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Affiliate Program Intro
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>> Our What
is an affiliate program? Everyone who surfs the web has
come across affiliate programs. You may have seen a
banner on a website that says, “click here”, and once
you do, you get access to whatever’s being promoted. Or
you could click on a link in an email you’ve received.
You’re using someone’s affiliate program.
Basically, the company that sells the product sets up an
automated way for people to be paid a set amount to help
them promote their products or services. The links send
you to the company’s website where you can buy the
product. The owner of the originating website or email
gets a fee for taking you there.
The bookstore Amazon was the first company to heavily
promote affiliate marketing on the internet. Although
this type of marketing is ideal for businesses that only
operate online, it's also become popular with businesses
that have both an online and bricks and mortar presence.
Affiliate programs are an ideal way to make your web
site profitable. With the huge range of affiliate
programs now available, there’s almost bound to be
something to suit you and your website.
How it works
Perhaps you’ve created a website about the city where
you live. People find your website while searching for
information about your city. Once they’ve read your
pages they check out your recommendations. They might
click a link to book a flight there. You get paid a
commission. Then they clink your link that points them
to somewhere they can book a hotel room. Another
commission for you. Then they might want to buy a
guide-book or street map. Yet another commission.
Or perhaps you have a website connected with your hobby.
Maybe you want to share your enthusiasm about the crafts
you do. Your website could point people towards
suppliers, books on the subject, magazine subscriptions…the
list is endless. And all the time you’re earning your
commission.
The commission is paid in different ways according to
the company you’re affiliated to. You can be paid per
impression, per click, per lead or per sale. The
stronger the likelihood of a sale, the higher your
commission will be.
The advantages for you
There’s no need for you to develop the products – it’s
already been done. All you need to do is to pick the
best out of those available. You don't need to spend
money on making or storing the product. Sending people
to your affiliate merchants means you don’t need to take
or process a single order, or worry about processing
payments. You don't have to handle or mail the product -
your merchants do that. You don’t have to offer customer
support. Affiliate programs are usually free to join.
You can run your affiliate business part time for a
little extra cash while making minimal effort.
Choosing your affiliates
It’s worth spending some time making sure that you
choose the right companies to affiliate with. Different
companies have different requirements. Some require you
to have a minimum number of visitors to your website,
while others require you to have your own domain name.
The best way to choose an affliate program that will
suit you is according to the type of people who visit
your website. If your website is about guitars, you’re
unlikely to have much success with affiliating with a
company that sells gardening products. The first thing
you need to do is know your target audience.
You also might consider whether you want to join every
single affliate program that comes your way. A lot of
people find that they make the most money from using
only a small number of programs. Also, concentrating
your advertisements may allow you to be paid faster.
Sometimes, it can be hard to choose between two similar
companies. What works well for someone else may not be
the best choice for you. It’s not just about how much
money you can make – you’ll want to feel confident in
your recommendations.
You can maximize your income by thinking beyond the
obvious. If your website is aimed at parents, obviously
you might think of affiliating to a toy company. But
what about books, clothes, videos, DVDs, child oriented
software…
If you’re thinking about affiliating with two similar
websites, you might want to choose the one that easiest
to use or offers the greater benefit to a visitor, even
if it pays less in commissions. You'll do best with
programs that represent a subject you're personally
interested in. Your own interest in the subject will
entice others.
To join an affiliate program, you simply go to the site
and complete their online application form. Some
programs approve you instantly, while others check out
your application before it is approved. Once it’s
approved, you're given some HTML code that you can cut
and paste onto your web page.
How do I make my money?
Before joining any program, you should probably be aware
of the different payment programs available.
Pay Per Impression
Here you are paid according to the number of times the
advertiser's banner is displayed on your site. The
amount paid is usually small, but it is easy to earn as
everytime a visitor loads the page, you earn. The more
vistors your site attracts, the more you earn.
Pay Per Click
With this method you’re only paid when visitors click
the advertiser's banner on your site. It generally pays
higher than the pay per impression program. You’ll get
better results if your banners are carefully selected to
suit your target audience.
Pay Per Sale or Lead
You only earn if your visitors click through the banner
and buy the product or service.
Often, to avoid wasting resources in issuing checks for
very small amounts, advertisers will accrue the amount
owed to you until it reaches a certain amount before
they pay you.
How do they keep track of referrals?
Every affiliate banner or link that a visitor clicks on
has some type of coding added to the URL - this
differentiates it from other affiliates' links. The most
common means of tracking affiliate links is by "cookies"
Cookies are tiny files stored on your computer by a web
browser when you click on an advertising link.
Cookies are generated to track visitors to websites.
This is how they can "remember" what you bought when you
visit there again. For an affiliate company, the cookie
records information on which affiliate referred the
visitor to the company, and when.
As some computer users block or delete cookies, there
are other methods used to track referrals. For example,
CGI-based scripts related to the individuals affiliate
code attached to the URL links and database matching
algorithms are used.
Second tier programs
A two tier program allows you as an affiliate to sign up
other affiliates under you. You earn a smaller
commission on the referrals or sales that arise from
their advertising efforts as well as your own.
This costs you far less time and money for each sale if
some of them aren't yours. In effect, you have your own
sales force and pay a commission to your sub-affiliates.
Except that the commission comes out of the affiliate
company's profits rather than yours.
The affiliate company benefits by a possible exponential
growth of its sales force for no more effort on its part
- you're providing that. It’s not hard to recruit people
under you in two tier programs.
A second level can be a great advantage to you as an
affiliate. Even if you only spread the word amongst
friends and family, you never know when someone who
signs up under you will really take off. They could earn
you a lot by their own efforts in spreading the word
about a program. You might not get rich, but you'll get
some welcome extra income.
A multi tier affiliate program builds on the concept of
a two-tier program.
Not only can you earn from sub-affiliates, but you can
also earn from their sub-affiliates, and perhaps their
sub-affiliates. With a two tier program, you have an
incentive to sign up sub-affiliates. A multi-tier
program gives you the incentive to help your sub
affiliates sign up others.
Is it for me?
If you have a website then there’s guaranteed to be an
affiliate program to suit your needs and audience. For
minimal effort you can make your website earn money,
even while you’re happily sleeping. Perhaps it won’t
make you a fortune overnight. And it’s true that no-one
hands you money for doing nothing. But with some careful
thought and planning, choosing an affiliate program that
fits in with YOUR website and sells products that YOU
are confident in is a straightforward way of increasing
YOUR income. And it costs you nothing.
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