Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate (aka Associate) programs are a win-win situation for everyone involved. Internet-based merchants hook up with affiliates to generate traffic to their web sites. Affiliates get paid if the traffic from their site visits the merchant web page. The smart Internet entrepreneur does some research to determine the best affiliate programs for her business.

Where to Look

Affiliate networks are the middle man between affiliates and web sites with affiliate programs. Look for affiliate networks that provide all the tools needed to set up and maintain an affiliate program. AssociatePrograms.com is a popular directory with information about merchants that pay you to sell their wares.

Commission Junction is a free network that offers access to thousands of the best affiliate programs. Commission Junction combines all your affiliate earnings (product sales, on-line ads, links) into one monthly check.

What to Look for

The best affiliate programs will be those that target your customer base. An on-line florist would get little traffic from a pet supply website. You want an affiliate whose business is similar or comparable to your product. Avoid affiliates with low quality products. Ask to speak to existing affiliates to find out if a company is reputable.

Referral traffic may link to the merchant site and not buy initially but return to make a purchase weeks later. Look for affiliate programs that remember your site was responsible for that customer. The best affiliate programs remember you for 60 days by using cookies to tag the customer’s computer when he visits the merchant site.

The best affiliate programs offer reliable support such as ads, logos, and sales advice. Good programs also provide timely updates on click through sales and earnings, and, respond to questions or problems within 24 hours.

Getting Paid

There are three common affiliate payment plans. With pay per sale, the merchant pays when the affiliate sends a customer who buys from the merchant’s site. The payment could be a set amount or a percentage of the sale.

In a pay per click set up, the affiliate is paid based on the number of people who visit the merchant’s web site regardless if a purchase was made.

With pay per lead programs, affiliates are paid based on the number of people who sign up as leads. A lead would be a visitor who filled out an information page on the merchant web site thus becoming a potential customer.

Multi-level payment plans allow affiliates to earn commission on sales, clicks, or leads from their sites as well as commission based on activity generated by affiliate sites they refer to the merchant site. Another form of payment is residual commission. Affiliates continue earning money after the original sale has been made. This is common in situations where customers pay monthly fees for merchant services.

The best affiliate programs pay at least 25% commission with some going as high as 50%. Payments should be made at least once a month although some affiliate programs pay quarterly or twice a year.

Whether you are a successful Internet Marketer already, or if you are just venturing forth into the online world, affiliate marketing is an excellent way to either get started or to supplement your income.

With the multitude of affiliate programs on the market, how do you decide which ones to promote?

There are lots of things to consider when choosing an affiliate program to promote and to weed out the wheat from the chaff. Here are five tips on how you can find hot affiliate programs to promote:

1) How Much Commission Will You Earn?

This is probably one of the most important questions you will want to ask yourself, as it directly affects how much money you will earn. There is little point in spending hours promoting a program that pays you very little. It’s just not cost or time effective.

It is better for you to promote a high paying program as you get a better return for your time and money.

However, there are times when promoting a lower commission product is a good idea. If you are making, say $10 on the front end, but there is a back end product that you can make $500 on, then it is worth promoting the front end providing you get credited for the back end product purchase too.

2) How Are Commissions Paid?

The Internet is a global market place and the person running the affiliate program may not be in the same country as you are. If they are paying by check then it may cost you a significant percentage of your commission to cash the check. Not good huh?

It may be that they pay through a particular payment processor which isn’t available to your country. You need to check how you will receive your payments and if it is practical for you to do so.

3) How Often Are You Paid?

Obviously, you want to know how long you will have to wait until you get paid! Some merchants will pay you weekly, monthly or even quarterly. You need to understand this in order to manage your cash flow better.

4) What is the Minimum Payout?

This is related to the above two points. Depending on the minimum payout and how often and how you are paid – it might not be worthwhile you participating in the program. If, for example, the minimum payout is $20 and you are paid weekly by check and it costs you $30 to cash the check then there is no point participating if you cannot guarantee to earn more than $30 each week.

5) What Promotion Resources Are Available?

Good affiliate managers will offer a wide variety of resources to their affiliates to help them promote the product and make money. This could be articles, keyword lists, adverts and more. The more resources available, the quicker you can get running and the easier you may find it to promote the product.

Affiliate marketing is a very lucrative business and running a successful program is surprisingly simple. Finding the right product that meets your criteria can help you make the money you want! Use the above questions and the tips from the Success For Affiliate Managers book and you strike gold with affiliate programs.

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and what do you specifically do to drive people to sign up for dish network?

Thanks a lot !!!

There are a lot of affiliate programs out there. How do you know if you’ve picked the right product or service to promote? First, make sure the affiliate program speaks to a specific niche market and not a general group of people. Niche marketing works and the tighter you narrow down your niche, the more focused the buyers are. Also, the tighter the niche is the more you can focus your ad copy and encourage clicks that will convert.

There are many affiliate bureaus online that bring together companies that have affiliate programs and the people who wish to join them. Commission Junction is one of these bureaus. Commission Junction has a mailing list and a promo list that will notify you when companies have special offers for their affiliates. This can be a good way to choose an affiliate program because the mailing lists might open your eyes to a market or product you wouldn’t have thought of yourself.

Another source for profitable affiliate programs is searching online for lists of the top best-selling affiliate products. Don’t reinvent the wheel. Expose yourself to what is already available online and rely on the advice of trusted internet marketers through mailing lists and their websites. It may sound too simple, but it works.

