[Georgie Peri]

What a interesting case study .....

Heres the best part
"From January 2008 through December 31, 2008, FreeCause will donate $0.15 per toolbar user per month to Susan G. Komen for the Cure for each user who downloads and uses the toolbar."

$0.15 donation for users downloading & using the toolbar ..

Source:
http://freecause.com/snapcms/casestudy/komen

~~~~

[Merchant Consultant Team]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_G...n_for_the_Cure

[Haiko de Poel, Jr.]

Linkshare ID = VeKRIlTcjvA
CJ ID = 10398347

Site: Lookpink.com
Name: Justin Holland
Phone: 6172920200
Fax: 6172920218
E-mail Address: justin@freecause.com
Mailing Address: 107 South Street Suite 5C
City/State or Province: Boston , MA
Zip or Postal Code: 02111
Country: United States
Make Checks Payable To: FreeCause, Inc

Admin Note: Moved Thread

[Vinny O'Hare]

So they are paying themselves when a user downloads this?

[Haiko de Poel, Jr.]

The toolbar takes over the search function and drives the search through the PL yahoo results that they get paid for everyclick and then to top it off they overwrite (via their affiliate link) the serps, so they get paid from yahoo, and as an affiliate - the cost of this is $1.80/year per user which they pay to Komen.

Other URLs associated are / were:

LOOKPINK.COM
PINKRIBBONCARD.COM
PINKRIBBONTOOLBAR.COM
PINKRIBBONTOOLBAR.NET
PINKRIBBONTOOLBAR.ORG

[2busy]

The Wikipedia article links to an article in Time magazine : http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...3947-3,00.html That explains how unhappy the real fundraisers are with the "pinkwashing" or using the Komen Foundation for a marketing tool. They complain that it fools people into thinking they've 'done their part' and keeps them from looking deeper into the issues. The pretty pinkification of marketing campaigns lets people think that everything is fine and funding is benefiting research when it actually trickles pennies down to the cause and enriches the marketers. They're not called parasites for nothing!

[leeann]

Omg! I'm speechless (believe it or not). This saga just keeps getting more disgusting. Thanks for the info.

[net4biz]

"Holy Cow, Batman" ... "That's a Spicy Meatball" ...

The era of "Dueling Toobars" is upon us. Break out the Banjo.

Plus, it is also a 'Get Paid To Click' program in disguise ... which of course NO merchant
wants that traffic ... except of course if you making a profit from it. Let's do a little math and see how it all plays out in the old bank account.

Say I buy some traffic ... 100,000 worth ... Say I will pay $1.80 per year to some
worthwhle cause plus I will pay YOU a savings of 10% on anything you buy when you use MY toolbar to shop and how about this - I pay you $1 for everyone who you refer to download my toolbar.

From the 100K in traffic, I get 10,000 downloads ... and everyone of those gets 100 downloads on average ... ONE Million Toolbars ... total cost $900,000 for the $1 affiliate fees and $1.80 million to the so-called Charity - Total - $2,100,000 plus a few servers and a programer and such ... say that costs $400,000 - You spend $2.5 million. But you end up with ONE MILLION toolbars hanging out waiting to do their thing. Let's say they bring you $1 per toolbar per month on average in affiliate commissions ... $1 million buckeroos per month. And this $1 on average number is
probably way low - especially in the months of February (Valentine' Day), May (Mother's Day), August (Back to School), November & December (Christmas).

Annually, $12 million in revenue less $2.5 million in costs. KaChing: $9,500,000 in PROFIT first year ... $900K more in the 2nd year because you don't have to pay the referral fee.

Using an Affiliate Network is irrelevant other than that is the place to get all the merchants on board and to drive the downloads in volume. In a sense, every downloaded toolbar is a defacto affiliate of every merchant who signs up for the toolbar - whether they poach others traffic or not.

It's a 4 level MLM program ... Free to join ... you get $1 for a referral plus save 10% or so on what you buy for downloading the toolbar and you and the upline Charity and the Promoter and the Merchant make money.

"The Times They Are A Changing."

[Zeus]

Where the part about affiliate marketing in that story? The game is to look good for a cause but who's paying the bill, the merchants and their regular affiliates, once again.
And the thieves at LinkShare keep stuffing money into their coffers.