[Gary-AvantLink]

Alright I've claimed twice now that "We are the datafeed people.." since we launched our ABW forum on Monday of this week.. here's why.

Every merchant in our network has three (3) datafeed options available to AvantLink Affiliates...FREE of charge:

1. The Raw Datafeed version (Based on the Recommendations of ABW Affiliates (http://forum.abestweb.com/showthread.php?t=64131))

2. The Dynamic, 100% Customizable, SEO-Friendly, PHP-based, Crawlable Output Content (get the idea ;) ) version

3. The JavaScript Plug-In version


Let's discuss these.... They're all available in our Affiliate Tool Center.

[Haiko de Poel, Jr.]

Gary,

Get a sample going, so ppl can see it Like the hippie site you sent me to, or post a link...

[Gary-AvantLink]

Here is a good example of the dynamic feed in action
http://www.wasatchspeedgoat.com/bc/shop.php
Like I mentioned this tool is customizable and CSS-supported..

this is not an exaggeration: it literally took me 15 minutes to have the trail run products from the Backcountry feed up on WasatchSpeedGoat.com... about an hour more to customize the template, and now there is a Trail Run shop on that blog/site.

BTW this is a sample of the Dynamic version (#2) mentioned above.. remember once installed it does not require any maintenance.

[texgsh]

Gary

I look forward to getting involved with your network

I should have the basics of my site up in the next 2 weeks.

When I have relevant content, blog and framework in place I will get back with you

Thanks for helping

Tex

[Gary-AvantLink]

Thanks Tex.. and welcome to ABW.. you should Introduce Yourself (http://forum.abestweb.com/forumdisplay.php?f=16) to everyone.. :)

[Snib]

Hey Gary,

I just noticed this thread and want to make a suggestion for the #2 option. I noticed the first page and any intermediate category pages don't list any products. Why not show a few of the products from all of the listed categories here: [LINK OUTDATED]. I've found that this brings the products closer to the front page and reduces the number of clicks for customers and bots to retrieve product information.

- Scott

[Gary-AvantLink]

Scott, Thank you for this suggestion. Scott Kalbach and I talked about it and we think it's a great idea. We will work it into the dynamic datafeed product as a configuration option.

I'll let you all know when it's ready..

Gary M

[Snib]

I also suggest Brand name filters so people can view all the products by a particular brand in the current category. If you make these links search engine friendly you can create different combinations of products for each category. A price sort and price range might also be helpful to shoppers.

- Scott

[Gary-AvantLink]

Scott, we're listening...Thanks again!

[nicbos]

Hello Forum,

i think also a feature to get a combination of relevant products between categories would be interesting.... something like "customers who bought this may be interested in purchasing this..." (like Amazon does).

My little opinion :howdy:

Nicola

[Gary-AvantLink]

Snib,

I thought I would update this thread.... the two suggestions you made above (1-Include featured products on category pages with web service client, and 2-Filter by Brand option in Raw datafeeds) have both been added to our Datafeed Manager with the v3.0 Datafeed Manager Upgrade (http://forum.abestweb.com/showthread.php?t=73403) we announced recently..

I want to thank you again for your great feedback & suggestions.. Gary M

[Morethanable]

man this is confusing.. advantlink is WHAT???

are you like CJ and linkshare?

damn this datafeed learning is getting confusing..

I understand the whole GET a datafeed.. I understand formatting a datafeed in excel, taking out what you dont want etc.. customizing it..

But I wish their was a simple solution

A. - If you want to create a site do this...
B- If you want to intergrated this feed into a site do this..

If you want to setit up via mysql and php do these steps.. here is a video showing the process. .

would be a lot easier..

[jackson992]

Have you even started a site yet???

[Gary-AvantLink]

advantlink ;) is a new affiliate network.. (Ok I mean AvantLink)

We opened the network in Oct of 2005. We had a datafeed client previously that was marketed as a 3rd party tool. Rather than charging Affiliates or merchants for the use of the tool, we wrapped a custom network around it and started talking to and adding merchants. Now we're starting to get more merchants, great Affiliates and we have a fully-integrated tool center that is free to use.

are you like CJ and linkshare?

Yes in a way, although at this point we're not running lead generation or cpa offers. We feel our strength is in catalog/merchant site deep-linking, and dynamic and useful tools.. so we're only focusing on merchants and not just any 'advertiser'..

More Info:

Affiliate Information Page (http://www.avantlink.com/affiliates.php)
Merchant Information Page (http://www.avantlink.com/merchants.php)

As far as your comment on tutorials/videos. We'd like to offer these types of how-tos asap.

Thanks for the suggestion!

Gary M

[purplebear]

"are you like CJ and linkshare?"

To a degree, yes. They're not quite as large as the other two yet but big difference is Gary actually listens to his affiliates....he not only listens and hears, but he's actually paying attention to what they're actually saying and is interested in hearing it. You're not just a number to him and he doesn't treat you that way, either. If you have a question you can go to him and not wait two or three days for an answer...you get an answer pretty quickly.

In all fairness to CJ and Linkshare...they are really big so maybe that's why they don't act the way AvantLink does, but have a feeling even when AvantLink gets as big, they won't change much.:)

[Donuts]

I made 4 suggestions to Gary's team and they added them all within 24 hours - and they added them the correct way - no small feat to please a picky person like me. These weren't little things either, they were system changes and data format changes that affect many things - they programmed and rolled them out asap. I'm cautious by nature of new "networks", but so far, Gary and his team have really been pushing my happy buttons.

[Donuts]

Oh crap, my fault, just recounted... make that 5 changes, not 4.

[Chris - AMWSO]

I'm late on this thread but been chatting with Gary this past week, great tool set and impressive set up, I'm impressed! The updated data feed tools are awesome and the RSS support is the best I have seen!

Cheers

Chris