Also, keep in mind that successful affiliate marketers are able to distance themselves a bit from the product they are selling. While you want to review and research the product you are promoting, you don’t have to necessarily be passionate about it. Adwords is paid advertising, plain and simple. If you want to make money using Adwords, you want to focus your efforts of promoting products that people will buy. Try to think of products that people must have or that they need. Find affiliate programs for things that are always in demand. You can also target products or services that people would use in their off time.

One of the best resources for popular products or services is to search for consumer’s top ten lists on the internet. These are lists that are created by regular people at sites like Amazon.com or on their personal websites that list their favorite products. Find these lists by typing in the product you are looking for into a search engine and adding “list”, “best” or “best selling.” You’ll find a lot of interesting leads from what the search engine pulls up.

Taking the time to do some market research before starting a campaign will go a long way toward making your efforts profitable.

I’m self-publishing my new book about to be published shortly through LightningSource. Here’s my dilemma as a self-published, self-marketing author:

1. Do I leave fulfillment to LightningSource/Amazon who will charge me 55% right off the top, leaving me with much smaller margins (the cost of the book will come from my share, the remaining 45%) and focus on just marketing the book? If I take this route, then I can’t do much for affiliates and Joint Venture partners, but reduces a lot of S&H overhead.

2. Do I do the fulfillment myself, selling the book for lower than Amazon, worrying about shipping and handling (especially international shipments, refunds, etc)? This approach will give help me pay decent amounts to affiliates, JV partners and bulk resellers, but increases my order- processing overhead.

What do you think?

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Ravi Jayagopal
Author, “No Business Like E-Business”

http://www.NBLEB.com

Richard C,

The other problem with selling on Amazon is that Amazon will not share the buyer’s contact info with you (unless I’m wrong?).

So, I’m trying to figure out what’s the best way to market on Amazon, as well as on my web site – but the major problem of doing it on my web site is figuring out the shipping price for international buyers.

- Ravi

http://www.RavisRants.com

I have been thinking about getting into the credit card affiliate programs and just wanted to know who the best program is, and also some name of some forums that may speak a little about these as well.

Thank you in Advance.

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Affiliate marketing has become one of the most effective ways to advertise online. It is also one of the easiest ways for anyone with a website to make a profit online. Affiliate Marketing is an agreement between a merchant and a website owner. The website owner, or the affiliate, allows the use of their site for the promotion of the merchant’s products by linking to the merchant’s website. In exchange, the merchant pays a commission to the affiliate on all sales generated by the affiliate for the help www.ppc-profit-marketer.com. Every time someone clicks on the link on the affiliate website and proceeds to make a purchase, the affiliate gets a commission. The merchant will pay the affiliate only when a customer clicks on the product link and makes a purchase.
Affiliate marketing programs are described as a win-win situation for both the merchant and the affiliate because of the pay-for-performance scheme. Both the merchant and the affiliate enjoy some benefits in affiliate marketing for the help www.affiliate-sale-booster.com. There are many benefits on the merchant’s side. It gives the merchant a wider market in which to advertise a product or service. Affiliate marketing will give the product or service the maximum exposure that it may not get with other traditional advertising techniques. The more affiliate sites a merchant has, the higher the traffic, which can convert to sales. Affiliate marketing is the equivalent of having an army of sales people who will do the advertising and will only get a commission if a customer purchases.
Meanwhile, since an affiliate marketing relationship is a win-win situation, the affiliate also enjoys many benefits. Foremost among these is the easy way to make a profit. The affiliate can earn by having an ad or link to the merchant’s website, which prospective customers will hopefully click and proceed to make a purchase. As soon as the customer clicks on the ad on the affiliate’s site, is redirected to the merchant’s website and goes on to buy that particular product, the affiliate earns a commission. The more referrals there are the more profit for the affiliate.
Affiliate marketing is an excellent way to earn money while at home. There are virtually no production costs. The product is already developed and proven by the merchant, and all you have to do to find, as many prospects as you can that will bring in the profit for both the merchant and the affiliate. Affiliate programs are usually free to join, so affiliates do not have to worry about start-up costs. There are thousands of products and services you can choose from. You can find affiliate programs for every product under the sun. Surely, there is a product or service out there that is relevant to your website.
In addition, there is absolutely no sales experience necessary. Most affiliate programs offer excellent support when it comes to providing marketing material. The simplicity of affiliate marketing allows you to be an affiliate marketer at the least cost and the most comfort. You can even build a successful affiliate marketing business right in the convenience of your own home. In affiliate marketing, your responsibility is simply to find prospects for the merchant; you do not have to worry about inventory, order processing, and product shipping. These, along with customer service support are the duties of the merchant.
Because of the global reach of the internet, you can easily find thousands of prospects. You can intensify your advertising campaign by exploiting more aggressive and productive strategies such as viral marketing. By attracting more prospects, you also maximize your potential to earn. Another benefit of an affiliate marketer is the minimal risk involved. If the product you are advertising is not making money then you can dump it and choose another. There are no long-term binding contracts tying you to products that are not making enough money.
All the same, the best benefit of being an affiliate marketer is the opportunity to increase your income; and you can make a profit even if affiliate marketing is only a sideline business. With your own affiliate business, you can earn easily earn extra income, although you do have to exert effort and use your imagination to maximize your earning potential. Indeed, affiliate marketing is one of the simplest and most effective business opportunities on the web today.