Affiliate programs are best for merchants because they only pay for results. Only bloggers who can actually convert their traffic into sales will benefit from them. That means the blogger is in control of what drives their income and can directly increase it.
How an affiliate program is structured affects which sales will be attributed to your traffic – and only those will generate commissions. How repeat visitors are tracked will have a definite impact on your potential earnings.
Most affiliate management companies use cookies to track referrals. When someone clicks on your affiliate link the cookie is stored on their PC and identifies them as a repeat visitor if they return to make a purchase later. While that sounds simple it is not. There are many ways for cookies to drop sales.
- Cookies have an expiration date. They are only good for a limited period of time with 60 days being the most common time period I’ve noticed in affiliate programs.
- Cookies are specific to a particular computer. If your potential buyer clicks on your affiliate link while they’re at work and then buy from a different PC you won’t get credit for the sale.
- Cookies can be deleted by PC users. Some have their PCs set up to delete them whenever they close their browser or shut down their PCs. Others delete them manually or have software that deletes cookies – usually spyware programs.
- Cookies can be overwritten. What happens if someone visits an online store by clicking on your affiliate link and then visits it again later using another affiliate link elsewhere? Which affiliate gets credit for the sale?
- Some online retailers ask if someone referred the buyer. If the buyer names one person and the cookie indicates another who gets credit for the sale?
When selecting an affiliate program these are the factors to keep in mind:
- Who tracks the sales and sends payment? Many prefer to use a third party service so they only have to meet one minimum amount and can rely on that service to collect their earnings and send them payment.
- How often do they pay? Most third party affiliate management companies pay monthly when you reach a payout amount which is often $25 but can be higher. Some affiliate programs only pay quarterly and most pay only after you reach a minimum amount.
- Do they use cookies to track return visits? Many buyers don’t buy right away and with cookie tracking you will still be compensated for later purchases. This is the standard so you may want to avoid any affiliate programs that do not pay for residual sales.
- The length of time before the cookies expire. The longer the cookie persists the more likely you will be credited with future purchases. Sixty days is fairly standard and some last as long as a year.
- What happens if the buyer visits another affiliate between clicking on your link and making a purchase? This is the most challenging information to obtain as it is not always readily available.
- What percentage of each sale you earn. This can be only 5% at Amazon (although that page says up to 15% it primarily pays out only 5%). I recommend focusing on programs that pay at least 10%. The Executive Gift Shoppe affiliate program pays 12% and you can make up to 30% for magazines to 65% or even 100% for ebooks.
- How dependable is the seller? Your reputation is affected if you’re recommending them so do some research and make sure. Search for reviews, testimonials, and complaints before you start promoting.
- Are their prices competitive? This is more important in some niches than others. You can use product price comparison sites to find out how easy it is to compare prices. If the products are easily researched and their prices are much higher your sales will be lower than normal.
Long time readers of GrowMap know that a friend of ours owns Executive Gift Shoppe, an online gift store that offers an affiliate program. Since almost any blog could offer gifts I’ll use their program in future posts containing tips on using images and how to pre-sell affiliate offerings.
Be sure to read about pre-selling in my next post in this series as it is the most important difference between those who make money with affiliate programs and those who do not.
If you’re already familiar with affiliate programs I can strongly recommend the high quality personalized and engraved gifts ExecutiveGiftShoppe offers as well worth promoting. Visit the next link for all the reasons I recommend their business, personal and groomsmen gifts.
Here is a win/win for bloggers. Join their affiliate program, write a creative post about their store or any of their products, and enter it in their Blogging Contest. Even if you aren’t a $50 gift certificate winner your blog will receive traffic from other entrants and be heavily promoted by us. Any blogger who enters will be linked from this blog too AND many will be featured in specific posts and recommended at Twitter and FriendFeed.
This is one of the chances to maximize your visibility and online exposure by participating when someone else wants to promote your links for you. Now is the perfect time to learn how to monetize your blog with affiliate products because we will personally assist you. Ask any questions you have in the comments of this post or contact us at Twitter.
There are NO dumb questions. Not sure how to insert an image? Need assistance finding an angle that fits your niche? Want to know more about pre-selling? Not sure how to use an affiliate link? No matter how inexperienced you are we encourage you to take advantage of this opportunity for free personal assistance to take your skills to the next level and start earning money in your blog.
