuss my passion for the internet with them.

… so the NJ HangOut Meetup has been created. It allows me to network and friend entrepreneurs in the NJ area. This way I can ping the group and see if anyone wants to ball out. Traditionally, a response I would get from friends is they do not have money, they are broke, they just paid their bills. Understandable. Now I can hangout with a group of friends who is always about making more money and expanding their business.

The Hangout consists of some affiliates like Rohail Rizvi, NJ advertisers, and even an NJ affiliate network – CPA Staxx, which I have yet to meet. There are others as well that do big numbers in the affiliate space and some are also starting out but at least have done affiliate marketing.

The purpose of the hangout is to grab a beer on a weekend, relax, and talk whatever is on our mind. Not only do these hangouts become just a weekly networking event, it becomes a close circle of friends who enjoy the industry and enjoy talking about marketing. I know personally I have grown attach to the group, making friends and enjoying everyone’s company. We don’t always talk business, we talk about life, vacations, clubbing, and everything in between. The group isn’t JUST a networking event, but more of friends you can talk in depth business with.

Preview of the HangOuts:

Our hangouts are becoming more of a place to hangout with friends who enjoy the industry and become close friends. I have a tattoo on my arm saying:

“He that walks with wise men, shall be wise, but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.” – Proverb 13:20

This is true and I got this tattoo done because I started going back to the old me. I started hanging out with friends that are not as driven as me and are in situations that I do not want to be part of anymore. It was a chapter of my life and I want it to be just that, a chapter. I wanted to keep a reminder to myself, who I hangout with I will become. Making sure I am with the right people at all times.

This is also another reason why I travel a lot to multiple trade shows and conferences because I am surrounded by people who are passionate about the internet industry as a whole.

I will never leave or forget my friends I grew up with, I even invite some to these hangouts in hope they can get some encouragement to do even more. Without my circle of friends that I grew up with, I do not think I would be in my situation now. So I will never forget who they are, especially the ones who support what I do.

They say you are who you are base on your surrounding environment and this is the case with friends and people who you are with.

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I honestly can’t wait as I never been to Puerto Rico.

The meetup will almost be like a mastermind meetup style, where affiliates can network and also have fun. I have been to mastermind meetup, ThinkTank. I can tell you the environment is totally different from conferences and the traditional trade shows. It is almost like having a BIG local meetup with people that speak your language.

Mike has arranged a special deal with the Ritz Carlton in San Juan at a discounted rate for the dates of November 18th-20th. I personally may stay a bit longer than those 3 days, maybe for a week as I never been to Puerto Rico.

Mike has this set with some great plans – day with great activities. Here is the itinerary that he has planned:

Catamaran http://www.saltydreams.com/index.htm

• 7:30 am start boarding outside of ritz carlton for catamaran
• 8:00 am leave for catamaran
• 9:00 am Check In at catamaran
• 10:00 am Departure
• 11:00 am Arriving to (Icacos, Palominito, Lobos, Tortugas o Palomino)
• 12:00 pm Lunch
• 1:00 pm Departure to (Icacos, Palominito, Lobos, Tortugas o Palomino)
• 2:30 pm Sailing to Villa Marina
• 3:30 pm Arriving at Villa Marina
• 4:30 back at ritz carlton
• 6:00 pm board for La Rumba Dinner Cruise(sales around bay of San Juan) http://www.larumbacruises.com/index.html
• 6:30 to 8:30 possibly 9:30 still working out time but dinner and open bar will be provided

This looks like a promising meetup and definitely a fun way to get away from the cold (East Coast) during the month of November. If you are interested in participating with a bunch of veteran affiliates and have fun as well, I suggests you pre register for the Puerto Rico meetup. I will be participating in this event and I already know several affiliates that will be doing the same.

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I got back a day earlier than my planned San Francisco trip. The reason was because I was hella tired from the show. Also everything seemed a bit different. Ad tech was held at Moscone West building and not the Moscone Center. The Moscone West had 3 floors dedicated to adtech, where as in the past it was just 1 huge floor at the Moscone center.

I arrived Sunday and I hanged out with Wes Mahler and Brian Evans most of the day until the mastermind dinner. THe dinner was a great meeting event with some big names in it. Monday at the show, I just didn’t go. I went and met up with Kevin and we all went and toured Nappa Valley. Tuesday, I did go to the show and had meetings in the morning back to back. I found some great traffic sources and also talked to some users who owned CRM, in the process of taking on the advertiser world!

For adtech itself it seemed smaller, there are 3 floors. The bottom 2 were exhibit halls and the top 3rd was where all the speakers, keynotes, sessions, beer garden etc is located. So it was just walking around was tiring in itself. For me I was tired after Sunday because I went hard and experience a HangOver movie effect the following day.

The show itself is like any other trade show, a bunch of vendors and people that don’t know what they are talking about when you start to talk about real numbers. You also see the repeated booths as well. The best meetings I had was the ones away from the booths and with vendors that didn’t have booths. It seemed they were more into the meeting and their projects than the show.

