Starting Out With Affiliate Programs

Let’s start with an important fact. Though you can earn from affiliate marketing even without the benefit of having your own website, it is still a much better option that you get one. A website is the anchor of your work at home business. It will be easier to promote your business and products or affiliate products if you have your own pages in cyber space.

We have previously discussed the basics of creating your own website and optimizing the same for the search engines.

In this article, we’re going to tackle some initial steps you should take in securing an enrollment to an affiliate program and in ensuring that it will be a profitable enterprise. Study these steps carefully.

* Choose the right affiliate program as covered in last week’s article.

* Enroll for the said program. Keep in mind that before you can be a part of this work at home business, you must first opt-in, or verify your application, through your email.

* Once enrolled, you will be given access to a website where you must log in. Do not forget your login details.

* You will see the list of the affiliate merchant’s products inside. You will be given the option to choose a product for which a campaign will be launched. Once a product is chosen, you will be furnished an affiliate link. Do not lose this affiliate link!

With your affiliate link at hand, it’s time to move to the next level!

Your affiliate link is what will tell the affiliate program’s system that a purchaser was referred by you. Your pre-sells that end up becoming successful sales are actually coursed through your affiliate links, thus informing the affiliate program that commissions are due to you.

It is quite evident then that affiliate marketing as a work at home business is all about persuading a potential customer to at least check out the affiliate merchant’s products through your affiliate link. The reason why affiliate marketing is called, well, marketing is because you need some promotional strategies to induce a person to become a purchaser.

We will discuss these marketing strategies in the next article.

The success of an enrollment with an affiliate program as a work at home business depends on the amount of commitment and effort you invest in the same. Being an affiliate, you must remember, is an online job, but a job nonetheless. You cannot just sit down and let this home business earn for you, at least, not initially.

Eventually however, you should be able to automate most of the process by installing some tools for a self-sufficient system of your own. We will cover this thoroughly in subsequent articles.

For More Free Resources visit www.start-ownbiz.com

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Earn with the Ebay Affiliate Program

What would the internet be like without Ebay? For those of you who are not members, you will learn that Ebay is it's own culture. Connecting sellers and buyers from all over the country; all over the world. The item that you cannot purchase at your local department store you can find on Ebay.

I have been a Ebay user since the start of 1998. My first purchase was in June of 1998. I think I purchased a crappy laser pointer or some other cheap gadget. Yes, I was there when Ebay had little or no fees. It was a time when ebooks and hosting auctions were not available. Ebay has definitely changed. I remember my first official sale: April 29, 1999, A Mark McGwire Olympic card. At the time, it was difficult to get rid of that baseball card! But, I needed a little money and sold it for $95. Boy, was I thrilled! (I was pretty young at the time). 9 years later, I have a feedback score of 100% and very proud of it! At times, however,it seems tough, and sometimes impossible to run with mega Powersellers and online companies placing their products in every category imaginable.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my time on Ebay. But, as I stated prior, it is hard to compete. I've sold only 27 items since my membership with Ebay began 9 years ago. Maybe I am a little lazy but also, a little intimidated. I have tried to make ebook and script sales, but you have to sell a whole bunch to make any money!

The Opportunity

During my journey on "how to make more money online," I discovered the Ebay affiliate program. Do you ever ponder where the seller fees you paid went? Well, most of it is going to Ebay and a portion may go to affiliates.

Well, I am not making any money with Ebay on my own, why don't I try to make money off of other seller's products!

I found Ebay's affiliate page and was redirected to Commission Junction. Commission Junction handles Ebay's affiliate program and is very reputable. It was a quick and easy minutes to get signed up and I was then ready to start. What do I do next?

I am somewhat familiar with building websites and such, but did not have a clue about how to put Ebay items on my website. From there, I did some research on the Ebay Affiliate Program and discovered a website script called BANS: Build a Niche Store. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, was all up in arms about the success of Build a Niche Store.

I was excited about the reviews the Build a Niche Store had received. I bought the software for $97 which gave me the rights to install on an unlimited number of sites. (I am currently working on 13 sites as I write this review). The first and second sites that I made live were indexed by Google in less than 24 hours! The beauty of this software is that it optimizes your site so that your website will be seen on search engines. My very first site is on page one of Google for a pretty competitive keyword!

