Wednesday

Commission Junction Changing Things Up


One of the great things about utilizing affiliate programs as opposed to contextual advertising is the ability to 'modify' your listings to better blend with your site. Typically, contextual advertising requires an individual to 'not touch' the code, although small modifications are allowed 'pre-code creation'(Changing Text Link Color on Adsense).

Commission Junction recently announced that they are moving to Javascript style links and ads. Using javascript removes the ability for the publisher to modify their listing. This will remove one of the inherent benefits of being an actual publisher for an affiliate program. This move has upset a lot of affiliate publishers, many long term customers for CJ.

CJ responded:

"The Bottom Line: The new JavaScript linking format will give CJ more flexibility and control over their links and creative. The new links will also give CJ Google-AdSense-like insight into their publishers, which will help eliminate rogue affiliates from their network."
Is this a good move? Are they going to push publishers away? Time will tell if this does strengthen their affiliate program. The move is undoubtedly to appease investors, since the transfer to javascript will benefit advertisers more than publishers.

CJ's Homepage:

CJ Vantage enables advertisers to realize their performance marketing goals by combining Commission Junction's pay-for-performance expertise with advanced affiliate marketing functionality.
Advertisers rejoice and publishers cringe.

Friday

Blockbuster Online Affiliate Program

Blockbuster Online has raised their commissions once again!

Now affiliates will earn $26.50 per sale! Join now, and take advantage of this great offer!

Good luck, and happy promoting!
Affiliate Future announced BlockBuster Online raising their affiliate commissions. Exciting news, but don't go throwing together affiliate sites just yet.

Make sure whenever you create an affiliate site that you are aware of the programs policies. Many programs such as BlockBuster do not allow advertising that target their keywords. While this is a gray area, violating their TOS could mean you loose all your earned commissions.

So, just a friendly reminder. Familiarize yourself with the affiliate programs TOS and happy earning.


Wednesday

Affiliate Propaganda

When I search for a product that I'm interested in purchasing, I hope to be greeted with the most relevant pages. Typically, this would mean that I would find the 'official' page for the product in question. This is assuming that the manufacturer, retailer has an online pressence, but everyone does nowadays.

A study shows that 15% of Brand Searches Stray away from Company sites. This is extremely interesting and frankly exciting that affiliates have a chance to market a product for the big boys. Your affiliate page has the potential for being a point of sale for Brand Searching.

Users' behavior when conducting searches that include brand names is especially interesting in light of ongoing legal battles over search engines' trademark-related advertising policies. Queries involving brand names are growing in popularity, too.
Because of these findings no doubt trademark violations will be cracked down on a lot more. Google Adwords already doesn't allow the use of Trademarked names in it's campaign. But how does this affect affiliates and what advantages do 'official' sites stand to gain?

Time will tell if Google/MSN/Yahoo! want to truly keep affiliate sites out of the branding searches.

Monday

Parasites Stealing Your Affiliate Link Credit

Spyware does exist that would allow a hosts to transform your affiliate link into a link of the spywares owner. This would cause credit of the link to go to the spyware owner and not to you, the publisher. Educating yourself on these methods of 'stealing' and making yourself aware of ways to protect yourself can save you money.

5 Star Affiliate Programs offers a blog that tracks and monitors developments in the parasite world. Below are two articles, focused on parasites stealing your links.

Stop Adware
Parasite Protection

Protect yourself and your affiliate links by remaining ontop of developments in adware and the spyware world. For further news Digital Point has a thread worth reading up on as well.

Wednesday

Affiliate Cookies


When choosing an affiliate program cookies can make the difference!

The main purpose of cookies is to identify users and possibly prepare customized webpages for them.
The cookies will remember your referral, even though the customer may visit at a later date. This will ensure that you get credit for the referral, even though they did not enter the site through your creative.

Often times a customer will visit a site through your ad, but return at a later date to actually make their purchase. Potentially the customer is looking around, comparing prices, doing research and will return later for purchase. If your affiliate program does not offer cookies, you then miss out on the sale. So make sure you are getting the most out of your affiliate program, ask for the cookies.

