A4U Expo wrap up, award winners and photos
Wow! What an absolutely fantastic event. I would like to personally thank the Existem team - Matt, Claire, Chris, Louisa, Pete, Tom, Ryan, Kathryn, Mark and Bruce for putting together the most professional, polished and useful event for anyone working in the “online” industry in the UK. Bar none.
The 2 day event at the ExCel in London was just full to bursting with real high quality panels, workshops, presentations, exhibitions and opportunities to network. I think the final figures were that around 1000 people were coming through the door on the first day alone, that is an awesome result and represents the fact that Affiliate Marketing is becoming more and more of an accepted and established route to market.
Anyway I have a terrible memory so am just going to go ahead and post some of the highlights for me, and thank a few people.
First of all thanks to the gorgeous Tara and Fiona for sharing the 7 hour journey down by car with me. Thanks too for the chocolate Maltesers stains and crisp crumbs, worry not though the car was valeted first thing when I got home! BTW your blogs are no longer “secret”. 
As for the Expo itself I’d like to thank my fellow panelists on the “Meet the Super Affiliates” panel. It was a real pleasure to share the stage with Duncan Jennings, Kristopher B. Jones and Sri Sharma. I’m sure I speak for everyone when I say how pleased we were that the event was standing room only. Thanks also to everyone who came over to say hello after the event too, very much appreciated. I’ve had a few emails too from attendees who asked what the sites were that I recommended for finding designers/coders etc. The first one that I talked about was the SitePoint Forums, specifically the Contests where you can ask many designers to pitch for your business. Kris also talked about Elance which is a similar resource.
I’d also like to thank Affilinet for letting me eat all of their fruit while I was detoxing from the Buy.at party the previous evening. I’m sure I paid you back with some free consulting for one of your merchants though 
(BTW how beautiful is Nicky Iapino in the flesh?) Cheers to Frostie for the health kick smoothie too. Likewise it was great to catch up with Helen, Matt, Kevin and Sheenu from DGM and steal their chocolates when I was looking for a pick-me-up after all the detoxing
Big shout out to Jess, who I caught up with for the first time in ages (albeit too briefly) on the first day, lets speak soon about some bingo stuff. Nadeem, great to see you also mate, you’re one of the nicest, genuine guys in Aff Marketing. Love the new blog too. Keith, nice to see you too mate, we really should speak more. Clarke, always good to catch up with you, one of the “old timers” in this industry and a really funny down to earth guy. Same applies to Carol, Stewart and Graham (yes he does exist) from the Paid On Results team, fantastic bunch of people. Great to meet fellow Northerner Ray too, and my competition winner, Laura. Kirsty, my nominee for “Best Affiliate Blog”, nice to catch up with you, my you were “tipsy” at the Buy.at party weren’t you? Paul and Julie, nice to see you guys too, same goes for Jason and Jude, I’m sure I saw Mr. Grumpy actually smile (once) too. John and Jason, as always good to catch up with you both. Jason, what was with the blazer, shirt and portfolio under your arm? Were you going for a job interview? James, as always a pleasure - I’m really looking forward to your upcoming incentive to win a car. Hurry up and get it officially announced. Dan, keep up the good work with your blog, always good to catch up with you too. Joe, good to speak with you also, its been a while - and your blog isn’t crap, honest. Shane, top guy, when’s the blog coming? Jo (smiler) from Stream 20, I promise to remember who you are from now on, after Thursday night how can I forget?
I would especially like to thank all the people who introduced themselves to me as readers of my blog. I was genuinely touched by the amount of people who came up to say that they enjoy my ramblings. Bless you guys!!!
The Expo was also host to the very first A4U Affiliate Marketing Awards. Here is the list of winners in full:
Publisher Choice of Network 2007 - Affiliate Window
Well done guys, you have had loads of innovations over the last year, especially the ShopWindow tool which rocks.
Publisher Choice of Agency 2007 - Existem-am
Well done Mark and Bruce. I don’t know Bruce too well but I do know he knows his onions. As for Mark, he’s one of the nicest helpful people in the industry so well done guys.
Publisher Choice of Merchant 2007 - PrezzyBox
As I’m now a non-executive director or Prezzybox I have to say this award was well deserved!
Merchants Publisher of the Year 2007 - UK Web Media
Well done Jamie, Mark and crew. A great bunch of guys who I know do one hell of a job for the merchants they work with (please wire the usual amount to my bank account for this post).