Build a Niche Store will help you create a site that can be geared towards any niche you pick from Ebay's website. Ebay items in your subject will automatically be fed into your site If someone bids on and wins an auction through your BANS site, you are paid money. If someone signs up for and account on Ebay through your site, you earn an affiliate commission.

If you are not completely familiar on how to make a website and have it optimized for search engines, The Build a Niche Store script will definitely put you in the right place. Build as many sites as you want and have a great time with it.

Michael Campbell is a restaurateur. To learn more about the Build a Niche Store software, visit Michael's BANS page and Marketing Blog.

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Understanding Affiliate Programs

Years ago before the internet was born, starting your own business was like taking a leap into the unknown. It involved MONEY, TIME, and lots of worry. If you were one of the lucky ones your business was a success, but many were doomed to failure.

Now the Internet has evolved, and though many businesses fail possibly through lack of understanding! no one loses a fortune.

When someone begins the search for a business on which to make money, it is almost always an affiliate program that catches their eye, probably because most of them say Free To Join. Yes they are free to join, but if you are looking to work and make money it is almost certain that you will have to upgrade and pay a monthly fee.

Understanding the program. Any good affiliate programs will have a learning process and you will be told to read and read again until you understand what is required of you. You should also have a mentor, that is someone that is there to help you. He or she will reply to you by email or by messenger, they will help you through any problems to the best of their ability as your success means success for them.

The main task of most affiliate programs is to refer others who will sign up and create your down line. Only those that upgrade will be of use to you. Once you begin to receive commission your monthly payment should be taken out automatically thus leaving you free to build up on your commissions.

How to refer others to your program! This is where many affiliates fail, the ability to refer is not always easy. If you can build your own website and work to get it on the searches it is a great help as this is almost free advertising. Another way is to traverse other websites and place your ads for the program on them.

There are many free ad sites which you will find by placing Free Ad Sites in the search box. Always use a different email box for this project as you are sure to get lots of spam emails back, you do not want to fill your usual inbox with spam. Another way to refer is by using PPC, (pay per click) this can work out expensive but it does work, you will need a certain amount of paid sign ups to cover costs. Google is the most expensive but you can find many cheaper search engines out there, Overture is good and less expensive.

Once you start getting paid signups you yourself will have to learn to be a mentor as they are almost certain to require help of some kind. Do your home work and read up on your program in between your other jobs, it is surprising how quickly you learn and find yourself able to answer their questions confidently.

You should now be on the road to earning an adequate income, you must give yourself at least 12 months before expecting high earnings, and it is a slow road but a steady one, usually with residual income that does come in very handy in your retirement.

For More Free Resources visit www.freeearningtips.com

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Your affiliate program fortune

Your affiliate program fortune is already sitting in your pockets! You just don’t know it yet. Please allow me to explain.You have a 9-5, which, with the commute and headaches, has turned into more like an 7:30-6:30. You maybe have kids, a spouse, a dog, a car to repair, and a leaky faucet. You have yard-work, housework, homework, and work-work.

However, you understand that people are making money online. You think that you could create a small fortune through affiliate programs, if only you could make it fit in your schedule. You understand some of the basic concepts of setting up a web site. You have an idea for a site focusing on something you know a lot about. You’re pretty familiar with making sure your META tags match page content, and you’ve learned about getting traffic to your site. You know that you can get traffic, because you have a unique perspective or approach to the topic of your site. You might also at some point think about selling some of your own products alongside the affiliate links you have (or would like to) set up.

So, where will you find the time to run a site, find affiliate programs, give your visitor’s great content to read, and begin to create your Internet fortune?

The answer is in your thinking. Your thinking has to help you realize that the fortune is not yet in your wallet. The fortune is, however, already in your pockets. I’ll say that again. The fortune is ALREADY sitting in your pockets.

How can your fortune be in your pockets? Your fortune is in the pockets of TIME you have. You have ten minutes here, and twenty minutes there. You have time while the pot is on the stove boiling water, and you have time while you’re waiting for your kids at their soccer practice.

You have pockets of time, and if you ever want to have more than just pockets of time, you must learn to use the pockets you do have more effectively, starting today.

(This has as much to do with planning your life as it does building a successful and income-producing web site. You can take this skill and apply it all over the place for anything you want to accomplish.)

So how can you use your pockets effectively?

