Affiliate Marketing To Be An Affiliate Or Not To Be?
So what is affiliate marketing and how does it work
. Well basically it is all about promoting other people's products and in return they pay you commissions. However there are many things to consider before you jump in and start promoting a bunch of products or any affiliate products as far as that goes.
First of and most important make sure you have used the product or know something about the product! It is a lot easier to promote something that you are familiar with and know that the particular product is indeed going to be useful for people. Don't just start joining programs and pasting links all over. Trust me that is not the way to go about it! Always know and trust the product or service you are promoting.
The next thing you want to look at is what percent of commissions do they pay out? Typically I try to stay with at least 50%. Next make sure they have good promotional methods set up and already in place such as promotional links, banners or email campaigns. You want to make sure it is worth your while and easy to promote.
If you have an existing website then you typically want to join or promote affiliate markets that are similar to what your website is about or somehow linked to it. Assuming you are getting traffic or regular visitors then they will already be interested in your particular market. While this method is not a must, in my opinion it is what works best and at least it will get you heading in the right direction while you become more familiar with promoting other affiliate markets.
Do you need a website to promote other people's products? Well normally I would say yes at least in the past, however there are ways to get into affiliate marketing without having your own website. One way to do this is to join blog sites that are similar to what products you are promoting and post there with your affiliate links in the post. However make sure you are very careful with this method! First of all make sure whatever blog you may post to allows this method first! Second, don't just start posting a bunch of links, make some simple posts first and establish yourself. Once you have done that then you may recommend a product or service that may help them.
The best way to get started with affiliate marketing is to visit Clickbank they have a very wide variety of products to promote. You can search through their data base and find what best fits your needs. Once you find something that may interest you they provide a special link for you to start promoting the affiliate product of your choice.
I still normally recommend that you have your own website if you really want to make money online especially if you are going to get into affiliate marketing. Again it is not an absolute must but in my opinion it is the best route to go.