Affiliate Marketing Guide

How to Make Money With Affiliate Programs

Affiliate marketing is one of the most widely used method of making money on the Web. Although it is easy to use it is also badly misused... 80% of all affiliates don't make any money with them.

What Are Affiliate Programs?

An affiliate program is a partnership with a merchant were the affiliate earns a commission on sales/ or leads that the affiliate produces by referring visitors to the merchant site.

What Is Affiliate Marketing ?

It is a specialized form of marketing where an affiliate promotes a product or service and in return is rewarded by a commission when a sale is made or an agreed action completed.

Simply put an affiliate send visitors to a merchants site and they buy something then the affiliate gets  a percentage of the sale. The process is simply:

1. The affiliate joins a program and places affiliate links on his website or in a newsletter.
2. Visitors click the links and are sent to the merchants site.
3. The affiliate earns a commission on any sales made to that visitor.

 Benefits of Affiliate Marketing 

• You don't need a merchant account.
• you don't have to spend large amounts to manufacture and store inventory.
• No order processing
• No shipping or handling of products.
• No customer e-mail queries  (inquiries and support are 24/7 issues that can easily eat up 50% of your day) .
• They cost nothing to join (beware of those few that do)
• No start-up costs.

Affiliate Programs FAQ

It all sounds simple and in fact it really is. So simple that most people are naturally sceptical and so I've put together a small Affiliate program FAQ

• Are Affiliate Programs Free to Join? - Affiliate programs are almost always free to join and you should stay away from the ones that aren't.
• Are they safe to join? -Yes they are.
• Why do merchants offer affiliate programs?- They are a easy and cheap way to recruit a large number of sales people to sell their product.
• How does the merchant know that I sent the visitor? - Your affiliate link contains a special tracking code unique to you.- See how affiliate programs  work for more detail.
• Do I need any special software? - No all you need is the link supplied by the merchant.
• Does my website need any special features like PHP, SSI etc?- No any website will do.
• When do I get Paid? - That depends on the merchant most have a minimum payout of $50 and pay monthly but it varies a lot.
• How Do I get Paid? - That depends on the merchant but most pay by cheque, PayPal and the larger ones bank transfer.
• How Many Affiliate Programs can I Join? - As many as you want.
• Why are they ideal for website owners- See above

Getting Started with Affiliate Programs

If you are new to affiliate marketing and website building then you may want to consider an affiliate marketing manual. There are many training programs on the net claiming that they can teach you to earn thousands of dollars a day doing affiliate marketing but many turn out to be overpriced and over hyped so you need to be careful.

I purchased the Super Affiliate Handbook about 3 years ago and found it very comprehensive in that it not only covered the affiliate marketing it also covered basic website building and traffic building. It has proved very popular and is still for sale and being regularly updated which is quite rare for an Internet marketing manual.

Related Articles and resources:

• 3 Common Affiliate mistakes and how to avoid them
• What are Affiliate Networks
• How Affiliate Programs Work