Making Money with Affiliate Programs ? Part II


In this holiday season online shopping is hotter than ever! According to US Commerce Department online sales continue to grow with a robust 25-27 percent this year over 1992. Online holiday shopping at a rate of 10 percent is also considerably outpacing the 5.7 percent growth of overall retail sales. Goldman Sachs predicts 23 percent of all gift-buying this holiday season will take place online!

So, if you don't have a product of your own to sell online, how can you profit from this exciting trend?

One of the finest ways of making money online is to promote other people's products or services by becoming their affiliates. Affiliate is a term used for a website that drives traffic to another website in exchange for a predetermined commission.

Thanks to the success of several affiliate programs in the early days of online business, most merchant websites, today, use some kind of affiliate programs to promote their sites and generate sales.

Considering the sheer numbers of affiliate programs available on the Internet, you may feel overwhelmed. However, if you set some basic criteria, it would be lot easier to find a good program that suits your need.

Free sign up

The affiliate program that you are planning to join must be absolutely free. There are way too many good programs available for free, why should you pay for one? Moreover, the programs that require payments to join are mostly multi Level Marketing (MLM) programs. Although, there may be many good MLM programs existing on the Internet, I don't think it's a viable option for an average person.

Good commission

You deserve handsome compensation for all your hard work! No matter, how you look into it, in most of the cases, promoting a product or service is not an easy job. Since you are doing the uphill struggle of bringing the client to the merchant's door, your commission should be real good one. What is an acceptable commission anyway? If you are promoting an information product, don't go for less than 50 percent. For more tangible products and services your bare minimum commission should be 15 percent of the sale. If you are promoting monthly subscription, choose a program that pays a portion of subscription fee as recurring commission to you as long as the client referred by you stays subscribed.

Tow-tier affiliate program

An affiliate program which pays certain percent as a commission from the sale for bringing in a client and another if that client brings in other clients. Two-tier affiliate programs are more preferable since once a client base is built, it becomes a great source of residual income.

Quality affiliate tracking system

The merchant should have a very good and well-organized affiliate sales tracking management software system. You have to be absolutely comfortable with the statistics generated by the affiliate program. The program should show such important aspects as repurchase, if any, by the client referred by you, your second tier affiliates, activities by your second tier clients, etc.If you do not feel comfortable with the tracking system provided by a merchant, better stick to the merchants, who use third party affiliate managing system. At least, you will know that a dishonest merchant won't be able to defraud you.

Efficient customer support

You should feel satisfied with the service and support you get from your affiliate program owner. A good program highly values its affiliates and gives priority to its customer support system. As the clients that you are sending to the merchant are primarily your site's visitors, you should be extremely picky about the quality of customer service the program renders. After all, your own site's reputation is also at stake here!

Promotional materials

If you are planning to promote an affiliate program, you will need more materials then mere banners. Unfortunately, even many high-end affiliate programs do not carry enough promotional materials to satisfy the need of the affiliates. Promotional material should include: contents to build mini-sites, various ad articles, different kind of text links, product brochures or presentation, etc.

Commission payment policy

The affiliate program should have a sort of minimum payment policy, where you can receive commissions if even you have made just one or two sales. A reasonable amount is US $25. Less than that is not viable due to processing costs. Commission should be paid each month. If you are located outside of US, see if the merchant makes payment through Paypal or other similar services or not. For most of the countries checks issued in other countries are not a good option.

If an affiliate program meets all these above mentioned criteria, you can consider joining in this program. However, to get best result from your efforts, before signing up, you should also consider the following rules:

You have to like the product you are promoting Any salesman will confirm you that this is one of the fundamental rules of selling. If you are selling a product or service you must have confidence in it. If you like the product and will use it yourself gladly, you found a product to promote! Don't waste your time with a product that is not

up to your taste!

Promote a product or service consistent to your website's subject matter If your site is all about soccer, you will be better off with products and service related to soccer. If this same site promotes,for example: pesticides, no matter how hard you try your success will be very limited! Before joining in any affiliate program first you should identify who your visitors are, what do they like and which products they will probably buy online. Once you know your niche market it's lot easier to find products or services for it.

Many webmasters think that in order to make money through affiliate programs, all you have to do is to come up with a site and fill up the site with affiliate links. Sooner all later people will click on them. Unfortunately this does not work! Making money through affiliate programs is also a business and like any business you have to have a proper business plan. Only a well prepared businessplan followed by its meticulous implementation can bring success to your affiliate endeavor.

Nowshade Kabir is the founder, primary developer and present CEO of Rusbiz.com. A Ph. D. in Information Technology, he has wide experience in Business Consulting, International Trade and Web Marketing. Rusbiz is a Global B2B Emarketplace with solutions to start and run online business.


