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Thursday, April 23, 2009

5 Essentials For a Smart Affiliate

Are you a struggling and frustrated affiliate? Are you tired of spending more money than you are making online? If this is you, I understand your dilemma. There are so many e-books and how-to-programs out there that promise outlandish results. Not all of these programs are rip-offs, but a lot of them are! I have spent my hard earned money on many of these bogus "Overnight Riches" scams. I am sure you are aware of the saying. "If it Sounds to Good to be True it Usually is!" I had to learn the hard way how to become a Smart Affiliate Marketer.

The basics of affiliate marketing are fairly easy. If you are someone who is familiar with these basics, than you know what I mean. If you are new to it, it really is not that hard. There are so many products online you can become an affiliate for. Whether you decide to promote something you are personally interested in, or a product that is "HOT." There is really no lack in options. You just have to find it, become an affiliate, and start promoting!

Finding a product to promote and becoming an affiliate is the easiest part. Promoting is where it can get tricky for some. These marketing "GURUS" out there can make it seem so easy sometimes. They show us their awesome earnings, and tell us we to can make this much money overnight. This is really not true in most cases. Promoting your product takes time, a little money, and some patience! There are many ways you can promote a product. Most of them cost money, but there are some avenues that are completely free. So basically, the bottom line is. Affiliate marketing can be easy, but you will have to spend some time and a little money to become successful at it. Find the best ways to promote your specific product and you can make good money.

5 Essentials for a Smart Affiliate

1. You must have a website of a blog!

Of course you can always try to promote your product without a website or a blog. You might just make some money too. Having a website or a blog gives you much more opportunity to make money. This way you are not completely relying on Pay-Per-Click ads. Plus, if you have a website or blog, you can promote more than one product at a time.

2. Choose the products you pick to promote wisely!

You can pick any product to promote. Yet, you don't want to choose on that is not going to make you any money. I would suggest you choose something that is popular, but not over-promoted.

3. You need to have a list!

Having an email list is essential. So if you don't already have one, get an opt-in box on your website or blog.

4. Take advantage of the affiliate resources the product you are promoting offers!

Most good products or programs to promote have ready made articles, ads, and content for you to use. Utilize these.

5. Don't put all your eggs in one basket!

Promoting only one product gives you less chance to make more money. Promote more than one and you get the chance to see which one sells better.

What you need to do now is take action. Put everything you have done into motion. Once you have your product or products to promote chosen. Join their affiliate program and start promoting. Put together a website or blog based around your chosen niche. Make sure you post to it regularly to keep it fresh with new content. At some point you will want to add an opt-in box onto your site. You can do this by simply by joining an auto responder site. There are many auto responder sites to choose from, so do some research and pick the one that suits your needs best. Creating a list will benefit you tremendously. It will create the opportunity for you to send out future promotions. Easy advertising.

Don't forget to use the resources your affiliate program offers. It is always nice when you don't have to do all the work yourself.

Now that you know 5 essentials for a smart affiliate, you need to put it to action. I want to stress to you that if you keep going and put in just a little effort everyday, you can succeed at this. You can create a successful business at home. You can make more money than you do currently at your day job. I just have one rule, and that is. Don't Give Up! I know it can get so frustrating and confusing. You will have to do a little self teaching, but most of it is very easy after you do it a couple times. Keep a positive attitude and the mindset that you will achieve success. There are many great programs out there that are very helpful for beginners who are at a loss with what to do next. Also, there are couple of great programs that can help you achieve each of the essential steps I have discussed in this article. So, don't get bummed if you don't make that fortune overnight. It can still be achieved!

Gina M. Is the publisher of the Smart Marketer Weekly. A weekly newsletter filled with helpful hints, great product reviews, and answers to common affiliate questions. Drop by to join this free weekly newsletter and get more information on helpful programs and content related to this article at http://www.smartaffiliatenetwork.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gina_M

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Easy Way to Make Fast Money

With the economy on the skids, companies laying off working, decreasing work hours, and an overall lack of good paying jobs, just about every middle income family is feeling the pinch. The immediate question that comes to mind is: Is there an easy way to make fast money? Even if you could just make enough to pay the mortgage payment or car payment, right?

The short answer to the question is yes! However, one must be very careful due to the fact that there so many scams out there. The goal of this article is to inform you, the reader, that there is plenty of money out there for the taking and give you some resources to get started. The problem is, everyone wants to get into your purse or wallet to give you some of that crucial information on how to tap into that money supply.

So what is this easy way to make fast money? Very simply it's in affiliate marketing, and the way you go about doing it. There are plenty of free resources out there that lay out the complete method, and I'll leave with one at the end of this article. The key to this easy way to make fast money is marketing a product to a very specific crowd of people in a very specific free way. You can't make money just throwing a product up on a website and promoting it to anyone and everyone via Google AdWords or Yahoo Search Marketing. That is the surest way to end up in debt and make no progress.

A much better way is to find what we call a "niche". A group of people that WANT something to fill a need or passion. So you look for the crowd, such as the guy who wants to get over shyness, or the girl who wants to lose 10lbs fast before her wedding. These people will whip out their credit card for you if you get in front of them with a solution to their problem! Once you find that crowd (and it's very easy once you start thinking in the mindset), you simply write free articles, create free blogs, all targeting your niche using specific keywords. You create a simple landing page via USFreeAds or Squidoo, and promote a product via Clickbank to solve their problem. I know a lot of marketers who use this easy way to make fast money and have quit their day jobs doing this for multiple niches. The best part is, it's not rocket science and anyone can do it! Once you get started you will wonder why anyone would NOT do this for a living.

