I am honored to announce that I will deliver the annual Allan P. Kirby Center Lecture in Free Enterprise and Entrepreneurship at Wilkes University.

Past speakers include Jerry Greenfield – cofounder of Ben & Jerry’s, award-winning consumer journalist John Stossel, known for his contrarian reports and Give Me a Break segments on ABC’s 20/20, and the “Juice guy” Tom Scott from Nantucket Nectars.

The lecture will take place Tuesday, April 7, 2009 at 7:30pm. The location is the Dorothy Dickson Darte Center for the Performing Arts in Wilkes Barre, PA.

If you reside within the state of Pennsylvania or will be in the area stop by and hear me talk about the Pepperjam Story, the Kris Jones Story, and my view on how businesses, students, and everyday people can leverage the internet to make more money, stay connected, and improve the world.

See you there!

Friday is already here – I don’t know about you but since January time seems to fly by….maybe it has to do with the yin and yang of the financial markets…keeping us (business owners) on the edge of our seats.

Talk about time flying by – SES New York is here already. This has got to be at least my 4th or 5th SES NY.

SES NY is by far the biggest gathering of search-engine marketers in the world. SES San Jose is also huge, but the NYC thing really attracts the top search minds and the largest of advertisers in the world.

OK. So I’ll be Travelling to SES NY on Tuesday evening with a small army of Pepperjammers, including the General Manager of Pepperjam’s agency business Ian Howells, head of technical integration for our PPC division Christian Wenzel, and head of search-engine optimization Todd Butcher.

I’m speaking on two and moderating one panel. BTW – if you’d like to meet feel free to drop me an e-mail at kris @ pepperjam.com or simply introduce yourself at the host hotel (Hilton NY). FYI – I drink Miller lite and love a stiff redbull and VO.

Here are the details of my panels….

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

4:00pm-5:15pm

Dealing With Affiliates: A Roadmap to Success

Join this panel for a no-holds-barred discussion where performance marketing’s top contenders square off. As SEM evolves, marketers find themselves competing head-on with affiliates. Marketers want more leads/sales, increased affiliate-generated leads/sales, and less cannibalization of search campaigns. How can this be achieved in a world filled with increasingly hostile rhetoric on both sides? Join a panel of experts as they break silence on taboo issues and work through the finer points. You’ll walk away with fresh, new perspective and the ability to collaborate profitably.

Moderator:
Jeffrey Rohrs, VP, Marketing, ExactTarget

Speakers:
Kristopher Jones, President & CEO, Pepperjam
Jeff Ferguson, SES Advisory Board, Director of Online Marketing, Napster
Lori Weiman, CEO, The Search Monitor
Peter Figueredo, CEO, NETexponent

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Advanced Paid Search Techniques

12:45pm-2:00pm

How can you best tap into long tail terms? Are there targeting techniques you’re overlooking? This session examines these and other techniques to help you get more out of paid search.

Moderator:
Kristopher Jones, President & CEO, Pepperjam

Speakers:
Josh Fialky, Senior Client Services Manager, Idearc Search Marketing
Thomas Bindl, Founder & CEO, Refined Labs GmbH
Matt Van Wagner, President, Find Me Faster
David Sprinkle, Director of Paid Search, Acronym Media
Andrew Goodman, SES Advisory Board, Principal, Page Zero Media
Wister Walcott, Co-founder and Vice President of Products, Marin Software

Ads in a Quality Score World

2:15pm-3:30pm

More and more, ranking well in paid search listings is less and less about how much you pay and more about the “quality” of your ad campaign. But what goes into making up your quality score? In this panel, we’ll take a closer look at quality factors and give tips on increasing the perceived relevancy of your campaigns.

Moderator:
David Szetela, CEO, Clix Marketing

Speakers:
Kristopher Jones, President & CEO, Pepperjam
Ron Jones, President/CEO, Symetri Internet Marketing
Frederick Vallaeys, AdWords Evangelist, Google
Misty Locke, President & Co-founder, Range Online Media

Have you checked out my book yet? Under $20 at Amazon – http://www.amazon.com/pepperjam

See you at SES!

I’m making some last minute preparations for Affiliate Summit West 2009 in Vegas (being held at the RIO).

I’ll be moderating a panel at the event and Pepperjam Network will be exhibiting.

Five other Pepperjammers will be attending ASW with me including my beautiful wife Robyn Jones (Senior Director of Affiliate Relations), Maura Goodwin, Director of Pepperjam Network), Katharine Dempsey (General Manager of Pepperjam Network), Brock Siegel (VP of Business Development & Sales, Pepperjam Network), and Sugar Boy Ken Mohn Jr. (Chief Strategy Officer).

