Affiliate Product Data Feeds Resources, Affiliate Network Services Documentations, Guides and Articles

Data feed Resources, Articles and Guides
Data Feed Management For Merchants
Affiliate Product Data feeds Tools and Services
Affiliate Network Specific Implementation Guides and Documentations
Affiliate Program APIs and Webservices

This page was created to provide you with the resources needed for a successful affiliate data feed integration. The data feed resources are targeted to affiliates and advertisers alike.

If you are new to data feeds, you might want to read my comprehensive article:
Merchant Product Data feeds for Affilates - 101 (extended 9/2006). It is geared towards merchants, but from an affiliate point of view. It is in my opinion useful for people on "both sides of the fence".

The next paragraph has additional references to other articles about the same subject. Chances are good that things in one article that are not 100% clear to you, are explained differently and more understandable in another. It's no easy subject and very technical, but not rocket science either. You can do it!

If you are looking for information to price comparison shopping search engine data feeds, check these resources instead.

Data feed Resources, Articles and Guides

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XML Data feeds and Webservices for Affiliates - Article written by Carsten Cumbrowski
IPC & FREE Data feed Directory provided by 5 Star Affiliate Programs
Datafeeds 101 - A Beginner's Primer by Linda Buquet and Chris Ditty
Data Feeds Tested - How to create and effectively use data feeds for profitable campaigns by MarketingExperiments.com (June 2004)
Datafeed Forum at ABestWeb.com - Learn and discuss about everything related datafeeds
Product Data Utility has a good and detailed collection of posts about working with product datafeeds.
Data Feeds for Newbies - Affiliate Tip #43 at AffiliateTip.com
What is an Affiliate Datafeed? - Article by Web-Procreate.com (WebMerge)

If you are a newbie and don't know where to start and what decisions to make regarding datafeeds and also want to know what requirements you have to meet in order to work with feeds properly, then you might want to check out this forum thread. It is a bit long and a lot of noise around it. I want to take my responses from there and write up something cleaner. I just did not have the time to do that yet though. :)

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DataFeedFile.com - Price comparison search and shopping scripts for affiliates

Data Feed Management For Merchants

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Providing Data Feeds via Affiliate Networks

Logo	Description
	AvantLink - Data feed Manager - Affiliate network build around datafeeds. Free datafeed access for affiliates. Three data feed options are available 1) Raw Data feed , 2) Dynamic, 100% Customizable, SEO-Friendly Product Management Tool, 3) simple JavaScript Plug-In. Coupon datafeeds (RSS support) are also available.
	Commission Junction (CJ) affiliate network with "Big Catalog" product database feature with access to the merchant product data via web, data feed files via FTP and HTTP via web services. See the "Affiliate Network Specific Implementation Guides and Documentations" section below for implementation guides of product data feeds into CJ, for advertisers and for affiliates.
	Linkshare (LS) Merchandiser Service is the data feed management platform of the Linkshare affiliate network. You can also find implementation guides and other Merchandiser Service resources further down below.

Most networks today provide the ability to make product datafeeds available to publishers. You can learn about the networks that offer data feeds and were not mentioned above in the sections further down below.

Independent Data Feed Solution and Service Providers

Affiliate Program Tools by Finon Corporation, an affiliate data feed management and delivery tools suite for merchants. Five tools in one product: 1. External Datafeed Manager allows complete feed management, 2. Product Display Maker, to create customized HTML-based displays of any and all products from your datafeed, 3. Direct Link Maker, 4. Search Link Maker and 5. Search Form Maker. The cost for the solution is only $99/mo and includes hosting and support.

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Affiliate Product Data feeds Tools and Services

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Easy to use "Plug-Ins" and "Widgets"

