» Affiliate Marketing

Five Steps to Affiliate Marketing Success with No Money

David Ward — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 04:00:52 +0000

Everyone likes Free, and especially if they can start a business for free. Unfortunately, even the best FREE business opportunities are not really free. Even if there is no money out of pocket in the beginning, there is an investment of your time, and your time is worth something. The only question you must ask yourself when considering a ‘free business opportunity’ then is how much time are you willing to invest into the opportunity to make it successful for yourself. But, if money is the only thing holding you back from making money online, there are a lot of opportunities that can generate you an income – and in some instances a very large income – but you must decide if you are willing to invest your time in the same way you would if you had put up a bunch of money to get involved.

SD Ward & Associates is continually reviewing online marketing opportunities for clients, and have several recommendations for great online marketing opportunities that you can join for free under our “Join for Free!” tab to the right of this article; however, this particular article is dedicated to that of getting started in affiliate marketing without having to spend any money to do so.

The following are five steps are how you can start building a financial future as an affiliate marketing professional. All it will take is your time – a few focused hours a day for a few months – to start generating a growing income without any out of pocket expenses. There is really no better place in the world that an average individual with Internet access can start making money without having to put a single dollar out of their pocket in order to do so. Let me share briefly how you can go about doing this, and offer you some guidelines that will get you well on your way to building a monthly re-occurring income working from the comfort of your home.

The one business that I know for certain that you can start with absolutely NO money out of pocket is that of building an affiliate marketing business. Affiliate marketing is a really slick way of earning an income from home, and the only ‘investment’ you have is your time. Affiliate marketing is the process by which you select a product or service that you believe in or feel comfortable with telling others about, then set about marketing that product or service on behalf of the individual or company that is offering it. The best part of affiliate marketing is that you can promote as many products or services as you want to. And, IF you are good at it (and thousands upon thousands of average people are) you can make enormous (LOTS) of money.

Steps to Starting Your Own Online Affiliate Marketing Business

In a nut shell, for you readers who get bored or grow impatient quickly, this is how you do it: choose a product you like, sign up as an affiliate of it, write articles that interest you, advertise the affiliate links for your products or services on your article page, promote your article. It’s that simple. OK, so, now that I have the bored and the impatient taken care of, let’s break this affiliate marketing business down and see what it takes.

1) You will need to have access to a computer or smart phone with Internet access. I have known some people that did not have a computer or Internet service to start an affiliate marketing business who worked from a school computer lab or used a computer at a public library. There really isn’t any reason anyone that can read or type can’t do this if they really want to.

2) Find a good affiliate program that offers good commissions for what they have to sell. There are lots of companies that have affiliate programs. Almost everything you can think of is or can be marketed through affiliate programs. Most Fortune 500 companies offer some sort of affiliate program to promote at least one of their products if not all of them. There are several companies online that you can work with who broker affiliate programs. In some cases you can deal directly with the company that is offering a product or service. One particular type of company that I started doing affiliate marketing with was computer software like that of Anti-virus and computer performance and maintenance software. I chose this because, #1, I really believed in what the software had to offer (personal experience), and #2, the commissions were good on the software I chose to sell.

3) Determine what subject or subjects that you are really knowledgeable or passionate about. I always recommend to my coaching clients that it be one that you know a great deal about where others could either be inspired or benefit from your knowledge or experience. Once you determine what that subject or interest is (or they are), begin writing on it each day. Write short articles of between 500 and 750 words that can be read in three or four minutes max. This is a good length to engage a reader, but not so long that they run out of time to read it.

What are you most passionate about or what is it that you know the most about from your life work, education, or recreation? Once you determine that, start writing about those things. Begin by just opening up a word processing program and start writing about it – everyday, for 20 minutes. You will find that the number of articles you will accumulate will be more than enough to promote your products or services with after a few months. If you are unsure what you are most passionate about, one of the best reflections of who you are is what you post to your FaceBook or Friendster profiles, or whatever social network you belong to.

4) Start a blog or begin posting your articles to your social media profiles that include links to the products and services that you are promoting. If you choose a subject like ‘camping’ that you enjoy and want to write about, include links to camping supply and outfitter companies that you are an affiliate for. I encourage most writers to set up a WordPress blog (it’s free to set up), and begin their personal blog in a blogging community to get additional exposure, and link their social network profiles to their blog.

