Gateway Shutting Down Affiliate Program, Online Website Sales

Just got this message through CJ that said Gateway is shutting down their affiliate program and the Gateway.com website will become an educational website. They also give the typical 2 or 3 day notice, as always, affiliate marketers take it because they have to.

Hello Everyone,

Hope you’re doing well!

I regret to inform you that the Gateway program is being shut down. As of July 27th, Gateway.com will be transformed into an educational site and will no longer be a forum for e-commerce.

Please remove all links immeditately in order to avoid product fulfillment issues.

It has been a pleasure working with all of you.

Best,

The Gateway Team

Gotta love the lack of spell checking nowadays.

Affiliate marketers aren’t the only ones who are losing out; all of the online sales reps are losing their jobs too. Gateway will continue to sell their computers at retail outlets, and, I assume on websites like Buy.com, Newegg, Overstock, TigerDirect, etc. This has certainly caused a little uproar on sites like this one TabletPCReview, where many members were hoping to get an updated C-142XL tablet. One rep they talked to said he didn’t think they were continuing the tablet pc’s, while another said they were the leader in the tablet market and she thought it would be crazy to stop selling the line.

I am assuming they will still sell on the big sites like TigerDirect, but it would be good to get an official word from someone at Gateway. It seems like a bad move on Gateway’s part, I much prefer ordering everything online so I don’t have to deal with the sales people.

Thanks again for the short notice.

Added: Some posts about it on Techmeme today:
From Between the Lines In a statement, Mark Hill, Acer’s U.S. general manager said: “We are shifting Gateway’s distribution method to better align with Acer’s successful global strategy, which was built upon an indirect model.”

Larry adds: Bottom line: Don’t go to Gateway.com if you want a system. You’ll find Gateways at outlets like Best Buy, Circuit City, CompUSA, Costco, Office Depot, OfficeMax, and Wal-Mart.

From Yahoo! Finance This change will dramatically simplify Gateway’s business model and deliver significant cost savings, ultimately resulting in an improved value proposition for consumers.

“We believe that our retail and e-tail partners offer consumers the best, easiest and most effective way to purchase Gateway products,” said Mark Hill, Acer Group U.S. General Manager. “Customers can rest assured that they will continue to get the award-winning products and outstanding technical support they’ve come to expect from Gateway for the last 23 years.”

Frpm PC World The change has resulted in some staff cuts, said Lisa Emard, a Gateway spokeswoman. “These reductions have been happening in small waves as the company has methodically evaluated each department and function,” she said.

The change could help Gateway better compete with rivals Hewlett-Packard and Dell, said David Daoud, research manager at IDC. Also, since the indirect model has worked well for Acer, it may be hoping that focusing on the same model can help boost Gateway sales.

Posted by Jimmy Daniels Posted in: Affiliate Marketing, Branding Mistakes, HP Computers, Layoffs No Comments » July 2008

Annoying TV Ads

If you have watched any shows on TNT lately, you know exactly what kind of ads this article from the NYTimes is talking about, the ad industry calls them a snipe, but they are annoying as hell when you are actually watching the TV show. The ones with noise are really disruptive and annoying, and I hope they do not become some form of industry standard, as many networks plan on running them, backlash or not. ABC has already tested some in July, sans sound, thank God, and are planning on using them more and more this fall. Oh joy.

Snipes are just the latest effort by network executives to cram promotions onto television screens in the age of channel surfing, ad skipping and screen-based multitasking. At first, viewers may feel a slight jolt of pleasure at the sight of a new visual effect, they say, but over time the intrusions contribute to the sense that the screen is far more cluttered — not just with ads, but with news crawls and other streams of information.

That may be so, network executives say, but the extra content is here to stay. The snipes — not to be confused with bugs, those network logos that pop up in screen corners during shows — are important enough to the beleaguered television industry that the networks plan to tolerate the backlash.

ABC tested the icons in July and will introduce them gradually this fall to get viewers familiar with the shorthand. To minimize complaints, ABC will keep the icons and all similar visuals silent.

Viewers say that snipes and bugs are degrading their experience of watching television. Even some performers seem to resent the assaults on their work’s integrity. At last week’s Emmy Awards, the comedian Lewis Black delivered a blow against screen clutter, yelling, “We don’t care about the next show. We’re watching this show.” Source: As the Fall Season Arrives, TV Screens Get More Cluttered

I can see Lewis Black saying that right now, and he is right, we want to see the show we are watching, not stupid little ads interrupting it. Who gives a shit about what is coming on next if the ad interrupts what is on now. All it is going to do is end up making people more and more resistant to ads anywhere, I know it will me.

Posted by Jimmy Daniels Posted in: Ad Injection, Advertising, Branding Mistakes, TV 3 Comments » September 2007

Chase Sucks

Or, who not to bank with.

Remember when banks were pushing the fact that they had so many ATM’s as a convenience for their customers? Remember when they were free? Well I do, and I believe I have used them for the last time this month. My bank, Chase, charges a fee of $1.50 if you use an ATM that’s not in their network, on top of the fee that ATM will charge you, usually ranges from 1 to 2 dollars or more. They say we have ATM’s everywhere and it should be easy to find one, well that’s just bullshit, that ATM is making money off of me, I can’t believe it would cost them another $1.50 per transaction. Plus, get this, I used an ATM that was out of my network, it charged me 2 dollars, Chase charged me 3 dollars. Why, you ask? I did a balance inquiry first, this ATM says goodbye after one transaction, so I add to swipe my card again, costing me another $1.50 from Chase. So, that one withdrawal cost me $5 dollars!

If you have a savings account, you more than likely have it linked to your savings, just in case something happens and you overdraw, it is automatically pulled from savings to cover it. Do you think there should be a fee associated with this one? I thought that’s the whole point of linking, it is an electronic transfer, so no one had to go carry cash from my savings account to my checking account, BAM done in less than a second. They charge 7 dollars per transfer. I hit a spot this month where my checking account was drained and it auto transferred 3 times from my savings account to my checking, costing me another $21 dollars in fees. A $7 dollar fee for an electronic transfer, that is outrageous, unless it’s not all electronic and someone has to eyeball it once, but still. If anyone knows the correct procedure, I would sure like to know, just post it in a comment below, or on your own blog and ping me.

Chase, I’m not impressed, your bank sucks, I will no longer use the ATM, I will stop and clog up a line at the bank window instead, while getting a shot at flirting with a bank babe. I have had to have several fees removed in the past, it’s ridiculous. As The Rock used to say, your can take these fees, turn them sideways and shove them straight up your candy ass.

Don’t bank at Chase.

Posted by Jimmy Daniels Posted in: Branding Mistakes 2 Comments » April 2007