Logo	Description
	DataFeedFile.com (DFF) aggregates hundreds of datafeeds. Provides various tools to affiliates to utilize the data from Javascript Plugins to xml feeds. Contextual matching, category matching, merchant matching, coupons are only a few of the features of DFF. Also check out the DFF Blog by founder and CEO Andrew Nurcahya.
	GoldenCAN is an affiliate product data feed, coupon and search integration solution for publishers and advertisers. Golden Can was the first successful service of this kind when it was founded by Asif Malik in May 2005. It remains to this day one of the leaders in providing easy access to product data to the average affiliate.
	Product Showcase Creator - creates affiliate-link encoded product showcases. The tool was developed by Akiva Bergstrom in 2003 to provide simple means to affiliates for creating basic product showcases based on a merchants affiliate datafeed. The tool does nothing else and does not provide any of the advanced features the other services mentioned here provide, but it is straight forward, free and does not require an account with them to generate your showcases.
	PopShop.com - easy to generate mini shops and widgets for your site, feed or blog. PopShop lists over 750 merchants with over eight million products across the three leading affiliate networks CJ, LinkShare and ShareASale (more will follow). The interface is easy to use and true Web 2.0 style (Prototype). Output options range from JavaScript snippets, classic ASP and PHP code, XML, RSS, TypePad or Blogger widget and more. The basic version is free (no "click sharing"), paid versions offer additional features including white label results. I did a write-up of the PopShops.com features at ReveNews.com in June 2007. Some things probably changed since then, but it still provides a good overview of the service in general. Founders and Execs of PopShops.com are Jessie Jones (CEO), Angel Djambazov (Marketing), Dan Harms (Dev) and Eric Artzt.
	FeedShare is an affiliate data feed distribution system. FeedShare provides JavaScript and PHP Storefronts, access to raw (but normalized) data feeds in CSV or XML format and also coupon feeds via web API. FeedShare does currently provide access to over 140 merchant product data feeds and this number keeps growing. FeedShare is owned by Lushann Web Technologies, LLC and was originally created by Alan Jeric.

Site Builder Tools and Scripts based on Data Feeds

Logo	Description
	MyDataFeedScripts provides affiliate product data feed driven template sites for affiliates for a one-time fee of about $99 per script. Some feeds are available for a special low price ranging between $19.95 and $85 per feed. The scripts were developed by a guy who calls himself "The Doctor". The site does currently only accept PayPal as payment method.
	FreeDynamicTemplates.com by Evgenii "Geno" Prussakov, AM Navigator. Some free dynamic product datafeed templates for affiliates.
	FeedProcessor.com is a service that converts product datafeeds into content-rich affiliate websites easy and quickly. FeedProcessor.com is a web based application and service and does not provide dynamic scripts for developers.
	FindItFastGold.com provides tools to build your own software catalogs for your site from a wide range of products that are available via the RegNow and RegSoft affiliate networks. RegNow and RegSoft are owned by Digital River.

Feed Processing Scripts and Desktop Tools

Logo	Description
	WebMerge by Fourth World Media Corporation allows you to publish datafeeds with templates from any HTML editor on any web server, fast.
	Cusimano.com Scripts - Tools to Boost your Affiliate Sales - Cusimano.com provides easy to use tools for webmasters to increase affiliate sales.
	Scripts4YourSite.com aka Recycled Talent - Scripts specifically for internet/affiliate marketing and e-commerce functionality. Coupon and RSS News scripts.
	AffiliStore - build and maintain multi-page websites directly from merchant product feeds. Requires Linux hosting, MySQL and PHP. A free "teaser" version is available for download and testing.
	Datafeed Extractor by AffiliateWebsiteTools.com is a small Windows tool that allows you to extract only the product records you want from the various affiliate product data feeds. The tool does not support the download of feeds and can only process files from the local hard drive, but is there able to process even the largest feeds that are available. You can try the tool free for 30 days or 100 runs (whatever comes first).

Data Feeds 2 Feeds Tools and Services

DynamiFeeds - Simplify, automate and empower datafeed affiliate marketing! Dynamic RSS affiliate data feeds (currently in beta)

Data Feeds Support Tools

Affiliate Data Cleaner, a free Tool by AMWSO that allows affiliates to clean up merchant Data feeds of unwanted HTML, special characters, hidden carriage returns and other junk that can create havoc in data.

Coupon Data Feeds

ShareASale Deals Database XML feed with current promotions and coupons for ShareASale advertisers.
Promotional Links Data feed Feed by Commission Junction. See CJ transfer guide for publishers below.
Orange Links - promotional links data feeds via FTP by DoubleClick Perfomics
Coupon Feed Syndication (RSS and more) - Note: You must be logged in to Avantlink in order to make this link work. Powered by AvantLink affiliate network, Also available "Deal of the Day" Feed.
- RSS feed with the latest online coupons by MyCoupons.com. Note, the feed is not ready for direct use as an affiliate. You have replace the links that are provided with the feed with your own affiliate links.
ForMeToCoupon.com is a coupon feed aggregator service that agreegates deals and coupons from over 1,700 merchants into one single feed for you, to be used for your website or service. The service is commercial but a free trial is available upon request.