5) Find others who need articles for their blogs or who would be willing to allow you to post some of your articles on their blogs that have your affiliate links embedded into the content of your article, i.e. an article on rock climbing that talks about the importance of having a good fitting pair of rock climbing shoes, with a link embedded in it for a Website that sells rock climbing shoes that you are an affiliate of. The more your articles are distributed with your links or contact information in them, the more traffic you will see on your Website or through your affiliate links.

EXTRA CREDIT: If you really want to explode your affiliate marketing business once it is up and running and generating you some monthly income, consider self host your blog as soon as you can afford to. When you self-host your blog, it gives you full control over everything that goes on your blog Website, including the advertising and affiliate links that will earn you money. In order to self host, you will need a domain name. A domain name is your personal or business address on the World Wide Web. They cost between $8.00 and $35.00, depending on the company you choose and whether or not there are any additional services provided to you with the domain name. Hosting costs are based on the amount of traffic you hope or plan to have. Expect to pay between $2.50 and $100.00, per month depending on what added services you want.

Keep in mind that you can make as much money with a low traffic Website with a high rate of visitor response as you can with a high traffic Website with little or no visitor response. That is why product or service selection for your affiliate programs are so important. The product or service affiliate programs you choose should reflect the nature and content of your Website. I also recommend you do not use any company that promotes or reflects values that are not shared by you personally (this is known as being a socially responsible net-citizen.

If you are not sure about how to go about choosing a product or service affiliate program that’s right for you, read my blog on “How to Choose an Affiliate Program that’s Right for You.”

FTC Crackdown on Affiliate Marketers

David Ward — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 04:00:01 +0000

It comes as no surprise to many in the content development business that it would eventually happen. The Internet has become a virtual jungle of content infomercials to a point that an innocent bystander who happens across a Website that practices such a thing cannot tell the difference between legitimate content and an endorsement for a product or service being eluded to in the article. Before you go getting all down on websites that practice such things, almost every major media outlet in America (including the alphabet networks – ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN) practice the same thing in one form or another. It’s just how the free enterprise system works, and the FTC wants to do what they can to protect unwary Internet consumers from potential fraud or misunderstandings that would lead them to act in a way that might not be in their best interest.

Hear is some news you can use, and we encourage you to pay close attention to it if you are an affiliate marketing professional (or even an novice). Starting this past December 1, 2009, the FTC put some guidelines in place to help protect consumers from unscrupulous Website owners who subtly promote products and services within the context of the content they post. It is now required that if you promote directly or indirectly any product or service that is not your own and available on your Website either by advertisement or hyperlink, or where such a product or service is promoted, endorsed or recommended by content of any kind on your Website, that you must clearly provide a notice to this affect, that you are doing this, and the notice must be clearly posted and/or accessible from every page

Additionally, you must provide notice to any email recipients within the email you are sending if you send email with links included in those email of websites other than your own and where providing those links may result in a profit as a result of your referral. Here is an example of a written notice for the Website owner who promotes products and services through content and editorial, as well as personal email:

“The advertisements and/or links on the pages of this Website and/or blog pages of this Website that may be found in or around any article or within any email that originates from our Website, or other domain related to this Website constitutes an affiliate marketing relationship between our Website owners and yourself, or with the destination Website of any link on our Website. What this means is that in most cases, if you click an link that we have an affiliate relationship with, that we may in most cases make a referral fee or commission on if you click on them. As such, we are required by law to share this information with you so that you are aware that our endorsement(s) of a product or service, or website that is accessible from our website, or an email which may allow me to earn a commission or referral fee if you click on the links therein.”.

If you are an online marketer, and do not have a notice like this on every page of your Website, or a link on every page that directly accesses this Disclosure, you may be operating your Website illegally and subject to sanctions, fines or both by regulatory agencies that monitor and/or police the Internet. Our advice? Play it safe. Have a notice at the bottom of every page you have on your Website that lets people know these things about your Website, or have a link in your top menu bar that is explicitly for the legal aspects of your Website.