So, where to do you go from here? Obviously there are more details around putting this together that can't be fit into just a single article. Below you will find a link to a totally free program that will show you the easy way to make fast money. And, with no out-of-pocket expense!

Check out the EZ Online Money System. Free access to a full system that reveals the easy way to make fast money.

JR Thompson is a successful affiliate marketer helping others succeed and acheive their goals of success online.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=J._R._Thompson

Friday, March 20, 2009

How to Make Quick Cash Online

How to Make Quick Cash Online
If you've spent any time online, you've more than likely seen ads, promising you vast riches for a small investment, whether through pop-up ads, emails, banners, or streaming video. They seem alluring, because they offer testimonials from successful individuals, who are "living their dreams". They promise you financial freedom, with very little effort on your part. The fact of the matter is they're lying to you! You will NOT get rich, and if you do make ANY money, you will be working very hard to earn it! The truth is, unless you have a background in web design, and advertising (bachelors degree minimum), you're NOT going to get rich online, so don't waste your money investing in these programs. Ultimately, all you're doing is making the owners of these sites rich.

If you're looking to make a little extra cash however, there are some legitimate opportunities to make supplemental income online. The bottom line is that you'll have to work for it though. If you're willing to invest a little time, there are several ways that you can earn money, with absolutely no investment!

Before you delve into earning, you have to get the idea out of your mind that you'll make anything near what you would make in a traditional job. Odds are, you'll probably be making less than minimum wage even. You have to look at this as extra cash that you'll use to supplement your income, not replace it. If you're looking to replace your income, you might want to look into finding a 'real' job that allows you to telecommute.

Once you've accepted the fact that you're not going to get rich quick, and that you're just going to earn enough to cover your midnight McDonalds runs, the first thing you need to do is set up a new email address, that you'll use exclusively for money making opportunities. You don't want to use your personal email address, or you will be inundated with emails, and your personal messages will get lost. In addition, a separate email address makes it easier to manage the things that you're doing to make money.

One of the easiest places to start making money is by filling out surveys. Most companies require that you earn a minimum amount before requesting payment. Surveys don't require much effort, and there are even programs that you can download to fill out the surveys for you! Some of the surveys pay in the form of free products, based on your interests. One thing to keep in mind when signing up for surveys is that a lot of companies are repeated on sites, so keep a list of the companies that you've already signed up with, so that you don't sign up with them multiple times.

Another way to earn some cash is by running a blog. Many companies will pay you for writing a review in their favor, and posting it to your blog. This is referred to as "pay-per-post". The benefit of this is you can usually write about something that interests you. As with surveys, these companies usually require that you earn a minimum amount before payout.

While not a new idea, selling on eBay is always an effective way to make some quick cash. You don't need to invest in inventory to sell either. Just look around your house and find things that you don't have use for anymore. The old saying goes, "One man's junk is another man's treasure". Just because you don't have use for something, doesn't mean someone else won't, and in this day in age, you never know how much people will be willing to pay for something!

There's always new trends popping up on the Internet. Those companies need you! They are willing to provide training and will pay for your response, reviews, or anything else they require to kickstart the business.

As stated before, you will NOT get rich from any of these opportunities. You can however earn some mad cash with one, or several of them. In addition, some offer the added benefit of social interaction, and entertainment.

Now... if you really want to get rich while working from home, you need some ideas! You need something unique. You need to grab a niche now before copycats flood the Internet with the same content.

As an example, CasinoLowdown.com, one of my sites, started out three years ago reviewing casino games. There was hardly any competition. Once the affiliate managers saw how successful the site had become they started emailing all of their affiliates with casino game data. Now there are tens of these copycat sites all competing for the same 'long tail search terms' (long tail is the bulk of your traffic that is made from lesser terms).

source:
http://www.affiliatelife.com/articles/how-to-make-quick-cash-online.html

The Beginner's Guide to Translating Blog Entries into Dollars

The Beginner's Guide to Translating Blog Entries into Dollars
Unless you live in cave; you've heard about the blog explosion over the past few years! Now you're thinking that it's finally time to try your hand at such a feat yourself, and maybe garner a few extra dollars in the process. The only problem is that you have absolutely no idea where to begin. Here are some tips for first time bloggers...

Choose the Right Blog

Make sure to read the terms and conditions of every user agreement before plastering your blog with countless ads and links (which is another thing you probably don't want to do, unless you have an unsatisfiable craving to give your site the appearance of living spam; we'll address this later). There are tons of blogging sites out there (Blogger, Blog, Wordpress, Livejournal, Xanga, and TypePad being a few of the most popular) with pre-formatted stylesheets to choose from, and basically all the kinks worked out for you. Browse around and see which ones you like best.

Some blogsites, notably WordPress, don't like Adsense or are not proponents of affiliate programs. Blogger, amidst many other blogging sites, does.

Choose the Right Topic

Regardless of whatever newest mp3 players or video games are the hottest sellers on the market, take a step back and decide whether the products that seem the most popular are really the ones you want to write about. Stuff that sells well does so largely on its own merit, of course, but the benefits of top-notch reviewing and recommending can do wonders in advertising a product. With your blog, you want to write about something you're actually interested in. If you don't care about the things you're writing about, chances are your writing will seem bland and dispassionate, and you will seem as if you're only out for economic gain. Whether you actually are or not is your decision, but you definitely don't want to come across that way. When you have an interest in the products you write about, you're more likely to write about them well - creatively, passionately, and even expertly. A writer hooked on the things he writes about has a much better chance of enticing his readers to be as well.

