Peaches

IME as both an affiliate rep and as a freesite owner, most of the work done and money spent is on smaller fish. They go to shows - they get 4 of them to pitch in and get a room. They eat free food and drink free booze. They email you constantly for every single little thing. Will some of those become whales? Possibly, but these days, unlikely. But when you put down $20K for a party/sponsorship, pay one or two people $80K a year plus benefits and travel expenses to run these events and only 3 of your biggest customers are there and the rest are just sucking up the freebies, at some point you have to question "Why are we doing this?"

Like I said, it's harsh, but it's true. I would predict in the next few years you'll see fewer affiliate programs, per se, and more "invite only" programs. I've seen several programs already cut down on their parties, sponsorships, contests, etc. I've also noticed quite a few are "combined" sponsorship parties. It used to be you'd have to decide between 4 or 5 different parties to attend at the same time during a show. Now the whales are being treated to private sit down dinners and the minnows to the combined sponsorships free for alls.

A good program, with several years of customers and traffic streams, could even run with no affiliates. One of these traffic streams could easily be programs like Zango.