Diversity in Your Affiliate Portfolio by Donny Gamble

6 12 2006

As you already know, affiliate marketing is literally one of the greatest businesses in the world once you get it up and going. It has been made popular on the internet by companies such as Clickbank, Commission Junction, and Amazon.

One thing that all of the super affiliates I have spoken to have in common is that they all have a collection of products that they are thinking of promoting/ are promoting. They know which products are launching. Products that have launched, products that have been successful for others… these guys are very critical about product selection.

What it means to have a diverse portfolio is that you need to have a variety of different affiliate programs that you promote.

As an understanding, the vast majority of affiliate programs fit into 3 basic payment structures:

Single Commission- One Level: Here you’re paid just once from the purchase of the customer. If that customer joins the said program you don’t earn any more commissions on sales made by the clients.

Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) Commission: Here you’re just one flat fee for the customer, not for his purchases.

Residual Commission- 2 Tiered and Above: You’re paid every time the referred customer makes a purchase and also a percentage of the commissions earned by referrals of that customer. You can therefore earn from your second, third, or fourth, etc. generation recruits even though it’s at a lower percentage normally.

Create an affiliate portfolio of different programs to sustain long term affiliate income. Smart affiliates know about selecting the right programs to promote, they’ve also focused on promoting just these few programs.

The key here is, you may want to balance your portfolio. This is so you can be generating income even if for some reason you’re not able to work.

This is exactly why residual and multi-tiered programs are absolutely necessary elements for a well balanced portfolio.

Therefore, plan and churn out your own in-house portfolio based on the product quality, sales conversions, commission percentage and availability of promotional tools.

Promoting your affiliate portfolio on a planned schedule will get you the best results. Build up this foundation and you will be on your way to affiliate success.

About the Author

Donny Gamble is a super affiliate marketer and is owner of www. affiliatemarketingjournal.com. To get the guide that helped Donny become a successful affiliate, please visit Secret Affiliate Weapon



Affiliate Marketing-An Introduction by Mark Justice

3 12 2006

Affiliate Marketing-An Introduction by Mark Justice

Simply put, Affiliate Marketing is one of the most common forms of making money on the internet. If you’re new to Affiliate Marketing and your finding everything that your learning is a little “mind blowing” but really want to start making money today then here is the quickest way to get results. Keep in mind the biggest failure in affiliate marketing is not collecting prospects’ email addresses, so remember to always use a Lead Capture Page to first get the customers name and email address before sending them to the sales page.

Since the key to affiliate marketing success for merchants is finding the right affiliates, Clickbank offers the best way for merchants to succeed, by bringing merchants and affiliates together. As the market leader in digital products, Clickbank offers many advantages for both merchants and affiliates. For those who didn’t know what it is, affiliate marketing is a cooperative effort between the merchants and online publishers or affiliates, whereby an affiliate is rewarded for every customer provided through his effort.

Now that you have an idea of what affiliate marketing is, now you need to know what are the things you need in this kind of business. As long as the top marketers in the 5% slab, continue to make their millions and the latter continue to make reasonable amounts of money and have the urge to emulate the top marketers, Affiliate Marketing will continue to draw the attention and be popular with Home Based Business Entrepreneurs. Having indicated the above reasons for the popularity of Affiliate Marketing, it has to be mentioned that statistics indicate that only 5% of the marketers do make big money.

These are the ultimate reasons why more and more people are succumbing to affiliate marketing, one of the many money-making systems that are conceived as a result of the popularity the internet has been generating since it came into being. This is the reason why affiliate marketing thrives as a result of the internet’s popularity. Internet home business owners are making millions each year due to the increasing popularity of affiliate marketing programs.

Out of all the possible approaches to affiliate marketing, lead capture and list building represents the smartest and most effective option. Rather than just making the sale today, use a lead capture page and an autoreponder to set up an ongoing campaign and market to the same prospect over and over again. The easiest sale is always to an existing customer..

The way affiliate marketing works is so simple one would have difficulty believing how such a scheme is able to generate cash. It really is very simple just launch your blog, post your articles and learn as you go along, how to maximize on blogs as marketing tools that will bring a huge difference to your affiliate marketing. Just don’t build it, but go out and educate yourself about what it really takes to make it with affiliate marketing.

