Archive for June, 2010
How Do You Explain, “What is Affiliate Marketing?”
Anyone who spends any amount of time in affiliate marketing will eventually have to answer the question, “What is affiliate marketing?” For those who aren’t highly computer literate, it can take a while to grasp the concept. For others, the field is synonymous with scammers and multi-level marketers who pollute otherwise enjoyable websites with their promotions. Either way, you’re likely to encounter both confusion and stereotypes when you venture out into the world of non-affiliates.
One of the best ways to explain affiliate marketing to strangers is to invoke examples of traditional sales reps or commissioned sales people. You can point out the examples of manufacturer’s reps who go to stores, or door-to-door salesmen who go around marketing their wares. They don’t earn the entire sale. Instead, they get paid a percentage of the total sales that come through them.
Of course, people will then wonder how anyone knows you sent the sales, not to mention how you do your promotions. You can explain that you have special web addresses (most people will glaze over if you start talking about URLs) that contain a piece of code that lets the original merchant know who you are. When people click on those links and end up making purchases, you make money.
And how do you get those clicks? Well, you make websites about related topics and build a following, or you purchase advertising through other sites that already have many visitors.
In most cases, this simplified explanation will eventually sink in. It may take a little longer with, say, your grandmother, but have patience – she’ll get it someday.
How to Choose a Good Affiliate Marketing Program on Shareasale
The methods for choosing an affiliate marketing program to promote will vary from network to network. CJ has performance bars, Clickbank has gravity, and others are a bit more nebulous. Sure, you could look at the EPC or CPC (depending on the network), but that doesn’t always tell you much. There’s a HUGE different in EPC when you have a few capable affiliates promoting something with PPC and using a landing page vs. when you have a couple of newbies submitting direct links to their favorite “get paid to click” networks.
With Shareasale, there are a few things you want to look at with any program. First, even though it’s not always useful, take a look at the EPC. If it’s zero, that’s a good sign that no one is promoting the program. Depending on how the site looks, that could be either a fantastic opportunity or a good warning sign. You’ll have to use your judgment on that one. If the average commission is high and the EPC is low, it could be a sign that either it doesn’t convert well, or that a lot of bad marketers are sending way too much untargeted traffic. It’s tough to make a judgment here, so just make a mental note and consider it in light of the other things you’ll uncover later.
Next, take a look at the reversal rate – both 7 day and 30 day. Some merchants batch process merchandise returns once monthly, so if you see an extremely high 7 day reversal rate and a normal 30 day reversal rate (5% or lower), it’s a good sign that their program isn’t as bad as the 7 day reversal rate would seem. If the 30 day reversal rate is high, though, steer clear of the program.
You should also look at the merchant page itself. Is the page attractive and well-organized? Does it look amateurish? Does it have a phone number at the top encouraging users to call in their orders instead of placing them online (thereby cutting out your commissions).
Finally, take a look at the average commission. If the average commission is $1.00, you’re probably not going to have much luck promoting the program with PPC or PPV marketing. It might work, but it’s highly doubtful. On the other hand, if the average commission is $80, you have a lot of room for advertising expenditure. Again, look at both the 30 day and 7 day figures to get a clearer picture of things.
As you get more experience in affiliate marketing, you’ll eventually develop your own techniques for evaluating merchant programs. For now, though, this list should help you get started in evaluating affiliate marketing programs on Shareasale.
Will an Internet Marketing System Work?
A lot of people wonder if they will ever find an internet marketing system that works, or if it’s even possible that any of them work. The truth is actually pretty simple – almost all of them work. They just don’t all work for everyone. The problem is that we all come to this field with different skills and different weaknesses. What works for one person will not always work for another. Luckily, though, there are ways to maximize your chances of finding a program that works.
- Do an honest appraisal of yourself – Your strengths, weaknesses, and your ability to invest. This is extremely important in choosing a program. If you don’t have money to invest, don’t waste your time with courses on paid traffic. If you don’t have a lot of time to invest, not many programs at all are going to help you. The initial time investment is never as small as sales letters would have you believe.
- Find out exactly what traffic source is being taught – If a course’s sales letter doesn’t make it clear how you’ll be earning money and driving traffic, run far away. It’s a big waste of your time and it’s also a good indication that things may not be completely on the up-and-up.
- Get a money-back guarantee – Use that “free trial” to quickly look over the material and see if it fits your work style. If not, get out while you still can.
And of course, you have to make sure that you’re willing to follow through. Without follow-through, there isn’t a course in the world that can help you make money online.
Internet Marketing Tools: Picking a Domain Name
When it comes to internet marketing tools, few are more handy than the ones that help you pick your domain name. A great many of the “good” domains have been taken at this point, so it’s difficult to come up with something that’s keyword-heavy, memorable, easily spelled, and most importantly, AVAILABLE. The tools below should help you accomplish that.
- Thesaurus: This is the most basic tool in your arsenal, but it’s important. Suppose you want to make a blog about your obsession with chocolate. Instead of just giving up when “chocolateobsession.com” is already taken, you can use your thesaurus to come up with alternatives like problem, addiction, need, urge, and so on. With enough synonyms, you’re bound to find something that you like.
- Dotomator: This site lets you use multiple columns and enter words you’d consider pairing. In the previous example, you might put words like chocolate, choco, candy, and sweets in the first column. In the second column, you’d use words like obsession, problem, fanatic, etc. The site would then try every possible combination and tell you which ones were available for registration.
- Apt Domain: This site is similar to Dotomator, except that it lets you put all the words in the same column. This is better if you don’t care about the specific order of the words in your domain.
- Expiring Domain List: This is available through a number of registrars, and it simply lets you browse domains that are about to expire. Often, you’ll find hidden gems that you can snatch up immediately when owners forget about them.
Do you know of any other good domain-finding tools? Leave your thoughts in the comments!
Internet Marketing Ideas: Valuable Links for SEO
When it comes to internet marketing ideas, it’s not exactly revolutionary to come out and say that you need inbound links to rank well in the search engines. We all know that much. Google has made it very clear that they value sites that are valued by others (in the form of inbound links, which act as popularity votes). Among links, though, they’re not all created equal. There are definitely some links that are more valuable than others – but which ones? Below, we’ve covered a few of the most important factors in determining the quality of an inbound link.
- Anchor Text: Anchor text is crucial, as this is one of the best ways to tell Google what a page is about. If you want to rank for a particular phrase, it’s vital to have inbound links that use that phrase as their anchor text. This one small step will dramatically improve your ability to rank.
- Pagerank: Pagerank gives you a good idea of where a site stands in terms of inbound links. Ideally, you want as many links as possible from high Pagerank sites.
- Relevance: It’s not just about anchor text. If a site relates to your topic, the link is going to be worth more to you.
- Purity: If a link is purchased, it’s probably worth less than a non-purchased link. Obviously, it’s impossible for Google to know which links are paid in all cases, but it’s not too difficult to figure out the ones purchased through major link buying services. It’s also not at all difficult for your competitors to report you for link buying. The best case scenario is one where you build links manually and don’t buy any at all.
What other traits do you look for in your links? Although these are some of the top factors to consider, they’re not the only ones. Weigh in on the comments!