WidgetBucks launches in the UK and Europe today
As of 10pm GMT today, WidgetBucks are launching their contextual ad network of shopping widgets for online publishers to the UK and European market.
So what’s so good about it?
Well a few things actually. First of all WidgetBucks gives bloggers and site owners another revenue stream via it’s widgets. But what’s different about their widgets is that publishers can earn via both CPM (Cost-Per-Thousand Impressions) and CPC (Cost-Per-Click). The way it works is that when you serve a WidgetBucks ad widget on your site, users based in the UK will see a short-duration display ad followed by a shopping ad widget that features UK-based merchants and products, listed in £UK pounds sterling. So you get to earn twice from one ad serving. Sweet.
Here’s an example of a WidgetBucks widget in action:
What else?
Well, for non-techies like me the interface is an absolute dream to use. After signing up and creating an account (which takes 20 seconds tops) you can access the “New Widget” page which gives you all the options on one single page to create your own widget. Again this process is simple and very straightforward, you can create your own widget, and preview it live within 10 seconds. You can also choose to either let WidgetBucks crawl your page and choose suitable content to be displayed within your widget or you can choose your own categories. It’s the simplicity and user-friendliness of the interface that I really like, it’s an absolute joy to use.
Sounds good, anything else?
Yes! You can also earn money by referring people to WidgetBucks. So when you refer a new WidgetBucks user, you will receive a 5% referral fee based on the commissions earned by the people you refer. You’ll receive this 5% for the full 12 months after the new member joins. In my opinion this is a really good deal, if only UK affiliate networks offers these kind of deals.
Background
WidgetBucks isn’t just a new startup, they have been around for since 2005 as part of the Mpire Corporation. In the last 9 months, they’ve served over 6 billion ad impressions and are nearing 1 billion monthly impressions. In June of this year, they announced a $10 million investment, led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, a premier venture firm.
I’ll be plugging WidgetBucks into a few of my sites and blogs today and tomorrow. To sign up and try them out for yourself, click here.
What I’m listening to right now: Lloyd feat. Sway – “How We Do It In The UK”
Tuesday, July 15th, 2008 at 10:50 pm and is filed under Blogging, Making Money. 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.
July 15th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
Sounds very cool I think I’ll have to take a look.
July 16th, 2008 at 12:36 am
“if only UK affiliate networks offers these kind of deals” - AWIN, AF and POR *do* offer 5% on referred affiliates (and for life, not just for 12 months) - it’s only the rest of the Industry that doesn’t reward affiliates properly.
July 16th, 2008 at 7:04 am
This blog used to be interesting; now its just a load of PR fluff for businesses that have approached you.
Can you not start to post interesting stuff again, as you used to do a year or two back?
Thanks.
July 16th, 2008 at 9:27 am
Robert - I get approached from a LOT of businesses wanting me to mention their products and services, now more than ever. I reject 99% of them but I will blog about those that I think will be of interest to my audience. I happen to think that WidgetBucks launching in the UK is highly relevant and a service that I will use, hence my blog post.
July 16th, 2008 at 9:39 am
Lammo - interesting point, in all the years of being an affiliate I didn’t know that. I’ve just scoured the AWIN interface trying to find details of how to recruit new affiliates and all I could see was a small piece in their FAQ saying that you can earn a % on all referrals. It doesn’t tell you how much, nor does it tell you how to refer affiliates! Likewise AF has NO faq’s telling you about referrals and no mention of it anywhere on their site. However well done to POR as they explain clearly and easily how to earn 5% for the live of affiliates you refer to them.
July 16th, 2008 at 10:29 am
I’m surprised you didn’t know about this 5% thing with AWIN. I remember when you could actually see the list of affiliates that were earning for you. You could even email them and offer them tips
I’ve been earning that 5% for years now. I wonder where the money comes from merchant or network?
This WidgetBucks thing looks interesting, I might have a play with that.
July 16th, 2008 at 10:56 am
Nearly all of my WidgetBucks income has come from the 5% which is great. This is a significant move and I’m hoping the move into pay per click in the UK and the rest of Western Europe means I’ll start to see some direct income from my sites. The scheme is to be extended to a load of other countries in Europe at the end of the month.
July 16th, 2008 at 1:32 pm
[...] on the WidgetBucks European announcement on SeattlePI and on here.org.uk. Also check out our comparison of WidgetBucks and [...]
July 16th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
I could be wrong, but I think the AWin referral stuff is done by signing up for their affiliate programme as if they were any other merchant - if there’s any more to it than that then we’ve missed it to.
Signed up to Widgetbucks - wasn’t too impressed that I had to go through the approval process just to see what their widgets look like, but that’s by the by now. Bit worried that its contextual matching served up ads for wide screen TVs on a motorsport site, though! Wonder if it’ll put Lewis Hamilton ads on our home electronics site? I must give that a try and see what happens.
July 19th, 2008 at 6:28 am
Are you getting good conversions from WidgeBucks? I’ve been promoting them for some time now but my conversion rate has been very low. I’m actually thinking about dropping them and concentrating on something else.
August 16th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
[...] on from their launch in the UK in July, WidgetBucks have just launched their own customisable skin platform for creating your very own [...]