Very recently, a new affiliate program called WIdgetBucks launched, offering contextual PPC ads for consumer products. Many affiliates were hoping that it would be a replacement for AuctionAds, but the widget seems to be slowing down page load times, and conversion rate metrics have turned out to be less than stellar.

For starters, Vlad found two major flaws with WIdget Bucks. In fact, he believes that it's not only a poor answer to AuctionAds, but no replace at all:

There are two major reasons why I dislike the program:

1. Although it is easy to configure and place it on your website, buthat once its on your website or blog it may take really long time for the widget to load, while preventing your website from loading completely.
2. I have a problem with the fact I forbidden to remove html links by Mpire.

Don't waste your time! You can make better money with AuctionAds and even Amazon.

Speaking of AuctionAds, one of its founders, Shoemoney, also gave it a go and wasn't impressed. Even though he gets personal and nasty toward the end of his post, Shoemoney was both fair and transparent in his analysis of the service itself. He both cited the same loading problems as Vlad, and admitted to trying the program out in a vertical that's not exactly known for its high CPC -- video games. As Shoemoney explained:

[...] it was by far the worst performing ad network I have ever used. Its most likely my fault as I choose the “video games” category and it probably didnt just convert. [...]

The main reason I stopped running it was that the widget takes 10 SECONDS on average to load. I just don’t think my users have that long of attention span. While their terms of service (which I will get to in a minute) does not permit me to show statistics I will tell you it was getting half the click through ratio of AdSense.

Despite how the WidgetBucks TOS prevent affiliates from publishing statistics, Zac Johnson did. However, this was in the wake of receiving an email from a VP of a the parent company, mPire, informing him that he was a Top Performer. Granted it might seem that WidgetBucks is trying to run an astro-turf campaign by exempting its top performers from the TOS clause that prohibits affiliate from publishing affiliates, Zac hasn't exactly thrown his support behind them. While he made no mention of load time problems. he didn't exactly sing their praises either:

I already needed a new program to replace AuctionAds, so WidgetBucks came out at a great time for me. It’s not a huge earner, but it’s a fun case study in itself. With a few more categories in place, I will continue to rotate and test each. Once we have a good idea on what’s earning the most money, I / you can focus on that niche and maybe setup some new dedicated sites or blogs.

In sum, it seems that WidgetBucks seems to have some work to do. If they want to retain affiliates and then expand on them, they are going to have to address the server issues that are causing their PPC widgets to load so slowly. Another problem that seems to be facing them seems to have to do with widget design.

Essentially, more and more advertisers and affiliate marketers are having to find ways to avoid banner blindness. Since WidgetBucks is a PPC-banner kind of product, the problem with their conversion rates have to do with click through rates. I imagine, then, that something about the design of their widget is turning off users. They might want to invest in trying to make it more alluring to users.