Use Affiliate Marketing

Amazon Associates is by far the most popular affiliate marketing program in use today, but just about every site, whether it deals with electronics, books, movies, music, clothing, lawn supplies, etc., ad infinitum offers such an option. This means that the website provides you with links to certain products or pages on their site in the form of text, banners, photos, or a combination, which you then paste into the appropriate HTML section of your blog. The links are encoded with a special ID that allow the site in question to track how many people reach their site by clicking a link from your blog. Some sites will pay you per click, but most give you a certain percentage of the total purchase of a customer who clicked your link. Not every person who clicks through to an affiliate site will buy something, so not every click will bring you money, but be patient, and with steady, high-level content and time, you should start to see a gradual increase.

Put Blog Ads

The most popular blog ad program is Google AdSense, which pays per click and allows you to determine what type of ads are displayed, as well as where. The main benefit of AdSense is that the advertisements are relevant to the material discussed on your site, which prevents them from becoming annoying to potential readers. Many more blog ad programs exist, including but not limited to AdBrite, BlogAd, and Chikita. Do a little research and find ads you feel would look good on your site - enhancing its content while remaining palatable to readers.

Proper Presentation: Consider the Text Ad

You want your links to be seen, but you don't want them to be the only things your readers see. Consider the layout of your site, as well as its content and the types of people likely to come there. Will they be looking for concise prose and easily accessible photos to click on? Or will huge blinking ads or banners do more to detract from than emphasize the blog entry?

Even if they're not catchy, consider using subheaders (like the ones in this article). Most people appreciate dealing with broken-up text as opposed to never-ending walls. Readers will be more inclined to keep on reading an extra-lengthy entry if its separated parts make it look shorter than it actually is. People also like being able to scan text for specific information, so make sure your subheader titles are relevant and informative.

The key to making money with a blog is to choose a blogging site that allows advertising and/or affiliate programs, pick a subject you care about, write about it passionately and well, and present your information, affiliate links, and ads in an appealing manner. If you strive to balance all of these factors, then with patience and consistent updates, your blog should eventually begin to rake in revenue.

source:
http://www.affiliatelife.com/articles/the-beginners-guide-to-translating-blog-entries-into-dollars.html

8 Steps to Making Money in Affiliate Marketing

If you walk into your local Borders or Barnes and Nobles bookstore, you will see shelves of books that promise to show you how to make millions by starting your own business. But it will be hard to find a book that offers the unlimited growth potential and low-cost startup equal to affiliate marketing. You can start affiliate marketing with the flexibility to match your current situation in life and proceed to your desired level of success on your own timeline.

The steps to success as an affiliate marketer are within the reach of anyone regardless of your prior experience. The steps you need to build your search marketing business are already online for you to take advantage of them. All you need is a computer connected online, time to learn and a little startup money to advertise. I will outline the 8 steps of the process to become successful in affiliate marketing.

Step 1. Believe to Succeed
To be successful, every endeavor must be based on your belief that you can succeed. It is common nature to be skeptical of new money making opportunities. Let's be honest and admit that many business opportunities over promise with statements that stretch the truth. All I am asking is that you have a positive attitude that you can be successful and will give the necessary effort to make money in affiliate marketing.

Step 2. Learn About Affiliate Advertising
Affiliate advertising can best be understood as three basic components: affiliates, affiliate programs and affiliate networks. You will be the affiliate as you will advertise other people's products and services for a commission. Affiliate programs are created by other businesses to recruit affiliates, like you, to sell their products and services. Finally, affiliate networks are third parties that facilitate the relationship between affiliate programs and affiliates.

Step 3. Learn How to Advertise Affiliate Products
The easiest way to drive traffic to affiliate programs that you promote is search marketing. You can use search marketing on sites such as Google, Yahoo and MSN to identify persons searching for products and services that you promote. To be successful, the affiliate marketer must have a strong knowledge of search marketing and how to generate leads for the products you promote.

Step 4. Join an Affiliate Marketing Network
To evaluate what type of products you would like to promote, you should join an affiliate network. An affiliate network includes many different companies with affiliate programs that track the results of affiliates. These networks are a central location for affiliate programs so you can evaluate different programs as well as consolidate the commissions from selling several different products.

Step 5. Evaluate and Join Affiliate Programs
Once you have been accepted into an affiliate network, you will want to join affiliate programs. Some affiliates like to focus on a specific niche such as ebooks while others advertise for a broad base of programs. Here, you will want to experiment with various options to determine what works best for you. Evaluate each affiliate program: what results are expected and how they pay commission to affiliates.

Step 6. Create Search Marketing Campaigns to Promote Affiliate Products
Once you have identified the affiliate programs you want to advertise, you will signup at your preferred search network. Google Adwords is an excellent place to start creating advertising campaigns to promote your affiliate programs. You can start with a limited advertising budget to get your feet wet and build the dollar amount up as you sell more products.

Step 7. Learn How to be Successful with Search Marketing
You'll need to track your sales result for each search marketing campaign. The more you learn about search marketing, you will be able to monitor and improve your search campaigns to maximize your affiliate commissions. Try to stay away from affiliate products that are too competitive so you will want to do your own search to determine how many marketers are already promoting a product.

Step 8. Invest and Grow your Ad Programs
You will want to manage the amount of money you make in commissions and determine how to invest that money to grow your business. The more money on hand, the more ads you can run to promote more products. The great thing about affiliate marketing is that you can start with a limit budget advertising one product and eventually grow your business to an unlimited size.

I would suggest that you manage affiliate marketing as a business. You'll need to track your expenses and pay taxes on your commissions. As you grow your business, you will need to monitor your products, advertising and especially your cash flow. If you think like a business, you will develop the processes necessary to stay on top of your affiliate marketing business.

