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John's Work at Home Blog

Thursday, July 28, 2005

Online Affiliate Marketing

I knew I wanted to sell stuff on the Internet. The problem was I had nothing to sell .. I'm not an author, I'm not a professor, I don't manufacture anything.

Then I discovered online affiliate marketing. It works something like this:

A person registers with some company's (merchant's) affiliate program (retailers such as Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Vonage, etc). This person then "drives" or "refers" Internet traffic to these merchants. When a referred visitor purchases some product, say a book or piece of software, the person who referred the visitor is paid a commission for generating the sale.

There are two main methods for driving online traffic to these companies:

• Build a large or small website. Place various links, banners, and products on this website. When your visitors click through on these links and purchase a product you will get a commission.
• Send potential customers directly to the companies using Pay-Per-Click (PPC) networks. When these people purchase a product you will get a commission.

It takes more time to build a website with all of the Affiliate links. However, you can use your website to "presell" the company and/or products that you are promoting. In addition, you can capture the email addresses of your visitors. These can be used later to offer more products and generate even more sales. Luckily, there are software programs available that can make building a website a breeze. One of the easiest I've seen is SEO Site Builder System .

Retailers are not the only ones setting up affiliate programs. Mortgage compaines, Internet search sites, financial services companies, online magazines, use affiliates to get new visitors and customers. Affiliate marketing is good for everyone involved. Affiliates don't have to build their own online stores or carry an inventory, but they can still offer visitors a chance to shop.

I'll go more into all of this at a later time. We did an article on online affiliate marketing as part of our Hot Work From Home Ideas for 2005 You can read it here.