What are the things that make an affiliate marketer successful?
What makes for an affiliate marketing success story?
Is there an easy way to become a big player in the affiliate marketing industry?
These are all questions very much on the minds of affiliate marketers who are looking to make their mark on the business.  Affiliate marketing is something that many refer to as the easiest and most sure-fire methods of making money online, it is actually more complicated than some will tell you. A savvy affiliate marketer always plans ahead and tries to carry out his or her plans in the most efficient manner. They can increase their earning potential by using the proper tools for building a successful affiliate marketing venture. After talking with some of the biggest names in the business, we have come up with the following three important tools which every affiliate marketer needs to become successful in the affiliate marketing field.
Important Tool #1: Your Own Website
Having your own website is the single most important tool to have at your disposal if you are in the affiliate marketing business. You need to create a professional looking website – this will be the home base of all of your marketing work. You need to put together a site which is user-friendly, appealing to prospective customers and one which will make them want to check out the links you have to the product or service you are marketing. The first thing you have to do before anything else is to create this website and make sure that it will appeal to your target market.
When creating your website, keep in mind that the reason most people are online is to look for information – so give them information! Have your website full of original, well written and useful content. If you have articles which are useful on your site, it will be easy to build an audience. Remember that content is still king on the web; having useful, informative content will also build your credibility and establish you as an expert in your field. This will also ultimately net you a higher search engine ranking. By putting up content which people find useful, people will come to see you as someone whose endorsements can be trusted. Building a reputation as a credible expert will also build you a potential customer base.
Important Tool #2: Incentives
Competition is fierce on the web. You have to stay a step ahead of your competition if you hope to capture a significant market share. Use every tool at your disposal to get traffic to your site; and from there, to purchase the product or service you are marketing. One of the best tools to attract prospective customers is by having an opt-in email list. You can offer a free newsletter or e-zine to those who sign up. Offer incentives to visitors to make them more likely to sign up for your newsletter. You can offer free software, exclusive access to content on your site – whatever will appeal to your niche market.
Important Tool #3:
Link Popularity
Getting targeted traffic to your site is something it’s hard to stress enough. Web traffic is the single most important thing in the web based business world. Getting people to your site should be a top priority for you. Do everything you can to boost your search engine rankings. One of the factors which determines your ranking is link popularity. You need to get a reciprocal link exchange going with other sites; it’s important to get links to your site out there on the net.  A great way to do this for free is to submit articles (which will have a link to your site at the bottom in what is called a resource box) to free article directories and e-zines. You’ll get exposure for your content, be able to plug your site and each article will have a link to your site. The more places you submit your articles to, the higher your link popularity will be.
Make sure that your articles are useful and well written so that they will be picked up for publication in more places.  These are three of the most important tools (but by no means the only important ones) which affiliate marketers can use to increase their earnings. There are nearly endless possibilities for promotion – your creativity is the only real limit. Don’t be afraid to explore new ideas and keep working at it until you can take your rightful place as one of the big players in the field of affiliate marketing.
36 Comments
Maurice
September 3, 2008The number one on your list still seems to be a sticking point for so many would be marketers and online entrepreneurs.
Free just doesn’t cut it anymore but so many people insist on trying to make money online without their own domain(s) and sites.
Basic advice, but good 🙂
Jana
September 3, 2008Thanks Reed, once again your insights. Boiling it down three steps is a great way to stay on target!
Graham Price "The Sales Guy"
September 3, 2008Hello Reed and many thanks for posting this clear and concise information. I would just like to add that when talking about having Your own website as being a must for online success. A replicated website from some affiliate program or other just wont do either.
I myself fell into the trap of purchasing a (website) only to find that I did not have full control over the editing. Yes I agree “Content is King” BUT – It must be content that You have total control of. Hope this helps –
Kindest Regards – Graham Price “The Sales Guy”
T.M. Harris
September 3, 2008To Maurice…I started off my career using free websites…they were called BLOGS.
You know…blogger.com and wordpress.com? Yeah, they give out free blogs…and I used to use them to try and get people to check out my product reviews, and optin to my offers.
As a matter of fact, I still have one of my blogger blogs still kicking after almost 3 years, and it actually gets more traffic than my normal blog on my own website.
So, does free cut it nowadays? YES!
Wayne Brooks
September 3, 2008Good stuff Reed,
I’d also offer that tools are simply enablers and that consideration should also be given to one of the most significant touchstones for the high rolling affiliate marketer…namely the target market being served by your offerings.