1. Decide
Make a decision that you are going to work on this project for at least 15 minutes each day, no matter what (you can take two days/week off). You can work more than that, but you must work at least 15 minutes every day on your site. Decide that you are going to make this site become reality within 6 months. (Be realistic with yourself. If you’re only working 15 minutes/day, 6 months is a realistic goal.)

2. Take action in the right direction
Begin with the end in mind. You have heard this before, but maybe you’ve never applied it. I’m saying to you now that you should read this article, and then apply the principle. Begin with the end in mind. Take 15 minutes/day for the next 5 days. Get your plan on paper. Figure out what you want your site to look like. Look at the general layout. Keep it simple, so that you can design it, or explain to someone else how to design it. Lay out so that anyone can easily navigate to any page of the site from any other part of the site. Put it on paper first. Have friends (and even strangers if you like) review your site plan. Ask for their honest feedback. Don’t be offended if they tell you that you might try changing some things. Take what works and leave out what doesn’t. Decide on a color scheme. Color is very important in marketing products.

Here is the hazard of not beginning with the end in mind: You will spend hours of time working on completely unrelated projects, surfing the Internet, and reviewing affiliate programs which will not fit into the layout of your site. (Not having a layout for your site would be like climbing a ladder that you couldn’t see the top of, but you thought would lead somewhere good, only to realize once you reached the top that your ladder wasn’t even leaning against the right wall.) Start with the big picture of what you want your site to look like, and work from that plan.

3. 15 per day
Working on it 15 minutes/day, it probably will take 6 months to put together a quality site, so break down the larger project into 15 minute pieces. Work the plan and the design backwards. A good-sized site with lots of content could be about 100 pages. Let’s say you’re building a site about, oh, I don’t know… let’s say baseball bats. (It’s an example for purposes of this article.)

Your site might be broken up into 4 sections like:

History of Baseball bats

Types of baseball bats

The baseball bats of famous players

Reviews and places to buy baseball bats online

Each of these sections might have 22-25 pages each. So here’s how you break it down:

Month 1:
Every day, you’re going to create the content for 1 page in the History section

Month 2:
Every day, you’re going to create the content for 1 page in the Types section

…and so on.

At this point, all you have done is taken 15 minutes/day to write a short article about some aspect of the larger section. Anyone can find or make 15 minutes of time every day, if this is truly something that they want to do.

At the end of four months, writing 1 page/day, you will have written between 80-100 pages worth of content for your site.

Now you might be thinking that you don’t have 100 pages worth of content to write. That’s fine. Take the first two months, develop a 35-50 page site, and then spend 15 minutes/day researching, finding affiliate programs, and getting relevant links into your site. Just use your pockets of time effectively.

4. Bring it all together
You’re now in month 5, and you’re realizing how valuable your pockets really are, because you’ve created a great site about baseball bats (or whatever you want to create a site about), and you’ve done it in the pockets of time you had. Now it’s time to take 15 minutes/day, and make sure everything is working right, that your pages are aesthetically pleasing, and that people can get around easily on your site. You will also be using these 15 minutes/day to find affiliate programs for your chosen topic, add the links to your site, make sure everything is running well, and then get your site up online.

5. Continue the process
In month 6, getting traffic to your site will be where you spend your 15 minutes every day. (How to get links and what kinds of sites you trade links with will be reserved for another time, but continue the pocket principle.)

Use the pockets of time you have, and rather than watching someone else on TV build their dream, start building your own dream through online business. You can do it if you realize that you do have small pockets of time, and then use the time in your pockets. If you’re willing to do the work to make it happen, and are disciplined enough to build pages and write content no matter what, you will be successful. In short, you have got to start making your pockets more valuable.

Thank-you for spending the fortune of your last 10 minute pocket reading my article. I hope it helps you be more effective at Internet affiliate marketing, and that you can apply these ideas and the process elsewhere in your life.

For More Free ResourcesThink: Your affiliate program fortune is in your pockets

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How to Promote an Affiliate Program

If you want to know how to promote an affiliate program successfully, you must choose the appropriate words in your promotions, as well as deliver your marketing message in a way that influences prospects to build an intense desire for the product. Learn how to promote an affiliate program using persuasive endorsements, and you will soon find yourself earning massive affiliate commissions.

Here are some excellent tips to write compelling endorsements or advertising messages in promoting affiliate products.

1) Master the art of writing attention-grabbing headlines and subject lines. Your promotional messages will not be read unless you grab the readers' attention right at the start. You have to entice them enough to make them stop what they're currently doing and read your message. This is probably the most important step on how to promote an affiliate program effectively.