AFFILIATE MARKETING RESOURCES:
- Top Ways to Increase Success with Affiliate Marketing
AFFILIATE PROGRAM RECOMMENDATIONS:
- Derek Semmler (Twitter) How the Bridaluxe Wedding Affiliate Program Hits the Affiliate Network Nail on the Head
- Weddex (Twitter) Bridaluxe: Wedding Affiliate Program for Wedding Pros
- GrowMap (Twitter) How to Evaluate a Gift Affiliate Program
- ExecGiftsBlog (ExecGifts) Executive Gift Shoppe Gift Affiliate Program
AFFILIATE MARKETING for AFFILIATES:
- Derek Semmler (Twitter) Case Study: Getting Started with Affiliate Marketing
- AffiliateXFiles (Ron Cripps) How to Become an Affiliate Marketer
- AffiliateXFiles (Ron Cripps) How to Create a Product Review Site That Sells
- Derek Semmler (Twitter) Building Affiliate Stores
- Adam Riemer (Rollerblader) How to Pick Merchants to Promote
- Derek Semmler (Twitter)How to Add Affiliate Products to Your Site
- AffiliateXFiles (Ron Cripps) Affiliate Marketing Tips For Long Term Results
- AffiliateXFiles (Ron Cripps) Affiliate Marketing FAQs – Ask your questions here and get answers from successful affiliate with 9+ years experience
AFFILIATE MARKETING FOR MERCHANTS:
- Murray Newlands (Twitter) Affiliate Marketing for Merchants
- Adam Riemer (Rollerblader) What You Should Expect from your Affiliate Management Company aka OPM
- Adam Riemer (Rollerblader) Common Mistakes When Hiring an Affiliate Manager
- Adam Riemer (Rollerblader) How to Select an Affiliate Management Company
- Adam Riemer (Rollerblader) How Small Businesses Can Compete for Affiliates
- Adam Riemer (Rollerblader) Why Merchants Should Offer Affiliate Commissions on Gift Certificates
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- Wedding Boom Predicted for Next 22 Years (growmap.com)
- How to Evaluate a Merchant Gift Affiliate Program (growmap.com)
- How to Attract Affiliates to Your Program (marketersdaily.com)
- The Way I See It: State of Affiliate Marketing Part 1 (revenews.com)
Gail Gardner
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ARTICLE is very informative. Finding great business opportunities and money-making ventures online is really hard especially when you are a first-timer. But what I learned in this blog is really helpful. Thanks really for the information that I got because they are really helpful. I love the blog and hope to read more of these from the author! Nice job!
Still being a newbie affiliate (sorta), this may be a dumb question – how does the size of the network fit in, do smaller ones just give garbage?
Frankly, I’ve found some real garbage and good ones on big or small…
.-= Dennis Edell´s last blog ..He/She Has Unsubscribed – Should You Ask Why? =-.
@Mirjam Thank you for commenting and that IS an excellent point. It DOES take just as much time to promote a product you love that makes you $40 a sale as it does to promote one that makes only $10 or less.
I usually focus on programs that pay at least 10%; however, I do know someone who made a good income from Amazon.com (only 5% on most products) because she focused on only high dollar items. I have suggested that off and on since she told me.
Until I get that pre-selling post written the most important point is to answer WHY you recommend it and WHY they would want to buy it.
Answering what’s in it for the buyer makes ALL the difference! How does that product or service BENEFIT them? (Anyone who knows anything about sales has heard about focusing on benefits instead of features.)
Many stores offer affiliate programs and have weak product information. Research and feature their more expensive products and you are very likely to close the sale before they head over to the merchant’s site to buy.
InternetStrategist’s last blog post..Blog Traffic Up 54.87% in the Last 30 Days: Our Proven Traffic Improvement Strategy
very interesting, looking forward to reading your post on pre-selling and seeing what you have to say on that 😉
As to the percentages of commission you get, I think it is more important to actually look at how much you´d make per sale. I mean, 50% might sound great, but if it would only give you $10, I´d rather go for 10% of higher priced items and earn more.
Cause in the end… the work involved selling something that gives you $10 in commission could very well be almost the same as it takes to land you $50 or more in commission on one sale ….
Mirjam’s last blog post..Using Massive Traffic Techniques – a Long Shot or Big Money Maker?
@Dennis LOL! Also what I tell people when they run small to very small businesses and think market research done on Fortune 500 companies applies to them. It usually doesn’t.
“and making decisions based on bad data is very dangerous”
Almost my exact words when people ask me why I don’t follow “guru” newsletters. LOL!
Just a little levity… 😉
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..Best “Blog Improvement Review” Contest – 1 Winner – $100 via Paypal
@John Dilbeck Thanks for taking the time to weigh in here. I agree with you that last cookie is probably better for affiliate promoters because it is reasonable to believe that the last persuader is more likely to have finally prompted action. I’ve got to spend more time in your blog.
I’ll work on a post that explains why last click causes major issues in tracking the source of sales to ecommerce stores, especially if they run ppc ads, affiliate programs and they’re listed in shopping comparison sites.
@will gamerz Yes, affiliate programs are one way to generate an income and like any other way it requires a learning curve to do it well.
@Dennis Thanks for sharing that link. I have got to make the time to do more posts on Web analytics and tracking. Few have a clear idea on how inaccurate they are – and making decisions based on bad data is very dangerous. More on that very soon.
@Rob Many people tune out advertising. If getting clicks is a challenge imagine how much more it takes to generate sales? We must all learn to provide value when recommending specific products and services. Remember that people consider what is best FOR THEM and not for those they visit or those hoping to sell them something.