More Resources

5 Affiliate Marketing Mistakes To Avoid
Many people with the best intentions fail at affiliate marketing because they fail to recognize some common mistakes in their strategy. The worst part is that most of these key mistakes occur long before the affiliate page is written and the links inserted.
Instant Success - Yeh Right.
Join our affiliate-program and make your fortune overnight.Sound familiar ?How many times have you received email to say that by joining company X you will have instant success.
Is There Any Money On Over Saturated Markets?
Well that depends ultimately on you! Let me explain?I have tackled a few over-saturated markets that are just splattered everywhere on the internet and at first when I tried I pretty much failed miserably. You wanna know why?Because I was doing EXACTLY what every other bloody Tom, Dick and Harry was doing? I was trying to promote products that were already being marketed the exact same way everyone else did! I took the obvious trail that most others do!But of course I wasn't going to give up without a battle - I had to put my thinking cap on, I knew there had to be a way so I didn't give up! I got creative and looked for ways to promote these products that sell so well (Heck who doesn't want to sell a product that people jump at right?)Here is what I did? I started marketing these products tactfully in other niche's I had.
Affiliate Programs - How to Pick the Solid Ones
This is very important, because your reputation is on stake here! Joining the wrong affiliate programs will only hurt your online business.First of all, it is almost impossible for you to collect adequate informations on those merchant companies.
6 Critical Rules When Building An Affiliate Website
There are 6 rules you must use when building any affiliate website if you want the website to make you any money.Building Your Site Rule #1 Always have a strong headline.
Is Earning Money With Affiliate Marketing A Myth?
Day 1 - What Are Affiliate Programs?Welcome to the wide world of affiliate marketing!Affiliate marketing (sometimes called referral marketing) is based business people.So, what is an affiliate and what does he or she do?The affiliate marketer acts as a "middle man" between merchant and consumer, but without adding anything to the consumer's cost.
Discover The Affiliate Program thats Right for You
Are you looking for a profitable Affiliate Program?When you start to examine the possibilies for your homebased business, it is easy to be overwhelmed with the sheer number of "opportunities" available. A search for "Affiliate Programs" in Yahoo alone, will yield over nine million matches!As with anything worthwhile in life, starting a homebased business using affiliate programs, should not be done without doing some homework.
How To Profit From 2 Tier Affiliate Programs And Build A Sub-Affiliate Army In The Next 24 Hours
Before I get into depth with this article I first want you to have a good understanding of what a '2 Tier' affiliate program is and there advantages. Then from there I'll go on to explain how you can start recruiting Sub-Affiliate's by simply locating the Super-Affiliate's within your Niche market.
One Little-Known Secret to Wealth the Gurus Never Told You About!
When I started my internet marketing career, I knew that in order to succeed online I had to duplicate what my mentors were doing.I had read several popular ebooks at that time, written by marketing gurus, and each of them explained how to research niche markets in order to find out what products to create or sell.
8 Basic Rules for Choosing The Right Affiliate Program
Joining an Affiliate Program is a great way to start earning a sizeable income on the Internet without many of the hassles that come with running your own business.But the problem is? there are so much affiliate programs out there for you.
9 Ways to Catapult Your Affiliate Marketing Career
Affiliate marketing involves the promotion of a website by a person known as the affiliate. He is the one who acts as the middleman between the merchant and the customer.
3 Tips To Succeed With Affiliate Programs
Dear friends, when it comes to promoting affiliate programs we all follow a certain defined process. We first go to google.
Overachieving Your Way to Super Affiliate Stardom
Internet business is a bit confusing especially if you're not really knowledgeable at it. You will also be left completely blank, asking yourself as to what type of online business is best for you.
Pros and Cons of Third Party Online Affiliate Networks
Online affiliate marketing has taken the internet by storm and has proven to be a highly effective way of maximizing website revenue. Why limit yourself to selling your own products when you can profit by selling somebody else's too?There are thousands of individual affiliate programs offered on the internet, many being through third party affiliate program networks such as OffersQuest, Commission Junction and Linkshare.
Three Critical Affiliate Marketing Tips For Higher Commissions!
Affiliate marketing is quickly becoming a very specialized form of online business. It seems that people all over the Internet are clamoring for more affiliate tips.
How to Evaluate an Affiliate Program
There are thousands of affiliate programs offering wide range of benefits to their affiliates. However, many of these programs and the claims they make are not to be trusted.
Webmaster Affiliate Programs - How to Separate the Good from the Bad
More and more people are turning to the Internet and specifically, affiliate programs, to make money online. However, it is not as easy as you might think to determine the good affiliate programs from the bad, especially if you do not know much about affiliate programs to begin with.
How to Easily Increase Your Affiliate Commissions in Two Days or Less?
Clearly, the people benefiting the most from affiliate programs are the companies running them. My goal here is to help you - the affiliate - earn more money.
High Paying Lateral Keywords
If you run AdSense on your site you know that some words pay more than others, much more in fact. More than likely you have also learned that terms like "structured settlements" and "mesothelioma" can produce incredibly high PPC revenue, if they show up on your site at all.
Affiliate Revenue For Beginners
Affiliate programs can be a very powerful source of income for your website and many meaning the majority of websites on the net uses affiliate programs to generate revenue from there websites and many are making lots of cold hard cash. Here are the most common terms that you will encounter with affiliate programs-Cost Per Click (CPC) or Pay Per Click (PPC)-Cost per thousand (CPM)-Cost Per Action (CPA)-Cost Per Sale (CPS)Cost Per Click (CPC) or Pay Per Click (PPC)The cost per click-through; the fee charged every time a user clicks on a banner ad or HTML link.