2) Target the emotions. People respond better to emotions than logic. In fact, research suggests that we rely on our emotions most of the time when making decisions. Therefore, you should aim to expound more on the affiliate product's benefits (which appeal to the emotions) more than the features (which appeal to logic). Here are examples of features and their corresponding benefits:

Feature: This drink contains catechins.
Benefit: This drink prevents the growth of cancer cells.

3) Organize related sections and group them into subtopics. Each subtopic should have a convincing subheadline. For easier reading, use bullets when you have a list.

4) Know the product you're promoting inside out. Buy it, then read or use it. List the negative points (if any), before countering them with the overwhelming benefits. Write an unbiased review or testimonial after using or applying the product. Make sure that you relate your actual experience and not make up something just to make some quick sales. Earning your customers' trust is of utmost importance.

5) Write short sentences and limit each paragraph to 4 lines if possible. Long sentences and paragraphs are harder to read. The more effort the reader exerts, the more chances he will get discouraged to read further.

6) Use simple yet hypnotic words. Use the software from mobysaurus.com to come up with the most appropriate words to use. Highlight the most important words or statements. Try to include the word "because." People have reasons for everything, so state the reason "why" because it justifies your cause.

7) Include endorsements/testimonials from famous people, as well as people whose personality/occupation fits with the product. A copywriter's endorsement for a persuasion book is better than a chef's. (The case would be different though, if the endorsement comes from a well-known personality. In this case, the endorsement will be well received notwithstanding the product.)

When the endorser's reputation has been tainted, remove his testimonial from your promotions.

8) Write a riveting story that connects with the product you're selling and the action you want people to take. When you tell a story, you lower the readers' resistance, make complicated things easier to understand, and perk up their emotions. You get them to escape temporarily from the real world and enter another dimension. When they are in storyland, their minds are more open to accept concepts and ideas that they have previously denied.

Engage as much of their senses as possible. Let them see, hear, smell, taste, and feel the various aspects of your story, then tie them in to the affiliate product.

Now you know how to promote an affiliate program using compelling words and messages. Apply these useful tips now and boost your affiliate earnings!

Michael Lee manages one of the top money making affiliate programs online. He gives highly profitable and free affiliate marketing tips, tools and resources to help you make money with his reputable Clickbank affiliate program at www.20daypersuasion.com/affiliateforce.html

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Building a Home Business no Risk

For millions of people the dream of working for themselves or of working from home is persistent. The nagging desire to earn more income, be their own boss, and run a business under their own terms is strong. For many however, the risk is simply too great. The capital needed to open a store, obtain the merchandise, and market their business is overwhelming and far too risky to convert the dream into reality.

What many people don't realize is that there are home business opportunities that offer the average person the ability to start their own business minus all of the risk. These opportunities are not get rich quick schemes and they are not guarantees of success; they are legitimate home business opportunities that require significant time and effort but provide an equal opportunity to everyone who truly desires to work for themselves full time or part time.

One of the simplest ways of creating your own home business opportunity is to become an affiliate marketer. Marketing knowledge is certainly an advantage but absolutely not a requirement of becoming successful in this field. Some affiliate marketers earn a reasonable residual income to supplement their regular earnings while others make impressive full time incomes.

So what is affiliate marketing and what does an affiliate marketer do? Simple. Affiliate marketing is a system in which individuals gain permission to market products for a company. The company in return pays a commission for referrals or actual sales. Affiliate marketing however is not a hard sell or cold calling type of business, so if an individual is not a savvy salesperson, this is not necessarily a stumbling block. Affiliate marketers do not have to invest capital in a business, maintain merchandise, or complete transactions. In many cases, the affiliate marketer doesn't even have to talk directly to potential customers.

Affiliate marketers merely try to get people to visit a website. They pre-sell a product and increase awareness. This can be accomplished through fliers, business cards, billboards, newspaper ads, and so forth out in the real world. It is particularly effective online through writing articles, building webpages, writing newsletters, and participating in forum discussions on related topics. Some affiliate marketers also run banner ads online, sell on e-bay, or get the word out through social bookmarking sites.

