How To Choose The Best Affiliate Products
Most newbie affiliate marketers don’t know how to correctly choose affiliate products to promote. Learn nine ways on how to choose and promote the best affiliate products to place more profits in your pocket.
1. Choose products with proven track records.
If you’re choosing products on Clickbank.com, then choose those at the top of their categories (i.e., the best sellers) and those with high gravity numbers (between about 75 and 150). In addition, ask the vendors about their conversion and refund rates.
2. Do NOT choose products based on price alone.
Big price plus big commission percentages equals big profits, right?
NOT always.
Sometimes you can use low-price products to bring new customers into your sales funnel. So throw a few $5 products into the mix – you might be surprised at your improved conversion rates and the new customers you bring on board!
3. Select evergreen products.
If you’re sending out occasional broadcasts to your list, you can sell any kind of affiliate product you want. But if you’re selling using long-term strategies like blogging and article marketing, then consider choosing “evergreen” products.
Evergreen products are products that were relevant last year, this year and will be relevant into the foreseeable future. And that means you can make money on these products years after you submitted an article about it to the article directories.
Here’s an Example: A book that teaches marketers how to write good sales letters is evergreen, because basic copywriting “rules” have been in place for as long has humans have been advertising.
On the other hand, a book about how to optimize web pages for Google is NOT evergreen. Why? Because Google has the nasty habit of changing it’s content algorithm frequently, potentially stranding your web pages hundreds of positions from the top in the search results.
4. Look for sales page leaks.
Sometimes vendors think too much about their own profits and forget that some of their make-money-now strategies hurt their affiliates.
For Example: A Clickbank.com vendor who uses 2Checkout.com payment buttons or encourages customers to call in their orders avoiding the sales page process is stealing commissions from affiliates.
You can avoid this simply by looking over the sales page (and sales process) before becoming an affiliate. Here are the most common sales page leaks:
- Different payment options that don’t give the affiliate credit.
- Upsell options that, when chosen, override the affiliates cookie (and the affiliate loses the commission).
- Google AdSense ads on the sales page.
- Links to other products on the sales page.
- Prospects get put onto a mailing list that redirects them to a sales page that doesn’t give the affiliate credit.
- An affiliate sign-up link on the sales page. It’s awfully tempting for visitors to sign-up as an affiliate, purchase the product, and get the sales commission for themselves.
5. Watch out for shady vendors.
Usually the sales page leaks mentioned in the last tip are mistakes made by honest vendors. When you point out the mistake, they’ll quickly correct it.
However, there are some dishonest vendors who purposely use alternative payment commissions, faulty tracking software and other tricks to rob you of your commission. Indeed, some vendors even do things like falsify refunds so your affiliate account doesn’t show that you’re owed any money.
To protect yourself against these sorts of vendors, always deal with known, reputable people in your niche. And if you consider working with someone new, then search for his/her name, email addresses, websites and product names in Google to ensure he has a long, good history online. If you see a pattern of customer OR affiliate complaints, then move on and find another vendor.
6. Look for products with high commission percentages.
Commission rates vary depending on what you’re selling.
Example: Selling physical products (like computers) may put as little as a 5% commission rate into your pocket. But if you’re selling digital products, then you can usually expect at least a 40% commission rate, with 50% being the average. However, sometimes you’ll even approach 100% commission rates on downloadable products.
If you find a digital product offering 25% commissions – and the product doesn’t require personal service on behalf of the vendor (such as software installations or personal coaching) – then skip it. You can probably find similar products that pay at least a 50% commission.
7. Look for a hungry niche FIRST… and then look for a product to promote.
Some beginning affiliate marketers stumble on a product and are taken in by the promises of a high commission rate and potential big profits. But when they actually put the product on the market, they find that there’s very little demand for a “how to” instructional video for pygmy goat farmers.
Instead, what you need to do is find a hungry niche first, find out what they’re ALREADY buying, and then sell something similar. If you’re selling information products, the easiest way to do this is to go to Clickbank.com and seek out the best sellers (those at the top of their categories that have a high gravity).
8. Promote only those products that you’d use yourself.
Or, if you’re not a part of the niche market, then only promote those products that you’d recommend to your mother or your best friend.
Point is, don’t let the excitement of big commissions and a high conversion rate cloud your vision. Your primary objective is to help your customers.
If you’re selling products that fill your pockets with money but don’t solve your customers problems, you’re sacrificing long-term profits for short-term gains.
As such, put your primary focus on helping your customers by recommending good products. Doing so will earn their trust, which means they’ll be more likely to buy from you in the future. It’s a win-win situation.
9. Join the JV and pre-launch lists in your niche.
If you’re a known “super affiliate” in your niche, then vendors who’re about to launch new products will send you these products for free in hopes that you’ll promote. And because you’ll be one of the first affiliate to promote these products, you can generally make a lot of money on launch day.
But what happens if you’re not a super affiliate? How do you get notified about product launches?
Simple: Join joint venture (JV) notification lists in your niche.
Example: If you’re selling online marketing products, then join www.JVNotifyPro.com. If you’re not in that niche, then search in Google for your broad niche keywords alongside search terms like “JV opportunities,” “affiliate opportunities” and “pre-launch.”
Subscribe to all the big marketers newsletters in your niche. If there aren’t any JV notification sites or lists in your niche, then subscribe to the newsletters of all the big marketers.
Generally, the biggest marketers will have advanced notification of product launches and/or they’ll pre-notify their prospects about their own product launches. You can then write to the product owners to ask if you can join the pre-launch affiliate program.
Conclusion
If you don’t take time to carefully consider the affiliate products or programs that you promote, you end up not making much money. Bummer. Instead…
Follow these nine tips: choose the best affiliate products – promote them the best way you can – make more money!
For more information about Search Engine Optimization watch my SEO Professor Review video at http://2MinuteProductReviews.com/seo-professor-review/
Service Availability: Most services reviewed by this websites are available in the United Kingdom. This includes the following cities and their surroundings: London, Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Sheffield, Bradford, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Wakefield, Cardiff, Coventry, Nottingham, Leicester, Sunderland, Belfast, Newcastle upon Tyne, Brighton, Hull, Plymouth, Stoke-on-Trent, Wolverhampton, Derby, Swansea, Southampton, Salford, Aberdeen, Westminster, Portsmouth, Oxford, Newport, Norwich, Cambridge, Gloucester, Bath, Canterbury and others.
Looking For More Information?
Make sure to explore other articles in the Adsense category or contact us to suggest a website or a service to review.
|
|
