How To Make Easy Money From Affiliate Programs
Opportunities run rife when one decides to commence a home based
business marketing affiliate programs/products. There are so
many to choose from but they all have one thing in common; you
promote the product or service and you will be paid a fee or
commission on any sales generated as a result of sending
visitors to the site hosting the affiliate program. It sounds so
easy, the supplier provides the product, the website, banners to
use for promotional purposes and even a few prewritten ads you
can use, and they will even deliver the product for you.
All you have to do is promote their site (which is identified
with your unique i.d.) and sit back and collect the commissions
as people take up their offer. So what type of products do you
promote? If you are looking to build a business with increasing
cash flow I would suggest that you take on products that pay a
residual income. That is you sell it once but you continually
get paid a commission for as long as the customer uses that
product. This is far more beneficial than being paid once and
then having to make another sale before you get paid again.
You can expand your earning capacity by leveraging your efforts.
That is if any of your customers decide to promote the same
affiliate program you will get an over riding commission on
their sales. This is referred to as a two tiered commission
payment. The commissions paid can also be generated from several
levels dependent on the number of people you have in your down
line and this is referred to as multilevel marketing or MLM.
Now all this may sound good but have you ever wondered why most
people that take this approach make very little or at worst
finish up broke and subsequently bail out.
First of all everybody associated with the host company is
promoting the same product using the same website, banners,
prewritten ads etc. They have nothing unique, nothing
distinguishes their business from every body else's. Further, in
many cases they are relying on a single product or products from
the one supplier. You need to differentiate yourself from the
rest. After all why should they buy from you? Offer something
that nobody else is offering i.e. a free e-book, report
(preferably one that is relative to the product on offer) or
some useful software. This will give you an edge over your
competitor and a reason for people to deal with you.
Don't lock yourself into just one product or supplier; expand
your product range and the number of suppliers. Continue to look
for those that offer residual and leveraged income.
The usual problem with is approach however is that you finish up
with a multitude of websites to promote and are bound by the
limitations of their site. Again you will be competing with
everybody out there offering the same products through the same
suppliers. As stated above, to be successful you need to
differentiate yourself from "the crowd".
It therefore becomes necessary for you to have control over what
you are offering. Preferably you need to modify the website you
are promoting by including additional benefits and resources.
Make it reflect your personality and then you have something
unique even though the actual products may be the same. Separate
yourself from "the crowd", be different, offer more than the
others and people will buy from you.
The problem is that you cannot modify the host's website so you
need to have your own, with your own domain name, hosted with a
hosting company of your choice such as that available at ...
http://www.Host4Profit.com/cgi-bin/home.cgi?48371
With your very own website not only can you promote the same
affiliate programs but you can add others. Keep all products and
services related, some will complement others whilst others will
provide a choice. Delete the less profitable ones and
concentrate on those that are producing the income. You no
longer have "all your eggs in the one basket" and you have
leveraged your profit potential.
Assuming you now have a viable website it is time to look at the
marketing of your site.
You will need an auto responder such as that available at ...
http://www.GetResponse.com/index/67040 which is free.
A comprehensive email campaign is required to follow up your
prospects and customers. You might like to check out the 199 pre
written e-mails at ... http://www.affiliatedoubler.com/?mgs1941
Alternatively you could write your own but this would be very
time consuming.
A marketing guide is also preferable to keep you on track and to
guide you through a comprehensive approach to marketing your
site. Other tools and resources such as pop ups or pop unders,
facilities to capture your subscriber's details, together with
search engine submission software to promote your site are just
some of the other resources required for successfully marketing
your site.