Further, affiliate marketing allows you to make money online by earning commissions off sub-affiliates, people you have brought on to be affiliates of the parent company. Affiliate marketing is considered as one of the best ways to make money online. The simple scheme called affiliate marketing is more than enough for someone to be able to make a lot of money online.

About the Author

To learn more about my automated marketing system, check out my new site at http://acsclick.com/go.php?7876/4252 or my blog at http://marksaffiliatecashsecrets.blogspot.com/ for more tips on affiliate marketing. Feel free to distribute this article in any form as long as you include this resource box.



3 Success Factors For Affiliate Internet Programs by Juhani Tontti

2 12 2006

Only simple things will work. In internet marketing generally, the product is always #1 as to the success factors. In Affiliate Internet Programs marketing relevant product information, good SEO capabilities and high quality product images are in key roles.

1. Relevant and useful product information. When you surf in the Net, there are very few Affiliates Internet Programs web sites, where the product information is clear and easily understandable. This is funny, because the major task of the site is to be attractive and the major promise to the visitor should be clear right away. All the information including design should be useful, not hype with overpromises, which then appear to be underdeliveries.

By the way the product includes the whole package, i.e. all services like support, training, links, articles etc. When we remember that decisions are made by feelings, the image of the site is extremely important. Not for a search engines but for a visitor.

One of the tasks of Affiliate Internet Programs is to pre sell the core idea of the offer. The best way to pre sell is to make an emotional impact with the look of the site. This is the good way and a visitor actually do not know why he is so fascinated with the site.

The Affiliates Internet Programs site must be easy to navigate, which is an important part of the quality.

2. Good SEO capabilities. SEO, search engine optimization, means that the site with content and the backlinks can get the pole position at major search engines search results. This is a key feature, because it means free, targeted and constant traffic to the site.

The SEO of Affiliates Internet Programs is a planning process, not an accident. Here the keywords act major roles. You either succeed or fail by choosing the keywords. So keyword research is a task to which you have to invest know how and time.

A lot of web site content must be planned according the chosen keywords. By keywords a marketer can reach the market. And the more good keywords the site uses, the more markets and people it can reach and the more business this will bring.

In Affiliates Internet Programs keyword picking the demand / supply ratio is the most important figure. If your site is new and operating in a small niche, pick keywords with Overture searches of around 1.000 per month to keep the competion moderate. The ideal situation would be that the supply figure, i.e. Google search results with that keyword, is under 1.000.

Normally this means that you have to use special keywords like, typos, misspellings or quotes, because the supply rarely is high. Very few Affiliates Internet Programs owners write on purpose their copy with typing errors.

3. High quality product images. The look of your Affiliates Internet Programs is important and the image of the quality depends a lot about the graphics used. When we remember that most of the decisions are made by feelings, we can understand the meaning of the product images.

High quality product images are one of the best ways to pre sell the core idea by making a visitor really want the product



How To Make Money With Affiliate Marketing - It`s Not That Hard! by Christopher Jones

30 11 2006

How To Make Money With Affiliate Marketing

This is probably the quickest way to start making money online, and can be very rewarding if done correctly. To make money with affiliate marketing the first thing you should consider is the product you are going to promote, as a rule it is far better to promote a product that you have some interest in as oppose to something you know nothing about.

I think the main reason alot of people find it hard to make money as an affiliate, is because they are not promoting the product to the right audience. One of the quickest and most effective ways to promote affiliate products is through Google Adwords. This enables you to start making money with affiliate marketing in as littles as 15 minutes. That said Google Adwords does have quite a learning curve and I suggest you do some reading up first on how to write effective ads. As a rule to write an effective Google Adwords Ad make sure you make the first line a feature of the product and the second line a benefit.

Also there alot of people that claim to be making millions online through affiliate marketing, and will show you amazing screenshots of thousands of dollars being paid to them. What they don`t show you is the advertising costs! There are thousands of places you can make money with affiliate markeitng for free.

The best way to make money with affiliate marketing for free is through a blog which is a free website, if you find blogs where people are interested in the product you are promoting and then invite them back to your blog to leave a comment, you will soon find you get alot of people visiting your blog and quite a few sales of your affiliate product, as it is targeted traffic.

