ComputerHunter.org |
|
|
|||
|
 |
Writing About How Easy Affiliate Marketing Is, Dont Make It So
It seems that the VERY popular fashion of article writing is not unlike real world clothing fashion in that; the same things keep coming around with seasonal regularity. In fact, more so with the fast paced development of the 'home business' or 'work at home' article topic conveyor. I'm probably guilty of the above for writing on this specific subject itself, having seen a few others lament the continual rehashing of the 'same ol', same ol'. Although in my defense, today's comment is not so much the same lamentation but, in my eyes at least, an attempt to put the record straight about a specific subject, of which I've read far too many articles about recently. To be fair, I'm sure only good intentions (and a need for something to write about) are responsible for the latest round of 'Affiliate marketing is simple' and 'You'll be earning online in no time as an Affiliate' type articles. In so many of these articles, Affiliate marketing is touted as the 'way to go' for anyone who has a website (or EVEN NOT, which is rubbish for all but a few). I currently run seven Affiliate websites, recently 'trimmed down' from twelve because of the amount of time involved in all that was required to keep each website competitive in the Search Engines and interesting to visitors, both new and returning, chasing PR and generally maintaining what have become known as 'affiliate content websites'. Some merchants supply complete website templates, which are helpful, provided you have total SEO control, but even so, they are not generally well packed with content and certainly they don't have 'ready to go' RSS feeds, news updates, blogs and articles etc. So even though, as I said, they do help, there is still much to be done initially and maintained continually to end up with a comprehensive, interesting and SE friendly Affiliate website. I had to 'trim down' my activities simply because, even though I am fortunate enough to be a full time Internet home businessperson, I did not have the time to keep that number of websites producing viable 'income for effort'. When you consider the amount of work involved in just one affiliate content website, I'm sure most will understand why I have had to 'streamline'. At the same time, I hope a realization of the effort and time involved will also become apparent. Of course, before we even start any of the following, we assume we have the ability to build our own websites with a degree of professionalism and functionality, templates aside. Without these two aspects at least, anyone who does visit, will leave shortly after. For the sake of the exercise, we have magically received the knowledge and experience to achieve this? overnight! Our website will need to be nurtured through a period of at least 3 - 6 months of little or no activity (unless we also happen to be, again miraculously, well versed, experienced, and game enough to throw money at PPC engines). During this period we will be setting up and making use of the advantages of RSS feeds, blogs, content articles (both other's and hopefully, some of our own). We'll be updating and changing things almost daily in order to achieve some targeted traffic through the SEs, when we're finally out of the 'sandboxes' etc. While this is all coming together, we're spending a lot of time on a link exchange program (not so much for PR, but because back links are an important component in the SE results). This needs to be done manually because the automatic programs do more harm to a website's SE chances than help (but that's another article!). Slowly, our website is gaining some targeted traffic, the only kind of any use to an Affiliate website. We may even have managed a few sales, provided we have, again miraculously overnight, become confident and made good choices of Affiliate programs and products around which we have built and nurtured our website. The traffic and occasional sale, although exciting to the 'first-timer' serve only to create more time consuming work. These 'hits', as we call them, need to be analyzed. We need to know where they came from, what particular promotional method brought them to us, what part of the world they originated, the referring URL if any and so on, so we can concentrate our efforts in the right places and forego those which don't seem to be successful. No serious Affiliate relies on a single product or program for an income. We all know about the security and sense in 'multiple income streams'? Well, the concept is a very important aspect in Affiliate marketing., so this ONE website we've just managed to bring to a point where it MAY BEGIN paying for some of the time effort and expense involved in it's inception, really needs to be one of a number for an Affiliate to hope to became self-sufficient through Affiliate marketing. Of course, luck plays it's role in all things and some do make good quickly and sometimes, one product or program WILL be sufficient for the desired income. Maybe, with some, the whole exercise is more a hobby or interest and a little pocket money to pay costs is all that's wanted. These are all personal aspects, which are of no consequence. We're talking about people who are being told how easy it is to become an Affiliate for 'income' purposes. Having now totally destroyed the Affiliate dreams of thousands, I will now say that it IS a marvellous Internet home business model and you can start and progress to the point where you are making some income, without spending very much at all. In fact, the only outlay that is absolutely necessary, in my opinion, is the domain and hosting for your website. In that respect, Affiliate marketing is TRULY the 'no-risk' home based business model. Still again, there is much to know about the domain and hosting aspect of the preparation, which will have consequences if not considered correctly, before we even think about what I have spoken about above. Do yourself a favor if you're relatively unfamiliar with Affiliate marketing or even halfway there, get the right advice from the right sources. The right sources are people who have been, and/or are doing it themselves and aren't afraid to explain that it's not all that EASY, but certainly possible for those who really WANT the 'work at home' dream for themselves and their families. This article may be copied ONLY in it's entirety and ONLY with this Author's Resource attached with links functioning. The 2005 Edition of Steve Brennan's popular ebook title 'The Affiliate Guide Book' is available now. He also operates a number of Affiliate wesbites which include The Diet & Weight Loss Place and The Home Based Business & Affiliate Center.