More Affiliate Revenue Information:

Related Articles

Pros and Cons of Third Party Online Affiliate Networks
Online affiliate marketing has taken the internet by storm and has proven to be a highly effective way of maximizing website revenue. Why limit yourself to selling your own products when you can profit by selling somebody else's too?There are thousands of individual affiliate programs offered on the internet, many being through third party affiliate program networks such as OffersQuest, Commission Junction and Linkshare.
Affiliate Programs - The Fast Track to Wealth
Remember the day when you made the ultimate decision to change your life? Yes, it was the day when you decided to start your own home business. Gosh, I remember the anxiety when I uploaded my very first web site, waiting for something to happen.
Affiliate Marketing: An Online Marketing Strategy
Everybody it seems can make money online. The simplest way perhaps is to make money online through affiliate marketing.
Two Quick Ways to Make Your Copy of Merchants Data Feed Different From All Other Affiliates
Product data feeds are really popular among affiliates because they can help produce thousands of product pages quickly and easily. Such pages can be used to drive highly targeted search engine traffic looking specifically for those products.
Choosing The Right Affiliate Program
Choosing the right affiliate program is vital for your success. We don't want to end up with lemons, right? It is not advisable to invest time and effort into something that will not yield the best return for the energy expended.
How To Make Affiliate Sales In 15 Minutes
If you are one of the 98.6% of affiliate members that never make one cent from affiliate sales or make small $5.
Affiliate Product Landing Pages - Three Tactics That Sell
As competition within the online affiliate sales arena rises to a fierce boil, affiliate sellers expecting any degree of success must first find effective methods to set themselves apart from the crowd.An uninitiated affiliate may expect to make sales simply by placing a referral link on his website, or by distributing the link in an email.
Generate More Sales in ANY Affiliate Program - Part Two
Incentive Marketing, Incentive Marketing, Incentive Marketing?It doesn't matter that there are potentially thousands of other affiliates promoting the same program because from today onwards you are going to create an unfair advantage. Today you are going to learn some of the skills to becoming a SUPER INCENTIVE MARKETER.
Googles Changed The Rules Again So Now What?
Some tips for Affiliate MarketersSo Google has changed its policies regarding affiliate advertising. In case you don't know, their new policy will allow only one ad per search query for affiliates and the parent company with the same url.
Affiliate Program Mastery: Learn How To Build Internet Capital Goods for Free
As I mention in almost all of my articles, 97% of Internet marketers never make a cent online. I mention this simple fact because it has a lot of power--it has the power to completely discourage people who are not succeeding, and it also has the power to encourage those same people who are failing to learn, so that they can succeed.
Affiliate Marketing What Is It And Why Use It?
Affiliate Marketing is having Affiliates do your Marketing for you. What I mean by Affiliate is someone who tells people about your product/service and you pay them for a desired response, such as a purchase.
10 Ways To Increase Your Affiliate Commissions
1. Participate in chat rooms related to the product you're reselling.
Ebook Review: The Super Affiliate Handbook
Rosalind Gardner's 270 page ebook "The Super Affiliate Handbook" is the "Holy Bible" of affiliate marketing. It's also surprisingly well written (I've seen some real junk passing as informative writing) and logically steps through each of the 15 chapters, all but the Introduction building on the previous in an easy to understand style.
How to Evaluate an Affiliate Program
There are thousands of affiliate programs offering wide range of benefits to their affiliates. However, many of these programs and the claims they make are not to be trusted.
6 Affiliate Mistakes Youre Probably Making...
Everyday I see more and more affiliates making the same mistakes. The worst part is that they're just doing what they're taught by the so-called "experts.
Not An Affiliate? Why Ever Not?
If the idea of pursuing a living on the net has repeatedly crossed your mind but you still haven't found a way to implement it, then affiliate programs are going to break the ice for you.Affiliate programs are a lot like learning how to swim in a pool before you go to the open sea.
Marketing A Single Affiliate Program is the First Key to Success
There are a lot of affiliate marketing programs out there that claim to make you more money than you could possible spend; when in true reality, you've just sign up to be another person that the company can send you emails to buy their products!Have you fallen for that kind of bait? I have before!! Hook, Line, and Sinker!!!Well the First KEY to really making an affiliate program work for you is just by sticking with the one program you've signed up for until you make a profit. It gets quite easy to keep signing up for program after program in hopes that you will finally hit pay-dirt.
Affiliate Marketing Secrets that You Can Use
Affiliate marketing is a very hot topic on the web right now. Not surprising when you consider the fact that a vast majority of successful online entrepreneurs make their money from affiliate schemes and programs.
Affiliate Program Marketing: 10 Significant Sharp Ways To Increase Your Affiliate Commissions
Millions of people sign up for affiliate programs, but have no clue on how to promote and market them effectively to generate piles of cash.Below are 10 significant sharp ways to start generating a lot of sales and commissions, starting now:1.
Successful Free Affiliate Programs
Affiliate programs are the latest money making tools available on the Internet. While there is definitely not a lack of options available, there is a lack of good options available.