Affiliate Marketing

What is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate Marketing is a fabulous way to generate a revenue stream online. The principal of an affiliate program is that you link to a retail site, or some other type of site that "sells" something, collects personal information from visitors, or some similar activity. As an "affiliate" of that company, you earn a commission or a bonus from any resulting sales or leads that you generate for the merchant.

The most common type of affiliate program is where you send visitors from your website to a merchant's website and earn a percentage of any sales that result from that traffic. Some programs are pay-per-lead rather than pay-per-sale, meaning that you earn a bonus simply by sending them a visitor who in turn agrees to receive further information from the merchant. Other programs are pay-per-click, where you earn a little bit of money everytime someone clicks through to the merchant, regardless of whether they take any further action or not. Google AdSense is a great example of a pay-per-click affiliate program.

How much can I earn?
Affiliate programs typically pay between 4 and 15% but can go much higher. It all depends on the industry, the profit margin of the items being sold, and the generosity of the merchant.

If you manage to generate a lot of targetted traffic to your website, and find an aggressive program or product line to promote, you can literally earn a low six-figure salary with just one website. Don't expect to do that right out of the starting gate, however, or you'll be disappointed. It takes lots of experience and skill to achieve high levels of success in affiliate marketing, but it is possible for those willing to invest the time. Here's a great resource if you're really serious about learning every aspect of being successful as an affiliate: Ken Evoy's SiteSell.

The key to success lies in driving huge amounts of traffic to your website(s). A good benchmark is to expect to get at least one sale per every 100 clicks to a merchant. If the items you are trying to promote are particularly expensive you may not see that high of a conversion rate, but then your commissions should be larger to make up for it. A good price-point to shoot for are items in the $100-$200 dollar range. Ideally you will make an average of $15 commission per sale. I've seen programs where it is possible to earn $100 or more, so it pays to look around.

Check out networks such as Commission Junction for a large pool of merchants you can promote. NetShops Affiliates is also excellent if you're looking for niche stores to promote.

Success? Where?
If you want to be really successful in affiliate marketing, you will want to build a strategy first. Start by getting familiar with the affiliate marketing industry. Learn about PPC ads (Overture and Google AdWords) and SEO (search engine optimization). Research keywords using the Overture keywords tool or WordTracker to find out what terms people are searching for online.

If you have a hobby or special knowledge/skills, look around to see if there are related affiliate programs. You could build a site containing articles about your hobby, and place related affiliate links throughout the site. Another option that some people have success with is to build "shopping malls" filled with banners and links. These AREN'T my personal favorite, however, some of them do well if they are marketed properly.

Some affiliates don't build websites at all - they just use PPC ads from companies like Overture to link to stores using their affiliate ID in the URL. Be sure and check the terms and conditions first, as many affiliate programs do not allow this.

So many paths...
The more you research affiliate marketing the more ideas you'll have of the potential to earn income. I encourage you to take the high road. Learn the right way to market your site rather than looking for shortcuts which usually result in getting your site banned by the major search engines. Besides, isn't there enough "crap" on the internet already?

Sp@mmers can make good money using unethical practices, but it's a lot like day-trading in the stock market. In my opinion it's better to build a quality site that will stand for years to come, providing you with residual income. You may develop a site "template" that works really well, and begin building more sites in different categories. The possibilities really are endless. For some excellent business-building tips be sure and check out Ken Evoy's SiteSell. Also check out places like ABestWeb and WebMasterWorld to learn more about affiliate marketing and SEO.

Hope this helps you get started - good luck!