My panel will be held on Sunday, January 15, 2009 from 12:00pm-1:00pm. The panel is entitled “Affiliate Marketing in 2009″ – the panelists are:

Me, President & CEO, Pepperjam (moderator)
Gary Ackerman, President, M3 Mobile Marketing
Linda Woods, President & CEO, PartnerCentric, Inc.
Brad Wilson, CEO, Brad’s Deals
James Keating, VP of Marketing & Operations, ShopWiki.com

I’m looking forward to seeing old friends and mixing it up with some new people.

Please reach out to me beforehand or stop me if you see me at ASW and say hello!

I thought I would share with you the things I’m most thankful for in 2008. The list isn’t exhaustive; instead, these are some of the first things that come to my mind when I look back on an incredible 2008.

Things I’m Most Thankful for in 2008:

- The birth of my son, Kris Jr.
- The unfettered love and support I received from my wife, mother, extended family, and friends
- An all around incredible team of employees at Pepperjam
- Continued, extraordinary growth of Pepperjam’s Agency Business
- The opportunity to keynote Affiliate Dag and to speak at numerous conferences
- The opportunity to work with and speak to hundreds of high school and college kids in Northeastern, PA
- I published my first book, which has sold over 10,000 copies in its first 8-months and has been one of the best-selling books of 2008 on search marketing
- Pepperjam made #70 on the Inc. 500 List
- Being named a finalist for The Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year representing Pennsylvania
- Maintaining Pepperjam’s status as a privately-held company despite numerous opportunities to take on VC or be acquired
- The many new people I’ve met as I travelled around the United States and different parts of the globe
- The incredible success of Pepperjam Network – we launched in January and have nearly 700 advertisers and thousands upon thousands of affiliates. Oh ya – and we’ve generated millions of dollars in new revenue for Pepperjam
- The addition of numerous restaurants, bars, and coffee shops to downtown Wilkes-Barre (that’s where PJ is located)
- Being nominated and confirmed to the Board of Trustees of Misericordia University
- My health and happiness

Things I’m Most Looking Forward to in 2009:

- Turn around in the economy
- Continued growth and leadership position for Pepperjam and Pepperjam Network
- Obama taking over the Presidency
- An update to my book / addressing what I believe is a convergence between PPC & SEO
- Spending time with my family
- Moving into a new house
- Taking a vacation with my wife in February and my family during the summer
- Meeting new people and helping to open doors for them within the internet marketing industry
- Speaking at industry conferences and trade shows
- Involvement in my community

Less than two months ago we announced the release of Pepperjam Store Builder.

Pepperjam Store Builder is a next generation product feed technology that allows Pepperjam Network affiliates to quickly (less than 60 seconds) and easily create dynamic storefronts. The storefronts are created by selecting specific products or products categories from a list of several hundred Pepperjam Network advertisers – the affiliate has the ability to completely customize the look and the feel of the storefront.

As part of the kickoff of PJN Store Builder we launched a $2,000 contest. The contest provided $10 to any Pepperjam Network affiliate for simply submitting a Web site that integrated Pepperjam Store Builder (we received over 100 submissions!). The other part of the contest, which ends today at 5pm, is a $1,000 Grand Prize for the Web site / store that best integrates Pepperjam Store Builder.

The reason for this post is that the winner of the Grand Prize is voted on by YOU!

If you’d like to see our finalists and vote for the store that you think is best CLICK HERE TO VOTE NOW!

If you’d like to learn more about Pepperjam Store Builder CLICK HERE.

UPDATE – WINNER ANNOUNCED!

I was interview by Jeffrey L. Smith (President/CEO) of SEO Design Solutions as part of my speaking at SES – Chicago next week.

The interview includes questions about affiliate marketing, traffic monetization, traffic generation, PPC, and Quality Score Optimization so I thought I would share it.

CLICK HERE to read the entire interview.

This year has really gone by quickly.

To me it seems like Search-Engine Strategies – New York was just a few weeks ago. SES New York is always the first major search conference of the year for me (it always takes places in the beginning of the year – Now….I’m just finishing up my travel plans for SES – Chicago, which is the last search conference of the season for SES.

I will be attending and speaking at SES Chicago (December 8-12, 2008).

The first panel that I’ll be speaking on is “Ads in a Quality Score World.”

Here’s the description from the SES Web site:

“More and more, ranking well in paid search listings is less about how much you pay and more about the “quality” of your ad campaign. But what goes into making up your quality score? In this panel, we’ll take a closer look at quality factors and give tips on increasing the perceived relevancy of your campaigns.”

Here are the speakers:

Moderator:
Jonathan Mendez, Founder & CEO, RAMP Digital

Speakers:
Andrew Goodman, Principal, Page Zero Media
Kristopher Jones, President & CEO, Pepperjam
Ron Jones, Search Engine Watch Expert & President/CEO, Symetri Internet Marketing
Mary Berk, Senior Product Manager, Microsoft

I’m especially excited about this panel because I feel that Pepperjam has been one of the pioneers in addressing and optimizing Quality Score. In fact, I dedicated an entire chapter to “Quality Score Optimization” in my best-selling book.

