Ecom Access

I recently wrote about the difference between markets and communities on OneDegree.ca, and explored how brands should approach online communities, but it’s also occured to me that there is little said about how community hosts (such as bloggers, forum moderators, and podcasters) could effectively monetize. In other words, how do these individuals generate a return all the passion and hard work they’ve poured into a hobby, and turn it into a business. Brands that can answer these questions for community hosts will be in a great position to build lasting and profitable relationships with some of the most influential consumer on the web.

Essentially, these community hosts have built content communities. They’ve (1) generated content, (2) put that content its context by building community around it, and (3) generated conversation around that content. Well, if these community hosts do decide to monetize, they face many of the same ethical constraints that brands who want to engage their communities do. The only difference is that these community hosts are all too well aware of what those ethics are. Their challenge, rather, is in finding revenue model that can offer them the control and flexibility to monetize their communities without compromising them. After all, if the community dissolves, they have no source of revenue left.

Well, I believe that affiliate marketing can offer both that control and flexibility.

1. It’s performance-based model means that community hosts are in complete control of how much they want to push monetization — i.e. there is no pressure from sponsors push certain kinds of content.
2. By finding an affiliate program whose products are relevant to community interests, affiliate promotions can actually add value to the community experience.
3. Affiliate marketing offers more flexibility because community hosts can choose from a variety of channels to feature promotions — i.e. email, banners, sponsorships, text links, coupon codes, etc.
4. Community hosts retain complete control over what their members are exposed to — i.e. they don’t have to promote all of a brand’s products, just those they endorse or are comfortable with.
5. Affiliate tracking codes mean that community hosts can even integrate promotions with multi-media content (such as podcasts) by offering a coupon code.
6. And more custom support means that community hosts can get creatives that complement their community’s spirit, rather than just pushing the brand and its promotions.

Just over a week ago, I attended  Podcamp Toronto and delivered a session (presentation below) on just this topic. Relationships are becoming an increasingly more important factor in the sales process, but some of best online relationship brokers and brands are still struggling to find viable and sustainable ways of working together.I think that affiliate marketing may just be part of the answer.

For community hosts, finding the right affiliate program that features products that are relevant to the community can be an effective way to both monetize and add value to that community. For brands, setting up an affiliate program that offers dedicated support can offer a stepping stone to establishing long-term relationships with communities and their hosts.

Tags: content communities, online communities, pcto09, podcamp toronto, Social Media