Different layouts appeal to different people. Your blog is like many designer sites I visit. It doesn’t lead me anywhere that makes sense to me. I am more into words so perhaps I am not your target audience. I tried clicking on the obvious: a link that says “all our free stuff” and have no idea what you’re trying to get visitors to do.
I understand the theory. I just wish that a few people would actually click through on the adverts that I have carefully placed for them.
Rob’s last blog post..Listings
John- I know that and I know you knew that also. Assuming nothing “fails” from first to last it’s still a good argument to make…just looking for her opinion on it. 🙂
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..Best “Blog Improvement Review” Contest – 1 Winner – $100 via Paypal
@Justice Good to see you here. I’ll be visiting your blog too.
growmap’s last blog post..What NOT To Do With Your Existing Web Site When You Upgrade or Remodel
Wow! This is a marvelous guide on how affiliate program works. Its good that someone really know how the affiliate program companies set their cookies before he/she make an attend to do the next things concerning promotion. In that case one would understand how many days, months the cookies is set to expired. Great post guy…
Justice O. Omorodion’s last blog post..3 Ways To Increase Affiliate Sales!
@Kenneth Glad to be of assistance. Nothing is simple when it comes to analytics and tracking sales. Much more on that soon so you may want to subscribe.
@Dennis Thanks for the link. I’ll check it out. Even when they SAY the first click unless they know something I don’t they can NOT guarantee that because they don’t control the cookies on someone’s computer – the PC owner does. That is one of the many issues with promoting affiliate programs. You are bound to miss some commissions and believe it or not there are some major issues for merchants offering them too. More on that in future posts.
Oops – http://21stcenturyaffiliatemarketing.com/2009/02/28/aweber-changes-their-affiliate-program/
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..Best “Blog Improvement Review” Contest – 1 Winner – $100 via Paypal
The link below is actually a discussion on changes to Awebers affiliate programs, specifically, “Your affiliate cookie will be a 1 year, first visit cookie.”
Some find this very unsettling as it means no matter who’s link you click in the end to purchase….the affiliate behind the 1st click you made will get the sale.
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..Best “Blog Improvement Review” Contest – 1 Winner – $100 via Paypal
@Chris Thank you. I hope you’ll subscribe and visit often. I’ll be by to check out your blog shortly.
@CRM software Yes, the best way to get started and learn anything is to jump in with both feet and build on your experience.
@Blogaboutnothin Yes, Clickbank has been around a long time and many people do make money with it. I always made more money from AdSense (long ago) and Commission Junction; however, that is partially because I did not focus on promoting ebooks. The commissions are certainly higher.
@GregR Thanks for the tip. I haven’t checked that tool out yet.
@Make $156 One reason few succeed is that there is not one key: there are many things that have to all happen. While low traffic blogs can’t charge big money for ad displays they certainly can focus on preselling affiliate programs – and preselling is very important. I’ll be posting about that soon so do consider subscribing. First you create quality content – then you must start driving traffic to it using Social Networking and commenting. You must have both content AND traffic to make money.
@Bob As long as what you offer is relevant to your readers it is never to early to start. I don’t think any blog should look like a giant billboard – ever – no matter how popular it is. I am not aware of any affiliate program including ClickBank penalizing low traffic sites. You’re doing what I’ve advised many realtors do: offer more information specific to your properties. Most real estate sites might be more interested in using free ebooks or reports to generate leads than selling them to generate an income. You might try offering home related magazine subscriptions though. Someone interested in buying a house might be interested in home decorating, home improvement, and other related subjects.
@Karmin No matter how much you research and read the best learning comes from doing. That is why I’m encouraging bloggers to just get started NOW. You’ll only regret the lost opportunities is you don’t.
@Dennis I would be interested in seeing that blog. Could you share the link? The true answer is not first or last click – it is tracking every visit. Google Analytics uses last click but I believe first click is more important especially to small businesses and this is why. Although Fortune 500 companies might want to know the last reminder for any small business that is not a household name the FIRST click is the most important. Once someone learns of your site THEN the wise buyer is going to check you out elsewhere. I have far more detail on this so perhaps another blog post to explain it all would be best. I’d like to refer to the blog you mention in that post.
There is a discussion on another blog I frequent over which cookie is best…1st click or last; which do you prefer?
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..Comment Contest March – Sponsors and Prizes
In the past I had no idea what I was doing and I evaluated affiliate programs on the fly. This trial and error was a big part of my learning experience.
This is interesting inforamtion. I would like to offset some of the costs of my PPC efforts with some affiliate linking or other effective method of selling ad space on the site. Is there ever a time that is too early to start? For example my trffic doesn’t justify selling banner ads etc… but would adding an affiliate link before a lot of traffic reduce my ranking with clickbank or other such svc?
Bob Maiocco’s last blog post..Cherry Creek North Townhome For Sale – 2960 E. 4th Ave
I use the Google Webtools Conversion system to double check inbound and out bound. It is a little tricky but you can see if there is leakage with some math.
Cheers
GregR’s last blog post..Orphaned Earthquake Pandas Given New Life (Video)
Nice writing style. Looking forward to reading more from you.
Chris Moran