Nifty Slideshow Maker

11th January 2017 - Broken for now, fix being researched. Google has withdrawn the rss feed api on which this depends 

Find it here: www.kdl.to/nft-slideshows.html

Description

This great tool lets you make slideshows for your blog or website.
Each one you make showcases the Zazzle products you want with each image linked to its product page on Zazzle.
What's special about them is that each of the links carries your referral id so you can earn commission on any referred sales. *

The links also carry a tracking code. More on this later.

Unlike Zazzle's own equivalent, the Flashpanel, Nifty Slideshows don't use Flash and so are fine on mobile.

*There are some ifs and buts around what qualifies as a referred sale - you'll find out more if you visit your associate page or the Zazzle forums. Your associate page, if you're logged on, is here: www.zazzle.com/my/associate/associate

Nifty Slideshow Maker main area

This screenshot shows the main settings area with the live preview just above it.

All you have to do is fill in the boxes and then click the "make slideshow / apply changes" button. The live preview will update so you can see what your nifty slideshow will look like.

About the Zazzle RSS feed pull

The nifty slideshow maker gets the product images and titles by making a request of Zazzle's RSS feed mechanism and then packaging up the returned results into a slideshow.

The easiest, simplest thing about feeds seems to be the hardest to grasp. I've explained all about them with lots of clickable examples and screenshots. Read about the important stuff here: http://razamazazzle.blogspot.co.uk/p/about-zazzle-rss-feed-mechanism-instead.html

Examples

In the lower half of the settings area are some hot tips and examples. When you click the "make slideshow / apply changes" button the contents of this area will contain your nifty slideshow code - to get it back again click the "reset" button (which also resets the form back to its starting content).

How to use Zazzle Voucher Codes

Piece of cake, simply add &pm=VOUCHERCODE on the end of the feed pull you want to use.

Wherever you're using the slideshow, do make sure you explain when it expires, what it covers and on which domain it applies (really important if you're using the international domains feature, below).

Tracking codes explained

A tracking code let's you know where your promoting has been successful.

It's a word you make up that will be quoted in your Referral History report on any referral sales arising from the link the tracking code was present on.
You can use letters, digits and the underscore (_) character in your tracking codes.

This is what a tracking code looks like in your Referral History report (when you refer a sale via a link that used one). The link that was successful here used newkdl as the tracking code:

I use tracking codes like nft_pntrst, nft_fbk, nft_twtr and nft_gpls - I'll let you work out where I use those tracking codes ;)

Zazzle's International Domains

There's an optional feature of Nifty Slideshows you can use that should improve the chances of getting referral commission.

A brief explanation. If you bring someone to a product on the zazzle.com domain with one of your referral links and they buy from that domain, cool, you get the referral commission (there are some caveats but we'll ignore those).

However, if your referral link is to one Zazzle domain but the visitor ends up buying on a different Zazzle domain you don't get the referral.

For example you bring them to Zazzle via a zazzle.com referral link but they end up buying from the zazzle.co.uk domain instead. No referral commission for you :(

Zazzle doesn't have a domain for every country, so the home domain for them is the zazzle.com site. Other countries don't have their own but instead get redircted to a similar-language site. Denmark visitors, for example get redirected to the German zazzle domain, zazzle.de
You'll be pleased to know that Nifty Slideshows can, if you want, sniff out which country a visitor is from and then change all the referral links to use the Zazzle domain associated with that country.

How?

You add &zd=1 to the end of your feed spec, in the box "Zazzle RSS feed pull to use".

If you do, whenever someone visits your blog / website that has a Nifty Slideshow on it, this happens:

• their ip address is used to look up their country
• a lookup table is used to determine which is the right Zazzle domain for them
• all the links in the Nifty Slideshow are then changed to link to that domain instead of the normal zazzle.com domain.

If you're in the US then you won't see any difference but your non-US visitors will.

Be aware, though - if your slideshow contains non-US products (like binders or postage stamps) then non-US visitors will be taken to a generic gifts page on Zazzle if they click those products.  Even so, you'll still get any referral commission due if they do buy.