ASW Chance Meeting: Affiliate Inspiration
Feb 25th, 2008 by msdanielle
It’s the middle of the afternoon on the first day of sessions at Affiliate Summit West here in chilly Las Vegas. Today’s sessions on email marketing, SEO, and optimizing videos went pretty well, and later I’ll be giving an update on one in particular that I attended just a couple hours ago.
However, today’s personal highlight for me had to be during the luncheon hour. Half of the conference hall was walled off for the luncheon area, which included about 100 tables and numerous buffet arrangements, beverage carts and dessert displays. With the number of attendees most likely in the thousands, it was definitely my delighted surprise that Mr. Benjamin “Ben” Chui sat at our table. If you’re in affiliate marketing, particularly coupons and tech deals, you probably know who “Ben” is. He runs a deal site called BensBargains.net, which was the inspiration for my site, PinkDeals (originally dubbed by me as “the BensBargains for women”). I found his site in 2000 and always figured there should be a women’s version of it.
Ben was the last person I’d expected to run into randomly at this conference, but the person I’d most likely want to meet. I asked him if attends many affiliate conferences, and mentioned he’d only been to one in New York, where he was a guest speaker. So of course you could imagine my amazement that he ended up at my lunch table!
Ben is a very nice guy, and very straight forward. He lives in San Francisco and you can tell by his grounded and mild demeanor that he’s probably a very cool person to hang out with. I’d be happy if PinkDeals could reap a quarter of the revenue of Ben’s site, and it motivates me even more now knowing that I am on the right path.
I’m writing this post half out of excitement that I met Ben, but also to inspire those of you who might really gain some value from networking in your industry. Since I’m getting more into the realm of affiliate marketing, it’s important for me to meet with the affiliate network reps, meet other affiliate marketers, attend seminars to be in the right mindset, and get my business card into the right hands. Networking with the right people will help you gain the foothold you need to squeeze into a competitive market, and in some cases, you might make some unexpected and inspiring connections.
More updates to come!
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What are the chances of that? A good chance to talk about your site too and use Ben as a sounding board. How is the site going by the way?
Very few opportunities to attend sessions or events like that down here in Australia. Can’t quite justify flight expenses yet to attend
i know, right? the cosmos must have been in alignment at that very moment.
the site is not my first priority at the moment so it could definitely be doing better but that’s why i’m here. hopefully i’ll change that soon!
Maybe you were the inspiration behind this…
http://www.pinkretailtherapy.com/
hey no competitor advertising!
Thats my website! As much as Pinkdeals is a great website I’m afraid it wasnt the inspiration for my blog, although funnily enough before I turned it into a blog it was a discount code site!
i like the stuff on your blog — i can pretty much be sold on anything pink…
Haha, what are the chances! … small sphere
Now I know who you are! You’re Ms. Danielle, It took a second to click!
Great to finally meet ya!
thanks wil! your presentation was really informative and insightful. can’t wait til you post your presentation on SEER
If I didn’t know Ben as Ben, I would have been getting excited that Jackie Chan had sat at my table. It’s not just me who thinks they like alike, is it?
if jackie chan were in his late twenties…i can see that
btw did you attend aff summit in london?
Unfortunately not.
Maybe next time, or maybe I’ll just join everybody in Vegas next year. 
[...] could make sure to get one for myself before I leave. To my surprise and also to Danielle’s (see her reaction here), the quiet Asian guy that was getting his ass kissed by Shopzilla was Ben from BensBargains.net – [...]
It’s never too late to meet more inspirations
-Mike
this is true. i definitely encourage other people to check out their industry-specific conferences, if not for anything else than tossing around ideas with like-minded people and connecting with your account reps. there’s definitely more of a trust relationship formed when you meet people face to face
Had I known you ran that site at the time, I would have invited you to the deal site meetup I organized during asw. There is always next time.