Wayne
Your blog paycheck is waiting.
EJ
September 3, 2008Actually, there are a TON of free resources that a perspective marketer can use, including free websites (blogs or otherwise).
The key is to find the free stuff that doesn’t necessarily APPEAR to be free. That takes some work to find, but its out there.
A little extra effort to find these resources saves valuable resources for a beginning marketer.
Chris Imamshah
September 3, 2008Reed,
Very good basics. I think #1 having your own website is critical and especially one where you have control over the content as this is how Affiliate Marketers can best promote their affiliate products.
Naturally, building a list of customers or visitors and developing your relationship with them is also crucial as they will buy from your links based on your recommendations depending on if they trust you and think you are credible.
Good stuff. Thanks,
Chris
http://www.fastinternetmarketingtips.com
admin
September 3, 2008@Maurice I agree a lot of people are afraid to invest that first $10 and get a professional domain name
@Graham I agree for maximum success you need to have an original web site of your own, however you can still make money with a replicate
@T.M. Interesting points, for me it was hard to make money online without having a domain name and professional hosting account
@Wayne Good point
@EJ I could see that becoming a great product either for free that you giveaway to build your list or something to sell.
Rick Falls
September 3, 2008Should your own website be a blog instead of the traditional sales page?
It seems like the best way to get people to really want to hang out with you (join your list or blog) is to give them something very personal that they could maybe only get from you.
Would that be a fair statement ?
The link and backlink thing,
I get it in terms of how important it is,
but how do we get the links?
Thanks, Rick
Rick Falls
September 3, 2008Hey Reed,
Good timing on the blog, it looks like you did it just in time to avoid the google email crash and burn.
Rick
William Stewart
September 3, 2008These are actually the 3 most important tools:
1. a forum,such as mine where you offer free advertising =
http://web-success.forumotion.com/index.htm
or
http://www.myfreeadboard.com/classifieds/WebSuccess4YouBiz/
2. a Youtube account, such as mine:
http://www.YouTube.com/Willprospector
3. a WebCam….I want people’s opinions on my forum or here about the best webcam for a Dell
using Vista.
Sign up for Host4Profit webhosting and I will pay your 4th month using PayPal or AlertPay:
http://www.host4profit.com/cgi-bin/home.cgi?71146
admin
September 3, 2008@Chris yes I agree for me the majority of my income comes from my list, joint ventures and speaking gigs.
@Rick if I were to only do one web site it would be a squeeze page since that is the most profitable web page you can ever have. To get links give people a reason why to link to you. The two most popular reasons are 1. it helps their readers 2. they make money. what’s this about a google email crash and burn?
@William that’s a bit of a spammy comment but I do think you have some valid points. Forums can build a great community as do blogs. Youtube can be very profitable and web cams are a great way to show that you are who you say you are.
Haidi
September 3, 2008you are right, the most important is link popularity and beware of google banned policy.
James
September 3, 2008Hey Reed this is good advice any newbie should listen to.By the way nice to see you got your
blog up and running I’m right behind.
See Ya
James
William Beck
September 4, 2008Hi Reed,
Great article and useful advice. One of the most time consuming
tasks that I have been doing is back linking.
Thanks
Willy B
http://www.my-family-money.com
Jane
September 4, 2008Reed,
First off…glad to see you finally broke down and put up your blog. You probably have enough insight and information to post on a daily basis for years to come without having to search for any content at all.
I agree…#1 is CRUCIAL! I didn’t understand how important having your own website was until 9 months or more into the internet game. After having put up many of them since I’m not so sure exactly what I was afraid of…but to all of you newbies I say get your domains and build your first site (no matter how ugly it is the learning experience is well worth it).
Looking forward to more posts,
Jane
http://www.yournichetemplates.com/adsense
admin
September 4, 2008@Haidl actually what I think is the most important thing is focus but link popularity will change things for most people
@James thank you
@William is that commenting on others posts? Yeah that seems like it’d be time consuming. Does it give you a lot of traffic?
@Jane thank you, yes I’ll hopefully be putting up something every day for awhile 🙂
@NicheDepot.biz thanks for the trackback
Davion | Secrets Of Affiliate Marketing
September 4, 2008Hi Reed,
You forgot to mention about list building tools like autoresponders. That is your forte isn’t it?
Btw, writing articles is one powerful workhorse that has never faded away like most traffic driving techniques. The search engines exist for quality content. I personally used this method to drive over 1 million targeted visitors over 1 year to my websites using articles only.
admin
September 4, 2008@Davion that is a fantastic way to make money. Please see section 2 of the article (incentives). Where do you submit your articles?
