There are many advantages. For anyone with a website, it is the ultimate marketing tool that will earn money for you without much effort. Of course, to make even more money, you will have to put in a little more work.
Here are some of the reasons why affiliate marketing is a sure shot way to earning some extra cash on your website:
- As an affiliate, you don’t have to do a lot of writing or any promotion of the affiliate programs. Because of that, those tasks are done by the affiliate networks.
- You don’t have to do any technical work. All of the tracking and accounting is also done by the affiliate networks.
- You don’t have to worry about the promotional materials. All of the promotional materials are already done by the websites.
- You don’t have to deal with payment processing and client support. All these are done by the affiliate networks.
- You don’t have to offer customer support. All of the customer support is also done by the affiliate networks.
- You don’t have to worry about making a product. All of the product development is also done by the affiliate networks.
- Since you are working as an affiliate, your time is your own. You can choose when to work and when to take a break. You can organize your work in a way that you run your own business. In order to learn more about affiliate marketing, you will need to read books, forums or articles about the topic.
There are also a couple of things you should know before you venture into affiliate marketing. Pay attention to these tips if you are offered an opportunity to choose between two or three similar products, take the first one off your list. Simple tasks like filling out a form, program description, terms and conditions of the promotion should be available on the websites. Once you sign up for these forms, you will be given an affiliate link. The other option is to look in your favourite search engine for affiliate offers. Several affiliate networks provide offers and links which you can use to join.
How to Earn Money as an Affiliate
- Think of a Niche Market
You have to think of a market that will be most suitable for you and your websites. It is better to choose a larger, well-defined niche market for your website. Try Google’s AdWords keyword tool to help you research your market. It is an excellent tool, particularly useful if you have no idea about what to promote.
- Research the Products
Once you have chosen your market, the next step is to do some research on the products. This is the critical part of this step. Here you need to know what competition you’ll up against, as well as the ratio of demand to supply. Make sure you choose a product that will easily meet the needs of the people in your chosen market.
- Choose your Product
Now that you have chosen a profitable niche and chosen your product, you are ready to make some money. Simply use your affiliate link to promote the product and you are off to the races. If you have chosen your affiliate network successfully, you should be able to see your account blossom with sales within a few days. While it won’t be easy, it is the dream come true for every new affiliate.
- Create your Website
Website creation is the next step in the process. Close to 80% of all affiliates create their website using WordPress or other blogs – usually these blogs are no more than one page websites. The remaining 19% use programs like dreamweaver, Frontpage, or MS Word to build their website.
The first two options are easy, but difficult to maintain. If you choose to go with wordpress, you will need to get a domain name and through several site building programs become technical enough to learn how to FTP and host your site. Then you will also need to get a hosting company to host your site. With all of these estimated costs, many prospective affiliates choose the third option, which is to create their website.
In terms of content, affiliate marketing is almost the same as having an on line store. You must however offer the same products on your site that you do on your domain. Because of the high competition for most generic domain names, choose your domain name with care and research to make sure you pick a.com domain name which is.org, for example. If you do not provide good content on your site, it is extremely difficult to attract visitors.
- Build a Website
Once you’ve created your site, it’s time to build your website and begin marketing it to attract visitors. Don’t expect to simply put a copy and paste site together. You should spend at least one hour each week building and updating your site.
