Did you know we had a big release of SocialSpark yesterday? Maybe you saw some chatter on Twitter about it; maybe you saw a new type of Opp in the Marketplace; maybe you had no idea anything changed at all! Either way, here are the updates that are most likely to affect you:
Bug Fixes:
- Advertisers and Bloggers can no longer accept requests or invitations for Opportunities that have been yanked. We’ve also cleared up the messaging around this functionality to make it clear how much an advertiser will be charged and when.
- Several bloggers experienced an issue where a reservation email was sent out before the funds were secured for a Sponsored Post (and if it failed, they had an email but no reservation). This issue has been resolved.
- Bloggers will now only see the “Wait” indicators for Opps that are open.
- Opportunities with future start dates no longer show up in the site search results.
- Cleaned up the way requirements are displayed on Opportunities.
- Improved the Thumbalizr screenshot script so that it no longer replaces a good screenshot with an empty screenshot.
- Fixed a number of IE display issues.
- Several fixes to the Affiliates server, which powers our CPC and CPA Opportunities. This includes a browser-related fix for CPA conversion tracking.
New Features:
This week the Dev team pushed hard to get the Cost Per Click program ready for prime time, implementing features that will benefit both Bloggers and Advertisers. Advertisers can now create Cost Per Click Opportunities and start seeing results as soon as the Opps go live. And bloggers can start earning money within minutes of posting CPC links to Twitter, Facebook, their Blog, or anywhere else permitted by the advertiser.
You may have already noticed a few new Opportunities popping up under the CPC tab in the Opps list:
If you’re interested in a CPC Opp and you meet all of the advertiser’s requirements, click the Get Link Code button.
All of our clicks are run through ClickForensics, a process which can take up to an hour to complete from click to cash. Advertisers can monitor which Affiliates are performing well and where the majority of their valid and invalid clicks are coming from (I’ve blurred them out in our screenshot but you get the idea).
Advertisers also now have the ability to add Google Analytics tracking codes to their URLs without having to go through the Google Analytics URL Builder tool. The tracking code will automatically be added to the end of whatever URL you input for your Landing Page when you check the box.
A great new way to take a CPC Opportunity is with the Social Media links. Currently we have Twitter and Facebook links, but we’ll be adding in some of our other favorites soon. We’ve done some tests with link performance on Twitter versus a typical blog post and have been amazed with the results! Twitter links can typically reach a wider audience in a shorter amount of time so they are great for providing quick results.
TinyURL now available for Social Media links
Bloggers can return to the Get Code page at any time to see how their CPC program is performing. And the greatest part is that you get paid the same day, rather than waiting for a formal review process to take place!
Smaller new Features:
- We now allow Advertisers to set an End Date on CPC Opportunities.
- The Invite to Opportunity feature now populates the message according to the Opp you choose from the drop-down.
- Ended CPA and CPC Opportunities now redirect visitors who click an affiliate link back to the site that referred them.
- The search engine now searches a blog’s tags list.
- Social links now generate TinyURLs to be more Twitter-friendly.
For future SocialSpark releases, we’ll be tweeting and blogging a day in advance and letting you know in a post like this one what changed right after the deploy. So make sure you’re following @IZEALove on Twitter to stay in the loop!
As always, we welcome your honest feedback. Please feel free to take advantage of the GetSatisfaction widget appearing on the left-hand side of all pages in SocialSpark, or go straight to the Feedback area now:
