Today whilst browsing through the blogs on A4U, I came across this Dodgy Bidder - Name & Shame? I, being me, put me 2 pence in. Almost immediately I was pinged on MSN with a ‘have you seen this?’ re the blog, ‘Yes, I have I’ve commented on it’ was my reply, ‘why do you ask?’ I was absolutely horrified at the answer - ‘because the word is it’s you’. Now, I know I’m not perfect but for one I’m female and this quite clearly is about a bloke - he mentions the word ‘him’, two - I’m not sure I’m high profile, three - I tend not to break the rules where brand bidding is concerned PROVIDING I’m given all the information when signing up for a program and the merchant or agency doesn’t change the goalposts without adequate notice or in some cases no notice at all and four - I can categorically state that I do NOT ‘gripes about “dodgy affiliates” bidding on brand terms and giving the industry a bad name - my pet hate is Closed Bidding Groups that are not disclosed on Networks (but that’s something I’ve bored you all with before and I’m sure I will again. Within 15 minutes I receive an email from TD saying the usual stuff - take it down or within 24 hours we’ll stand you against a wall and shoot you, so confused as at this point I don’t know it’s me, I log into TD and check the program information. This is what it says :

Sponsored Keywords/Adwords:

Important: We allow affiliates to buy sponsored keyword terms relating to the Jessops brand including miss spells, but excluding the exact term JESSOPS.We allow affiliates to buy sponsored keywords/adwords on search engines, so long as they are clearly marked as affiliate links (”affiliate” or “aff” in the supporting text). However, we DO NOT permit affiliates to buy keywords relating to our competitors brand names or trademarks. e.g. “Dixons”, or “CamerasDirect”, etc. Any affiliates who do so will be removed.

Okay - I’m sticking to the rules on this program and even have the word -[Jessops] in as  negative exact match, why do people think it’s me, why have I just received the email from TD saying it’s me and why is Rob B now seemingly back tracking on what he had earlier said.

The moral of this story is ‘Get the facts right before you accuse people of wrong doing’ Several times we have been wrongly accused of deliberately ‘Brand Bidding’ but never have the accusers been proved right. Please don’t shoot yourself in the foot with comments like these :

It isn’t really my style to do this, but why should this affiliate get away with these dodgy tactics while pretending to be white as white at the same time?