Consider Affiliate Programs
The first affiliate or revenue-sharing program on the Net was started by Amazon.com in July 1996. Amazon now has more than 25 millions customers and 500,000+ associates earning fees from promoting Amazon's online marketplace for books, toys, hardware and software, and other consumer goods.
Don't brush off affiliate marketing; it's an important component of ecommerce today.
If you're in the business of selling, affiliates are a cost-effective way to get your products and brand out to the masses. If you're in the content business, affiliate programs are a great way to give your visitors value-added features such as books or software related to your site's topic.
Source: Ad Resource's Affiliate Marketing Reference Guide
Joining or running an affiliate program is a business decision and should be looked at in terms of your business plan. Do you want to earn residual income from your website? Is the traffic too low or specialized to attract other advertisers? What do you really know about your website visitors? How can you merchandise your site to match their interests? Think products and services not brand names!
Join an affiliate program
Most of the advertising on the Net has moved from pay-for-impressions model like traditional media to a pay-for-performance model. And pay-for-performance can pay very well indeed.
Many affiliates report incomes over a $1000 a month but even more report earning barely enough to pay their webhosting fees. A few tips worth considering:
- Select programs with decent fees for downloads or registrations
- Stick to products and services that are related to yours but don't compete directly
- Offer a free newsletter to website visitors and promote selected products in each one
- Refer newsletter readers and website visitors to free offers and services
- Draw repeat visitors by offering valuable information and entertainment
- Stick to a small number of affiliates—don't run a banner-ad farm!
Many affiliates have no real products of their own. They offer directories, articles, discussion boards and links to programs that pay them for registrations and leads.
Mini-site or cash machine
One curious but highly successful type of affiliate site is the mini-site. This is a one- or two-page website where folks are given a long-winded sales pitch and then offered only one action: proceed to buy the product. Most of these mini-sites promote information products such as e-books (many related to affiliate marketing itself) or popular consumer items like cell phones or bust enlargement devices. Most of the sites are terrible looking but they evidently work.
The owners often use pay-for-placement search engines and buy keyword placement from Overture, FindWhat, and Kanoodle. Tip: Bid low but bid on lots of terms.
Creating a mini-site doesn't take much time and so practitioners run lots of them. With a rock-bottom domain fee and free or low cost web-hosting mini-sites can be little cash machines that take little or no time after they are set-up. Of course, everyone on the Net who knows about them is trying to cash in on them now so competition it steep.
The following affiliate directories include descriptions of programs, ratings, and links to more information, and directions on how to join each program:
Look for Commission Junction merchants first if you want to receive monthly checks. Most of the other pay quarterly.
