Headline: Recent trends MediaTrust has identified in the performance marketing industry.

Details: Because of our position in the industry, we can see burgeoning trends that are impacting the business of our advertisers, publishers and 3rd party providers that service the performance marketing industry. Below are a few of the recent things that appear to be floating up to the surface:

Flight from Regulation-scrutinized industries: Affiliate marketers are moving away from some segments that are under the gun from the Obama administration’s focus on consumer protection. The unresolved nature of these segments (debt consolidation, refinance, etc) suggest affiliates should be focusing in segments where there is more certainty.

Many affiliates are testing installment plans that price on a cost per sale basis: This is a result of the ongoing scrutiny lawmakers are putting on some of the less than above board continuity plans. (See CBS News, 60 Minutes and ABC News coverage of these programs). Also, this fear of legislation is pushing more affiliates to do pure CPL campaigns to reduce their risk to fraud claims from some of the dodgier continuity programs that take advantage of consumer naive. The programs that are being tested are Cost per sale or Revenue Share campaigns that have a lower repetitive payment to cover the cost of the product to make the initial barrier to purchase lower.

Overall Continuity plans seem to be decreasing in popularity: We feel this is in response to the increased media attention on the scam coverage in the media (see above). As mentioned above, more affiliates are moving to single billing sales or CPL campaigns to eliminate their risk to fraudulent advertisers.

We look forward to hearing what you all are noticing, so please chime in below in the comments section!