Another way to make money with affiliate products is through ezine ads, which is where an advert of your choice is sent out to many people that are targeted towards your product this can bring in huge amounts of cash if you get the right list.

The ways you promote your affiliate products are entirely up to you, but I would suggest using lots of different ways as the more exposure you get the more money you will make! One of the most popular websites to find affiliate products to promote is called Clickbank and you will find the majority of affiliate use this website.

If you really want to make good money as an affiliate then I suggest thinking about doing a JV with someone and creating your won product somewhere down the line. This enables you to make more money as you will have affiliate working for you that are promoting your product and once you get 100`s of affiliates you will be making some good money.

If you are just starting out with internet marketing and affiliate marketing I suggest you try the blogging idea above as it is free and you can get started earning your first commisions before you move on to paid advertising.

About the Author

Chris Jones Is An Experienced Affiliate And Works From His Home In The UK. He uses a combination of internet marketing techniques to make his money from home. For A Complete Guide And To Get Some Free Affiliate Marketing Techniques go to : http://www.ultimateaffiliateguide.com



10 Secrets of the Super Affiliate Mindset by Anik Singal

9 11 2006

Contrary to popular belief super-affiliates don’t really DO things differently than affiliate underachievers. Super-affiliates promote the same products. They use the same SEO techniques. They have the same headaches and they work just as hard.

The truth is super-affiliates THINK differently. Their minds and attitudes go far beyond the commission check. For them, affiliate marketing is not just a business– it’s a CAREER. This professional mindset makes a huge difference in how and when they take action in the marketplace.

I’ve worked side by side with many super-affiliates. I’ve even helped create a few. They all share a special kind of mindset. So as you read these 10 characteristics of affiliate super-achievers, ask yourself, could I learn to think this way?

#1 Super-affiliates think creatively.

You know what you’ll get if you do what everyone else does? You’ll get what they get… only you’ll be splitting it with them, and all their imitators.

In today’s Internet marketplace, you need to be a leader, not a follower. Super-affiliates don’t follow the crowd. Instead, they sell TO the crowd, applying the most successful marketing techniques to selling the most popular products and then add a unique spin.

It could be as simple as offering one unusual, but highly valuable bonus. It could be as sensible as using low-cost offline marketing, while everyone else is breaking the bank on expensive PPC. It could be as innovative as dumping the sales letter, and substituting a quiz or contest. But super-affiliates always, always, ALWAYS look for ways to be a little more creative than their competitors.

#2 Super-affiliates learn the hard stuff.

Less than 10% of people who start their own business are successful. Why? Most fail because they lack direct sales experience don’t bother with a marketing and business plan, or get into debt promoting products that don’t have a market. In other words, they flunk when they get tested on the really tough aspects of business.

Super-affiliates are different. They learn how to do all the hard things other people shy away from. They learn about selling and they get good at it. They set goals, make daily and weekly plans, and measure their progress. They don’t waste time creating huge content sites unless they have hard evidence that those sites will eventually bring them BUYERS (not just browsers or researchers).

And most of all, they keep their eye on PROFITABILITY. Not just traffic, not just visitors. Super-affiliates look for a return on their investment of time and effort, as well as money.

#3 Super-affiliates follow up.

Most affiliates can attract prospects. A few can convert prospects into customers. But only super-affiliates turn existing customers into repeat customers.

Super-affiliates know that the person who has already bought from you is the most willing prospect for your backend products, upsells, and cross-sells. These current customers are also the cheapest to sell to. As a result super-affiliates are always thinking of the lifetime value of a customer and always offering them the best value and deals.

#4 Super-affiliates give before receiving.

Super-affiliates invest time and money giving something of REAL value before asking for the sale and before sealing a JV. Maybe they give away useful content, offer a valuable resource or put in some equity for a piece of the action. In other instances they may give a customer the chance to win something or a smile.

Regardless of what is given away by super-affiliates they do business in a spirit of openness. It is not about beating the other guy but rather networking and making alliances. It’s about viewing the Internet marketplace as one great small town stretching across the globe, full of potential. It’s about saying “let’s talk” and putting money, effort, or reputation on the table BEFORE making demands.

