Affiliate Marketing Defined Part I

There have been many descriptions of affiliate marketing floating around but there is actually a simple description that describes this huge internet business model. Affiliate marketing is an arrangement set up between a merchant who is vending a product or service and a sales person (Affiliate) who wants to sell that product or service for a commission. Affiliate marketing is the easiest way for the average person, who has very little or no money to start, to start his/her own internet business.

Affiliate marketing has become more popular in the past few years largely because it is a very easy way for a person to start his or her own internet business with very little initial investment and a huge potential for return on investment. it is good for the merchant because he/she can have a huge team of sales people selling his/her product or service and not have to invest any money on advertising or promotion. Numerous new affiliates fail because they do not inform themselves on what affiliate marketing is and how it works.

Many people have the erroneous idea that affiliate marketing is selling and advertising. Granted, selling and advertising are a essential parts of any affiliate marketing program because without either you don't really have a business. Selling is essential, for without sales you are not making money. Advertising is also essential because without advertising you are making no sales. No advertising, no sales, no business.

Promoting and advertising a product or service is an essential piece of any business but these are only two facets of a complex formula. Affiliate marketing is a lot like a retail store. In essence, the retailer is an affiliate for each product or service he/she sells in his/her store. The retailer allies with the manufacturer of the individual products he/she is selling then spends his/her money advertising "The Store" and individual products in order to get traffic and ultimately, sales.

Some companies will even pay for each guest you drive to their site whether or not they purchase anything. There are two categories of affiliate marketing; there are affiliate networks which are comprised of a collection of affiliates and a collection of merchants and then there are individual affiliate programs that are made up of a merchant and his affiliates. Both function well, the potential affiliate should experiment with both categories to find out which fits his/her personal needs and character.

The affiliate networks are probably best described as the Sams or Wal-Marts of affiliate programs. They present a vast assortment of affiliate programs in one location where the individual merchant may only have just a few affiliate products to choose from. Some affiliate marketers will use a grouping of the two as they increase their labors to more than one affiliate program. The networks do not offer all programs that are in existence thus the fact that you will always have individual merchants out there.

A merchant or affiliate can connect with one of these networks just by simply navigating to one or to all and signing up. When a merchant signs up the network will handle keeping track of all the affiliates and paying their commissions. On the affiliate side, affiliates can sign up for one or many programs right there in one place which makes life for the affiliate marketer much.

The benefits are great. All you do is supply the product or service. The network lists your product or service on its network and affiliates sign up to promote your product or service. A merchant can potentially gain hundreds or even thousands of affiliate sales people in a short period of time. Once an affiliate signs up to promote your product or service it would be a good practice to visit the affiliate site to make sure the topic is compatible with your product or service. This practice will help guarantee additional sales for your product or service.

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3 Necessary Tools for the High Rolling Affiliate Marketer

What does it take to become a successful Affiliate Marketer? What are the ingredients of an affiliate promotion success story? Is there a shortcut to Affiliate Promotion glory? All these questions play around in the minds of affiliate marketers who need to make it huge in this business.

Although affiliate promotion is touted as one of the simplest and most effective ways to earn money online, it is not as simple as it sounds. The wise affiliate marketer designs every action and executes it the best way they can. They ought to also maximize the potential to earn by utilizing the right tools necessary for a successful Affiliate Promotion business. They have consulted some of the most successful affiliate marketers in the business and below are the top three necessary tools for a successful affiliate promotion business.

Important Tool #1: Your Own Web-site

The most important and indispensable tool in Affiliate Promotion is your own web-site. The first step in any successful affiliate promotion business is building a nice, credible and professional looking web-site. Your web-site is the jump off point of all of your promotion efforts. Thus, you must first build a user-friendly web-site, which will appeal to your prospects and encourage them to click on the links to the products and service you are promoting and make a purchase. Therefore, you must first concentrate your efforts in building a web-site that will cater to what your prospects need.

The most important thing you ought to think about is that all web users go online to look for information, not necessarily to go and buy something. Above all else, make your web-site filled with original, relevant and useful content. People will love articles that are appealing and helpful. Keep in mind that, in the net, content is still king and nice quality content won't only build your credibility, it can also help you accomplish a higher search engine rating. By posting relevant and useful articles, you establish yourself as a reputable professional in the field, making you a more reliable endorser of the product or service you promote. Establishing a nice reputation is a nice step in building up a loyal consumer base.

Important Tool #2: Incentives

Competition is tight in the net world. You must always be one-step ahead of your rivals to make sure that you capture a significant share of your target market. Therefore, you must use every feasible means to encourage people not only to visit your site but also to click and proceed to the sites of the products and services you are promoting. Building an opt-in electronic mail list is one of the best ways to collect prospects. Offer a newsletter or an e-zine. Better yet, offer incentives to your prospects to encourage them to subscribe to your newsletters. You can present free software, access to exclusive services and other freebies that will be helpful to your prospects.

Important Tool #3: Link Popularity

The importance of driving highly targeted traffic to your web-site cannot be emphasized . The all-important web traffic is at the top of the list of the most important entities in the net world. Attracting people to your site ought to be the first step you ought to carry out. Do everything to accomplish a high search engine rating. Link Popularity is one of the factors that search engines use to choose search engine rankings. Therefore, to enhance your link popularity, you must launch an aggressive reciprocal link campaign.

One of the best ways to do this – at no cost at all – is by submitting articles, together with your website's link at the resource box, to e-zines and free article sites. You won't only gain exposure, you will also have the chance to promote free, include a link back to your site. The more sites you submit your articles to, the better your link popularity is. Make your articles original, relevant and useful so that more sites will pick it up and post it.

These are but three of the many tools that an affiliate marketer can use to maximize earning potential. The possibilities are countless and are limited only by your imagination, creativity, resourcefulness and determination. You can always explore other ideas and modify other strategies, which you think might help you become a high rolling affiliate marketer.