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Affiliate Network Specific Implementation Guides and Documentations

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Commission Junction Guides

For Publishers/Affiliates

WebServices.CJ.com - CJ's FREE web services for publishers and advertisers. signup, documentations, resources, forums and source codes.
CJ Transfer Guide for Publishers (PDF) transaction and commission report, product and promotional links datafeed feed configuration and delivery options

For Advertisers/Merchants

CJ Advertiser Product Datafeed (PDF) data transfer guides for CJ advertisers
CJ Advertiser Action Datafeed (PDF) data transfer guides for CJ advertisers. This guide is for advertisers who utilize the batch reporting feature of Commission Junction, instead of the easier to implement pixel tracking method. To learn about the difference between pixel tracking and batch tracking and their individual pros and cons, see my comprehensive post about this subject at my blog at ReveNews.com.
advertiser transaction and commission report datafeed (PDF) data transfer guides for CJ advertisers

CJ Advanced Links Tutorial and URL Encoding for adverisers/merchants and OPMs to be able to easily create CJ tracking links to product pages or any other page, yourself or by your affiliates themselves. It is not required to have the CJ product catalog feature enabled for this. You could use this to provide your own data feed directly to your affiliates, free of charge and outside of the Commission Junction network.

CJU - "Commission Junction University" - Resources, news and information for CJ affiliates and advertisers

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Linkshare Merchandiser Program/Resources

For Advertisers/Merchants

Linkshare Integration Guide for merchants version 5.1 (c)2005
Sales Reporting Web Services for advertisers allows reporting of transaction data back to the LinkShare network in real-time, without the delay caused by using the existing batch feed feature. I don't have any documentation available for this feature. If you have one that you could send to me, please contact me.

For Publishers/Affiliates - Merchandiser Services

LinkShare Merchandiser resources and information for affiliates at LinkShare.com
Linkshare Merchandiser Service Request Form - a $250 setup fee applies unless you are active in the Network for at least 3 months and have generated at least 50 orders in the most recent calendar month.
LinkShare Merchandiser Implementation Guidelines (local copy) of version from August 2006) for affiliates with information about how to access the product data feeds at LinkShare.com.
Merchandiser Sample Feed File (local copy) in Microsoft Excel format provided by LinkShare via their product information page at the affiliate resources center.
Linkshare Merchandiser Program (XLS) List of LinkShare merchants who offer a product data feed to their affiliates via the LinkShare merchandiser service, including the information how large the feeds are, if they use advanced properties (attribute file) or not and the unique merchant ID (MID) that was assigned by LinkShare for that merchant within the LinkShare network.
Linkshare Merchandiser Delimited Product Data Feed Format - a primer for affiliates and merchants about the column structure of the LinkShare delimited data feeds, including an explaination of what the "Attribute File" option means.
The Linkshare Merchandiser Service - automated data feed access to LinkShare feeds - tips and tricks as well as some sample automation scripts for pulling feeds automatically on a regular basis without using any special or commercial tools.

For Publishers/Affiliates - Merchandiser Services Query Tool Web Services

Linkshare Merchandiser Query Tool API (local copy) - User Guide for the REST based web service to access product data from merchants who participate in the LinkShare Merchandiser program.

For Publishers/Affiliates - Link Locator Web Services

LinkShares Link Locator web services allows access to merchant links for affiliates via an API.
The Link Locator service groups merchant links into multiple categories: coupons, hot products, logos, promotion/general, free shipping and best converting.

Link Locator resources for affiliates at Linkshare.com
Link Locator Web Services Direct Homepage at Linkshare's resource center for affiliates. LinkShares SOAP Lite API/web service for publishers (affiliates) to dynamically access merchant link codes programmatically. Product link data cannot be accessed with this API unfortunatelly.
Linkshare Link Locator Direct V2.2 (PDF) - A guide provided by LinkShare with details about the options and structure of the calls and responses of their web services.
Linkshare Link Locator Merchants - List of merchants who's link information can be accessed via the LinkShare Link Locator web services. The data are not accessible via the web services for all LinkShare merchants unfortunatelly.
Linkshare Link Locator Direct Implementation Guidelines V1.1 (PDF) - last updated November, 2007
LinkBuilder Merchands (XLS) List of LinkShare merchants who support the LinkBuilder Web Services API

For Publishers/Affiliates - Automated LinkGenerator Web Services

LinkShare's Automated LinkGenerator Web Services overview at LinkShare.com
Automated LinkGenerator Affiliate Guide V1.0 (local copy) for LinkShares REST based LinkGenerator web services API for affiliates/publishers.

