[MichaelColey]

My volume of emails, newsletters, and calls from merchants this week must be about triple what I normal get.

It's too late to take advantage of these tips this year, but merchants who want to make sure their coupons and promotions gets posted next year should:

1) Utilize any automated coupon feeds possible. Right now, SAS and AvantLink are the only networks with good in-house coupon feeds. Hopefully the other networks will get on the ball, plus I wouldn't be surprised to see a good third party option become available before next year.

2) Send your emails/newsletters well in advance. If you're one of the hundreds of merchants who procrastinate until the day before Thanksgiving to send out your Black Friday deals, many affiliates won't get to them in time.

3) Don't try to recruit affiliates the week of Thanksgiving. The time to do affiliate recruitment is MONTHS earlier.

[Mack]

Very well said. When I logged into my mail yesterday morning, I thought my spam filter was broken there were so many messages.

I was surprised at the number of merchants who wait until the last minute. Like Michael said, the ones who got promoted were the ones who send things out in a timely manner.

In a way, merchants and AM's are competing with each other for our attention and our traffic, especially in Q4. Those that stay ahead of the game, win.


If any of them send me something today, or tomorrow, with Thanksgiving or Black Friday promotions, I'm going to reply with a link to this thread.

[Trust]

It is a lot but I expected it, I'm drowning in email. But you also have to consider that a lot of them wait till the last minute in this case because it's Black Friday/Cyber Monday and they don't want affiliates putting up those Black Friday deals too early.

[Donuts]

It's ridiculous to think we can get to all that we're being bombarded with. Peeps, do better prep next time. And if you don't want something published until a specifed date, we're capable of keeping those national secrets under armed guards... but last minute emailing means I won't put it up and I conclude you don't respect my time or my family and our holidays.

[MichaelColey]

One of the newsletters I got doesn't even have any details. It just says that they'll send out another newsletter late Wednesday afternoon or Wednesday evening with the link and details.

[MichaelColey]

The emails and newsletters are now coming in at about FIVE TIMES the normal rate.

[loxly]

Unfortunately as an AM I have to deal with what merchants give me. I totally agree that this week is too late, and don't expect you to get things up today, but the info needs to be disseminated. I just hope you forgive us and will add us to next week's to do list. I have had merchants in the pipeline that were making site changes and doing things to get ready and they just didn't get there in time. I am creating promotional calendars for merchants that will give them information on how to plan in advance for holidays and special events.

And for each of you that have many merchants and are getting buried, there is an affiliate that may need our emails this week

Plus, I would rather send you complete info this week, then have sent you teasers last week that required action this week, or that had information that changed, or sent you to sites that didn't have the right creatives yet.

[flamingoworld]

The other thing, with 1400+ merchants, please don't send me a Happy Holiday email. It is fine to send me something of importance and say Happy Holidays, but DO NOT SEND A SPECIAL EMAIL! I already have enough, don't need to weed through more. It isn't like you put a lot of thought into it, it isn't personalized, you just send the same email to everyone.

However, those who want to send gifts feel free.

[John Powell]

And my friends can't understand why I delete their forwarded emails without opening them.

[flamingoworld]

Got this tonight from Walmart:
"In addition, tomorrow morning you will receive a list of our Thanksgiving Day online specials (prices available Thursday only). "

So they expect me to forgo holiday festivities and sit and wait for an email from them?
Don't think so.

[leeann]

Ditto to all of the above. It's nuts!

[2busy]

My favorite was the one with all the new links to put up for "Special Savings" without any details so I get to go and look them up. The links were there, just no info..like, valid from? until? "Here, put these up".

[Trust]

Yeah, it sucks 2 of the biggest shopping days, at least in terms of hype, happen right after/during Thanksgiving. And agree I don't need the have a happy holidays emails at this time since most are just template. A couple real ones ok, gifts as Connie said are always welcome.

I purposely changed up my schedule a little bit. The plan was:

go to sleep around 4 PM, wake up at Midnight, which worked out. So now I'm going to get some work in overnight, early morning hours. Then enjoy Thanksgiving, watch some football. Get a couple of more hours in later tonight. So plan on staying up 24 hours today, go to sleep at midnight, wake up early and do some Black Friday work. Take the weekend getting ready for Cyber Monday.