#5 Super-affiliates know how to receive.

Giving is the best first step but it’s only the beginning. Once they’ve hammered out a deal or given something of value, super-affiliates also know how to take what they rightfully deserve.

That means they don’t just pre-sell… they ASK prospects for the sale. They’re not afraid to capitalize on a good deal. They LIKE profits and don’t apologize for being successful. And if they’re working on a JV, they state their expectations clearly, forthrightly, without a lot of fuss… and don’t de-value their list or reputation with cheesy offers.

Yes, the best super-affiliates receive their just rewards graciously, without throwing their egos around. And they not only say thank you. They look for ways to turn a “thank you” into an opportunity to generate more customer loyalty and more sales down the line.

#6 Super-affiliates think strategically.

Affiliate marketing isn’t a game of chance; its a profession. Super-affiliates are just as savvy about their industry, and just as uninvolved as other expert professionals, which means super-affiliates spend quality time thinking, planning, preparing, and evaluating. They analyze their sites, products, and sales and try to understand WHY one technique works and another doesn’t. They think about trends and ponder the mentality of their customers.

Bottom line is, super-affiliates LOVE their work.

#7 Super-affiliates test and analyze.

Profit, profit, profit! Super affiliates are hard-headed And committed to profits! They split-test carefully, think about why one ad pulls better than another, and try to duplicate the results. Time and energy is spent analyzing traffic, stats, and user purchase patterns. An aspiring super-affiliate has to be a fanatic about knowing his or her visitor to sales ratio on a daily basis and be obsessed with ROI.

If you want to say goodbye to the ranks of affiliate underachievers, learn to love the numbers like the super-affiliates do.

#8 Super-affiliates know when to go for volume over commission.

Here’s a very well-kept secret of some super-affiliates: you can earn a fantastic income from cheap untargeted traffic. Believe it or not, not every super-affiliate is brilliant at creating content or opt-in marketing. Some just concentrate on traffic — more and bigger traffic — and make money off of sheer volume sales and contextual advertising.

Here’s the basic formula, oversimplified of course: Let’s say that on a given web site you get 1000 unique visitors per day, or 30,000 visitors per month. If your average monthly profit from that site is $1500, then each visitor is worth 5 cents ($1500 divided by 30,000 visitors).

So in this example, if you spend 5 cents to attract a visitor, all you can do is break even. But if you can spend a lot less to get a visitor — say only 2 cents - you’ve got the potential to make some terrific profits on cheap traffic! Sure, it’s not going to be tightly niched traffic. But it’s also the kind of traffic that fits well with products that have mass-market mass-appeal, or even commodity products.

#9 Super-affiliates work a plan.

Successful affiliates have a simple business model: they replicate their success. Once they find something that works, they tweak it slightly, test, evaluate, and repeat. Some of the most profitable affiliate empires follow this simple, repetitive pattern. Consistent effort tends to yield consistent results, especially online, where certain types of marketing (like SEO) take time.

And more importantly, super-affiliates follow a schedule. So much activity per month, so many promotions, so many sales. When they fall short of their goals, they figure out why. If they can’t they cut their losses and try again.

Working a plan all boils down to discipline. Organization, tracking, and daily project management are a way of life for super-affiliates.

#10 Super-affiliates never quit.

Though they may ruthlessly dump under-performing products or cut their losses if the profits don’t flow super-affiliates don’t give up. They assume that they’re going to have some bumps and hard times and look at setbacks as essential learning experiences that, in the end, help them build a stronger business.

About the Author

This article is written by Anik Singal, founder of AffiliateClassroom.com. Anik Singal has developed his own system that made him over $10,000 in just 60 days. Sign up for a free course and find out more: http://www.amclassroom.com/cmd.php?af=508636



How You Can Make Money With Affiliate Marketing Programs by Vinnie Gallagher

9 11 2006

With affiliate programs, it really pays to work well with others. Also known as referral programs, affiliate programs are normally commission based sales. You’ll recommend a site to your visitors and then pick up a commission as a percentage of any sales that those visitors make. You’ll benefit from the commission and the merchant benefits from the sales.

