Affiliate Programs

 If you are relatively new to the world of internet marketing then affiliate programs are a good place to start. Affiliate marketing is simply where you promote other people's products, and in exchange you earn a certain percentage or set fee for every sale that you make. This can be as high as 75% in some instances.

They are very easy to get started with. You don't even need a web site in some cases, although I do recommend that you do if you want to make some serious money.

 To find a suitable affiliate program you could simply go to any major retail site on the net. Most will have their own affiliates section or partner programs. Alternatively you could visit an affiliate network who will give a whole directory of potential programs you can join together with their respective payout rates. There are many of these networks all over the net, but by far the most popular are Clickbank and Commission Junction.

As regards how it actually works, basically when you sign up to a company as an affiliate they will give you a special URL with your affiliate ID embedded in it. For example, company-you're-promoting.com/youraffiliateID. This will allow them to track the sales that they make and to know which affiliate to credit for the sale.

In addition in some cases they will give you all kinds of marketing tools, such as banners, text links, special promotions, etc, all with your unique affiliate URL embedded in them. You could use these on your own site, or if you don't yet have your own website you could use them in email campaigns, traffic exchanges, free ads, or any other promotional campaign.

I should point out that while it's tempting to simply pick affiliate programs with the highest payouts, you should pick products that are likely to get most sales from your site visitors or potential prospects. For example, given a choice between promoting a product where I can receive a $300 commission per sale, but it is not at all targeted towards my target audience, and a highly targeted and relevant product offering $30 per sale, I would choose the latter every time.

Also, if you're planning on setting up your own website think about how you're going to get traffic to that site, and how much competition you're likely to face. For example, if you're planning on setting up a mortgage website and promoting mortgage companies that pay per lead then you're going to be competing in an already over-saturated market, and your chances of getting lots of traffic in this area are very slim.

To conclude this section on affiliate marketing I just want to leave you with three excellent affiliate marketing ebooks that I have bought myself:

Affiliate Project X - This is probably the best guide to affiliate marketing on the internet. It's less general than other informational guides, being strongly focused towards promoting Clickbank products, but nevertheless shows you the exact methods that the author uses himself to make thousands of dollars every month from affiliate marketing. I've since used some of the methods myself, and have seen my own affiliate commissions increase dramatically as a result, so I can assure you that these methods actually work.

Secret Affiliate Weapon - This is a terrific package by the renowned super-affiliate Ewen Chia. Packed to the rafters with useful tips on how you too can become a super-affiliate. Just getting access to his secret blog alone is worth the ridiculously low price of $9.97 but you get so much more besides, including the chance to rebrand his free viral reports and videos with your own affiliate links, and give them away, earning you cash in the process. 

Super Affiliate Handbook - This ebook focuses entirely on affiliate marketing and offers some invaluable advice on how you can make it pay. The advice offered comes from Rosalind Gardner, a highly successful and renowned affiliate marketer, so you know you are getting the very best advice.