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Target the product to your site's
content and to your visitor's interests
Don't use the 'scatter-gun' approach and try to sell
everything - you will end up confusing your visitors.
Try to sell the things which your target market wants, this way you will be
providing a service to them.
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Link advertisements to your site's
content
Don't just display banner adds - people tend to ignore them
and also they won't be able to see them if they have disabled images on
their browser or have purchased software which filters them out.
Place ads strategically - Forrester research reports that product links
placed strategically in your site's content is twice as likely to result in
sales than traditional banner advertisements.
Offer reviews, testimonials and recommendations for selected products.
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Banners
Change banners often and periodically update your site.
Find out how visitors are reacting to your banner advertisements.
Choose banners which have a low download time.
Try to use banners which have a call to action such as " Help keep
this site free, click here to visit our sponsor"
Make it clear that you are selling something - this will also prevent your
visitors from feeling cheated when they suddenly find themselves in front of
an order form.
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Get your customers' information
Subscribe them to your newsletter/e-zine - it is much easier to recommend a
product to people to whom you have spent time creating credibility and
rapport.
By keeping in touch with your customers it is less likely that you will lose
them to any of the affiliate programs that you have signed up with.
You can convert only up to 1% of your first time customers into sales.
However this figure can rise up to 20% with repeat customers.
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Use affiliate programs as back-end
products
If you already sell your own product then affiliate programs are the
ultimate back-end.
Take care to feature quality affiliate programs because your reputation is
on the line.
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Test the product
Always try to promote quality.
Deal with a reputable company - your reputation is at stake.
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Experiment with programs
Test which affiliate programs work best - don't be afraid to drop a program
if it isn't working.
Find programs which offer real time tracking. Test which programs are
converting the most visitors to sales. Test individual programs to see which
links are more successful. Banners, text, reviews and devoting a whole page
to a product can all be tested to see which one works better for you.
Find a program which is good at converting visitors to sales.
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Try to offer product categories which
people are buying
The most successful affiliate programs are in jobs, computers, travel,
books, marketing, gambling, internet services and real estate.
Try to offer a niche product in a popular category. This way you can
differentiate yourself from the competition and find it easier to promote
yourself in the search engines.
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Generate traffic for your site
You need at least 500 - 1,000 unique visitors per day to make an affiliate
program work for you.
Make sure that your site has a professional appearance.
Sometimes affiliate URL's are very long and this can be a problem when
promoting in newsgroups or your newsletter. An easy way around this is to
place a link to a page in your web site and have that page redirect the
visitor to the merchant homepage. Place the following code just before the
title tag in the page that you link to from your newsletter: <meta
http-equiv="refresh" content="0;url=affiliate URL">
Both Corey Rudl and Ken
Envoy offer excellent, tested methods for generating traffic to your
site.
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Try to keep the customer at your site
Try opening a new window for each affiliate link.
When visitors complete their visit to the merchant site and close
the browser window they will find themselves back at your site. Insert
target="new" into your links as follows: <a href =
"affiliate url" target = "new"> Visit Our
Sponsors!</a>.
You can use frames. This way your visitors can view merchant sites in a
frame of your choice without leaving your site.
Find programs which allow co-branding. The customer can then
follow a link back to your site after the purchase.
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Always read the affiliate contract
When programs say "up to X%" commissions check to see how
much you will really be getting.
Check to see when your affiliate membership expires - if you don't renew
some companies will just stop paying you.
Check for exclusivity clauses - some companies will stop paying you if you
feature other related affiliate programs on your site.
Make sure that the company pays frequently and doesn't require you to have a
large minimum balance before you get paid.
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Ask for references
Contact the affiliate program manager and ask for emails of existing
affiliates. Contact them and ask them about the program.
You can also find the existing affiliates yourself by finding out who links
to the affiliate program company. Go to Infoseek or AltaVista and at the
search engine type +link: url -host:url You will find
many affiliate web sites out of the search results.
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