This panel is scheduled for Wednesday, December 10, 2008 from 2:15pm-3:30pm

The other panel I’m speaking on is titled “Affiliate 2.0: New Distribution Value Using Search & More.”

Here’s the description:

“As SEM evolves, marketers find themselves competing head-on with affiliates who are challenged to diversify tactics and distribution. Lead generators and retailers are investing less in affiliates and more in search. What does this mean for both of performance marketing’s top contenders? How can marketers balance both channels given their desire for incremental leads/sales and less cannibalization of search campaigns? Learn how to cut through the hostile rhetoric on both sides and work profitably across both channels concurrently. Join a panel of experts as they break silence on taboo issues and work through the finer points. You’ll walk away with fresh, new perspective and the ability to collaborate profitably.”

Here are the speakers:

Moderator:
Jeff Molander, CEO, Molander & Associates Inc.

Speakers:
Jeff Ferguson, Director of Online Marketing, Napster
Amanda Evans, VP, Search Strategy, WebMama.com, Inc.
Kristopher Jones, President & CEO, Pepperjam
Lee Gientke, Director, Business Development, OrangeSoda, Inc.

This is the same panel (with a different name) that I’ve been speaking on for years at SES. However, the speakers have changed and we have a new moderator, which should make for a lively debate and discussion.

This panel take place on Thursday, December 11, 2008 from 10:15am-11:15am.

Special thanks to Kevin Lee from DidIt who quoted me on ClickZ in an article titled “SES Chicago: Speakers Speak Out.” CLICK HERE to read that article.

I hope to see you in Chicago!

I will be attending with my Chief Strategy Officer (a fellow SES speaker) Ken Mohn, Jr. We’d love to buy you a drink if we see you in the Hilton watering hole.

If you haven’t secured a ticket to SES Chicago you can do so HERE.

We are excited to announce the official BETA launch of our next generation product feed technology called Pepperjam Store Builder™, which is available exclusively through Pepperjam Network for FREE to all advertisers and affiliates. Can’t wait any longer to see Pepperjam Store Builder™ log-in HERE.

Pepperjam Store Builder™ allows you to quickly and easily manipulate Pepperjam Network product feeds in real-time to build product storefronts on your Web site. You can use Pepperjam Store Builder™ to easily link to specific products, create dedicated product feed Web sites, supplement your existing content or blog, add additional value to your coupon or incentive site, or for just about anything else your imagination will allow.

With Pepperjam Store Builder™ you have access to millions of products from hundreds of Pepperjam Network advertisers. You can automatically create storefronts by selecting any combination of merchants, categories, or keywords. The more merchants and / or categories you select the more products that will be available to your Web site visitors. However, you may also choose to use the Pepperjam Store Builder™ search filter to refine your search to a specific kind or type of product. For instance, you may select CostumeKingdom.com as your merchant, but only want to display “pumpkin” costumes. No problem! Simply use the search filter and type in “pumpkin” to refine the feed to show only the products you want.

You want to know what’s even cooler? Creating a feed is so easy that you can build a storefront for virtually anything in less than 30 seconds and we’ll even show you a LIVE Demo as your building it! All you have to do is create your storefront, copy a small amount of code into your Web site, and voila – you have a fully functional product feed storefront.

Take a look at the screenshot below of Pepperjam Store Builder™. To get working with Pepperjam Store Builder™ immediately simply log-in to your account at www.pepperjamnetwork.com and start generating some feeds.

Want to see what an actual Pepperjam Store Builder™ Web site might look like? Check out www.Halloween-Headquarters.com

We’d like to take this opportunity to thank those of you that provided us with tips and suggestions for what a “next generation product feed technology” should look like – we are proud of Pepperjam Store Builder™ and we look to only improve the product moving forward with your constructive feedback.

Existing affiliates can check out the Pepperjam Store Builder™ HERE.

New affiliates must sign-up HERE.

Rand Fiskin recently announced that his venture capital backed internet marketing and technology company SEOmoz has not only successfully launched an index of the Web (30 billion pages+), but also a tool called Linkscape, which empowers internet marketers and search engine marketers to better understand and analyze the value of “links,” among other things.

I honestly believe this announcement by SEOmoz will go down as one of the most significant advances to the search-engine marketing industry in the last 8 years.

As internet marketers we now have access to the most robust and comprehensive tool available anywhere for understanding, prioritizing, and evaluating the value of links for purposes of search-engine optimization.

Learn more about this sigificant announcent HERE.

I was interviewed by PromotionWorld recently about Pepperjam Network and my view of the future of affiliate marketing.

You can check out the interview HERE.