Based on the activities of an affiliate marketer it becomes clear that a basic knowledge of a product helps tremendously as does the willingness to learn, but time is the primary commitment. Cost is generally not a concern with this type of home business opportunity. Joining a company's affiliate marketing program should be entirely cost free. In fact, if an affiliate marketer decides to build a website, there are even services on line that allow them to build a free website and/or free webpages. The vast majority of online marketing activities are also cost free although there are certainly some very effective marketing techniques, such as running ads on Google, that carry a significant price if an individual chooses to use that method of marketing.

No matter what area of interest, experience, or knowledge, an individual has, they should be able to find an affiliate marketing niche that they will be comfortable with and even enthusiastic to promote. Once this is done, an individual merely needs to study the techniques and strategies of successfully promoting products or services which can be accomplished via reading books and articles on the topic and participating in related forums and discussions on line.

Affiliate marketing has the advantages of quick and easy start-up, no specific experience requirements, and no significant risk or start up expense. It does require a persistent effort, time, and a commitment to learning and succeeding. It is a home business opportunity that offers a doorway for individuals to step through to realize their dream of working for themselves.

Looking for the right home business? Maybe affiliate marketing is right for you, find out more at the author's Top Affiliate Marketing Program or Dish Network Work From Home webpages.

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Money For All

Since the advent of the Internet, people in all corners of the world have ventured online to try and find their 'pot of gold' in cyberspace. While a few talented individuals have created their own fiefdoms online such as Myspace, Facebook, Yahoo, etc., for the majority of individuals, they are simply looking to earn some extra income in this great new frontier. When first venturing online, one of the ways that many try their hand at earning income is through Affiliate Marketing.


While this form of Internet Marketing holds great potential, there are many pitfalls to avoid. This article looks at several mistakes that beginning and sometimes experienced Affiliate Marketers make that greatly impede their efforts.

1. Building Someone Else's List...Instead of Your Own

Of all the mistakes that beginning Affiliate Marketers make, one of the most egregious is sending people directly to the sellers affiliate website without first capturing their information. What you are doing in essence is building someone else's list at YOUR expense. When marketing an affiliate sellers product, you first want to setup a 'lead capture or squeeze page' to capture their information so that you can sell them any number of products later. As it's been said countless times, "the money is in the list", build your list first.

2. Not Following Up With Prospects.

A major mistake that many beginning Affiliate Marketers make is not following up with their contacts. After spending time and money trying to get quality prospects to a website, many drop the ball here by not following through with their contacts. There are numerous ways to do this without being obnoxious. You could send out a newsletter, free reports or articles that relate to your offer, and other valuable information that keeps you in front of your prospects. Don't overdo it be sending out emails everyday, but do stay in touch with your prospects on a weekly basis.

3. Harassing Your Prospects

In conjunction with this, another mistake that many Affiliate Marketers make is trying to 'push' the sale on their prospects instead of leading them to it. The reality is that no matter how great you think your product or opportunity is, most people won't buy, and even the one's that do won't usually do so the first time they are exposed to your offer. Sending out emails with subject lines like, "What's Wrong, How Come You Haven't Joined My Business?", and "Don't You Want to Make Money?" and emails similar to this will do nothing but irritate and chase away your prospects. In order to be successful, you need patience, and most importantly you need to build confidence and trust with your prospect. Remember, "Some will, most won't".

4. Sending Multiple Offers in the Same Email

Another mistake that many Affiliate Marketers make is including numerous links and offers in the same email. Someone requesting information about a product or opportunity is interested in receiving information about that specific thing. Sending out follow up emails with numerous links and offers will not only confuse your prospect, but will quickly cause them to run for cover by removing themselves from your list. Stay focused in your emails on the product or service you're currently promoting.

5. Promoting Too Many Programs at the Same Time

Promoting numerous affiliate programs at the same time is like dating several women simultaneously; although it's a lot of fun in the beginning, trying to keep up with it all quickly wears you down, and leaves you enervated and broke. Concentrate on one program at a time, and focus on making money with one before expanding your efforts. Don't fall for the better mousetrap theory, that the next product that arrives in your email is the one that's going to make you a boatload of money, but realize that there is no one best product for everyone. In the final analysis, whether or not you have any success with Affiliate Marketing depends more upon you than choosing the perfect product or opportunity.

William J. Thomas is actively engaged in E-Commerce and Internet Marketing. Bill also contributes articles on life, business and other topics. His current website is Build Lifetime Income from Home With Your Own... http://www.billthomas.ws Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=William_J._Thomas

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