Archive for category Legal Matters
Affiliate Advocacy Conference Call about the #AdvertisingTax
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on March 9th, 2010
Just finished listening to the Affiliate Advocacy Conference Call with Melanie Seery. Her main guests were Brian Littleton, CEO of ShareASale, and Jen Goode, who was one of the main affiliates fighting the advertising tax successfully in Colorado.
Here are some of initial highlights that I got from the call.
Brian Littleton offered some great tips for communicating with legislators including:
- Don’t mention the unconstitutionality of any legislation. Legislators don’t like being told that what they are doing is unconstitutional.
- Most legislators have two offices, one in their district and one at the legislature. Go to or call whichever is smallest.
From Jeannine Crooks who was having some audio difficulty unfortunately:
- Don’t threaten to move. They generally don’t care.
Threats never work. Neither does telling them they are breaking the law. Stay level-headed and focus on the negative impact of the legislation.
One of the best tips came from Jen Goode who suggested that you try to find a local tie that affiliate marketing has to an organization in the legislator’s district, such as a non-profit or a school that uses affiliate marketing to raise money. This worked very well for them in Colorado.
More to come on this subject but these were some great tips!
![[Post to Twitter]](http://www.legacyaffiliateblog.com/wp-content/plugins/tweet-this/icons/tt-twitter-micro3.png){kind=icon}
![[Post to Yahoo Buzz]](http://www.legacyaffiliateblog.com/wp-content/plugins/tweet-this/icons/tt-buzz-micro4.png){kind=icon}
![[Post to Delicious]](http://www.legacyaffiliateblog.com/wp-content/plugins/tweet-this/icons/tt-delicious-micro3.png){kind=icon}
![[Post to Digg]](http://www.legacyaffiliateblog.com/wp-content/plugins/tweet-this/icons/tt-digg-micro4.png){kind=icon}
![[Post to StumbleUpon]](http://www.legacyaffiliateblog.com/wp-content/plugins/tweet-this/icons/tt-su-micro3.png){kind=icon}
Virginia and Vermont Advertising Tax Updates - Great News!
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on February 24th, 2010
Great news for Virginia and Vermont affiliates today! Both advertising tax bills died.
Here is the latest from the Performance Marketing Alliance (PMA) via Twitter. More to come later 
Breaking News: Colorado Affiliate Tax is Dead!
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on February 8th, 2010
Way to go Colorado affiliates!
The Performance Marketing Association just broke the news that HB 1193 will not include the Advertising / Affiliate Tax in Colorado.
From the PMA:
An agreement was reached today on HB 1193: the inclusion of affiliates establishing nexus will be removed from the bill entirely. HB1193 will now become a bill solely focused on collecting use tax, and nothing to do whatsoever with affiliates.
Breaking News: Affiliate Tax Passes Colorado House
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on February 1st, 2010
House Bill 1193 (the Affiliate, Advertising, Internet tax) just passed the Colorado House of Representatives by a vote of 33-32.
Brian Littleton, CEO of ShareASale, and Lisa Picarille both reported that Rep. Joe Rice may have been the first Democrat in any state to speak out against the tax, so perhaps there is a silver lining there. According to Littleton, he wasn’t necessarily opposed to the idea of the tax, but he knows that it won’t work. He is right! It won’t! It just means good affiliates in Colorado are going to seek out homes elsewhere while others have to give up.
One vote! That was the difference.
It’s on to the Senate now. From there, the last line of defense is the Governor and the outlook is bleak there.
As a side note (and I will post much more about this later), I do want to to say that at first glance, Colorado affiliates really had their act together and were really organized. Way to go guys!
Is your state organized? Because it’s likely coming your way, unfortunately. In case the threat didn’t seem real before, it’s getting all too real in some places now.
If you are a Colorado affiliate it may be time to take Melanie Seery’s advice and “Identify vulnerable merchants and find replacements.”
We will keep standing up for what is right. No affiliate terminations on my watch!
Affiliate Tax in Colorado #advertisingtax
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on January 26th, 2010
Colorado has introduced House Bill 10-1193, introducing the affiliate/advertising tax.
I have been meaning to post this and add my own commentary since yesterday but I finally decided to just link to Geno Prussakov’s post from Sunday.
Urgent action is needed…the committee is meeting tomorrow (January 27) on this!
Check out Geno’s post and learn more about the Colorado Affiliate Tax. Also, check out what you can do about the affiliate tax, whether you live in Colorado or not.
FTC Disclosure Tips
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on October 12th, 2009
As I expected after I posted last week about “New FTC Regulations Impact Review Sites,” I have been getting questions about what affiliates need to do to comply with the new FTC regulations.
There is no shortage of Tweets, blog posts, forum posts, or other commentary on the subject, but I did want to address what you need to do.
First, don’t panic. It is MY opinion (and my opinion only) that this is not that big of a deal. It is not armageddon for affiliates. It can actually be a good thing for you…see #2 below.
Second, compliance is pretty simple.
So what do you need to do?
- Read the FTC’s report - it’s 81 pages long, but you need to read it.
- Write a disclosure page. DisclosureReport.org is a good place to use for making a simple one. It is the lazy affiliate’s way to make a disclosure and I don’t really recommend it. What I do recommend is using your disclosure statement as a selling point, while, of course, complying with the rules. Be confident in writing your disclosure. There is nothing to be ashamed of. Copyblogger has some great tips for doing this in this post.
- Put this disclosure on your site and link to it from every page.
So far, as I can tell, that is just about it. Yeah, it is that simple.
I will be posting more on this as I learn more. Feel free to leave a comment with your thoughts as well
New FTC Regulations Impact Review Sites
Posted by Matt McWilliams in Affiliate Marketing News, Legal Matters on October 6th, 2009
Effective December 1 of this year, the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) will begin heavily regulating review sites, paid sponsorships, blogging, and what kind of hair products I use (the last one is a joke).
They recently released a report about these new rules and regulations. It is quite a read (81 pages of boring government junk), but it is worth knowing the details.
One alarming note: Reviewers face fines up to $11,000 if they fail to properly disclose endorsements or paid posts.
I am hoping to have time this week and next to read through all of it and keep up with the discussion on Twitter and the forums.
I also want to hear from you! What are your thoughts on this pending regulation? How does it impact the way that you will layout your site? How will it effect your social media strategies? (the report includes regulations on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, etc.)
It is unclear (to me so far at least) exactly how this will impact our affiliates, but if nothing else, it is the beginning of something that could greatly impact what you do every day.
|
RSS Feeds
|
Recent Comments