Google News - Top Stories
|
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Super Affiliate Strategies Part 3 In our previous Super Affiliate Strategies articles, we went over ways to increase your web site's click through ratio. Today we are going to take an entirely different approach, this time we are going to be promoting affiliate programs outside of your web site. Affiliate Income Optimization In my time researching the search engines, I've noticed something rather strange. Literally millions of searches are made each month for "brand names" and actual site names. For example, on Overture alone, last month, there were millions of queries made for the term "internet explorer". Having been on the internet for around seven years (running sites for over five), I've naturally assumed that people use it the same way I do. So, I know that internet explorer is a Microsoft product so I just type http://www.microsoft.com into my browser. Self-Replication, The All Important Third Step in Affiliate Marketing 'Self-replication' sounds like science fiction but it's not. It has nothing to do with cloning, in a biological sense. What I'm writing about here is a third and very important step of affiliate or multi-level marketing. Generate More Sales in ANY Affiliate Program ? Part Two Incentive Marketing, Incentive Marketing, Incentive Marketing? How to Become a Super-Affiliate Did you begin your affiliate marketing business like this? You surf the internet looking for an internet marketing product you can affiliate with and sell (even though you know nothing about internet marketing), sign up for the program and get your link, and then visit traffic exchanges and safelists, advertising your affiliate site. At the end of the day, week, or month, you wonder why you didn't sell one product. Affiliate Product Landing Pages - Three Tactics That Sell As competition within the online affiliate sales arena rises to a fierce boil, affiliate sellers expecting any degree of success must first find effective methods to set themselves apart from the crowd. Affiliate Marketing - Conversions What is a good converting site? Not An Affiliate? Why Ever Not? If the idea of pursuing a living on the net has repeatedly crossed your mind but you still haven't found a way to implement it, then affiliate programs are going to break the ice for you. 11 Awesome Ways To Explode Your Affiliate Commission 1. Start your own affiliate program directory. Join a large number of affiliate programs that go with the theme of your web site and list them all in a directory format on your web site. Then just advertise your free affiliate program directory. You will earn commissions and gain sub-affiliates. Plus you could start an affiliate-related e-zine too. The Key to a Successful Affiliate Program Two Christmases ago I tugged on one of those paper crackersand after a small bang, out popped a piece of yellow paperthe size of a credit card. Promoting My Affiliate Programs--How? Getting your website up, is really just the first phase of your journey to a career on the Internet. You must promote your website, your product or your service to the world. Well, how do you do it? What Was I Thinking I often wonder what I was thinking by joining an affiliate program and starting a home business on the Internet. I started up not knowing a single thing about affiliate programs, I didn't even recognize the term. I knew nothing about advertising, building websites, search engines, search engine optimization, or the million other things that I have learned in the past two years. Popup Killers - Not just killing that Popup but also your Revenue! With the increased use of popups on sites - when you enter,when you leave, while you are there - Popup killers (orstoppers) are all the rage. The Google Adsense-Adwords Automatic Money Machine Have you ever tried to make money through affiliate programs using Google Adwords? Then you know it's not easy. Some say that only 2-3 out of 10 affiliate Adwords campaigns will actually make a profit. But what if you could get your Adwords campaigns for free, or even make a little profit from using Adwords for promoting affiliate programs. Actually you can get your Adwords campaigns for free if you combine your Adwords campaigns with Google Adsense. With Google Adsense you place small ads on your own web-page, hoping that people will click on these ads. When someone clicks on a Google ad on your web-site, you make money. The normal approach to making money with Google Adsense is to have thousands of pages with Google ads, but you can successfully make money with Google Adsense with just one page. That's right - one page! 1. Step All you have to do is find niches, where people pay several dollars to get the top position in the Google ads. You can use Overture's bidtool to find high priced niche keywords. 2. Step Next step is to build your one-page Google Adsense money machine. Find a free article in one of the article directories and set up a page with your keyword targeted article and three Adsense ad blocks. Use small Adsense blocks, that only shows the top three high priced ads. 3. Step Last step is to set up a Google Adwords campaign with that niche keyword (and related keywords) - but you only bid 5 cents! Now sit back and watch the magic. People click on your 5-cent ad and come to your one-page-Adsense website. They read your article - and some of them will click on the high priced ads on your page. Bingo! - you've made a small profit. Nothing much, maybe a one dollar profit a day. My first Google Adsense 'Money Machine' is generating a profit of 2-3 dollars a day - that's at least $730 a year for just one page. Want to make more money with your one-page-money-machine? Find an affiliate program in that niche, and put your affiliate link on the page. Some of your visitors will click the Google ads and some will click on your affiliate link. What ever they do, you win! Now you've got your Google Adwords campaign for free or you're even making a small profit with your Google Adwords-Adsense money machine. At the same time you're marketing your niche affiliate program. Final advice Don't use this technique in the 'Internet Marketing' market place - it's much to crowded. Use your imagination and find niches like laser hair removal, wheel chairs, cell phone, homeowners loan etc. Take action - and go find some money making niche keywords. Pros and Cons of Third Party Online Affiliate Networks Online affiliate marketing has taken the internet by storm and has proven to be a highly effective way of maximizing website revenue. Why limit yourself to selling your own products when you can profit by selling somebody else's too? Why is Affiliate Marketing Popular with Home Based Business Entrepreneurs? The great strides made in the development of the Internet in the recent past has enabled information to be transmitted thousands of miles away with such ease and clarity that time and space are hardly of any consequence to the Internet Marketer today. Back-End Selling With Affiliate Marketing More and more people are getting into online businesses for a variety of reasons. First, because the Internet provides a wide market for businessmen and selling through the Net is often synonymous to selling their products to the world. Second, because starting an online business requires only a portion of the start-up cost that you will need if you are to set up an actual business establishment. And third, because you would virtually gain more profit online, considering your wide market and your savings. 8 Reasons Why Affiliate Marketing is the Better Option Many people are confused when they first become iterested in internet businesses, they find themselves asking what type of busisness is best for me? How to Booost Your Affiliate Commissions by almost 30% One possible drawback of this method is that some affiliate programs, like clickbank for example, expose the affiliate link along with your ID in the browser address bar. 10 Tips To Help You Create Your Own Money Making Affiliate Program 1. View your affiliate program as a partnership between you and your affiliates, and make it your priority to develop good relationships between you and your affiliate sales force.
|
|
|
|
|