I also went out and soft launch a new software which will be a game changer for the industry as well. I go through these issues all the time and I decided why not share my tools with everyone. So that went very well actually, more ideas that I expected as well. I met up with friends especially with HasOffers, GetAds, adKnowledge, Jonathan Volk, Dustin ,people from dk’s ThinkTank, Jim Kukral, etc.

It is always great talking to friends and how they are growing and how they are moving around with their business.

Other than that the show was great, but slower than normal. I didn’t see much affiliates at this show, nor did I see much advertisers as well. It was weird NOT to see some people that I thought would be going not show up. But everyone grows, expands, and diversify their business.

As for the parties, I attended the Affiliate Marketer’s Ball and it turned out to be a very planned out event. At Affiliate Summit West was the first Marketers’ Ball and I guess the venue was too big because there was a ton of empty space. At adtech, it was a good sized club and everyone mixed and mingled more than the Marketer’s Ball at Summit.

We then went to 2 other parties and called it a night after, I was tired! The next day, Wednesday, I just hanged around met with some people and that was it. I decided around early afternoon I wanted to go home. My planned trip to be home is actually today, arriving at 7pm EST. I was just so tired from Sunday, Nappa Valley, and Tuesday meetings – I wanted to just go home.

So I just went to the airport to get it all situated and luckily I got the next flight out of San Francisco back to Jersey! The flight was torture, just because I haven’t worked out in 4 days, my legs started to ‘jump’. Anyways, adtech was good the meetings and networking I did was amazing.

The video I have is a mix of the show and my trip to Nappa Valley.

Related posts:

1. Going to Ad-Tech 2008: San Francisco
2. Overall of San Francisco and Ad:Tech 2008
3. Ad Tech San Francisco 2010 – Wrap Up

Then we got ready for the dinner sponsored by LeadCola.

The dinner was a great way to interact with big guys in the affiliate industry and talk business while having a formal dinner. I have my IANteract dinners during affiliate summit, but this was a last minute dinner put together during ad-tech San Francisco.

The dinner conisted of Jonathan Volk, Brian Evans, Wes Mahler, Morgan Thomas, Ian, and other great people in the industry. I got to meet Sunil, Amar and their affiliate managers at LeadCola and talk about what their network is about. When I first heard about LeadCola at Affiliate Summit, I thought they were advertisers. They are another affiliate network with a lot of projects they are going to be doing in the near future.

As far as business a lot of ideas exchanged, especially talking about improving the affiliate space and optimizing their own internal offers they currently own. I didn’t tell them all the gold nuggets, just gold fragments.

on to the dinner…

The private dinner was held at Morton’s SteakHouse. We had a private open bar and then we headed to dinner after some drinking. After we ordered food and talked about what the new thing to do in the online space and where it is going. I also got to talk to Jonathan Volk and explained to him to stop copying all my blog posts ideas and products!

After we ate, we decided to just drink more and more. We had some wine and shots of patron. I swear we probably emptied 2 bottles of patron that night, me taking 1 by myself.

I am glad we had great people at the dinner and I was glad that it was fun and entertaining. These dinners are a great way to get to know people more indepth and establish a longer relationship in the near future.

As far as LeadCola, I want to thank them for sponsoring the dinner and allowing everyone to have such a great time.

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A while back I wrote how I toured MediaWhiz office 2 years ago and now they have a bigger and nicer office, even though I did miss the balcony from their old. Also I do apologize that  didn’t get a video of their new office or pictures, next time. I was starting the Patrick’s day early as were MonetizeIt.

Entering their new office, I can tell it is going to be much bigger than their other office. I walked in and simply just asked for my AM – Jordan. We took a quick tour of the office, which was a very nice and had a more professional style to it. They had an amazing view of the river and other scenic views. It definitely was a nice upgrade from their previous, again the office was pretty big and had a lot of room.

…. should have reserved my desk.

I met everyone from the MediaWhiz team as it is the parent company of other smaller company’s such as MonetizeIt, the affiliate network. We then just went in a back room and shoot the shit with Jordan and Dan. After a good talk we just started the tradition of Thirsty Thursday at MediaWhiz.

They had food, which I didn’t care for much. A couple of the MediaWhiz team had to leave as they also had their company basketball game going the same night.

I hung out for a bit and got my self acquainted with other team members of MediaWhiz. We put up some music and just had a fun time with friends. Basically shoot the shit with other team members, Dan, and Jordan.

As the day started to end and the night started, a couple others and I went ahead and went out for another drink. We went to a local bar and then across to another bar to get some more drinks and food. It was a fun fast paced night and I am definitely tired today. The night was definitely fun and enjoyed.

I want to thank Jordan and MediaWhiz for inviting me to their new office. I will have to get a video tour of their new office when I am over again. Apologize that I didn’t get it for this blog post.

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