Interview: Shaz Amin, CEO of Blue Track Media

We're very excited to present our 63rd interview with Shaz Amin of Blue Track Media.   Shaz Amin is the Chief Executive Officer of one of the most trusted incentive advertising networks in the affiliate space, Blue Track Media. He is highly respected for running his company with the highest morals and top notch support. In his spare time, he loves to play and watch basketball as well as spend time with his friends and family. He aspires to one day be a philanthropist and change the lives of those who are less fortunate.  

1. Could you tell us something about yourself? How old are you? Where were you born?

I turned 23 years old this year, quite depressing as I dislike aging, the only milestone I have left to look forward to now is now being able to rent a car at 25 without any surcharges. I was born in Karachi, Pakistan, but was fortunate to come to America at a very young age thanks to my parents. I'd love to tell you many things about myself, where should I start? I'd first like to let all the readers know that I’m just like them. I love to watch football on Sundays, I enjoy pigging out with wings and pizza with family and friends, and that I've already made one too many mistakes in my short life as well. Regardless of my job and title, I am just another human being that faces real life issues as frequently as the next person. The main reason I’m telling you this is because I rather have people see me and judge me as the person I really am, rather than the accomplishments and resume that might sound great on LinkedIn. I welcome anyone who sees me to approach me and strike up a random conversation, I really enjoy meeting new people and helping them out any way I can.  

2. How did you get involved in affiliate marketing? What/Who inspired you to enter it?

I never shy away from telling people who introduced me to this space. It was actually a good friend of mine whom I'm sure you know, Fehzan Ali from Adscend Media. It's quite the tale; back in our adolescence days I believe I was one of his referrals for one of those free iPod GPT websites. Since then we've both climbed the ladder with incentive modeled companies and helped each other when needed.  

3. What accomplishments so far are you the most proud of? When did you first "hit the big time"?

The biggest accomplishment to me was when I was relieving my mother from the responsibilities and bills around the house. My father passed away while I was a teenager so my mother had to pick up even more slack raising two children with a full time job. Nothing makes me more proud than saying that I forced my mom into an early and well deserved retirement! The second question is a bit tough for me to answer. Regardless of what I have achieved financially, I have yet to believe that I've "hit the big time." My definition of hitting it big is different, and it doesn't completely involve money. To me it means making a positive impact in peoples' lives that are less fortunate, enjoying time with friends and family without worldly stress, and gaining the upmost respect of my peers. Financial stability is very nice as well, but I have quickly and thankfully learned that money can either be a blessing or a curse, depending on what you do with it and how you behave once it arrives. It has the power to change people, and I would be lying if I said it hasn't changed me. For better or worse has yet to be decided though, time will tell.  

4. Tell us a little bit about Blue Track Media and what you do over there?

Blue Track Media is an advertising agency that represents advertisers who are looking to test out incentive promotional methods and publishers who run an incentive based model. Most advertisers are hesitant to experiment in this type of traffic, but we are happy to say that so far our advertisers have had phenomenal results. That's mainly due to the extensive knowledge that we have in the incent niche. I've personally been a part of it for 7-8 years and know the ins and outs of it. We are known for our quality incentive traffic which includes Virtual Currency, Social Incentives, Mobile Incentives, Content Unlocking, Co-Registration/Offer Walls, and many other methods. With our proprietary platform, we have the freedom to give our publishers a different type of experience that is catered to their exact needs. As the CEO, I manage the day to day operations and bring in new clients that could benefit from our model. I try to personally speak to new advertisers and publishers because they are able to see how genuine and trusting our company is once they are able to get a feel of the type of person I am. I have a great staff behind me that takes care of the rest of the tasks in order for our company to function effectively.  

5. With so many incentivized/content locking networks competing, what are the factors that distinguish Blue Track Media from the rest of your competition?

This question is destined to be filled with cliché answers that most readers have probably already heard over and over again. I'll try my best to answer this differently and short. - We do our best to respond to support questions after hours, on the weekends, and on holidays. - We built our platform from the ground up, which means we can add and change features upon request. - We have no debts or loans, so we pay on our publishers on time, every time. - You have the most genuine and down to earth person running this company, Shaz Amin. I could say more of the regular boring rhetoric; such as we will beat competitor rates and how we have "exclusive" deals, but I'm sure you're tired of hearing that over and over.  

6. One way to keep affiliates happy is to pay them on time and faster. What steps has your network taken to ensure that your affiliates will be paid on time?

We pay our publishers on time; there is no question about it. You can look around and see that 99.9% of our publishers have no complaints about getting paid from us on a timely basis. We also have very good reviews from publishers who have accounts with us. As for faster payments, we do have a few faster schedules for our publishers who can provide quality incentive traffic. One our publishers have brought in consistent quality and volume, they enjoy faster payments, however I won't sit here and say that we'll pay you weekly no matter what, because it's quite hard to get weekly payments from us being in the nature of the business we are in. When we have 100 publishers driving traffic to one campaign, one publisher has the ability to ruin it for the rest of the 99 with low quality traffic. We never want to put our other publishers at risk so we do our best to maintain a level playing field as well as routinely check the quality of the incentive leads that are being delivered. The good news is that we've never had a huge problem with our advertisers, thanks to our great publishers and fraud preventative measures; we are able to deliver quality traffic to them.  

