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Support Us

Last modified on October 3rd, 2011

As you are no doubt aware, the server this site is running on frequently faces difficulties. This is why we are currently using a powerful dedicated server. Unfortunately, those aren't cheap. If you want to help out, please read about our affiliation program further below.

Since November 2007 we have finally put on some (hopefully unobtrusive) merchandise links on the band and album pages. We are happy to say that they have shown good results so far, but we have noticed that some people don't quite understand how affiliation works, or have some misconceptions about the links. So hopefully the following mini-FAQ clarify this whole deal.

Who/what are Encyclopaedia Metallum affiliates?

We are currently running affiliation programs with the following merchant sites:

So how can I help? How do you get revenue from these affiliates?

The short version: bookmark the URLs above that you wish to use for any kind of shopping. Any time you shop there, you are supporting us!

The longer version: it's very simple; when someone clicks one of those links above (or those that appear on the band and album pages), and ends up buying something (anything!) on the merchant site within a certain time frame, we get a percentage of the sale.

As you saw, you do not need to buy the specific item you clicked on for us to get a commission. For example, if you click on an Amazon.com link for Sad Wings of Destiny, but end up changing your mind and a few hours later you order a few books, it will work! So, if you plan on doing any shopping on any of those sites - whether it's a metal haul on Shadow Kingdom Records, Holiday shopping on Amazon, or buying second-hand headphones on eBay, please think of us - you can effectively support Metal Archives by bookmarking the links above and using them whenever you need to! Even if you just buy something small and inexpensive, such as a used DVD for $5, it will have been worth it for us.

Note that if you do wish to use those links, you need to bookmark the links displayed above, and not the page you end up redirected at after clicking them, otherwise the tracking of the sale back to us will not work.

I run a metal distro - will you be my affiliate and place links to my distro?

Maybe. Do you run an affiliation program? If so, please let us know and we'll see how we can work together to get a list of your artists and/or available albums/merchandise, so that we can import them into our database and then display the links on the individual band and album pages.

Otherwise, you will need to have an affiliation program set up in order to have your store appear in our merchant links on the bands and releases pages. This would include tracking of sales coming from this site, a payment system, and hopefully some reporting features. Not everyone has the means to develop that, so there are companies specialized in the matter that can save you most of the work by integrating their software on your site. A big one we know of is Commission Junction; eBay used to use them, along with a lot of other stores, though we're not sure what their terms are. There are a lot more out there too, though remember that your software must allow payments to Canada (payments in USD is fine, even preferred since we pay our host in USD): some affiliation softwares require an European bank account, for example, so that wouldn't work.

Also, please note that very small distros ( < 2000 albums in stock) will not be considered, simply because the small number of links will not generate enough traffic to be worth the effort (neither for us nor for the distro).

For further information about how affiliation programs work (including tracking cookie duration and commission rate), please email us at moc/sevihcra-latem//retsambew.

What happened to the Paypal donations?

Since the affiliation programs have been put in place, donations are no longer required to cover the server costs. Thank you to everyone who donated during the difficult times, your support has been greatly appreciated.

But if you still want to donate for some reason, like, because you love us so damn much, well... who are we to stop you? Use one of the following methods (a Paypal account is required):

  • a one-time donation in USD :

  • a monthly donation in USD (your Paypal account will be billed monthly, like a subscription service - you can at any time) of :
    $
  • a one-time donation in any currency (supported by Paypal), by sending a payment to from your own Paypal account.