Affiliate Blog

Credit Card Widget Guide Part 2

In my first post, I explained the steps to customize your credit card widget by choosing your categories by card type, issuer or even selecting your own individual cards. For part two, we’re going to take a look at customizing the look and feel of your widget.

Most of step 2 is pretty straight forward, however there are some features I want to point out and demonstrate here in this post.  In order to begin with step 2 you must first click on the left side ‘Show/Hide’ link to expand the box.

 

Another item to note is that in order to display any changes you make to the customization you MUST click on the Update button.  The reset button will clear your changes and bring you back to default. It will not save any of your changes so only use it if you want to reset and start over.

Step 2. Customize Look and Feel

Widget Type.  The wide and narrow radio button option is one of the coolest features about this widget.  While the wide version of the widget allows you to easily create a comparison site chart, the narrow version gives bloggers the flexibility to incorporate credit card advertisements in their blogs sidebars or within the posts themselves.  The sizing of the narrow widget is standard for all blogs, namely type pad, blogger, and word press.

Agent-ID.  You can even apply your agent or sub ID to the widget to allow you to track sales on your end.

So what is "Agent Tracking?" What is an "Agent ID?"

Agent tracking is an additional feature incorporated to our existing HTML codes located at the end of each affiliate link. We strongly encourage all of our affiliates to utilize this feature as a way to track sales and performance when marketing several of our offers at one time. This allows you to evaluate if an offer is working in keeping with the needs of your business.

When you download creatives through the Credit.com affiliate site, you'll be offered a chance to add a custom agent ID.

Is there a minimum requirement on the length of an agent ID?  

Yes, an agent ID must be at least two or more characters in numeric or letter value.

Width – Button Color.  These functions are pretty self explanatory.  They allow you to match the color elements of the widget with the color scheme of your site or blog.

Button Hover Color.  I really like this function.  It shows the visitor that the button is an active link and clickable.

That wraps up part two of the Credit Card Widget series and should give you a better idea of the different options available for customizing the look and feel of your widget. Stay tuned for my next post where we’ll discuss the credit card finder widget and the rate table widget. 

Credit Card Widget Guide Part 1

Not only does our credit card affiliate program offer some of the best payouts and conversions in the space, we are also the only network to offer a credit card widget that can be used on your site or blog.

In the next three blog posts I will review and go over the features and functions associated with Credit.com’s Credit Card Widget.

After signing up for an affiliate account, simply login to Credit.com’s affiliate site and select the Credit Card Widget from the “Exclusive Offers” to begin customizing your widget to fit your site or blog.

Step 1. Choose your Categories.

There are 3 options here and it just depends on the list you want to create.  Do you want to create your list by card type? Issuer? Or create your OWN list based on the specific cards you select?

Option 1. Selecting by card type will allow you to create a list of cards that are for specific credit score ranges and card categories. This is a great way for sorting credit cards on a credit card comparisons site.>It is one of the ways Credit.com sorts our own credit card offers.

Option 2. Selecting the Issuer option will allow you to create a list for a specific credit card issuer. This is also a very useful way of organizing cards on a credit card comparison site.

Option 3. Selecting by card allows you to choose a widget for one single individual card, or to create your own custom list of cards. The drop down list provides you with every available credit card you can market. Some people choose to use a single card as a great cross sell offer.

Once you have added a few cards you have the option to move them up or down your list. You can also click on the trash can and remove the card altogether.

Stay tuned for more customizable tips and features in my next post, Credit Card Widget Guide Part 2.

Corey Bray manages the affiliate team and focuses on business development opportunities for Credit.com. His team's goal is to grow Credit.com's site traffic and exposure in the online credit and financial space.

Marketing Credit Cards in This Day and Age

With the recent credit card act, the online credit card space is going through some significant changes making it even harder to market cards successfully. 

For sites that generate a majority of subprime traffic, there really isn’t much out there.  Consumers will be finding that they are offered pre paid and secured cards but NOT the credit cards they are looking for.

So this must mean that those sites with prime traffic have a huge ROI.  Wrong!  Prime traffic sites are finding it just as hard.  With underwriting the way it is, even fewer of their applicants are qualifying for cards.  Since these cards pay on approval and NOT by application, prime credit card marketers are also seeing a hit to their ROI.

So what do you do?

Be Creative with How you Market Cards

Our site, like many others, is a credit card comparison site.  Building one of these for yourself is easier than ever with our credit card widget and API feeds.  Just because sites are successful with this approach, doesn’t mean that it’s your only option.

Including the credit card rate table widget in locations on your financial blog or site can lead to unexpected revenue.  Our rate table widget tracks the user’s activity on our site and will compensate you for their actions.  Instead of trying to build out a highly converting credit card site, you can rest assured knowing that we have done our due diligence on the conversion process to get you optimal results when linking to our credit card portal. 

Credit Cards as Cross Sells

A lot of people in the financial space use the credit report as a cross sell, but have you ever considered credit cards?  If you are declining a consumer for a loan product, a credit card or secured card on the exit page is one way to help that consumer.  A secured card will help to boost their credit score, hopefully allowing them to come back to your site in the future and actually qualify for the loan.  

Stay Compliant

Staying compliant means that you will be able to continue cards for the upcoming months and years.  This is the best way to make sure you don’t end up on a black list of one of the major issuers.  Our credit card affiliate program makes it easier than ever to stay compliant.  Our feed and widgets have the most up-to-date compliance information. 

You can also ensure that you remain compliant by simply linking to the credit card section on our site. This allows you the ability to get compensated for all available offers we have.  You can contact your rep for direct links to our credit card pages. 

Corey Bray manages the affiliate team and focuses on business development opportunities for Credit.com. His team's goal is to grow Credit.com's site traffic and exposure in the online credit and financial space.

Affiliate Update: CARD Act Reminder & Featured Credit Card Offers

On February 22, 2010, the second and most extensive round of consumer protections under the CARD Act are scheduled to go into effect. To help guide you through these extensive changes, we've posted a quick and easy summary that outlines all of the upcoming provisions for you here on our blog.

In light of the upcoming changes, we also wanted to take a moment to feature a few of our top performing credit and prepaid card offers for you to consider in your next affiliate campaign:

Orchard Bank Classic MasterCard
	Orchard Bank offers a variety of cards for consumers with less than perfect credit. With a simple preapproval process and the opportunity to add a positive credit reference to your credit reports, the Orchard Bank is the way to go. See Details
Public Savings Secured
	Only requires a low $200 opening deposit with easy approval. Also reports to all 3 credit reporting agencies and is a great card for re-establishing or rebuilding credit. See Details
Green Dot Gold Prepaid MasterCard
	The Green Dot card carries fewer fees than most prepaid debit cards and there are no credit checks or bank account requirements. See Details

To find out more about these offers, please contact your account manager for details.