Can You REALLY Make BIG Money With
Affiliate Programs?
Copyright 2002 By Willie Crawford
Can you really make big money with affiliate programs?
Can you
earn a satisfactory income from commissions on selling
others'
products? That question has to be on a lot of people's
minds.
There are a lot of people considering setting up a
website and
marketing affiliate products. They wonder whether or not
to
believe all of the hype. There are also a lot of people
who are
already marketing affiliate products. Many of these are
making
very few sales, and they are wondering.... what am I
missing!
To answer the first question... yes, you really can earn
big money
with affiliate programs. There's just a right way and a
wrong way
to go about it. Most people are going about it ALL WRONG.
That's
why the majority aren't making the big money they desire.
What are some of the things they are doing wrong, and how
can
they correct these things?
Far too many people are choosing the wrong affiliate
products.
They are choosing products that aren't a good match for
their
website visitors and ezine subscribers. Trying to market
a
product to the wrong audience is doomed to fail from the
start.
Instead, find or create products that meet the expressed
needs
of your audience. Marketing should not be about trying to
convince someone that they need a product that they're
convinced
they don't need. Instead, it should be merely
demonstrating that
your product is the solution to one of their problems,
wants,
needs or fears. Selecting the right products or services
is
essential to achieve any real success marketing affiliate
products.
Many people choose a product that offers too little
return on the
resources required to make a sale. The commissions earned
don't
cover the value of advertising and TIME expended. With
these
products or services, even if you make sales, you come
out worse
than you would be if you had spent the same time working
at the
local fast food restaurant or car wash.
The solution to the above problem is very simple. Market
only
products that pay a decent commission. There are many
great
products available that offer 40 - 100% commission. It
generally
makes little sense marketing a product paying only
20-30%. The
one exception to this rule is products that pay a
residual income.
The best example of this type of product is web hosting.
You
earn a lower commission, BUT you earn this commission
month after
month. Therefore you end up earning more in the long run.
If you
do market products which are poor sellers, pay low
commissions,
and don't offer a residual income, drop them. You time is
simply
too valuable to do otherwise.
Even with the right product, you need to market it
correctly.
This is also where a lot of affiliates fall down. They
market
all wrong. What are some of the things you many be doing
wrong?
1) Trying to sell an expensive product from a small
classified
ad. Many seasoned marketers recommend using the two-step
method
rather than trying to sell directly from your classified
ads.
With this method, your ad entices the reader to visit a
website
to get more information, or to request it from an
autoresponder.
With the autoresponder you get the prospect's email
address to
follow-up in case they don't buy at first. This allows
you to
provide a lot more product information (explain benefits
to the
customer) than you could in a small classified ad.
2) Trying to sell a product from an ad. With many
affiliate
programs, extensive research and testing has gone into
developing
a website that is an effective selling machine. With
these
programs, your job is to "pre-sell" the
visitor. You get them
interested and draw them to the website in a receptive
mood. You
don't oversell them though since the website can
generally do the
selling a lot more effectively than you ad can. Ken Evoy
writes a
lot about pre-selling in his 5 day course for affiliates.
This is
some of the best coverage I've seen on this topic and
best of all
it's FREE. To sign up for this highly recommended free
course
simply send a blank email to: tamsmentor100@sitesell.net
3) Running your ad in the wrong place. Don't run an ad in
an
ezine where the same product is advertised by 10 other
advertisers
in the same issue. This gives the impression that the
market is
already over-saturated. If you do run your ad in ezines
that run
lots of ads for the same products, at least make your ad
read
different. I'd recommend using a url featuring your own
domain
rather than using the assigned affiliate url. Then you
simply
use a cgi-script or html refresh code to forward the
customer
to the affiliate site. This has increased click-thrus
considerably
for me and many others who use this technique. You can
have
your own website up and running for $25 per month or
less.
There really is no reason not to use this method since it
does
increase your sales. If you'd like to get setup with a
website quickly and easily, I highly recommend
Host4Profit. I
host a number of sites there and am very satisfied.
However,
at the low prices they charge you will not get as much
tech
support as with a firm charging $80 or more per month. If
you'd
like to check out this HIGHLY recommended host visit:
http://williecrawford.com/cgi-bin/tk.cgi?warriors
Notice the url I used? This uses one of the cgi-redirect
script
I mentioned above. When I use this url in my ads it both
tracks
my response rates and distinguishes my ad from all of the
others
who might be marketing the same product.
4) Relying too heavily upon banners. If you are going to
market an affiliate product from your website, text links
incorporated into the copy on your website have been
proven
more effective than banners. They blend in with the page
better. Many people have been conditioned to ignore
banners. A
good affiliate program will offer you a variety of
banners if you
still desire to use them. The best affiliate programs
will
constantly test their banners and ads and will tell you
which ones
achieve the best results.
The best type of text link to have on your site is part
of
a recommendation. To honestly make a recommendation for a
product
you need to buy a copy first. You should KNOW what your
customer will receive and the only way to do this is to
get
a copy of what you're offering. That can also save you a
lot
of time since you will not waste time marketing a
terrible
product. If you order a product and are dissatisfied, you
should return it and probably assume that lot of other
will
be dissatisfied with it too. So don't market that
product!
Your recommendations can also be in articles posted on
your
site. As you create these articles, also run them in your
ezine and submit them to other ezines.
5) Offering too many different affiliate products from
the
same webpage. Ideally, a webpage would focus the readers
attention
on the exact action that you desire him to take. When you
give
your visitors too much choices, you fail to focus his
attention.
Give him too many choices and he'll never make a choice.
This
is the very reason that most fast food restaurants only
offer
1 or 2 choices in children's meals. They know that if you
give
too many choices they'll have trouble deciding. Your
visitors
are much more sophisticated, but they are just as easily
distracted :-)
You can REALLY make BIG money with affiliate programs.
However, that does depend upon you doing a lot of things
right. Fail to do these things right, and you're wasting
your
time. Do things right and receiving nice commission
checks in
the mail will be a regular occurrence. It takes a lot of
effort
and testing.
----------------
Willie Crawford is an internet marketing consultant who
has aided hundreds in building very successful online
businesses. Feel free to drop by his marketing discussion
board at http://williecrawford.com/cgi-bin/index.cgi
today to discuss marketing and website traffic issues ;-)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Note:
This article first appeared in our ezine, Limitless
Marketing Ezine. I publish original material
similar to this in each weekly issue. If you are not
a subscriber please sign up today using the form at:
http://williecrawford.com/cgi-bin/index.cgi
Feel free to publish this article in your ezine,
in your ebook or on your website. A note telling me
that you published the article would be appreciated.
My email address is willie@williecrawford.com
Thank you,
Willie Crawford
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