Announcing SlimKim.com

[SlimKim]

Hi Guys,

First ... many thanks to WebProWorld for a free and open forum like this. I know it will serve them well.

Here's the skinny on the SlimKim affiliate program:

SlimKim is a brand new search engine geared towards helping webmasters increase their revenue. We have a menu (that looks much like a toolbar) that can be placed at the bottom (or top) of any webpage.

The SlimKim menu contains eleven main catagories. When your visitors mouse over a catagory, they can then select from 7 different popular keywords for that subject.

You can check out the program at http://www.slimkim.com/affiliates.html

Here are a few highlights:

1. We offer real time reporting. This means you can place our code on your site and know before the day is over how much you are going to be earn.

2. We pay 50% of our gross income from advertisers bids to our affiliates. We could throw out some average bids, but it would hardly be fair. After all, if your site targets visitors that command lower ad rates, then you averages may be less than others.

3. We filter out all countries except US, Canada and the UK. Sorry about that one.

4. Our menu contains a few free listings for which neither SlimKim nor it's affiliates earn revenue. These are reference keywords such as dictionary, white pages, mapquest, news, weather and the popular search engines. These free listings are meant to enhance the affiliates service to their visitors and encourage use of the menu.

Please do read ALL the terms and conditions before signing up. I won't bore you with all the details here, but you will need to read them.

We have several online ventures and know there is a learning curve for each new endeavor. We are here for the long haul and value all comments and suggestions as to how we can improve.

Last but not least ... we take great pride in handling all our affairs with diligence ... this simply means "we do what we say."

Many Thanks
SlimKim

[Linda Buquet]

SlimKim,

Welcome to WebProWorld and thanks for sharing your program with us. Looks pretty unique.

[webwoman]

Is this a pay per click or pay per inclusion? I consult with clients about internet marketing and promotion.

If I were to include you in my toolbox, what do I tell my clients are the benefits of your program?

What kind of investment should the average small business owner expect?

How does it work?

None of this was self evident on the website. You have a button for existing advertisers, but no place for a potential advertiser to make a decision as to whether your program will work for them.

[SlimKim]

Hello Webwoman,

Thanks so much for your questions and comments. You have been very helpful.

We will remove our Advertiser link from our homepage while we redo that end of the program. In the new version we can answer all those questions ... but just now ... let me tell you a little about how it works.

1. It's cost per click. We have other PPC search engines running from the same database. Some show the advertiser bid amount and some do not. Early on, we did show the advertiser bid amount with each listing (at all sites). Today more and more PPCs are moving away from that. We can have a page set up for advertisers to view the bid amounts.

Perhaps you overlooked the "List Your Site" button. You did however find the button for exsisting advertisers "Advertiser Login".

List Your Site is for new advertisers but it hardly answers all the important questions you raised.

2. What are the benefits of our program? I like to get the truth on the table. We are a bit premature in launching the advertiser end of the site. Having said that, we will leave that portion of the site in testing for some time.

The truth is ... at this point our value lies in the ability to generate income for affiliates more than our ability to drive traffic to advertisers.

How can that be? Which is more important, advertisers or affiliates? At first glance you might think you can not have a sucessful search engine without both. The truth of the matter is you can.

Remember Yahoo was an affiliate of Overture for quite some time before buying OV.

I won't bore you with all the details but the simple explanation is that 95% of all second tier search engines (and to a lesser degree even G and OV) work quite closly together and show each others listings much more than you might think.

Sometime it's easily seen if you know what to look for and sometimes you would never know.

3. We value the insight we gain from professionals like yourself. In our rush to accomplish everything at once ... we sometimes overlook the obvious.

Our friends kindly call it multi-tasking ... when the fact of the matter is, more often than not we simply try to do too many things at once.

Heck, we just need to focus ... and take more time to test the advertiser end of the site.

SlimKim is run from a small office in Arkansas. We don't rub shoulders with Bill Gates nor the elite in Silicon Valley. Over the years we have gone down the wrong road more than a time or two. A great deal of time and money was lost while we retraced our steps ... to finally find the right road.

It's a crude way to do business perhaps. But then there have been successes. We love what we do and when I look at our bottom line for last year ... I always think ... not too shabby ... when we started back in 99 I knew this level of success was possible, but I thought it was reserved for a lucky few.

I have a singer / songwriter friend who feels that all the best songs have already been written. I tell him the biggest hits are yet to be wrote.

Some authors and screen writers feel the best books and movies are all taken. Nothing can be farther from the truth.

You hear a lot of talk in any industry (as well as the intenet) about how at this stage of the game certain things just can't be done. It's too late now. If you has got started a few years back, you could be set now ... but there's too much competition now.

A long, long time ago I used to buy into that line of reasoning. I was all a big big lie.

I shouldn't have to say it, but a guy that thinks like I now do will have some major disappointments. There will be times when you don't know where to go next ... and wonder why you even tried. You may not accomplish all you dream of ... but you will accomplish far far more with an expectation than without hope.

Reminds me of a one liner from my favorite book, that goes like this ...

... I've seen slaves on horseback while princes go about on foot like slaves ...

: )