An affiliate request I got in yon Mail

[Cthulhu]

Hey, my name's Derek (Auron aka Sir Auron at ACF), and I'm a moderator at ffmerchandise.invisionplus.net.

Much Like yourselves, we were born through the tattered remnants of what was AC.net, and we primarily deal with the merchandise side as you've most likely guessed.

We've been going for just over a year and a half now, own the domain ffmerchandise.net (not me personally though), and we're hopeful to be getting the proper site up sometime in the near future.

Anyway, the point of me sending this to you is that I was just curious if you would be at all interested in becoming affiliates with our forum?(not much, just a link of a little logo, and vice versa would be nice.) You're more than welcome to any news on upcoming items that your forum might well be interested in. We have another moderator, Touya (a former ACFer as well), who is the best at finding all the latest SE merchandise news. So we'd be sure to keep you up to date in that regard.

We also thought that becoming affiliates with you might help get a little more traffic going through both places, which could be a good thing. Our board is fairly small (91 members to date), but we're holding steady.

If this is something that just doesn't interest you at this time, or would rather wait until we're a proper site, then that's fine, I just figured it wouldn't hurt to ask.

With that said, feel free to contact me whenever is best for you, and I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.

Thanks for your time,

Derek

What do you think?

The site they referred to (ffmerchandise.net) doesn't seem to exist (although .com does, but that seems like a (cheap) webshop site), but the forums do. The forums don't seem to be very popular (91 members), but they do look active at the moment. I was going to be nitpicky about their member count, but I just saw we've just passed the 200 mark, so I don't think we should complain on that, .

But yar, I've explained my personal grievances with affiliates earlier (clutters up the site, doesn't seem to help much in terms of additional visitors, etc), but I can put my own stuff aside if you lot think it'll be a good idea.

 

[Tetsujin]

Weren't you against affiliates or sth?
Though they might have a point with those news about merchandising stuff. That is, if we're interested in those sorts of news.

 

[Makoeyes987]

I think its a good idea, and Sir_Auron was cool. I don't think it'd hurt at all, and would be a good thing.

 

[Cthulhu]

[quote author=Tetsujin link=topic=595.msg23013#msg23013 date=1235586370]
Weren't you against affiliates or sth?
[/quote]
[quote author=Cthulhu link=topic=595.msg23009#msg23009 date=1235586135]
But yar, I've explained my personal grievances with affiliates earlier (clutters up the site, doesn't seem to help much in terms of additional visitors, etc), but I can put my own stuff aside if you lot think it'll be a good idea.
[/quote]

 

[Tetsujin]

Well ja, it doesn't sound bad. I'm okay with it =p

 

[Max Payne]

I.....I agree with whatever's decided.

 

[A]

Wait a sec. Are you guys willing to take affiliates with your forum itself?

 

[Channy]

I've been to and from that site, and ffmerchandise is pretty good. They're quite on the mark about being up to date with what's been released, although they sell out quite easily and don't stock up on it afterwards.

I think with what they sell and how much traffic they get for that site, it'd be a good choice affiliate. If you guys do dat.

 

[Auron]

Hey all, Sir_Auron here. I actually probably would've registered here sooner, but I've been pretty cozy over at my (well, it's not actually mine, but you get the idea lol) forum. Hope you don't mind me posting here.

A couple of quicks things about our board just so you all don't think this is fake or we're a bunch of spammy, leeching retards or something...

I'm sure some of you remember the SE/FF merchandise thread that was up for quite some time at ACF, it was pretty popular, and it was basically in its own little world because the "upper management" (I use that term loosely, BTW) never bothered to check in. A bunch of the guys that were regulars in that thread, like myself, Blood Talon (Ryu), Materia Hunter, Quetsaeka (Not so much in that thread I believe, but the forum in general), Touya, Xioujin (Akatian), OWA 79, Nelxid, Zelu, Providence, etc., etc., moved to FFM...

Anyway, Materia Hunter created the board in summer '07, due to all the bullshit going on at ACF; The constant crashing, the political shit, the drama, etc. It was pretty much a safe haven, so we'd have somewhere to go when the site went down. Soon enough, we all got used to posting there so much, we gradually made that our new home. So then, when ACF finally went down for good, we already had a place set up. And that's were we've been since. It has decent traffic (we've been linked to a couple of sites due to Touya), but it does have its slow moments too. It is kind of what should be expected of a free board though. But as I said in the e-mail I sent to YopY, MH is working on getting an actual site up as soon as he can. Right now, it'll just lead to an error page. Also, the .com is an entirely different thing, that's why MH had to go for the .net instead. I think MH said that he tried to get into contact with them, but nothing ever came about as far as I know.

So with ALL of that said, that's pretty much all I wanted to get out.