Innovation in Affiliate Marketing - Network Award - Affiliate Window
As above, well done guys, well deserved.
Innovation in Affiliate Marketing - Merchant Award - Amazon
They got my vote too.
Innovation in Affiliate Marketing - Publishers Award - eConversions
Congratulations to fellow North-Easterner Duncan and his team, sound as a pound.
Publishers Manager of 2007 - Merchant Award - Zak Edwards from PrezzyBox
Yep, well deserved. He also won “lookalike of the year” for his “H” from Steps impersonation.
Affiliate Marketing Blog of 2007 - Kieron Donoghue
What can I say? A MASSIVE thanks to everyone who voted for my humble little blog.
Best Account Manager 2007 - Hero Grigoraki
Well deserved. Hero, you’re one of the hardest working managers in this business. It doesn’t matter what time of day/night/day of the week I email/MSN you, you’re always around. And lets not forget you have the BEST name in the world ever.
Best New Merchant of 2007 - Next
Hmmm. They just reduced their commissions, in time for Christmas.
Best New Affiliate of 2007 - Dealpond
Don’t know these fellas but well done.
Best International Publisher - eConversions
Duncan again! Top banana.
Industry Champion Award 2007 - Matthew Wood
Well deserved and who I voted for. If it wasn’t for Matt the industry wouldn’t be where it is now, no doubt about that.
Just one final note on the Awards. with it being the first one I thought that there were some people who were left out. Only because there can be only one winner in each category - and for no other reason. So here’s my list of people who I think should have also won awards:
Graham Keen from Buyagift - Top bloke and one of the most pro-active and approachable affiliate managers in the country.
Buy.at - Great team, very nice people and one of the best network interfaces in the industry.
Jess Luthi - Affiliate marketing superstar!
Equator - Top agency, they manage affiliate programs very very well!
So there we have it. If you didn’t attend the Expo, shame on you, you missed a brilliant event. On that note, why didn’t more merchants have an exhibition stand? Sure BT, Sky, Littlewoods Direct, eBay, Virgin Games and erm a couple of others did but that was all. If I were a merchant looking to grow my program or launch one I sure as pure would have had a stand and made the most of the biggest affiliate marketing conference in the UK.
Until next year!
Oh, here’s a few photos, as I get more I’ll update this post:
Clarke, Stewart, Carol and Graham from Paid On Results.
Dan and David Brent
Matt accepting his award.
Hero accepting her award
Mark and Bruce from Existem Affiliate Management.
Me getting an award!
Ray, Hero and Keith.
Tyson - Hey do you like my sports jacket?
A few other people have also blogged about the conference. I’ll also update this list as and when I see new blog posts on the subject.
James
Elaine
Jason
Keith
Dan
Markus
Paul
Joe
Nadeem
Lee
Stephen
Jess
Kirsty
What I’m listening to right now: Q-Tip – “Work It Out”
Saturday, October 27th, 2007 at 3:42 pm and is filed under Affiliate Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Welcome to my blog. My name is Kieron Donoghue and I run UK Offer Media Ltd. I thought it would be fun to post a daily (well hopefully daily) blog, writing about my experiences in Internet Marketing and more specifically Affiliate Marketing. I'll include some personal stuff too, probably about my other passions, music and cars. Please feel free to post your comments and thoughts too.
October 27th, 2007 at 4:11 pm
[...] stretch very far, but I did want to post who the winners of the awards were and thanks to Kieron’s post I can, so here [...]
October 27th, 2007 at 4:40 pm
Just wanted to say a huge well done for the blog award this week, truly deserved.
I enjoyed your panel session this week. I agree totally with your no suit, in this for the lifestyle comments. I got out of corporate life to do my own thing. Why would I want to employ staff and become a manager again? Keep it real KD!
October 27th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
I wrote pretty much the same about merchants in my expo posting, c’mon merchants, get yourselves a stand next time.
October 27th, 2007 at 4:55 pm
Congrats on the blog award. looks like it was a great event, it was a shame I couldnt go, but a death in the family meant I couldnt. Hopefully will make it to the next event
October 27th, 2007 at 5:05 pm
[...] days away from Marilyn (the old PC), but above are a few pictures I took at the event. Check out Kieron and Lee’s blog for more comprehensive [...]