If you already have a website set up on the internet, you can run an affiliate program from your existing web site, or you can simply build a new site to promote a particular product, service or affiliate program. As long as it brings in more cash than it takes to build or run a new web site, you’ll be on your way to recurring profits.

With any type of marketing program, you must be cautious when you select an affiliate program. Be sure to do your homework and check out the program thoroughly. Even though it may seem extremely tempting to go for the programs that pay the highest commissions but beware, these programs won’t pay you anything if your visitors don’t buy them.

Below, you’ll find some tips to help you select an affiliate program that’s right for you:

FIRST: Do not accept any less than a 25% commission from any affiliate program (I personally do not work with any program that pays less than 50% or under $20). With a little research you can find numerous programs with very rewarding commission payment structures and high percentages of pay in just about any field you are looking at.

SECOND: Review the sales page for the affiliate program you have an interest in. Is it something that would get you excited enough to make a purchase? Do they outline numerous benefits that the buyer would receive when they purchase the product? Finally, do they have testimonials from other people who have purchased the product and have had positive results using the product?

THIRD: Look for the statistic pages that list the number of click troughs’, sales, and earnings so you’ll be able to see how you are doing.

FOURTH: Always look for programs that offer a wide variety of marketing tools to put on your web site, including banners, text links, and of course graphics.

FIFTH: Find out how often you’ll be paid and be sure that the payment schedule meets with your own expectations. Some programs will pay bi-monthly, while others will pay monthly or quarterly.

SIXTH: Be sure that top level support is included. If they can’t answer your questions in a quick and timely manner, you don’t want to work with them.

Once you learn what you are doing with affiliate programs, you can make a lot of money. If you are just starting out, you should always use common sense and do not rush into anything. As you become more familiar with how things work, you’ll be well on your way to making a lot of money and enjoying making it. Even if you have to work hard, you’ll be glad you did.

About the Author

Vinnie Gallagher is the author, webmaster of http://www.AffiliateMarketingInsight.com a great resource website with Affiliate related articles, tips, advice and so much more.



Tips to Make Easy Money from Affiliate Programs by John Baffone

9 11 2006

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you’re probably not surprised to hear about someone making a ton of cash on the Internet, usually without doing much more than clicking a mouse for a few minutes a day. Bank accounts of successful entrepreneurs are going from zero to thousands in less time than it takes to change a flat tire on your car.

You see, Back in 1996, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos came up with a groundbreaking Internet marketing idea- to build a network of websites (called affiliates), in addition to your own merchant site, that all have banners and links “advertising” your merchant site. When someone clicks on one of these ads, they’re automatically directed to your merchant site. When such a customer buys your product or service on your website through one of the affiliates, the affiliate makes a commission. The affiliate also might be paid for each potential customer they are responsible for getting to your site- also referred to as “pay per click”.

Now you need to get the clicks and commissions into your pockets. It’s all about the strategy and the technique. Here are a few tips to get you on your way to making easy money from affiliate programs-

Tip #1- Choose your affiliates wisely. Distributing your affiliate links everywhere on the net is a bad idea. You need to think quality, not quantity. By placing your links onto websites of interest to potential customers will yield better results than just sporadic placement. For example, if you’re website sells beauty products, you don’t want to place links on a football blog or NASCAR website. I’m not saying that women don’t enjoy these types of sites, but statistics prove that women are more likely to visit the I-Village’s of the net instead.

Tip #2- Send your website to affiliate directories. You will obviously want more people to join your affiliate program, so it only makes sense that notify affiliate directories of your intentions so they may allow others to interact with you and start their own affiliate program. If you’re unsure about how to go about this process, please see #3.

Tip #3-Find a pro. If you’re not 100% positive you know what you’re doing, seek the advice of someone who has made money via affiliate programs on the World Wide Web. It can be quite difficult to sift through those making their fortune by selling the affiliate program books and e-books and those that really made money by doing what they claim to have done. At any rate, a money-back guarantee is a good way to feel better about your purchase.

About theĀ Author

John Baffone recommends that you visit http://www.googlewealthwizard.com for more information on Make Easy Money From Affiliate Programs.