BTW, Glad to see Makoeyes remembers me. 'Sup, dude? ;D

 

[Cthulhu]

[quote author=butterflybookmark link=topic=595.msg23184#msg23184 date=1235606986]
Wait a sec. Are you guys willing to take affiliates with your forum itself?
[/quote]

I dunno, do we?

 

[Alex]

I suppose that one is kind of your call

 

[A]

[quote author=Cthulhu link=topic=595.msg24061#msg24061 date=1235768501]
[quote author=butterflybookmark link=topic=595.msg23184#msg23184 date=1235606986]
Wait a sec. Are you guys willing to take affiliates with your forum itself?
[/quote]

I dunno, do we?
[/quote]
Well, if you do, let me know.

 

[Cthulhu]

Re-reading the question: Affiliates will preferably link to our frontpage, for great justice.

Also, where do we chuck the affiliates? Our frontsite's sidebar is pretty cluttered as it is already (which I should work on wicba, btw), so :/.

 

[A]

Would I have to PM you concerning affiliation?

 

[Geostigma]

im down with this if they still got those old cloudy wolf earings , and not the cheapo plasticy ones either

Anyway you could chuck the affiliate banner in the footer of the front page

 

[Auron]

For those that didn't read my post, the .com (y'know, the store) =/= The FF merchandise forums. We're an entirely different thing. We have news on it, but we don't actually sell anything. (We do have a B/S/T forum though )

 

[Cthulhu]

Yar, I was wondering about that - you did link to it in your e-mail, but the forums didn't match that site at all, :/.

Would I have to PM you concerning affiliation?

That, or just post it in here. I'm sure there'd be people who want to have their say on the matter.

 

[Auron]

^Oh, I see what you mean now. **facepalm**

Just to keep things clear; Materia Hunter owns the .net domain (since the .com was already taken), but he hasn't actually gotten anything up yet. so right now, it'll just lead you to an error page.

Also, me being slightly retarded, copied the link down wrong on the actual, functioning forum in the e-mail I sent you, it's actually this:

http://ffmerchandise.invisionplus.net/index.php?mforum=ffmerchandise&act=idx

So that's why that wasn't working. :-X

With any luck though, we'll be a proper site in the near future. But our little forum (we gained another member since posting this BTW, lulz) works good for now.

 

[Tennyo]

I'm down.

Also, affiliate with butterflybookmark's forum, fgj.

 

[Cthulhu]

Not entirely on the subject, but wouldn't it be neat if you moved from IVF (or whatever your forum host is) to a more official domain name and whatnot? We did it a few years ago with our own forum (http://ffof.nl), and it's worked out pretty awesomely - loads more control and whatnot. The forum's pretty dead nowadays, but still. The yearly investment is almost negligible (depending on what host you use), and your site becomes a lot more identifiable with its own domain - especially if it contains the exact keywords you want to associate your site with. Register 'finalfantasymerchandise.com' (or whatever) and you're almost sure to reach a number 1 position on search engines for 'final fantasy merchandise'.

Also, where would you like to see a link to your site? In fact, would you prefer a plain link or an image of sorts? Cause that matters, .

 

[Auron]

^I'll bring up the site thingie with the boss, and see what he says. It's a good idea though.

lol, I'd say somewhere where people will see it. Just where ever it'll work for you.

An image might work better. Might cause people to be more tempted to click it. Here's a couple (whichever is fine):

or

Thanks A LOT dude, I really appreciate it.

BTW, what kind of link do you want on our site? Image, etc.?

 

[A]

[quote author=Tennyo link=topic=595.msg24535#msg24535 date=1235852379]
I'm down.

Also, affiliate with butterflybookmark's forum, fgj.
[/quote]
WOOT.

And here's my forum:

http://z13.invisionfree.com/cloti/index.php?

I started the forum on... January 10th or something? And so far, I have 81 members, but have had to kick out about six. The number of people coming is increasing, and it is quite active (most Clotis here have joined, I think). We have more than 11,000 posts right now, and I soon will be creating a site and paying for the domain name... uh, so yeah.

And this is ze button:

<a href="http://z13.invisionfree.com/cloti" target="_blank"><img src="http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff97/Alexa024/jj8g95c.jpg"></a>

So yeah... let me know what you think. And if you say no, be warned that I will have a raid of members attacking you.

Oh, and if you want, I can make a new button.

 

[Cthulhu]

I'd really prefer having both buttons be the same size, and preferably of a width that isn't wider than our frontpage's sidebar. Dunno how wide it is exactly though, probably 100 pixels or something? Dunno.

As for us, I dunno, lol. I don't think we've got a button ourselves yet, is there anyone who'd give a shot at making a nice one? It should have the same style as our banner does, fgj.

 

[A]

I can ask one of the members at my forum to make you guys one - she loves using PS3.
And so how big do you want it to be then? :-/

 

[Cthulhu]

Just a bit less wide than the forum's sidebar at max. I cba measuring it right now though, .