October 27th, 2007 at 5:14 pm
Congrats on the blog award, from the write ups on this and other blogs looks like I missed a great event.
October 27th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
A mega-congratulations on winning the award Kieron.
When I got back home, my mum and a friend both asked me what I learnt at the event and here’s the response I gave them:
I told them that I learnt more from the presentation you were in than any other. More so than most people at the event, you seem to have your life in a balance Kieron. You work hard, you play hard, you are not a blagger, and you are not tied to an office desk from 9 to 5 every day.
At the presentation with the Super Affiliates, you were your usual down-to-earth self. You admitted you weren’t good at certain things and you were very respectful of the others.
What I learnt is that life is not about making money but about having freedom and being HAPPY. You were asked why you hadn’t upscaled your business with teams of PPCers etc. and you said that that didn’t appeal to you. You didn’t want the stress of managing 20, 30 or 40 people.
I only manage a few people and it is stressful.
I think that the guys who manage big companies don’t necessarily have their life in balance the way you do.
You are a top bloke and I take my hat off to you for doing it YOUR way.
October 27th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
[...] A4U Expo, the UK’s Affiliate Marketing Conference & Exhibition just ended yesterday. Kieron has a great overview of the event complete with [...]
October 27th, 2007 at 6:49 pm
UK Affiliate Marketing Award Winners - A4U Expo Pictures…
The A4U Expo, the UK’s Affiliate Marketing Conference & Exhibition just ended yesterday. Kieron has a great ……
October 27th, 2007 at 9:59 pm
[...] to mention people etc. Id like to refer to a few blogs that have been quick to write about it: Lee, Kieron, Jess, Stephen, Kirsty, Paul & [...]
October 28th, 2007 at 12:23 am
Good to see you at ‘the expo’ Kieron, shame you were unwell and couldn’t make the 2nd day, congrats on winning the award.
October 28th, 2007 at 1:40 am
[...] other views on the Expo, then try Paul, Kieron (I smiled twice!), Keith, Jess (sorry, didn’t see you!), Lee (sorry, didn’t see you [...]
October 28th, 2007 at 11:04 am
Looks like you had a great time. Congratulations on your personal award, Kieron!
October 28th, 2007 at 11:24 am
[...] of blogs, including (in random order) Jason’s, Keith’s, Joe’s, Paul’s, and Keiron’s who’ve done a magnificent job of detailing the event. But (yeah, I know, don’t start a [...]
October 28th, 2007 at 6:20 pm
Tipsy? That doesn’t even cover the enthusiasm with which we hit the gin. Unfortunately, one of the wine waitresses seemed to take a shine to my Duncan and she absolutely polluted us with free drink. Most of the time I wasn’t realising she was putting stuff in the glass!
Gah… we only lasted till 11pm the next night, lol.
October 29th, 2007 at 4:59 pm
[...] of others have already published their thoughts on the expo - be sure to check them out! Tags:a4uexpo, Affiliate, Affiliate Networks, [...]
October 30th, 2007 at 12:02 pm
Brilliant event and great to see everyone. Kieron - thanks for the advice
and well done on the award, well deserved. Looking forward to next year already…
October 30th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Ah gee thanks Kieron for the nice words. And thank you so much for the drive and letting us pollute your new car. CONGRATULATIONS on the Best Blog!
October 30th, 2007 at 4:22 pm
[...] Donoghue - Here.org.uk: “Wow! What an absolutely fantastic event…If you didn’t attend the Expo, shame on [...]
November 11th, 2007 at 2:59 pm
[...] not going to do a full review of a4uexpo it has been blogged about by Lee McCoy, Kieron Donoghue, Paul Wheatley, Markus Jalmerot, Joe Connor, Nadeem Azam, Stephen Pratley, Jess Luthi, Kirsty [...]
November 11th, 2007 at 8:49 pm
[...] not going to do a full review of a4uexpo it has been blogged about by Lee McCoy, Kieron Donoghue, Paul Wheatley, Markus Jalmerot, Joe Connor, Nadeem Azam, Stephen Pratley, Jess Luthi, Kirsty [...]
February 4th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
[...] Last year saw the first ever A4U Awards as part of the A4U Expo in London. This year the awards have grown up, matured and now have their very own formal black tie evening ceremony at the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel on June 5th. [...]