Dont Even Think About Affiliate Marketing Until Youve Read This - Part 1

You've probably heard some of the affiliate success stories from across the internet. You've also probably heard of the diverse benefits of affiliate marketing... Low start up costs, no products to deliver, no sales pitch to write, EASY! I was the same as you and it was these things that first got me into affiliate marketing. However, it took me a long time and several key distinctions to take my affiliate revenue from average to amazing.

In this article series I will attempt to highlight some of these distinctions in the hope of furthering your affiliate marketing knowledge and assisting in your success. I will attempt to give away as much information as possible without getting into trouble as a lot of what I am about to tell you, people are charging large fees to provide. Here are some of these distinctions.

1. Find A Good Product:
It seems so simple people often overlook this crucial aspect of affiliate marketing. If people are clicking through from your page to your merchants page and they are not being converted... You've got a problem. Most good affiliate programs will advertise their products conversion rates to entice potential affiliates. If they don't do this, ASK! Most affiliate experts recommend you purchase the product for which you wish to be an affiliate so you can sleep easy at night knowing its something you'd be confident to promote. Check your merchants page thoroughly looking at things like the general look and feel, and the perceived effectiveness? If your interested in this product? would YOU buy from this merchant?

2. Be a friend.
From a psychological perspective the reason someone buys something from an affiliate is that the opinion of someone who has used the product (ie already made the decision that the consumer is going to make) strongly confirms the pitch of the seller, and therefore the product is perceived to be more trustworthy. The affiliate should be presented as an average guy/girl who has used the product and knows the market and is different to the 'big company' (merchant) that is 'just out to make the sale'. If your page contains writing, it should introduce the affiliate personally, the tone should be friendly and informal (as you speak), and if possible could give an example of the success the affiliate has had using the product (or some other form of official confirmation of the products worthiness.)

3. Be an affiliate for more than one product BUT...
Obviously the more products you can be an affiliate for the better, but many new affiliates find it difficult to do this without compromising the effectiveness of their affiliate pitches. One great way to do this is to find a niche market that sellf more than one product. Let's take golf for example (hardly a niche market I know but go with it...) On one part of the site you could talk about the best putters (affiliate link) another part the best golf bags, another the best drivers and so forth. All your affiliate links are in AND if someone buys a putter you've recommended are they more or less likely to check out which driver you like too? You will notice however that this section did have a BUT...

Andrew Hansen is an experienced affiliate marketer and entrepreneur who specializes not only in online business but in other forms of investment also. He runs a website on revolutionizing your personal finances through affiliate marketing that provides best FREE information from across the web on afiliate marketing and contains steps to ensure success for the new affiliate marketer. Check it out at http://www.revolutionizeyourlife. net/affiliatemarketing.htm

In The News:


EARNINGS WATCH Updates, advisories and surprises
MarketWatch - Oct 10, 2008
Brinker had said in August that it agreed to sell a majority interest in Romano's Macaroni Grill to an affiliate of Golden Gate Capital for $131.5 million. ...

Oil Export Project Continues to Deliver Revenue and Create Jobs in ...
MarketWatch - Oct 10, 2008
Stephane de Mahieu, general manager, Esso Exploration and Production Chad Inc., an ExxonMobil affiliate, discussed the project's contributions to the nation ...

RBID.com New Business Affiliate, Leverage Inc., Strategic Deal ...
MarketWatch - Oct 9, 2008
The deal outlines a revenue-sharing arrangement, where Leverage(R) will receive a portion of profits from Get Solo products sold to Leverage(R) members ...

Techtree.com

YouTube’s new revenue model: affiliate links?
The Inquisitr, Australia - Oct 7, 2008
The model makes sense in terms of relevancy, but the angle is interesting, because it’sa traditional affiliate model, and it looks like Google hasn’t done ...
Google introduces YouTube click-to-buy CNET News
YouTube Makes Affiliate Play with Click-to-Buy Links ClickZ News
paidContent.org - YouTube Adds Affiliate Links To Its Videos ... Washington Post
Search Engine Land - Internet Search Engine Databaseall 471 news articles

The New Era of Travel Affiliate Marketing
Search Engine Watch - Oct 10, 2008
With shrinking commissions and lower margins, how can those affiliates increase their own revenue share? How are they going to separate themselves from the ...

Viacom Updates Full Year 2008 Business Outlook
MarketWatch - Oct 10, 2008
Viacom said affiliate and ancillary revenues grew at a double-digit rate in the third quarter. Viacom President and Chief Executive Officer Philippe Dauman ...
Viacom announces earnings warning Hollywood Reporter
all 66 news articles

Boston Globe

Viacom lowers 3Q earnings outlook
Variety, CA - 21 hours ago
Affiliate and ancillary revenues grew at a double-digit rate in the third quarter, the company noted. Execs will elaborate on the revised outlook Nov. ...
Slowing Ad Market Slams Sumner Redstone's Empire AdAge.com (subscription)
all 105 news articles

Virgin Games moves affiliate business into dgm
E-consultancy (press release), UK - Oct 10, 2008
Virgin Games’ CPA offer on dgm will be the ideal network complement to our award winning in-house revenue-share affiliate programme. ...

Fox Fails On Dodgers/Phillies In HD
TVPredictions.com (press release) - 21 hours ago
The reason for this is that Fox uses a splicer system whereby each affiliate can take the signal unaltered from Fox and send it out over the air without ...

Ad Server Solutions Enterprise Versions Released
Newswire Today (press release), UK - Oct 8, 2008
Publishers will be able to create their own niche advertising networks and affiliate networks with revenue sharing agreements that meet both the network's ...
affiliate revenue - Google News

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