Macau Affiliate Convention Day Two

Okay I overslept and missed the first session, but certainly enjoyed the next few sessions which dealt with issues such as payment solutions in China, the China Lottery and online gaming in Greater China. The most topical for me being the presentation on payments, presented by Chen Yu from Yee Pay. A surprising fact that was raised was credit card penetration, which is a maximum of around 5 million cards, of which maybe 2 million are active, on the other hand Bank Debit cards have a penetration of 20 Billion (with a B) . The great distrust between buyers and sellers for online products is still very strong, but gradually being broken down by firms like YeePay, Alipay and 99Bill which are showing consumers that there are trustworthy payment solutions. As well as in areas where the purchase is for online services such as MMORPGs, electronic deliverables and the like.

The final event of the day an the show was the Beer Panel which featured 6 of us from a wide range of backgrounds and industries fielding questions on a wide range of topics, from fraud in Asia to what areas are affiliates in Asia doing well in, to affiliate training and what are the emerging markets in Asia, and in what commerce areas.

All in all it was a great event. A great job by Mark Lesnick and his team to put this first Macau affiliate event together and I certainly look forwards to the next one!

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Macau Affiliate Convention Day One

Well my first surprise of the day was how many people are here, I guess I'd been expecting 50 or so, but there around 150 to 200 folks here from as far afield as the USA, Australia, Cyprus, Israel and all over Asia. A very solid turn out for the first event. A lot of the attendees and most of the exhibitors and gaming firms, but a lot of presentations are retail and general affiliate focused. An interesting mix for sure.

Certainly for me it was very educational to hear some of the China based presentations, especially from key note speaker, Shimizu Yoichi from Adways, getting an insight into what markets are working on in the region and what are not as well as how advertisers are using affiliate networks with the very slow change from CPM/CPC based ad runs towards CPL and CPA. Also regarding the restrictions in online gaming on the region that prevent the major gaming firms from moving very quickly into the market.

Mobile marketing has a very big roll in for networks and publishers , especially in Japan, apparently around 20% of all network Adway marketing is through mobile devices.

My 101 Session was not hugely packed, the majority of affiliates here being experienced folks who are already successful enough to fly from all corners of the world to join the event. I did have one heckler in the back row, who we almost had to throw out, I managed to fail to recognize David Wolf from Syntryx :-) , much to his amusement. Luckily I recognized everyone else that I have had chance to meet or talk with before.

Probably the best session of the day though (for me anyway) was the presentation by Monte Cahn of Moniker.com , it was an eye opening lesson in "domain real estate" and the reality that investing in a good domain is likely to bring in faster and better return than just about any other investment a person can make in any business. Looks like the new car is going to have to wait!

I finally found the river / canal that the hotel promotes as having "in" the hotel, much to my surprise and wonder, it is on the 3rd floor. You can take a gondola ride through the Venetian style shopping arcade of some 100+ shops. Pretty impressive!

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Macau Affiliate Convention Day Zero

Well it's a nice easy 2 and half hour flight from Bangkok to Macau and this is also my first visit to Macau. And so far I'm well impressed. Landing early, it was a 30 to 40 metre walk from the planes steps to the customs counter, cleared in 10 minutes, and out to the shuttle bus in 5 more. The bus left 10 minutes later and the hotel is so close to the airport I could probably have walked there in that time. The hotel (The Venetian) is huge. It's not big, or large..it is huge..and busy..it took longer to queue to check in that it did to land clear customs and get to the hotel.

Then I got lost trying to find my room, the instructions were simple enough, go straight turn right before the casino floor and take the lift to the 10th floor. I must have taken an early right and did a tour of the out wings before finding the right lift. Discovered ABBA are playing here next week in the process though!

The rooms, are all suites and are lavish, you could put a family of 10 in one room and have room to spare for sports. Wireless Internet in all rooms, TVs, Giant Bed, bathroom (bigger than some rooms I've stayed in) the living room and bed room are split by a mezzanine floor style layout. The floor plan is on the left.

I think I'd need an extra day to just explore the hotel.

Anyway the event starts tomorrow, so I have this evening to track down a few fellow attendees and see who has lost their marketing budget playing games of Casino War, Baccarat, Fan Tan, Caribbean Stud, Sic Bo and Yee Hah Hai... games I'm sure everyone knows all too well, okay they have Black Jack, Roulette (US Style Tables), Three Card Poker (Called Bragg in the UK) as well as the slot machines.

Right enough for day zero, more tomorrow once the event starts!

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Macau Affiliate Convention

While the CAC events have been mainly Casino focused through to 2006. This past year they have started opening the event to appeal to retail affiliate marketing too. Which is great for me with their next event being in Macau. I've not been to Macau before so this will be a great chance to see a new country and meet people in the Asia region. It's a two day event with presentations covering a range of topics with the core focus being on how to market in and to an Asian consumer base

I'm penciled in for a couple of presentations, though likely I'll focus on doing an "Affiliate Marketing 101" work shop (or two), it's great to be involved in teaching new people how to do affiliate marketing, and of course how to do it ethically!

If you'll be at the event or in Macau let me know as I have a day before and a day after free for meet, eat and drinks!

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