|
|
affiliate_marketing :: Internet Marketing :: Affiliate Marketing
Can You Succeed Marketing An Affiliate Based Program?
Success with Affiliate Marketing, or Internet Marketing in general, depends on a lot of factors; the product
you decide to promote, the type of advertising you use, the size of your advertising budget, etc. One product
in particular has been around since the dawn of the World Wide Web. It has in the past, and still is making
small fortunes for many Internet Marketers. The product I am refering to is information. Throughout this site
you will find an abundance of information on affiliate programs, marketing, website building, advertising and
so much more. Enjoy!
internet marketing
can be an enjoyable and profitable experience, but it can also be very
frustrating, time consuming, money draining and anti social.
So why do we keep putting ourselves through all this pain?
Well, I’m sure that for everyone there is a different answer
depending on your driving force, but for me it’s the thought that one
day I’ll succeed and make a tidy income. God knows how many ‘Get Rich’
schemes are out there but experience has taught me that 95% of them are
simply schemes for making the owner rich and not the affiliate. On the plus side, they do teach you the pitfalls of internet marketing and hopefully move you that little further down the line towards your ultimate goal.
You may think that this article is simply a moan about the chaos which is ‘internet marketing’
but I assure you that’s not the case. My aim is to pass on the good and
bad of this type of venture and to hope that I can help someone to
avoid the many obstacles and reach there goal reasonable unscathed.
Can you make money from a program which doesn’t sell a tangible product?
Time and time again you’ll see these type of programs – They’ll say
pay $5 as a one off payment and we’ll give you thousands in return. The
word that comes to mind is ‘Pyramid’. Logic tells you that $5 can never
become $1,000 without you sponsoring thousands of people and then
they’ve got to sponsor thousands of people and so on. At some point you
run out of people and the system fails. You loose your money but the
owner makes a tidy sum. Maybe the answer is to invent your own ‘Get
Rich’ scheme but then, how do these people sleep at night?
Personally, these schemes should be outlawed because all they do is serve to undermine the ethics of internet marketing.
So, can you make money from these types of programs – My experience tells me ‘No’
Should you avoid them?
Most certainly ‘Yes’
What about programs where you pay a monthly fee but again there isn’t a product?
These are very much the affiliate
based programs and do have some merits. They tend to offer the same,
old same old, free resource tools, safe lists to join and a type of ad
co-op guaranteeing leads and/or sign-ups. Of course, the tools are
usually obsolete in today’s market, the safe lists are more geared
towards the owner making an advantage by you joining using their affiliate
ID and the guaranteed leads are too old to be of any use. I’m sorry for
being a cynic but I’m sure there are people out there who are reading
this article and nodding there head because they’ve been there.
On the plus side these programs do have a sustainable growth because of the monthly income and so getting personally sponsored affiliates
can recoup your loses over time. The problem however, is that people
tend to be reticent to join because of the fees and then become
despondent when they struggle to get affiliates
for themselves. Most of the programs offer free membership and ‘Yes’
you will get tens to hundreds of people joining the free program but
the ratio from free to paid is very poor.
People enter these programs believing, that by simply joining, they
will be given thousands of Dollars for doing zilch! Like I said these
programs do have there merits and if you stick in and spend loads of
your money on advertising, hours of your time promoting to rotators and
safe lists then you may come out the other side breaking even or with a
small profit. Don’t get me wrong I still have some involvement with
these types of programs – Why? – Because I believe the hype that I can
be the one success story and come out the other side, a rich man!
What about the programs where you pay a monthly fee and promote a product?
If the product is unique in some way, affordable to the
masses, useable and needed and you can get in on the ground floor then
you could be onto a winner. In my experience, it’s the product which
brings in the serious marketer not the affiliate
program. Think back to the early days of mobile phones, when they use
to be very bulky and expensive and people were saying “They’ll never
catch on”
However, the marketer with vision saw the mass potential and stuck
in. Oh how I wish I’d been in this game then because now I wouldn’t be
here typing this article, I’d be on a beach somewhere and my secretary
would be typing this article. There are other types of product based affiliate
programs out there which will also give you a chance for success, but
finding it is like crawling through a minefield. Don’t simply sign up
because it’s free membership or the site looks professional, read all
the pages and understand the ethics of the owner. Consider the
product(s) on offer and think about your target audience. The
product(s) should be affordable, useable, sellable, exciting and
hopefully unique in its market. The affiliate
program should be affordable and sustainable. Look at the Compensation
plan and consider how feasible it will be for you and your potential
team, to reach the profit line. Some plans may look impressive but
sometimes they dazzle you with big Dollars. Look at the amount of paid
sign-ups required together with the percentages paid and compare this
to the cost of the program and the cost of advertising needed to reach
those required sign-ups. Work out how long it will take you to break
even, for instance, if the cost of the program is $20 a month and you
spend $20 a month on advertising you may get 1 or 2 sign-ups a month.
If the comp plan pays you $5 a sign-up you’ll need 8 sign-ups to break
even but it may take you 4 to 8 months to get to that point. So it
could cost you between $160 and $320 to get there.
Do your sums or you may never really break even?
You should look at the make-up of the down line and how it fits in
with the matrix/comp plan. Some down lines have legs, in that you build
so far down and then the line splits off and begins again. This usually
happens when you reach another level in the comp plan, but the
resulting effect can make it hard to progress to the next level. Some
have a straight down line so everyone who joins will be in your line.
This can be misleading in that you believe that it’s your sign-up and
you’ve earned money.
However, it does allow you to assess the popularity of the program and help you decide if you should continue.
Now Image you’ve come across an affiliate site (Not hard to do with today’s Internet) Ask yourself the following questions:-
Does the site look impressive?
Does it make you want to read on?
Does it have a product that excites you?
Could you use the product?
Could you sell the product?
Would you buy the product?
Is the product affordable?
Do I get the product as part of the affiliate program?
Can I afford the monthly payment?
Do they have a worthwhile Compensation Plan?
Do they have a matrix or a straight down line?
How quickly will I break even?
Can I make a profit?
SO CAN YOU SUCCEED BY marketing AN affiliate BASED PROGRAM?
Find today’s ‘Mobile Phone’ with an affordable affiliate program, offering you a good compensation plan, workable matrix and responsive down line and the answer is undoubtedly
‘YES’
Thanks for reading my article. If you want to subscribe to my newsletter then go to
http://www.profitmashine.com/biztipspop.html
About The Author
Ian Bosworth has over 2 years experience in internet marketing and has put all his ideas and knowhow into his website and newsletter at http://www.profitmashine.com
We hope you found the information on this page useful and will return often to browse
the many articles throughout our site. We will be adding new material on an ongoing
basis in order to keep our visitors up to date on the latest promotion and marketing
information and tools that allow so many marketers to earn a full time living on the
internet.
|
|
|
|
