Affiliate Marketing: Downside

Affiliate marketing is one of the major forms of revenue generation on the internet with so many benefits that it is hard to find a downside to it.

In the world of affiliate marketing, a web publisher gets products to sell for free along with the very tools to sell online; and, the ensuing clicks and commissions become a stream of independent and consistent income. On the other hand, an advertiser or a merchant gets free marketing for their products and services; and, other than the initial expense of setting up shop with an affiliate network, may not incur any cost till the publisher ‘performs’ through a sale or a click.

The merchant/advertiser, the web publisher, and the affiliate network system work together to provide easy online shopping experience to the consumer. In all of this, the consumer, buyer, client or customer is bound to get a better deal.

But of course, from the point of view of a web publisher or blogger, there are downsides to affiliate marketing that are stemming from the 'ease of use' factor where implementing affiliate marketing strategies is so easy and accessible that anyone who has a website or a blog can participate in them. As a result, each of us are competing with thousands of other similar sites offering the very same products. So, the challenge for us is to position and present our affiliate products and services in a manner to at least get our 'fair share' of the market.

One worry that has loomed on affiliate marketing is spamming, cookie-cutting and unethical usage of affiliate marketing systems by some web publishers. Due to the nature of online marketing and business, spamming can not be eliminated but the majority of the online business communities do not subscribe to it, and actively shun a spamming publisher.

The most recommended way to assure a fair share of affiliate market is to develop and implement Search Engine Optimization (SEO) on the content but to also perform actual website optimization strategies. Following that, affiliate marketing will have us and our online businesses perform to the best of our abilities.

How to Join Affiliate Networks

For Website Owners and Bloggers

Affiliate network systems provide a dynamic interface for merchants and web publishers to work together to reach out to the consumer in an effort to increase sales and generate additional sources of revenue.

This is achieved through a sophisticated online system of merchants and publishers that provides access to advertisements, tracks traffic, provides real-time statistics, pays web publishers, resolves issues, assures an ethical business environment, and strengthens online e-commerce communities.

If you are a website owner, a blogger or a web publisher, join an affiliate network to implement this free internet marketing strategy, and generate additional revenue from your blog or website. The following few steps on how to join an affiliate network as a web publisher, will enable your web or blog site to start making more money without incurring any cost.

- Go to the website of an affiliate marketing network, and register by providing name, the name of your site, and other basic information

- Now, you can browse all categories to find the best products or services to promote through your website or blog. This is an important decision that must lead you to categories that are best suited to the general themes of your website or blog.

- View merchants in chosen categories, and for best results, choose merchants and advertisers that enhance and complement your themes, and support your niche on the Net.

- Choose your favorite merchants in one click. Most merchants and advertisers have an easy online approval system, and can approve your site there and then. However, some programs may need to qualify your site based on traffic and sales. Either way, you will know by tomorrow.

- Once your site is approved by an advertiser, their program appears in your account. Each advertiser allows you to choose from various types of creatives available in that program such as 'text/email links', 'banners', 'media', etc.

- Visit the desired creatives page, and choose the best advertisements for your site keeping in view size, color scheme and images for a better 'fit' for your web page.

- The code for chosen creatives will be made available, click the provided 'code' or 'link' button; and, all you have to do now is to copy and paste it in the HTML code section of your web page. However, some blog platforms such as Wordpress, do not allow third party code, widgets, banners or other advertisements while Blogger does. For non-supporting platforms, try text links.

- Once the code is copied and pasted, the affiliate marketing network system will begin to record ad impressions, clicks, resulting sales and other important information about the traffic on your site. You will see ad impressions, clicks, sales, commission amounts and other data reflected in daily real-time statistics

- Most affiliate marketing programs provide comprehensive support and help sections for publishers and merchants to find additional markets, to expand existing markets, improve traffic, and to increase sales.

Join Linkshare Referral Program to become an affiliate of the very best on the Net.

In UK, click below to join UK Linkshare Referral Program:
..
515 Words

Primary keywords
affiliate network systems, affiliate marketing, how to, web publishers, website owners, increase sales, join free, revenue, merchants
Secondary keywords
linkshare, linkshare uk, ad impressions, clicks, ethical business, creatives, advertisers, banners, text links, email links
Related keywordsblogger, wordpress, html code
..

Also view Affiliate Marketing

..

How to be a Successful Affiliate Marketer

It is easy to register with an affiliate marketing network, find merchants by browsing various categories, apply to become their affiliate in one click, get auto-approved by some of them, copy the supplied code for chosen ads, paste it in the code section of your web page, upload the file, and there you are. An instant Affiliate Marketer!