7. What type of niches are good for content locking right now? What type of content we can use for better conversion?

I would hate to sit here and divulge all the secrets of our publishers, so I won't elaborate too much on what I believe is a good niche or idea for content locking. I'm sure many of your readers will respect that Blue Track Media holds the privacy of their publishers very highly. However I do think it's safe to say that the best ideas for content locking are the ones that you are the most knowledgeable about. For example, I personally have vast knowledge about basketball, so I'd probably make a basketball training guide with tips/plays and then put a content locker on top of it. Try to make something informative that people would want to go through the hassle of unlocking the content for!  

8. What do you think is the greatest challenge facing the industry is right now?

One thing I've noticed is that many non-incentivized companies are branching off and creating sister incentive networks. I obviously do not fear the competition; actually I invite it since we can all work together, but I do fear that the quality of incentive traffic might decrease and advertisers will once again shy away from trying out this type of promotional method. Not every company has the vast knowledge of the incentive niche as we do, so I'd advise every publisher and advertiser to be careful who they work with and not judge the entire niche based on one company if they didn't have a pleasurable experience.  

9. Are there any plans to develop Blue Track Media further in the near future? Will there be any interesting changes/improvements made soon?

There are big plans to redo the entire interface to provide more of an elegant and user friendly feel to our client side. I get easily bored with design so I have to keep changing the look and feel of our platform so things can stay fresh. There are always small changes and additions being made to our platform, the main reason I chose to develop a proprietary platform is to have the freedom to do whatever I want with it. I envision myself as a publisher logging into the platform everyday and wonder how I can make things simpler and cut the time it takes to find what I need. Every publisher has different needs, so one great thing about us is that we are able to cater to a variety of publishers and personalize the way they want things to appear. We always welcome suggestions from our clients and have a great track record of implementing them!  

10. What is the one thing you love about your job as an affiliate network owner and what is the one thing you hate the most?

I really love conversing with our publishers and advertisers, even if it's not solely about business. I enjoy hearing about people's weekends, their accomplishments, their families, etc. I'm amazed at all the different stories and personalities we have in our industry, there are some truly bright people out there who have worked very hard to get to where they are today. Plus meeting everyone at the conferences regularly and hanging out with them at the after parties is a very enjoyable time for me. I'm not a big fan of the stereotypes and condescending attitudes that some people have in this industry. Just because a person is new to the space, or doesn't make 6 figures a year yet, they get treated differently and sometimes looked down upon. The good news is that there are not too many instances of this and there are some truly kind people in our industry.  

11. What is your dream car?

Well considering that I still drive around my mom's 1998 Honda Civic to keep me grounded, I'd say any car that is 1999 or higher would be a dream car! I can't justify spending $100,000 on a car, it just makes no sense to me since cars are a negative investment. However, currently I am thinking about getting a new car soon, so I might consider the new Lexus GS series. I definitely enjoy luxurious and reliable cars; I'm that annoying guy who drives exactly 60 MPH on the highway!  

12. What are some of your favorite TV shows?

I'm currently really obsessed with Suits! I've always wanted to go to law school and I really enjoy New York City, so that show really fills both of those desires for me. The Office is also one show that I can always watch over and over again, it never gets old for me and always keeps me laughing. I also enjoy Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Community, and many others.  

13. What are some valuable lessons you have learned in life that you can share with the readers?

The first important lesson I learned is about time. I could sit here and use Wiz Khalifa's quote on how "Time is money, so I went and bought a Rolex." But I prefer to use this quote about time instead: "Waste your money and you're only out of money, but waste your time and you've lost a part of your life." - Michael LeBoeuf I really began to value time after I graduated college, every year in college I couldn't wait to get out. I knew I could use my time to make more money and start more companies once I was out. Well I finally got out, and you know what? I can't tell you how much I miss being back in. It felt more like 4 months instead of the 4 years I was in college. I was too busy working countless hours to achieve more and more, when I should have taken some time to pause and enjoy what I have done with not just myself, but with my friends and family as well. After that realization, I vowed to myself that I would spend more time enjoying my life with loved ones and taking more adventures to experience new things before it was too late. While I still slave away working at times, I have learned to better balance both work and life. The second thing lesson I learned is simple, stay humble, stay very humble. I am living proof that good things happen when you keep your head grounded and appreciate how fortunate you are.  

14. Thanks a lot for this interview. If there is anything else you would like to say to the readers of Affpaying.com now is the time!

I hope this interview gave the readers an insight on the type of person I am and the type of company Blue Track Media is. We are very high on our morals and do our best to provide the best experience to both advertisers and publishers. Incentive promotions such as content locking, virtual currency, mobile incentives, etc are our expertise and we would invite all of you to give Blue Track Media a chance to become your one stop shop for all your incentive needs! Feel free to contact me at shaz@bluetrackmedia.com for any questions or concerns. Again I thank you Gao and AffPaying for this interview, we look forward to more in the future!  

Many thanks to Shaz for sharing your time with us and for sharing some great insight tips here! What are your thoughts on the interview? Kindly share your thoughts in the comments section below. Also, if you have any experience with Blue Track Media, please write a review for them on the Blue Track Media review page. PS. If you are an affiliate marketer, affiliate manager or affiliate network CEO and are interested in answering a few questions about you, your network and affiliate marketing, please drop us a message.