If you have the right attitude, a good work ethic and the time to learn, you can promote just about any affiliate program. If you start slowly and learn as much as possible, you will be successful. If you take the process step-by-step, you will not be overwhelmed by the vast amount of choices and you'll stand a good chance of becoming an affiliate millionaire.

source:
http://www.affiliatelife.com/articles/8-steps-to-making-money-in-affiliate-marketing.html

Blogs And How They Can Supplement Your Online Marketing Efforts

While search engine optimization and link building campaigns are a great way to promote your business and website, blogs can also serve as an important marketing tool. By keeping your website updated, you will be better able to maintain top results in major search engines. Blogs can also help your website generate more incoming links, inspire a loyal readership, and ensure that new site content is indexed by search engines.

Using Blogs to Refresh your Website

Because blogs are so easy to start and maintain, they are one of the simplest content management systems you can use to manage your website. Adding a blog to the home page of your website also ensures that your front page is always updated with the latest news, content and links.

What kind of information should you include in your blog? The following are just a few content ideas that you might opt to incorporate into your blog

source:
http://www.markethealth.com/articles/view/blogs_and_how_they_can_supplement_your_online_marketing_efforts.php

5 Email Marketing Mistakes

Email marketing might be old school, but it still works great.

Yet people creating and paying for emails make simple mistakes and lose customers.

In today's economy, return on investment has never been more important as marketing spend is now analysed and questioned by senior stakeholders. Companies can't afford to be making such simple mistakes and missing potential sales. The fundamental aims of any campaign should be high deliverability, targeted mailing, maximum click-through rates and basic personalisation - don't let the email be the reason customers go elsewhere.

Affiliate Marketers should always remember these top 5 email marketing mistakes:

Five, trying too hard - designing an email as if it was a website, heavy use of flash or java script, which doesn't show up properly in an email and can be complicate. Keep it simple and clean, allowing reader to click to company's website.

Four, ability to reply - adding the wrong return email address either by accident or on purpose to avoid filtering responses lands. Replies can provide valuable information from problems with the email to enquiries about the product. Create a dedicated inbox account.

Three, missing information - need a comprehensive and segmented database. I've had this happen to me, ‘Dear xxx.' Do you think I read it? (Actually, I did. You never know.) Even writing ‘Dear customer' is preferable.

Two, image but no text… - many ISPs don't automatically download images so recipients are left with blank boxes. This makes it hard to track response rates. Always make sure this is considered in the email design and use a tool that demonstrates different ISPs or send a test mail to yourself first.

One, stopped as spam - Words in subject lines such as WIN A GREAT PRIZE will not get past spam filters.

source:
http://www.markethealth.com/articles/view/5_email_marketing_mistakes.php

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Affiliate Programs : Golden Opportunity or Waste of Time?

Now that the idea of doing business over the internet has been firmly established, many potential internet businessmen are searching for the best way to do business. Usually the choice comes down to whether you want to set up your own business and online store, or sign up for an affiliate program.

First of all, let's define what we mean by an affiliate program. An affiliate program is basically an internet business set up by someone else. They could be selling physical goods, education, information or any other products that can be sold online. By signing up as their affiliate, you are helping them promote their business or store. In return, they will pay you a commission for each sale you bring them. The amount of commission varies between different affiliate programs. Examples of affiliate programs include Amazon.com and Wordtracker, which you can visit at:

http://www.onlinebiz-help.com/links/wordtracker.html

1) EARNINGS

So how does an affiliate program differ from starting your own online store? Let's start by looking at the potential earnings. (After all, the main reason everyone wants to start an internet business is for the money). When you sign up for an affiliate program, you will be paid a commission for each sale you refer to the online store. This commission can range from 5% to 15% for physical products, and possibly up to 50% or more for virtual products such as subscriptions and ebooks.

On the other hand, if you start your own store, your profit can be much higher. For virtual products, your profit can be 100% of your selling price. After all, once the newsletter or ebook is created, you do not need to spend any more effort. When someone buys your ebook, they just download it from your website. If you are selling a physical product, your profit depends on whether you are manufacturing the product yourself, or buying from a wholesaler or dropshipping company. Your profit in this case could easily be more than 40% or 50%.

So, if you only consider the potential earnings, starting your own business is more lucrative than joining an affiliate program.

2) LOGISTICS

However, money isn't everything (Or so they say). When you are starting your own internet business, there are a number of logistic issues you need to look at. Here are a few things you would need to take care of:

a) Create your website
b) Design your product (if you are selling new products)
c) Create your product (if you are selling new physical products, or any virtual products)
d) Set up an online store
e) Set up a merchant account or payment gateway
f) Set up a warehouse or storage space (if you are selling physical products)
g) Have procedures and staff ready to fulfill orders
h) Set up an affiliate program to get others to market the products for you
i) Monitor for fraud
j) Monitor stock levels

As they say, "No pain, no gain". Having your own store pays very well, but requires a substantial time investment from you.

On the other hand, if you sign up for an affiliate program, all you need to do is set up a website to promote the program. All the ads, banners, marketing text etc will be provided to you by the affiliate program. Your only responsibilities would be to get people to visit your website, and hopefully click on the affiliate links to buy the products that you are promoting.

3) CONVERSION

Whether you have your own business or are promoting an affiliate program, the bottom line is the conversion rate, or the percentage of visitors that actually buy something from you. A number of factors influence this conversion rate. Factors as quality of the product, quality of the website, customer support are all important. However, I personally believe that the most important factor is trust.

When a potential customer arrives at your website, he will need to trust your site enough for him to be willing to buy from you. After all, on the internet you are just a faceless salesman. He doesn't know who is actually running the site and whether he will actually get the goods that he orders.