Indeed, most of us can accomplish all of these steps in the span of five to fifteen minutes. Try it at Linkshare affiliate marketing network for free.

However, it may not be as easy or as 'instant' to get traffic, clicks, sales and commissions. Our online internet marketplace requires more planning, understanding and skill from us to achieve success in our affiliate marketing objectives.

To be a successful affiliate marketer, each of us must exercise care in developing and implementing affiliate marketing strategies. Finding appropriate affiliate products and services is central to all such strategies but is not all. Professional online marketing experiences shows us that even when our chosen products and services are of outstanding quality and brand, we may not register much income from them if any of the following is lacking:

The general theme of a website or blog does not support the chosen product range. A classic example of this would be to promote lingerie at a website concerned with religious issues. Not only that it may offend some regular visitors of the site but will also be a wasted effort as it is unlikely that 'lingerie buyers' will be flocking at that URL address to make a buying decision about lingerie. On the other hand, a 'Donate' button for affiliate charitable causes may fit right in.

The website owner/operator does not have enough skills and knowledge to implement internet marketing strategies. Sales and clicks do not begin to happen just because affiliate ads are being displayed at a website. We are operating in a highly competitive marketplace where web publishers feel motivated enough to practice keyword bidding to capture lead positions on the search results page.
So, to begin with, each advertiser or merchant we chose, must be given focus with a targeted and dedicated (mini) marketing campaign; and, to place and position that product/service in your website and business scheme.
If our website owner/operator is not a web marketing professional, we may not be able to make the most of affiliate marketing opportunities. However, there are ways to overcome such barriers. Our first choice will be to hire an internet marketing professional at Net-Marketing; and, if that is not possible than to find available online marketing tools.

An excellent email marketing tool is offered by Vertical Response that allows the user to create, send and track email campaigns in minutes. Have a Test Drive. Build an email campaign for your affiliate business.

Web pages are not optimized for search engines (SEO). Even if we use well written and interesting copy with useful information about a product or sevice, we may still loose our most qualified buyers if our copy is not Search Engine Optimized (SEO). The search engine robots will invariably present search engine optimized (SEO) pages ahead of the ones that have not been optimized for search engines regardless of the quality of information presented in them.
..

500 Words
..

Keywords
Primary
affiliate, marketing, email marketing, seo
Secondary
lingerie, sales, clicks, commissions, vertical response, search engines, advertiser, web publisher
Related
website owner, operator, robots
..

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing has become an important component of internet marketing strategies because of the tremendous growth experienced by the affiliate marketing sector in the recent years. In a nutshel, affiliate marketing is a commission-based sales system unique to the internet where easy online affiliation with merchants results in the creation of ongoing sources of revenue for website owners.

The uniqueness of affiliate marketing system resides in its capacity to benefit the big and medium merchants/manufacturers on one hand, and the largest number of online businesses and website owners who are NOT merchants or producers, on the other. This interaction takes place through a sophisticated networking system that brings together web publishers and merchants where a publisher may acquire affiliate product information to refer customers from their website, and receive commission when a sale happens or another agreed objective is achieved.

Affiliate marketing includes PPC or PayPerClick but is not limited to it.

A web publisher may acquire and display advertisements of their affiliates in the form of text links, banners, widgets, email links, coupons and other 'creatives'. These images and links to affiliate products and landing pages are then offered to the publisher’s own clients and visitors. As well, a web publisher can join for FREE one or all of the affiliate marketing networks where participation in time-efficient and cost-effective systems of affiliation will allow even a small web publisher to sell products created by the industry leaders.

Affiliate marketing is created by the interaction of the Merchants (advertisers, manufacturers or producers of a product or service), the Publishers (website owners willing to display advertiser’s product/service links on their web pages), the Networks (programs or systems of affiliate marketing that allow the affiliation process to take place), and the Customers (online buyers, visitors, consumers, clients).

At this time, there are two major affiliate networks, Commission Junction and Linkshare, and both offer supportive and easy to use affiliate marketing systems. However, for starters, I will recommend Linkshare. Whether you are a web publisher or an advertiser, click the following text or banner link to join Linkshare affiliate marketing network and see if it works for you. Join for free:

..

547 Words

Primary keywords
affiliate, marketing, revenue, web publisher, advertiser, merchants, commissioned sales, traffic, online marketing, products, services
Secondary keywords
SEO, PPC, pay per click, google adsense, linkshare, commission junction, manufacturers, income, ad impressions, free, creatives, affiliate network,
Related keywords
text links, coupons, banners

..

Content provided by Webwords

..

Also view: How To Join Affiliate Marketing Network: Website Owners/Bloggers

..