Affiliate Marketing 101

David Ward — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 04:00:43 +0000

Affiliate Marketing Defined

By definition, affiliate marketing is the act of sending someone to a Website (through an advertisement or link on your Website) and then earning a commission when they buy something, submit a request for more information, or contract with the Website owner for services to be rendered.

Affiliate marketing was pioneered by Amazon in the 1990s as an incentive for users to earn money by referring others to their Website to purchase books. This concept for online marketing gave (gives) those who act as affiliates the ability to make money selling products without having to stock any inventory or have any overhead costs. Today, it is one of the easiest and most lucrative ways to start your own business online.

Taking the First Step

Most, if not all affiliate marketing participants, have their own Website, if not several Websites. If you do not have a personal Website, I recommend that you secure at least one domain name (preferably your personal name if possible). This will become one of two things for you – either your lead capture page or your landing page for what you are promoting. In some instances they will be one in the same. You DO need a Website so that search engines will be able to find you and what you are selling.

As a socially conscious consumer, I recommend www.smartycatdomains.com to all of my clients, because Smarty Cat Domains gives 25% of their profits to efforts and organizations that help single moms and children. Their prices are very reasonable and they give you lots of freebies and excellent customer and tech support service. [Disclaimer: I do not receive anything for referring you to their Website, but the satisfaction in knowing that I am helping to support a worthwhile cause]. You might be able to find a domain offer for a dollar or two cheaper along with some promotion the company might be running, bang for the buck, I recommend Smarty Cat Domains because I KNOW what they do for me after the sell. And, as I have said, in today’s turbulent and dysfunctional world, socially responsible purchases are just good business and good for our communities.

Connect with your Product

Have you ever seen someone or known of someone who was trying to sell something that they really didn’t believe in or feel that was providing the buyer with a good product or service? They just bleed with dullness and mediocrity. Why sell something that you do not believe in? That is just plain crazy, other than if you are just greedy or do not care. I never market or promote anything that I do not personally use or will not gladly use myself. I MUST believe it is good for those who purchase it, and as a result, I can be enthusiastic and proud to offer it.

Let’s say you are into health and helping people lose weight. This is something that you really believe in and are passionate about. So, you start researching products and services can be marketed to over-weight individuals which by the way, is a huge, HUGE market both online and in stores. In your search, you come across a manufacturer Website that sells cellulite cream – the stuff that you ‘just rub on and it takes away your fat and makes you look thinner’ – hmmm, bad example. I don’t know anyone that is a believer in fat creams who is into health. If you are into health, you are not trying to hide your fat, but lose it. So, let’s NOT be thinking about obese people we know trying to look thinner by rubbing cream all over their body, if they are not also pushing themselves away from the table and ditching the French fries and ice cream. Let’s just tell them to become accountable to someone about their eating habits and start walking instead.

Meanwhile, back at your search for the best products and services that you can find (and preferably already use), you decide you really like the blender that you just purchased and it happens to be a Vita-Mix blender (great choice). AND, that you like it so much that you want everyone in the world to have one too. It’s time to research it online. You visit the Vita-Mix corporate Website (no, I do not sell nor am I an affiliate of theirs) and you see their line of blenders. Now THIS is something you can get behind since you just purchased one recently and absolutely swear by it. [NOTE: This will be important to you when it comes time to promote it or them] Now that you have a product you believe in, it’s time to research it.

Research the Company and Their Product

It’s important to throw this in here since it can have an affect on your sales and your personal reputation. As good as a product or service sounds to you, you always want to do a little more research and see if you can find any dirt on the company or individual that you are considering becoming an affiliate for. Usually, with a little research to confirm that they are reputable for online marketing and eCommerce, that there are not tons of complaints about their products/services, customer service, and warranties, you can determine if you want to enter into their affiliate program.

This advice is especially true with ‘services’ that are marketed online, like those of training and affiliate marketing seminars, etc. These businesses can rack in the bucks for you, since they charge sometimes thousands for their ‘systems’; however, these are also some of the most complained about and closely scrutinized operations online by regulatory and consumer watch groups. Your reputation is worth far more than the money you will make with them until they get shut down, and you could run the risk of having to repay unhappy customers who complain to the FTC, attorney generals office in their home state, and to the better business bureau.