Having said that, one of the key methods of garnering trust is by recommendation and referral. If a store is being referred to or recommended by another website, the potential customer will feel that the store is trustworthy. After all, if the store is not trustworthy, why would the other website recommend it?

This is where affiliate programs shine. When you refer a potential customer to the store for which you are an affiliate, the customer will feel more relieved, since the store is being recommended by your site, a 3rd party. The customer will be more likely to buy from the store, benefiting both the store, and you as well.

There are both pros and cons to joining an affiliate program. You might earn less with an affiliate program compared to starting your own store, but I believe the benefits of not having to be responsible for the logistics makes affiliate programs are very viable "passive" source of income.

For more information on affiliate programs, do visit http://www.onlinebiz-help.com

About the Author

Steven is the webmaster of http://www.onlinebiz-help.com - Your Guide To Internet Business. His website contains various resources on affiliate programs and internet marketing advice to help you succeed in your internet business.

source:
http://allarticles.c.la/

Vital Things To Check At Any Affiliate Program

Affiliate programs are now one of the most popular ways for webmasters with lot of traffic to their sites to earn good money.

There are many factors which influence the amount of money earned by an affiliate. The most important is the quality of the affiliate program. So if you want to make lots of money, you must know how to choose an affiliate program.

First of all you should look for a web site that has been on the net for some time. That's how you know that you can trust them and you will receive the money you make. There are many untrustworthy programs that fooled a lot of webmasters with promises but they never sent the money.

Next step is to check the quality of the products the site is promoting. Don't advertise a product if you wouldn't use it for your self. You shouldn't be blinded by the high commissions an affiliate program is offering. If you join a program with bad products you will damage your image and you won't be able to advertise other products ever because people won't value your opinion.

Try to find an affiliate program with a good commission rate because you don't want to waste your time if you can make much more money elsewhere. A good commission would be a 20% to 25% of the product price.

We have discussed about the web site, the products and the commissions but none of this matter if the program doesn't have a great tracking system. You should look for programs that track visitors to their site using both CGI and cookies so you'll get your money for the sales you make.

It's also good if you can check your stats in real time. Before you sign up in a affiliate program you should first check how long do they track visitors for. There are affiliate programs that track a visitor only once and if they come back another day and buy the product you won't earn ay money. So best for you is to find programs that track visitors for 30 days or more.

Then you should be interested on how often the site sends your payment and if you have to earn a fix amount of money before they send them to you.

So these are some tips in choosing an affiliate program that will bring you a high income. If a program has most of the things mentioned above then it's worth trying.


About the Author: Check http://www.30daysinjuly.com if you are interested in having a 'coach' that will guide you to Internet Success and will show you how to create a profitable online business.
Source: www.isnare.com

How to Become an Online Affiliate Marketer

What is an "affiliate marketer"? Until about a year ago I had no idea what an internet affiliate marketer was. A friend of mine introduced me to online marketing and this unique form of sales and the rest is history. What I mean by history is: no more boss, no more commutes, no more stress, no more work place politics, no more lay offs, no more dead lines, etc...

An affiliate marketer is someone who uses various resources online to promote and sell other companies products and services. That's it! Affiliate marketing has changed my life for the better. By promoting other peoples products and services, I have reached a success level I thought only imaginable.

The key to this type of marketing is knowing your products or services and what type of advertising will bring you great returns. The best part of affiliate marketing is that you are responsible for nothing! No products, no shipping, no building, no customer service, no employees, no health insurance for employees, no manufacturing, ect....

All of the things I listed above are the responsibility of the companies you are promoting. That is the beauty of this type of marketing. You "poach" off the success of other peoples trials and tribulations creating a "win, win" situation for both parties. They pay you handsomely for creating them new business.

Has any of this got your attention? What if I told you that you can get started as an affiliate marketer online for less that $50? Now do I have your attention? Well it's true and I will!

The first thing you need to do is find a company that is willing to pay for your help. For example we will use ABCproducts.com. Let's say this company is a membership program offering you $20.00 for every member you bring to them that signs up for their program. The membership costs $40.00 a month so you get half or $20.00.

Here is the beauty to this program! If you sign up 100 members the first month that is $2,000 dollars into your bank account. In the next month you sign up 100 more for an additional $2,000, but don't forget about the 100 members you signed up in month 1. Every month they stay on the program you still get the original $20.00! So now after 2 months your making $4,000 a month.

This goes on and on and on! If after 6 months you have 4,000 members that you personally brought to the program, you get $80,000 a month without doing a thing. Every first of the month the money is put directly into your bank account from all of the marketing you did in previous months. This means that you get paid if your at home, on vacation, shopping, at little league, etc...

I mentioned the cost to you earlier. The only cost to you is to go to "GoDaddy.com" and purchase a domain name for $9.99 for the year. You want to make you domain name very similar to the company you are promoting. In our example earlier I used ABCproducts.com. Try to come up with a domain name like "ABCproductsonline.com".

Once this domain name is yours. Simply go online to different marketing tools such as Ezine Articles or Isnare Articles and write articles promoting their products or services. You don't need a website! You simply set up your domain name to "forward" to the homepage of the company you are promoting. Sites like these will allow you to post your URL at the bottom of your articles for $9.99 a month which is minimal for the potential "hits" they create.

This is why it is key to have a domain name that is "very similar" to the actual domain name of the company you are promoting. When they click on ABCproductsonline.com (your domain name) they are actually going to be forwarded to ABCproducts.com. If they like what they see and sign up for a membership? You get paid not only for that month, but all of the months to follow that they remain a member. Thus, this can put a great deal of money into your bank account!

Take care and we will talk soon,
Bill Lasher

Did you find this article helpful? Than take a look at the video tutorials here! http://www.MaverickMoneyTalk.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=William_Lasher

How Much is Your Affiliate Marketing Program Costing You?

