What Is An Affiliate Programme? An affiliate Programme (also called associate, reseller or partnership program) is a revenue sharing system used by companies who market their products and services. The company you partner with has the products and services.
Affiliate Programmes let you sell products of popular online merchants from your web site and in return pays you a percentage of sales as commission. Usually anywhere between 10-20% of the sale.
There Are Different Types of Programmes:
1. Pay per sale: If you refer a visitor to the online merchant's site and if he/she makes a purchase you get a percentage of the sale as commission. Depending on the merchant, the commission may be just for that purchase or for all the purchases that customer makes in his life time, or all purchases that customer makes in a fixed period of time (usually 6 months to 1 year).
2. Bounty: You get a one-time bounty payment for the customer you referred. You will not get commission on any future purchases that customer makes.
3. Pay per click: You get paid for every visitor you send to the online merchant regardless of any sale or purchase. Usually companies pay £0.05 - £0.10 per click.
4. Two-tier: You get commission on direct sales you generate and also you get commission on sales generated by affiliates you recruited. Usually companies pay 15% commission for direct sales and 5% for sales generated by your affiliates.
5. Pay per lead: You get paid a one-time fee for generating a lead for the merchant. Usually you get paid £2-£5 if the visitor you referred fills out a questionnaire or application.
Joining an affiliate program is easy, and in most cases free. The advantage is that you get access to products from huge companies like the online bookstore Amazon.co.uk.
Tip: Start with 1 Programme. Get it running smoothly and then add another. I would advice 3 to 7 Programmes working for you if the Internet is a part-time business. If you do it full time, you could handle more. Just do not end up neglecting some of them because you took on too much too soon.
You will be invited to use the affiliates marketing stuff; banners, graphics, sales letters, and very importantly a guide on how to best market their products and services. You do the marketing, they take care of the orders and you get paid for sending them customers.
Sounds great, right? It is a great way of earning some extra cash. But, before rushing off, read these important tips first.
If you want to succeed in this business, you will need to be ahead of the rest. Begin with designing a good looking web site that is focused on content or a theme which you know a lot about. Then you may carefully pick a good affiliate program that can provide goods and services connected to your interest.
Does the affiliate program offer you to join without buying
the product?
Will you be notified by e-mail when sales are made?
Do they offer backend products so you can get repeat sales from the same person?
How often will you receive a commission check?
Do you get credited for a sale if people come back in
month and then make a purchase?
Can you get around-the-clock help online or off-line?
Do you get a large percentage of each sale as
commission?
Do they offer you access to an online sales stats page?
Do they use a reputable system to track your sales?
Does the affiliate program pay commission for sales of
people who sign-up under you?
Do they offer customers different ordering options?
Will they keep in contact with you on a regular basis by
e-mail?
These UK Affiliate Networks offer a good range of Affiliate Programmes:
Tradedoubler
UK Affiliates
Affiliate Window
The Key to Selling An Affiliate Product
The key to selling an affiliate product is to have a lot of information on a specific subject and then relate your affiliate product to that. Build up trust by supplying useful information on your chosen subject so that the visitor will see that you are knowledgeable and your affiliate recommendations will appear much more attractive.
Suppose your web site is about Grand Prix racing. You can put recommended books on your site, or have a section where you list places people can write to order books about Grand Prix racing, auto sports, the history about Grand Prix Racing, etc...
Your visitors will buy those books (I hope for you) because they trust you, and you will earn a commission from every sale. This will be little bucks, but it gives your site credibility, and that is important! Do not forget to update your web site regularly.
Tip: If you have a bookstore at your site, check out other book selling sites and ask the web masters in charge if they would like to set up an affiliate page. If they do, link their site to yours and ask them to do the same. Every time people visit their sites, they will see your bookstore link, and that will result in more traffic and more sales!
Provide interesting content to keep your visitors interested, or they will turn away. Remember to give before you take!
Selling an item for £19.95 is as difficult as selling it for £49.95. Beware of companies that only have affiliate Programmes to get new customers for a low cost, paying unfair commissions. A trustful two tier affiliate program will pay you 15-45% in residual commissions.
Tip: Do not join too many affiliate Programmes. Join a couple and promote them as hard as you can. It will give you enough promoting and marketing work. If you splatter your affiliates all over your web site, your visitors will get confused, and click away from your site.
A few other sites that will help you finding good Associate Programmes :
Webmaster Opportunities - UK Affiliate Programme Directory
wwww.webmasteropportunities.co.uk
-Associate Programmes.com - US Programmes
www.associateprogrammes.com
By Allan Gardyne. A categorised and searchable directory of over 1000 revenue sharing Programmes, recommended Programmes, reviews, discussion board, etc.
-The Toolkit Digest.
To subscribe:the-toolkit-subscribe@onelist.com
A moderated discussion list for the exploration of affiliate Programmes. Two-tier commission Programmes not only pay you a commission for your own sales, but also for sales generated by others who you introduced to the programme. This is an incentive for you to encourage others to join the programme.
However, your main focus should be on generating your own commissions. Do not depend on efforts of others to provide your income.
Be Specific
Too many web sites try to sell everything and they do not know who to sell to. Get products that people ask for and focus your communication and marketing efforts toward the audience that has an interest in your services. Of course, you get the best deal and the most money if you do something on your own. If you sell information and distribute it electronically you take 90-100% profit!
Smart entrepreneurs get their own product line and sell it through their own affiliate programme. Perhaps you do not have any of your own products or a service to sell? There are ways to solve this.
Create Your Own Information Products
Write an E-book about a subject that you know a lot about,
and then sell it from your own web site.
Private label deals. Many companies will allow you to use
their product or service and put your own name on it.
Contact a company who is interested in more orders. You do
the marketing and they fulfill the order. No risk, no inventory.
Make clear daily goals and write them down. Then do it. A
big danger is spending a lot of time just browsing around and
watching cool websites. A cheap excuse is "I have to do
research." No way! Do your research AFTER you have
completed your activities.
Get out and meet the crowd. Millions go online every day
and they all have money in their pockets to spend. Where
other than to your site and order form should they go? :-)
Original Article written by Dirk Dupon, author of: 'Web Site and Ezine
Promotion': tips, tricks and secret techniques to promote your
Web Site or E-zine. 4 stars rated at ZDNet!
Get a FREE download: http://www.theweirdsite.com/idiots.htm