Tuesday

Affiliate Pitfalls

When searching for Affiliate programs, be sure your comparing apples to apples. There are a number of merchant programs that disguise themselves as affiliates.

It's not an affiliate program if you have to pay, to sell their products. Such programs that charge to be a member are merchant programs. These programs provide you with a store front that you manage and sell their product. The basis for the charge is that you are purchasing the franchise rights to the site.

It's strongly suggested that beginners into the affiliate world stay away from such programs. Focus on what's free and build from there, there is potential to make plenty of money without paying for 'said' programs.

Utilizing Amazon Tools

Amazon offers a number of tools for you to use when affiliating with their products. From direct Product links to a search box they have you covered for the best creative to blend with your site. Knowing your visitors will help you decide what type of ad to use.

Utilizing the stats of your site to decide what creative to use can help increase your revenue and make your site more appealing. Knowing the entrance pages will allow you to target those pages with quality ads. In addition, knowing your most popular exit pages will allow you to take advantage of exit links, search bars, etc...

Trial and error is definately the name of the game with affiliating and patience is key.

Monday

Important Affiliate Links

Affiliate Programs

Affiliate Future
Chitika
Click Bank
Commission Junction
Amazon

Top Affiliate List

5 Star Affiliates

Affiliate and Marketing Help Forums

V7N
Digital Point

Keeping up with the sites on these links can help make your campaign a successful one. Knowing what each program has to offer, their strengths, and weaknesses will make you more revenue! Please feel free to make any suggestions on others that need to be added.

Using Auto Traffic


The use of auto surf sites tends to set on the gray line of shady business. Often times its a pitfall for the investor and a waste of time for the surfer. Auto-Traffic sites pay a small amount to users to simply visit sites, using the money from the investors looking to get their site seen. Where do you fit in?

Don't get me wrong, there are legit sites out there that can provide quality traffic. However, the majority of autosurf sites out there are scams and/or a waste of money that can be spent on legit advertising, such as Adsense.

As what's been mentioned time and time again, do your research. Taking 10min to search google can save you a lot of time and effort in the long run and possible a good amount of money. It's easier to say than do, but patience is what really pays off on the net.

Affiliate Program Spam, Stay Away

Spam, spam and more spam, it clogs the inbox of the most diligent webmaster. Sometimes, affiliate programs find their way in through the backdoor in the form of spam email. Often enough their program sounds enticing, easy to accomplish, and just worth checking out. But be warned, if spam is needed to spread their message, are they really worth doing business with?

This question has surfaced amongst some popular webmaster forums such as Digital Point and v7n and the general concensus is to stay away. These affiliate programs prey on beginner web developers and can often entice a site owner to take sign up. Once signed up, the site owner(publisher), starts advertising said product. The problem occurs when the affiliate program either doesn't payout, or sets the payout so high that it's virtually impossible to reach.

It's strongly encouraged to check out an Affiliate Program before signing up. By doing a few quick searches in google you could save yourself a lot of headache down the road. After all, it's easier to learn from others mistakes and not your own.

Sunday

Monetizing with Text Link Ads

Text Link Ads
As mentioned in my previous post regarding finding niche affiliate programs, Text Link Ads has one of the best programs available for creating multiple streams of income.

Not only can you earn money by becoming a publisher for the site, but by affiliating you can earn up to $25 per referral. A referral is considered anyone who signs up to the program, from your link, and becomes a publisher or purchases text links ad space. Therefore, not only are you earning money by having the text link ad space on your site, but you are also earning from people who you refer to the program.

They have an intuitive menus system that allows you to track your purchased ads, published ads per month and earnings, and the amount of clicks/earnings you make from your affiliate program. All of these tools can help a web developer position content and ads in different parts of a site, to see which becomes most effective. So take advantage of what they have to offer, you'll be happy you did.


Text Link Ads

Friday

Affiliating with Adsense

While Google Adsense is primarily known for its contextual advertising, it does have a referral system in place where you can earn from affiliating. Google Adsense has referrals for the Adsense Program, Picasa, Google Pack, FireFox, and is always adding more.

