159 New Posts Today

[Charlie.Calabrese]

Our team has received questions with regards to buy.at’s stance on toolbars.

Simply put, we do not allow toolbars into the network that overwrite affiliate cookies, flash reminders, pop-ups, etc. or interfere with a customer’s web experience in any way under any circumstances. We make every effort to prevent these activities by scrutinizing every network application. In addition, we have a well versed Network Quality team that reviews and tests promotional activities for the protection of our merchant and affiliate partners. Rest assured that violations to our network terms and conditions are each carefully reviewed and dealt with swiftly, resulting in direct removal from the network.

At buy.at, we place onus on our affiliate partners to read and understand our terms and conditions, and our team is readily available to address questions via email, telephone, IM and forum postings. Feel free to reach out to any of us here should you have any questions.



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[Zeus]

Thanks for the clear stance on toolbars.

[Bill]

Bravo, Charlie. Buy.at's firm and ethical stance will help you attract many affiliates and new merchants.

Your team rocks. But you already knew that, didn't you?

[Convergence]

Thank you. I will begin reviewing opportunities with Buy.at -

[purplebear]

Thank you Charlie and all the rest of the Buy.at gang for your stand on this issue. Have joined several of your programs already and in the process of placing links on my site and ummmm tryin to figure out your links.... This year I made up my mind is the year for me to tackle em so will get there soon..... Have some of your regular ole links on my site but gonna get brave and tackle the more product specific ones. Thanks again for your stand

[ayakobing]

Hi purplebear,

If you have any difficulties, please feel free to contact me anytime.

Ayako

[Howard Gottlieb]

I too will take a look at your merchants.

[Mike Rawlings]

I just tried to get more info on buy.at/us and the url is down??

[Charlie.Calabrese]

try this link

www.buyat.com

[2busy]

It's good to work where people take pest control seriously

[mayfly]

Thanks BuyAt team.

I've with BuyAt for a little while. Joined three merchants, one has generated a few sales. Not much, but at least I know my commission won't be stolen by thiefbars.

[bonnievr]

Good to know. Thanks!

[MichaelColey]

Originally Posted by Charlie.Calabrese

Simply put, we do not allow toolbars into the network that overwrite affiliate cookies, flash reminders, pop-ups, etc. or interfere with a customer’s web experience in any way under any circumstances.

Is this still the case? I've been hearing rumbling about an influx of toolbars and parasites at Buy.at. Please tell me it isn't so.

[jon.brown]

Hi Michael

I am the Network Quality Manager at buy.at and I would be very interested in finding out about any toolbars or parasiteware on the buy.at network. Whilst we do have a very strict approval process in place good affiliates can turn bad and these can sometimes be difficult to identify. When my team is notified of such an affiliate they are investigated imediately and any software tested. We continue to take the issue of toolbars very seriously and those who distribute them are dealt with accordingly.

Warm Regards
Jon
jon.brown@buy.at

[Rollerblader]

Originally Posted by jon.brown

Hi Michael

I am the Network Quality Manager at buy.at and I would be very interested in finding out about any toolbars or parasiteware on the buy.at network. Whilst we do have a very strict approval process in place good affiliates can turn bad and these can sometimes be difficult to identify. When my team is notified of such an affiliate they are investigated imediately and any software tested. We continue to take the issue of toolbars very seriously and those who distribute them are dealt with accordingly.

Warm Regards
Jon
jon.brown@buy.at

I'm sending you an email and sent one to Charles last night. I found a ton of stuff when I launched a program on your network. Still love your Network and am hopefully launching 5 programs on the UK one, just hard to get them to respond back to me lol.

[JoyUnltd]

Originally Posted by mayfly

Thanks BuyAt team.

I've with BuyAt for a little while. Joined three merchants, one has generated a few sales. Not much, but at least I know my commission won't be stolen by thiefbars.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something, but if a merchant also belongs to another network that allows toolbar parasites, your commission could still be stolen once your visitor lands at the merchant's site.

[Rollerblader]

I'd like to rephrase what I wrote. I found a few things on their Network that I disagreed with, and Buy.at also brought one toolbar that I had missed to my attention. Also, I sent an email to Charles after 10pm and he did get back to me this morning. He has always been very responsive. Also, Jon wrote back to me very quickly.

[mayfly]

Originally Posted by JoyUnltd

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something, but if a merchant also belongs to another network that allows toolbar parasites, your commission could still be stolen once your visitor lands at the merchant's site.

Did you notice the OP and my response was made back early this year?

[Charlie.Calabrese]

First, let me say hi to everyone and thanks for taking the time to read this thread and post your points of view.

Normally my take on most matters is to let people express their opinions, gain insight into their points of view and gain a better understanding of how others see things.

In this instance I need to do a bit more than listen. I need to dispute some points made by Rollerblader (RB) in this thread.

RB was a contact for one of our merchants for a short period of time. During that time, a URL Reclamation vendor requested our Affiliate Development Team make an intro to in the interest of working with them through the affiliate channel. The opportunity was declined, and as such died at that point.

Later we brought it to the attention of RB that an affiliate had applied to the program and was running a toolbar, and that this affiliate had come to us thru another network of sites. As such we tested said toolbar, found it to be non-malicious with regards to overwriting cookies or other marketing channels. Once again problem solved and addressed in a very timely fashion.

Shortly after this interaction RB departed from his role with this merchant.

Which brings us to more recent threads. I received an email at 10:30 PM from RB, wanting to discuss toolbars within our network. Today I replied via email asking for specifics. He asked that we have that conversation over the phone rather than over email.

Since, RB and Kim Salvino have had a discussion where RB pointed out the issues which had been resolved historically and shared that another affiliate, who we will not mention out of respect to that affiliate, has deployed a toolbar. As a network, we are reviewing this outstanding question. The simple fact is that no network is 100% clean – though there are several that certainly strive to be just that.

We, here at buy.at, take a great deal of pride in our responsiveness and network cleanliness. RB's comments and opinions are certainly respected, as we are here to listen and help in any way we can, as a network.

On a personal note, buy.at is completely open to suggestions from anyone on any aspect of our network. Additionally, we are constantly on the look out for issues on our network. If you see any questionable affiliates using buy.at links, please let me know. My email address is below.


Regards,

Charlie Calabrese
Charles.Calabrese[at]buy.at

[MichaelColey]

Originally Posted by MichaelColey

Is this still the case? I've been hearing rumbling about an influx of toolbars and parasites at Buy.at. Please tell me it isn't so.

I got some further details and installed the toolbars to test them, and I couldn't reproduce any bad behavior.

If anyone has any examples of toolbar affiliates active at buy.at that they don't want to discuss publicly, feel free to email or PM me the details and I'd be glad to check them out and/or post in this thread about them. (It sounds like buy.at is very receptive to responding either publicly or privately, as well.)

[Rollerblader]

Buy.at has been very responsive and I have no doubts they will not take action if they find something that violates their T&Cs.

[Charlie.Calabrese]

Michael and Rollerblader...thank you both for the time on this...we are eager to be as open and clean a network as possible. Should you or anyone else find any questionable issues on buy.at please let us know.

c3