Katja Palmu
September 4, 2008Hi Reed,
I totally agree with you on the fact, that one needs their own website. I’ve tried with the affiliate websites and tried to use PPC with them. Unfortunately the replica sites didn’t meet with Yahoo’s guidelines and they required changes in them. (I don’t know much HTML).When a testimonial wasn’t enough, I lost interest. I still have £150 to be used on PPC advertising…
Leon
September 4, 2008Good basic advice Reed and helpful for anyone starting out. Thank you. One question a bit off topic… Have you thought about adding the ‘do follow’ plugin for your blog’s comment section? I would like to hear your opinion about it and if you are for or against it. Thanks again, Leon
admin
September 4, 2008@Katja I’d spend that remaining money for PPC on building your list by sending that traffic to a squeeze page
@Leon How do I do that?
Davion | Secrets Of Affiliate Marketing
September 4, 2008Hi Reed, I submit my articles mainly to EzineArticles. It gets me well over 1 million visitors, pure search engine organic traffic within 1 year. Of course, I do get traffic from other article directories like ArticlesBase as well. I do use tools to automate the submission for me. 😉
admin
September 4, 2008@Davion that’s very interesting I’ve never had results close to that from EzineArticles. Shoot me an email reedfloren AT gmail.com I’m curious as to how you do it. Thanks.
Davion | Secrets Of Affiliate Marketing
September 5, 2008Hi Reed, dropping you an email. 😉
Leon
September 5, 2008Reed, here is the link to the free dofollow plugin:
http://www.michelem.org/wordpress-plugin-nofollow-free/
A lot of blogs use it and it does give an added incentive for visitors to your blog to leave a comment.
Regards,
Leon
admin
September 5, 2008@Davion thanks for the email, I’ll get to it at some point today
@Leon thanks I’ll check that out.
john-affiliate marketing
September 12, 2008With the affiliate programs you can get more traffic and it is beneficial for you. You can also include the links in the articles. When people click on the links, the affiliate program initiator pays you.
admin
September 12, 2008@john that’s a good synopsis
Replica Watches
September 20, 2008Interesting article. I really like your blog overall. Really makes me think! Thanks!
admin
September 20, 2008@Replica thanks, glad it helps you.
Dale Kydd
November 9, 2008Hi Reed, thanks for another good post and to all who have replied as it has given me some other ideas and insights that had slipped my mind.
Newbie’s please do not get carried away with trying to learn everything on the net before you get started.
Learn about the product you have chosen and concentrate on it. There are places out there that will help if you get stuck, all you have to do is ask.
Here on this blog is one of them and a better place I have yet to find.
If you have time to read some of the items and reports that are sent out then do so but do not get snowed under with them. they all offer the same thing but in different ways.
Pace yourself to one a month if you really feel it is worth it but no more as you will find it will take time away from your site and the work you need to be doing to make your site and it’s contents an ongoing cash machine.
Your site needs to be up dated all the time to make it worth your clients coming back. Change a picture or placement of it or give a different freebee. Keep tabs on the loading speed and the click ability of your links. If you have downloads Please mention size as there are a lot of people still on dial up and if the download takes 12 hours to download most will cut of before it gets to half way unless it is something they really want. If you want good reoccurring customers then this is one of the most important things to consider when you place items on your web site and this includes your web pages.
Trust this also gives some help to those starting out.
Take care all
Dale
PETER
November 15, 2008Fantastic piece of advice. Very original, natural and pretty much obvious yet so elusive to a whole lot of newbies or even certain veterans, especially the bit that says “a whole lot of people are still on dial up and so mention the download size or else they will just cut off mid-way”. I have enjoyed myself here on this blog but the nugget I will take with me is the discipline of not getting buried under the snow and getting on with mastering the real money-making processes or procedures. THANKS TO ALL OF YOU. REED AND HIS SUPPORT TEAM AS WELL.
amril
January 4, 2009Very great info,
virtual world games for kids
May 8, 2009Content is king, I agree. Helpful and great information for people who are starting out.
[…] The first one “important tool #1: Your Own Website The second one “important toll#2: Incentives (I guess is Opt in list) The third one ” important tool#3 Link Popularity. What I try to say I make my first $10,000 in one month without any website and link popularity, even email list, that his from 6 years ago. My advice if you want to make money in this business build your list(Opt in List). But like everything else you need to learn this business because there are so many scams and overload information’s OUT HERE. […]
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