One problem that has caused more people to fail in affiliate marketing than anything else is the lack of an initial investment. You can join virtually any affiliate marketing program for free. However it can end up costing you more than you realize. In this article let's talk about how much your affiliate marketing program is really costing you right now.

And affiliate marketing program can end up costing you in three different ways.

1. Time

To be successful as an affiliate marketer you must invest your time. This will vary from one affiliate marketer to the next because everyone has a different lifestyle they lead.

However one thing that does not change is selling products online as affiliate marketer takes a consistent effort. Many people fail because they do not understand how difficult this will be and do not invest the proper amount of time to be successful.

2. Expenses

Building an affiliate marketing business will end up costing you money eventually. You will either pay people to do things for you which is known as outsourcing. Or you will purchase things such as advertising or software to automate your business.

To sell any affiliate product online you need visitors coming to a website. As the Internet continues to grow it becomes more competitive and imperative you spend money promoting your product.

Today affiliate marketers do primarily pay per click advertising, social networking, or article marketing as their three primary forms of promotion. All of these are expenses that you will incur in your attempt to drive customers to your website.

3. Commissions

If you do not represent the right affiliate programs you can lose a lot of money. For example the difference between one affiliate program that pays 40% and has a one tier affiliate program and another program that pays 50% on personal sales and 10% on second tier sales is huge.

Super affiliates are people who earn unbelievable amounts of commissions selling products for their merchants. They are also people who have are earned the right to a higher commission.

If you become an affiliate that demands respect you can earn a higher commission than an average affiliate. Therefore it's important that you become successful so your affiliate marketing program does not cost you thousands of dollars in potential commissions.

In summary this is three ways to view how much your affiliate marketing program is costing you. The commission you earn ultimately comes down to your amount of time and effort, as well as money you spend promoting your affiliate products.

Charles Chege is a Webmaster and owner of AffiliateChampions.com, which promotes top-notch affiliate programs in niche markets to aspiring home business owners. He shares his knowledge about affiliate marketing business and effective marketing strategies.Subscribe to our Affiliate Newsletter for FREE and obtain proven home business tips and tricks. http://www.affiliatechampions.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Charles_T_Chege

Affiliate Marketing - Tips on How to Choose the Right Affiliate Teaching Program

Things to consider before you start

So you have made a decision to get into Affiliate Marketing? Before you start make sure you have considered the following:
· What is your goal?
· How much time are you prepared to spend on learning each day?
· What is your budget?
These are serious considerations. Why?
If you do not have an ultimate goal that you have set yourself to achieve within a time frame, you will end up wasting your time.

If you are not prepared to invest your time, on a daily basis, to build on your skills, you are wasting your time.
Be clear about the money you are prepared to invest and be disciplined about managing your budget.
If you are committed, you are halfway there!

Finding the right teaching program for you

Be prepared to spend a certain amount of time researching various programs. Consider the following criteria:
· What do they offer in terms of teaching materials?
· What do their existing clients say about them?
· How much does it cost?
· Can you get out of the program i.e. is there an exit point?
· Will you get your money back if you exit?
· Search on the internet and find articles about the program
· How old is the program?
· Was it written years ago with no recent updates? If yes, stay away. The internet is a very dynamic environment that changes daily!

Personal Insight

Personally, I made quite a few mistakes and wasted time and money this is why I can honestly promote a specific program to you. I would still urge you to do your research for your own peace of mind.
Typical mistakes I made:

· Initially joined a program that was a once off fee of $77. Big mistake. The program was old (6 years!!). The material has not been updated since then and the free tools they promoted, existed, but have been updated since the program material was written, which caused untold frustration and confusion on my part.
· After a few weeks I gave up on this and started researching again.
· I found lots of "free" programs, but there was always a catch to it. The material was never comprehensive enough for a "rookie" like me to understand and learn.
· I then thought I could do this on my own with my limited skill set. Also a mistake. I ended up trying to market products that I had not researched properly, where the commission structure was appalling, payouts poor and on top of it I was spending too much money advertising. The result was a very poor ROI (return on investment)

Choosing the "Right One"
I eventually found the teaching program that is run by Mack Michaels, called Maverick Money Makers Club. This program I can personally vouch for. The teaching materials are excellent and the material is kept up-to-date.
Do not waste time and money. Choose and join the millionaire's club www.MavericksTopgunClub.com as the affiliate program that will teach you everything you need to know and much, much more.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ingrid_David

A Simple But Powerful Marketing Strategy For Affiliates

I would like to share a very simple but effective marketing strategy for affiliate marketers that generated me about $20,000 the first time that I used it and actually still earns me about $500 to $1,000 dollars every single month without doing any additional work on the promotion other than sending a few emails to new subscribers on my list.

I want you to understand that this makes me between $500 - 1,000 a month and I haven't done anything extra to promote this product. Here are the three things I would recommend that you do when you're promoting something, whether you're using video or email or anything else:

1. Bring the pain. It sounds harsh, but people won't buy unless you make them aware of the pain of not buying, so talk about the pain. This is not a negative thing to do. This is just the real thing to do. You want to help them and the only way to help them is to tell them the pain of what's going to happen if they don't buy. For an example if you are promoting software that is designed to spin articles. The pain in this case is duplicate content penalty, getting banned by Google potentially, not getting enough traffic, being cast out as a leper by your family - whatever the pain is you have to make sure that they are aware of how much life sucks without your product. The pain is always whatever problem that your product solves.