It is possible to earn more from these referrals than from the actual contextual advertising. For lower traffic sites starting out these referrals should be the way to go. Visitors are more likely to jump on a product from Google, than click a text link. In addition, Google offers a nice blend of Banners and creatives to make your campaign more successful.

Wednesday

Building That Affiliate Site


As discussed in my previous post, there are a lot of MFA(Made for Adsense) sites abound and not as noticable, made for affiliate sites. The question that arises is how do you know what type of product to focus on, when building a site for the sole purpose of earning revenue off of affiliating. The answer is not simple and does not come quick, so brace yourself...'A lot of research'."

A webdeveloper could easily regurgitate a website using existing content and about zero marketing. However, will this site be successful, will there automatically be traffic? Unfortunately, the 'build it they will come' does not pertain to the internet world. For this site to be successful the owner needs to focus attention on marketing the site. One of the quickest and easiest ways to do this is to use Google Adsense, as an Advertiser.

A website owner can get started advertising through the Adsense network for as little as $5.00. The trick to utilizing every click is to focus on quality ads that truly target the market you looking to sell to. In addition, finding the keywords that are not being heavily bid on will help in your search for good ROI(Return on Investment).

To by cheap and sell high is the name of the game and will require research and time. Luckily there are tools available on the net which allow you to see what the going rate for keyword is. By doing research up front, you can save a lot of nickels in the future. In the long run, these 'thrown up' sites can pay off, IF they are marketed properly.

For more information and good suggestions on what I've touched on check out 5 Star Affiliates take.

MFA, Made for Adsense

Everyone has seen them and the majority of people despise them, they are MFA's, Made for Adsense Sites. They are creeping up a lot more fequently now and some are actually starting to gain grounds in the SERPs(Search Engine Results Page). How do the MFA sites compare to the MFAP sites?

MFAP, Made For Affiliate Program sites. It would seem to me that sites created to market(affiliate) products would be chocked full of useful content, thus making a better webpage. At least the better content would warrant having a high SERP ranking, so why not more MFAP's? The answer is simple, it takes more work.

In time Google will do something to help combat the sludge of the internet, but until then, fight the good battle. Create quality websites with good content and even better affiliating. ;)

Finding Programs to Affiliate

Sometimes the best affiliate programs are not readily available, or rather advertised. These programs are found after you join a service, purchase a product, or subscribe to some sort of offer online.

Some noteworthy affiliate programs are available from such companies as PokerStars.com and Text-Link-Ads.com, but you wouldn't know it unless you signed up for their services. To be an affiliate for PokerStars.com you must have an account, downloaded their software, and remain somewhat active. Despite these requirements, the payouts are extremely nice, and worth looking into.

Text-Link-Ads.com is another example of having a fine affiliate program. They offer the affiliate $25 for every visitor that either purchases a text ad or becomes a publisher for their ads. They provide the Affiliate with a number of catchy banners, buttons, and useful tools to track their program.

Text Link Ads Text Link Ads Text Link Ads

Affiliate Future

Affiliate Future is one of the leading programs available in affiliate marketing. They offer plenty of products to choose from, to fit your websites needs. The following is a brief list of some of the things they offer:










As mentioned, this is just a very brief overview of some of my own successful affiliations. The actual lead earnings and sales earnings per program vary greatly, but all have successful click through ratios. It's important to choose the program that works best for the content on your site, to save on useless clicks. ;)

Tuesday

Amazon Sucks?

I just made $14 for selling $400 worth of merchandise for Amazon, and I'm sick of it.

Comments such as this are starting to run rampant amongst the affiliate crowd. Whose fault is this? Obviously Amazon is a business looking to make money, but are they starting to cut the grunts out of the picture. Afterall, the grunts are the ones putting Amazon's name out on the net and marketing the plethora of products they have to offer. Truly a game of give and take.

The downside to Amazon is that they have considerably low percentages for payout. However, they offer a broad line of products that you can choose from to market. So, utilizing Amazon could best be done by mixing it with other programs on your site, ie. Adsense, Clicksor, or other contextual advertising.