For Publishers/Affiliates - General Resources

Linkshare Resouce Center - Resources, news and information for Linkshare affiliates
LinkShare Web Services Overview at the affiliates resources center at LinkShare.com

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Performics Datafeed Marketing

Data Feed Marketing - FeedLab^sm by the Performics.com affiliate network
Orange Links the link datafeed via FTP or email by Perfomics.com
Orange Links by DoubleClick Performics - A primer for affiliates

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ShareASale Product Datafeed and XML Dealsfeed

ShareASale Product Datafeeds for affiliates and merchants. The feed format, structure and content. For PHP code and MySQL database scripts to automatically FTP download and import ShareASale data feeds into a MySQL database, check this post by Shawn Kerr at the ABestWeb Datafeeds forums.
ShareASale Deals Database XML Feed

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Other Networks

Logo	Description
	Zanox Worldwide Datafeeds - International and US merchants at the Zanox affiliate network who offer datafeeds. The Zanox data feeds can be accessed from within the Zanox affiliate interface. Access to product information is also available via their web services API.
	ClickXChange.com Datafeed Merchants - List of merchants at the ClickXChange.com affiliate network who offer datafeeds to their affiliates.
	AvantLink Affiliate Tools datafeed manager, dynamic product showcase, custom link builder, dynamic coupon feed and coupon feed syndication provided by the AvantLink.com affiliate network.
	Dark Blue Content Feeds Primer, here at Cumbrowski.com, for the data feeds format and access of the small affiliate network called DarkBlue.com available here at Cumbrowski.com.
	Kolimbo Raw Product Feeds Guide, here at Cumbrowski.com, for the raw datafeeds of the Kolimbo network by Kowabunga Technologies for their MyAffiliateProgram merchant partners.
	oneNetwork Affiliate Datafeed Tool for oneNetwork and RegNow affiliates. The tool allows affiliates to integrate products via simple JavaScript code, PHP or ASP/ASP.NET templates, XML feed or CSV feed file. The content of the feed(s) can be restricted by various filters, including product category, vendor and keywords. Additional layout options are available for the JavaScript and templates implementations.
	LinkConnector Datafeeds Primer here at Cumbrowski.com, an unofficial documentation for the affiliate product data feeds provided by the small affiliate network LinkConnector. They offer product feeds for about 40+ of their merchants is CSV format.
	ConverseonFeeds.com provides product datafeeds and resources for affiliates of programs that are managed by the outsourced program management company (OPM) Converseon.

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Affiliate Program APIs and Webservices

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Logo	Description
	Amazon.com Webservices, also known as AWS is a collection of web service for several services provided by Amazon.com for webmasters, web developers and marketers, including an API for Amazon.com affiliates to tap into the millions of products sold at the Amazon.com website. (See AWS Details at Cumbrowski.com) Amazon operates their own in-house associate program and is not using one of the large networks. To be able to generate commission via your application that is based on the product related web services of Amazon, visit their partner homepage at associates.amazon.com and apply for a publisher account.
	eBay Developer Program provides access to the eBay web services API and editor toolkit for eBay affiliates and software developers to build custom applications that leverage the vast amount of products available at the eBay marketplace that provide value to users and let you earn commission at the same time. eBay moved their affiliate program from Commission Junction in-house. In order to earn commissions by using the eBay developer network tools and services, you must apply as publisher to their new partner program at eBayPartnerNetwork.com.
	WebServices.CJ.com - CJ's free web services for publishers and advertisers. Signup and access documentations, resources, developer forums and examples of reusable source code.
	LinkShare Web Services Overview at the affiliates resources center at LinkShare.com. Information to LinkShare's Merchandiser Services Query Tool API, Link Locator Web Services and Automated LinkGenerator Web Services.
	Zanox Developer Kit (ZDK) (login required) provides access and information to the zanox Webservice API (For an overview and registration click here). You are able to access product data via the zanox Web Services API, which also provides access to merchant information and reporting data, such as transaction details.
	DR OneRiver Web Services API for affiliates provides access to advertiser details and reporting data via a SOAP/WSDL web services interface. See the brief documentation of the web service here on the site.
	Booking.com XML-RPC Webservice (formerly known as Bookings.net) is an international hotel reservation service with affiliate program and very feature-rich web services API.

Youtube Ebay Amazon Mashup Affiliate site script (PHP code) by Mark from 45n5.com. The script is free and was released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. See details and a 10 min video that explains how it works. It uses the Amazon, Ebay and YouTube APIs and you require for each of them an API key (free).

Update! The script is not compatible as is with the new YouTube API and the new eBay in-house program. Mark stated that he does not plan to update the script in the near future, but you can use the script and modify it to make it work again, if you'd like to. It is still better than starting from scratch.

More APIs including search engine APIs, blog and blog services APIs as well as other web development resources can be found at my web development resources and web services resources pages.

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