2. The second thing I recommend you to do is, whether it's in a video promotion, or text that you're doing as an affiliate, it doesn't matter what the format is, it is extremely important to actually show the 'how.' How does this tool work? I don't care if it's an e-book, show what some of the tactics are. If its software show how it works. Show how fast and easy it is to use and install. Explain the process give some examples of what it is like during the process of actually using it.

3. After you've done that, show the proof, arguably the most important is the actual results. We can represent this by a graph. You can show a screen shot of how it helped your sales go up. How much your traffic went up your self-esteem will go up. Your muscle mass will go up, or whatever it is that this product is supposed to fix you've got to show the proof.

So the three things that I would recommend you to always use in your promotions are:

• Bring the pain
• Show them how the product works, as in this video. If you can't do that, do it in a case study.
• Show the proof. What were the results of actually using it?

If you apply this technique correctly then all you will have to do is set up your recommendation, set up some follow up emails in your auto-responder and put it on auto pilot. I am still seeing money trickle in from many small campaigns that I have set up using this technique and I haven't done any work on some of them in years. It is a very good proven technique and it will work for you.

For a step by step guide on how to implement very powerful marketing techniques that will cause your profits to skyrocket please visit Affiliate Millions

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Anthony_Garay

Friday, March 13, 2009

Top 3 Characteristics Of A Super Affiliate

Making thousands of dollars in affiliate marketing is the dream of every affiliate who is trying to venture in the internet world. Becoming a super affiliate is not as complicated as you think. As long as you have the determination and you are committed to this goal, it is possible for you to become a super affiliate and make automatic income from the internet.

If you are serious to become a super affiliate, you must first adopt the super affiliate characteristics. Everything starts from your mindset. Once you have the characteristics of a super affiliate, you will then act like a super affiliate and become one in the end. This is how you can generate automatic income from the internet as a super affiliate.

Below are the top 3 super affiliate characteristics that you must adopt…

1. You must stay focused in promoting only one affiliate product at a time. If you try to promote too many affiliate products at the same time, you will diversify your energy and hence, creating less results for each of your effort. Every super affiliate knows the power of staying focused. It is just like a laser beam, when focused, it can cuts through anything that lies in front of it. And it is the same in affiliate marketing, if you are serious in generating automatic income, you must stay focused and concentrate all your energy in promoting just one affiliate product.

2. Create value for the people in your market. This is what many affiliates did not do. Creating value include providing quality information that will help the people in your market. The content you provide will then work as the pre-sell material and put the prospects into a buying mindset. Thus, you will get more sales if you create more value for the people in your market. Unfortunately, most affiliates only focus in generating automatic income and they adopt the money-first mindset. As a result, they fail to build trust with their prospects and thus make less money from their business.

3. The final piece of characteristic you must possess is that you must be serious in your affiliate business. Many struggling affiliates treat their business like a part-time hobby and that is why there are only earning the hobby-kind of income. If you truly want to be a super affiliate and make automatic income from the internet, you must be serious in your business. Treat your online business seriously and be 100% committed to it.

These are the top 3 characteristics of a super affiliate. Before you transform yourself into a super affiliate, you must adopt these characteristics. Once you have the qualities of a super affiliate, making automatic income from the internet will not be a problem for you.


source:
http://www.articlesbase.com/affiliate-programs-articles/top-3-characteristics-of-a-super-affiliate-816331.html

Friday, February 20, 2009

How to Cope With Google's Affiliate Rules

The latest rule from Google is aimed at affiliates. There has always been a rule that a destination URL can only appear once among the Adwords ads for each keyword. As the merchants generally advertise, that meant affiliates had to use their own URLs in theory. In practice, you could get away with cloaked URLs. But not any more.Does Google like affiliates? Not really, and it never has. Why? Because affiliates have less money to spend on advertising than the merchants themselves, and Google wants to generate as much money as it can from advertising. Google is primarily an advertising media, although we all think of it as a search engine.Only one destination URL for each keyword, and you must use a real URLGoogle will argue that in limiting one shown destination URL among adverts for each keyword it is avoiding confusion among surfers. For example, if there were three or four adverts on a page with the same URL (http://www.example.com/) would surfers be confused? I doubt it, but they might click on several of the ads with the same URLS just to see if they were different. That would mean the advertisers would pay more, because many clickers would be not be buying. The merchants would not like that, nor would the affiliates.The Rule now being enforced without exceptionOK, so Google has always limited this in theory, but now they are saying that they will enforce the rule that the destination URL in any advert must be the same as the actual destination URL without exception. In theory, this means that no longer can an affiliate send a surfer from their Adwords ads direct to the merchant. Instead, they need to send them to their own site first, and need a landing page that is relevant to the ad. Don't direct linking, but build a listThe best way around this problem is to change the way you set up your business. Instead of doing direct linking, which is sending the surfer through a cloaked link to the merchant's site, build a customer base. Send the surfers to your site and give them the option of signing up for your list, by giving them a free e-book or tool, or going on to the merchant's site. This is the best way of building your affiliate business anyway.Get leads for your businessAnother way around the problem is not to advertise on Google Adwords, but to spend your money getting leads from a lead generation site. You get the leads sent to your sign-up page and this way you will build a list of people interested in the products you are selling. This method takes a bit longer, but costs less than advertising through Adwords, and puts control back in your hands, not in Google's.

source:
http://www.articlesbase.com/affiliate-programs-articles/how-to-cope-with-googles-affiliate-rules-386424.html

Google Launches Affiliate Network

Search and ad king rebrands DoubleClick's affiliate-marketing program as it continues to integrate new assets.

