By participating in affiliate programs, you can use your website to earn revenue and commission from affiliate networks. As long as your website is interesting, attracts visitors and gets referrals from search engines you can make some money from these programs.
What is affiliate marketing? From Wikipedia, it is defined as a web-based marketing practice in which a business rewards one or more affiliates for each visitor or customer brought about by the affiliate’s marketing efforts. Take for instance I have a business that sells books and I have an agreement with you that if you advertise my books and direct customers to me, I’ll pay you let’s say 10% of the sales. In that case you are not an affiliate. In essence, the amount of money you make depends on how well you market the product. So if you have good marketing skills and you participate in different affiliate programs, you would be earning commissions from every sale made. It’s just like door to door marketing or advertising except that it is done online.
The key to succeeding in any affiliate program is your marketing strategy. How do you market the product well enough to convince visitors to your site to buy the products? Remember all you have to do is direct the customers to the company and nothing else. The company deals with the ordering, packaging and despatch of the products. Do not fall for affiliate programs that promote’ get rich quick schemes’, more often than not, they are getting rich from your ignorance. There isn’t anything like get rich; you have to put in time and efforts to generate income.
There are websites that advertise affiliate programs and asks you to pay to join. My resolve is that you do not promote an affiliate program but promote a product. I wouldn’t pay to join any affiliate program. The company pays you a commission to advertise their products so why should you have to pay to join a program in which you would be doing the company a favour. Those that fall for the gimmick to pay to join affiliate programs end up trying to con others because they fell for it. So be careful.
The good news about affiliate marketing is that you don’t have to keep surfing the Internet to find companies that require affiliates. There are affiliate marketing websites you can register with for free and you have access all the companies in their database that require affiliates. All you need to do is create an account with them and then you choose which products you want to promote. I have listed three of the affiliate programs I participate it to get you started. They procedure is similar but you may want to browse through their websites for more information.
Affiliate Programs
clixGalores
clixGalore Affiliate Marketing is a large affiliate network comprising of over 7500+ Merchants and many ten of thousands of Affiliates across five main networks in the USA, UK, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. They have no joining, setup, or monthly fees and your affiliate program is activated within 12-24 hours or sooner.
Clickbank
ClickBank is a large affiliate network that lists in excess of 2300+ affiliate programs (and is still growing). One of the main features of the programs that it offers is the ease in linking. With Click Bank setup is free, fast and you’ll have instant access to over 10,000 products with commissions as high as 75%. You’ll also appreciate their fast & accurate tracking system and dependable payment services.
Tradedoubler
TradeDoubler is a Pan-European performance-based digital marketing company offering a range of products and services to optimise return on investment. They partner with all types of website owners, to successfully increase the value of their traffic.
Recommended Reading
Buzz Marketing with Blogs For Dummies
If you’re new to blogging, or if you know the mechanics of a blog but want some help refining and targeting yours, Buzz Marketing With Blogs For Dummies will get you going right away.
An expert blogger shows you the ins and outs of putting together a professional-looking blog, walks you through the jargon, helps you decide what your blog should do, and even explains various software solutions.
Blog Marketing
All companies, large and small, know that reaching customers directly and influencing–and being influenced by–them is essential to success. Blog Marketing
shows marketing and PR professionals as well small business owners how to do just that without spending a lot of money. Readers will learn how to tap into the power of blogs to create a direct line of communication with customers, raise the company’s visibility, and position their organizations as industry thought leaders.
“Blogs will soon become a staple in the information diet of every serious businessperson . . . . Blogs offer an accelerated and efficient approach to acquiring and understanding the kind of information all of us need to make business decisions.”
