Late Night Internet Marketing with Mark Mason -- Affiliate Marketing Tips, Online Business Advice, Email Marketing and SEO
Are you using MailChimp for your affiliate marketing? That might not be OK. This week I talk about some issues with the MailChimp affiliate marketing terms of service described in MailChimp’s knowledge base that seem to be hostile to affiliate marketers.
I also give an update on the Late Night Niche Site and discuss the initial content plan that I have in place for launch of the site next month.
Show Notes
I just found out – and was completely shocked about it – that affiliate links are illegal in MailChimp. MailChimp is an email service provider which is a disruptor, together with Infusionsoft and AWeber, in email marketing in the last 15 years. It turns out that MailChimp has this crazy clause in their terms of service that talks about affiliate links potentially causing your emails to stop. The clause is linked below but some portion of it states:
“Affiliate marketers are typically rewarded by a third party for recruiting customers. The reason we don’t permit this activity is that there’s no real obligation to care about subscriber satisfaction or to maintain a healthy e-commerce relationship with them. MailChimp isn’t meant for this type of marketing.”
They also noted that linking is fine but you need to ensure that the URLs that you link to are not blacklisted or else your campaigns may be stopped. If I were a blogger who is planning to monetize my blog knowing full well that I will be promoting people’s affiliate products of various types, and learning how flaky these spam lists are, I would stay very far away from MailChimp.
————————————
In the episode, I refer to MailChimp’s “term and conditions” and “terms of service” — but what I am reading from in the episode is a
MailChimp knowledge base article about those terms (authored by MailChip and on their site).
Specifically interesting is this bit:
Affiliate marketers are typically rewarded by a third party for recruiting customers. The reason we don't permit this activity is that there's no real obligation to care about subscriber satisfaction or to maintain a healthy e-commerce relationship with them. MailChimp isn't meant for this type of marketing.
Their actual
Terms of Use are here and basically state that they can close your account for any reason (presumably for the reasons stated in the knowledge base article above. This is not all that unusual. No one should have to do business with someone unless they want to (aside from reasons of race, gender, sexual orientation, disability, etc).
The interesting things is that the MailChimp affiliate marketing position clearly indicates that they don’t want to do business with affiliate marketers (us).
LInks Mentioned In This Episode
*
Convert Kit Affiliate Link
*
Divi Theme Affiliate Link
Want More Late Night Internet Marketing?
Help Me Help You
The more I hear from you about your struggles, trials and tribulations, the more I can help. So, be sure to leave comments on this post to reach out to me on Twitter
@LateNightIM or on the LateNightIM Facebook Fan Page.
I'd love to hear what you think about the podcast. Better yet, I’d love to answer your question about Internet marketing on the show. Just drop me a line here on the blog or on the digital recorder at 214-444-8655. Don’t worry, there are no stupid questions. Unless you tell me not to, when you ask a question or leave a comment might even use it on the show.
Help Me Help Others