Google is now in the affiliate-marketing business, having launched the Google Affiliate Network, a rebranding of the network run by DoubleClick's Performics business.
In the typical affiliate program, publishers place links on their Web site to online retailers or other e-commerce sites and receive a commission for each referral they pass along.
The relaunched network will put Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) in competition with large affiliate networks such as ValueClick's Commission Junction and LinkShare, a division of the Japanese concern Rakuten.
The rollout comes as Google has been talking up new ad-driven business lines and integrating the recently acquired online ad powerhouse DoubleClick. Google, which built much of its empire on pairing ads with people's search queries, is looking to expand its display-ad network through its new DoubleClick assets, and accelerate its video advertising both on YouTube and through the new AdSense for video product.
Many online retailers derive business through affiliate programs, either in-house or through an outside network. Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) runs its own program. eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) recently followed suit, dropping its long-standing partner Commission Junction and taking its network in-house.
Among the larger retailers participating in the Google's network are Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS), Circuit City (NYSE: CC) and Target (NYSE: TGT).
Advertisers pay through a cost-per-action (CPA) model, in which they are charged only for the placement when a customer makes a purchase or takes another action that qualifies as a conversion.
Publishers will receive their commissions twice a month. Google said that it will put each application through a quality review, admitting publishers into the network at its own discretion.

Once they have been added to the network, publishers will be able to apply to advertisers, who can decide on a case-by-case basis which sites are a good match for their links.
It's a nervous time in the affiliate-marketing space. A controversial law took effect in New York last month that requires merchants who run affiliate programs to collect sales taxes on purchases made in that state, even if they don't have any employees or operations there.
Amazon and Overstock.com are fighting the law in court, but many fear that if it holds up, other states will follow suit, and affiliate marketers will become responsible for keeping track of overwhelmingly complex state and local tax codes.
Prior to the law, individual consumers were responsible for reporting out-of-state purchases on their income tax returns, but most people either didn't know about that law or ignored it.
Performics launched as an independent network in 1998. In 2004, it was acquired by DoubleClick, which was in turn bought by Google in a $3.1 billion deal that closed in March.
In addition to its affiliate-marketing business, Performics also carries a search-marketing division, which Google is in the process of selling.
ConnectCommerce.com will continue to host the affiliate network, but it will eventually be converted to a Google.com URL, Google said.

source:
http://www.internetnews.com/ec-news/article.php/3756451/Google+Launches+Affiliate+Network.htm

5 Google Affiliate Secrets To Help You Earn Thousands Of Dollars Monthly

By Christopher Kyalo


There is no doubt that Google affiliates rank as some of the most successful affiliates anywhere on the web.
Yet few understand the reason behind this success. Even the majority of Google affiliates who are yet to start making huge five figure checks do not quite understand why the Google Adsense program has flourished so much within such a short time.
Anybody who understands the real secrets behind the phenomenal rise of Google affiliates will be in a much better position to benefit and profit from it, whether or not they are current Adsense affiliates.
1. Google Affiliates Are Riding On The Most Dramatic Shift In The Advertising Industry In History
A few webmasters think that this Adsense and pay per click affiliate mania is a passing fad. All indications are that this is not the case. If anything mounting evidence points to one of the most dramatic and rapid shifts in advertising industry history. You can’t beat the deal to advertisers where they pay only for actual traffic to their website and more so when they can easily calculate their conversion rate on that traffic and predict their profit margin on the deal. This arrangement cannot be duplicated on TV or in any other offline media with so much precision and accuracy.
This means that advertising revenue will continue to shift away from other media and will move online at an even more rapid rate than is the case currently. And not just any online mediums like banner ads for example. The revenue will specifically shift to pay per click text ads. If you need some proof just look at the Google numbers in recent months, and most of it is being generated by PPC ad revenue.
What does that mean to a blogger or webmaster? It means huge and increasing profits as the number of advertisers grows and the competition between them for clicks grows fiercer.
It means that any expert in any tiny little niche will find it increasingly easier to make a good regular income from a low traffic targeted site with higher paying, more valuable Adsense keywords.
2. Google Affiliates Recognize That Content Is Not King, It’s Everything
Writers, or rather good writers are already enjoying a huge advantage as Google affiliates. Only well written content will attract quality traffic and only interesting engrossing content will keep that traffic coming back again and again. Only high-quality keyword rich content will keep a site high in search engine rankings and thus guarantee enough traffic to keep Google affiliate adsense earnings high.
3. Top Google Affiliates Are All Using The Blog Secret
Blogs were created for linking and everybody knows that links are closely related to traffic in two ways, firstly they generate traffic but more importantly, they help a site achieve high search engine rankings with usually opens the floodgates of traffic. Top Google affiliates are using this secret to keep those big fat Google affiliate Adsense checks arriving by special courier every month.
Most top Google affiliates have dozens of blogs loaded with the right keywords and engaging content. With just a little SEO (search engine optimization) skills, these new breed of high flying online professionals are able to get their sites to the top of search engine rankings. It is then minimal maintenance as they sit back and watch the traffic volumes flow to their blogs already loaded with Adsense ads. The result of all this is that the clicks happening at their sites shoots up and with it their Google affiliate Adsense earnings.
4. Google Affiliates Are Using The Secret of The Hook
In advertising it is called the hook. Journalists call it the angle or slant of the story. Both mean the same thing. It is all about picking up a subject and asking yourself, what aspect of it most interests your audience? If you answer that question accurately then your ad or your article will attract maximum interest.
Online this is becoming more critical by the day. Content that is not slanted to fit the interests and needs of you audience will not attract enough interest and this impacts on the traffic of your blog or site and ultimately on your Google affiliate adsense earnings.
Christopher Kyalo is a successful online writer and entrepreneur. Read the rest of this article at his Google affiliate writer’s blog. He can be reached at strongwallafrica at yahoo.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christopher_Kyalo
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