How to Choose the Best Affiliate Programme
Some of the key considerations in choosing the best affiliate programme when starting off as an affiliate marketer have to be the market demands and your interest or passion.
For those just starting off in online marketing, there are plenty of opportunities out there to earn money online without having to sell your own product.
With buying and selling online become the norm, every sale that a merchant or reseller can close be it for a physical or digital product or service is another sale in their books.
So instead of recruiting sales people, they offer an affiliate program that pays commission to those who help refer potential customers to their site to buy their product or services.
But, how do you choose the right product or service to promote? We mentioned the demands of the market and your interest or passion, let’s look at some of the success criteria for choosing the best affiliate programme.
Selecting the Best Affiliate Programme
There are thousands of affiliate marketing opportunities in the Internet in almost any sector or market you can imagine. Use the following tips and suggestions to learn about how best to choose the affiliate program that’s right for you.
1. Match Making Information
Depending on weather you already have a website or a specific interest, pick the affiliate programme that offers the type of products or services that fit your site or topic of interest.
This makes it easier for you to promote the product on your site, to represent these products without breaking its focus.
Your potential clients and visitors will also be able to immediately relate to the products, match their needs to it and find the resource and information you offer useful.
You already shown your passion for the subject or topic in your blog about, it won’t be too far fetch to say you will do a good job recommending the product or service to your readers,
If you are blogging about health and fitness, look for merchants that sell products in this category and check out their affiliate programmes.
If you do not have a website or blog, choose a niche that you are passionate about and interested in. It makes your work a lot easier and things will come naturally to you went you write about them.
2. Do Your Homework
So, you have made a shortlist of affiliate programmes that match your interest and that of your potential clients, next do some research.
Join the affiliate programme’s discussion forum and learn about the benefits and issues that existing affiliate marketers are facing. Other affiliate marketers can also offer you tips and advice that will help you decide if the programme is right for you.
If you don’t know what to ask when reviewing affiliate programmes, visit the FAQ section. This should give you plenty of information to think about.
From looking at some of the FAQ and benefits offer by the different affiliate programmes, you can even write your own criteria for a good affiliate marketing programme and use this to find the right match.
From this, you can eliminate some of the programmes that do not suit your requirements.
3. Look for Affiliate Marketing Programme NETWORKS
Instead of relying on their own Affiliate Programme, some merchants would sign up to an existing third party network to leverage on existing affiliate marketers.
These networks represent a wide range of products from different merchants and in a wide range of categories. This works out well for affiliate marketers as you can find all the merchants for products in your category in one place.
Affiliate marketers will still be required to apply to the different merchants for approval before they are able to start selling their products but being able to list products according to categories gives them an idea of what the competing products are and be able to compare them side by side.
Affiliate marketers can also track and compare their numbers, to understand what sells and what does, what gives more return, what are the information and tools available from each of these products and services to help you sell their product.
4. Think Like Your Customer
Often we focus too much on the product and specifications that we lose sight of what is important to the end user. Consider the benefits and advantages of the products and services to your clients.
Would your potential customers be compelled to not only visit your site to learn about what you are recommending and what value you have to offer but if they will ultimately click on the affiliate link and buy the product.
Once they have learnt about what you have to say and they are convinced, they will click on your affiliate link to go to the sales page. The product sales page which is put together by the merchant will be the final test in promoting the product. It will need to convert the visitor into a client.
Your goal is, if you have found a good product, evaluate the sales page. Put yourself in your customers shoes, be a tough judge of the sales page, if you are convinced then it is now down to you to build your case for sending visitors there.
If you convince the visitor to go to the sales page and the sales page can convince your visitor to buy the product then you are in business.
Make sure the products you are endorsing are worthwhile or in the business context, saleable. Ask yourself, if I were the customer, would I buy it? Would I recommend it to my family or good friend? If you can’t convince yourself or your family and friends to buy it, take a look at your next option.
5. Sales History
Most Affiliate Networks and Affiliate Programmes provide the merchandisers’ history sales data. Learn about their previous and present sales data, their proven and tested affiliate marketing systems and their partners’ experiences with them.
The sales records are the social proof. It shows which product or service is popular among netizens and is fulfilling a need in the market. Look for good paying and high converting products, such information is usually available from an Affiliate Network.
6. Affiliate Support
Often you will find that affiliate programs that you sign up to provide materials that you can use straight away to promote their product or service. These can be in the form of textual links, banners, graphics and articles. Some affiliate programmes even offer video tutorials, special discounts and free trial.
Choose affiliate programs that help you create these for your web site so you don’t have to do it yourself. However, we would recommend putting your own stamp in your blog by adopting some of the information from the articles provided and not to copy these wholesale. The idea is to add value to your audience in filtering the information that you think will benefit them.
Some affiliate programmes offer training and newsletters on how to effectively market their product or service including news any current offers. Remember that affiliate marketing is a partnership, so make sure your partner is able to support you as you help him promote his products and services.
7. Assessing the Programmes
Finally, write down all the advantages and disadvantages of each programme you are considering so you can clearly see the difference among your options. Compare the advantages of the programs with your own checklist. Take time to gather all the information you need to choose the right programme.
And, when you are ready, plan your next move, start promoting the product and service. Online marketing and
8. Continue to Educate Yourself and Your Audience
Be aware of the trends and changes in the market, continue to educate yourself by reading books, news and articles online on the industry or topic you are working on.
Things may change, new products or services may be launched in your market or the products and services you are currently selling may fall out of favour with your audience or netizens in general.
Sometimes, the provider or merchant may move on to other things so keep up with them. Apply Step 1 to 7 above to decide on other affiliate programmes and continue to use the strategies you have learnt. Success will be yours.
