The perfect affiliate program?
What you already said - high quality exclusive content that will convert well and keep retentions high. And offer affiliates both PPS and 60/40 recuring plans.
If the retentions are high, I will definately go for the recuring plan. I am averaging a 6 month retention per SU with one of the programs I promote. Given some mebers cancel their trial membership right after they sign up, it is really great. It means if the surfer doesn't cancel his membership after the first month, he probably will stay till his CC is expired
So, I don't want promotions like free TV or DVD for x ammount of sales per month. What I want is good retention rate.
P.S. Just though of something else - may be some sort of a bonus to the webmasters - go from 60/40 to 65/35 for a webmaster with 0 chargebacks for the previous 2 months. How about that for a novelty idea?
Peace