Affiliate Programs

Becoming an affiliate allows individuals and websites to profit from traffic they generate on the internet by linking to Merchant sites. These programs are completely free to join. The toughest task you face as an affiliate is to choose programs that match the type of traffic you have to your website. You only have so much quality available space on your site so do your best to match the interests of your visitors with the products on the website you are affiliating with. For example, if a website catered to animal lovers you wouldn't want to put a link on your site to a gun shop. Instead you might look for something that sells pet supplies.

Selecting Suitable Programs

Don't get fooled only by big commissions. While earning big commissions for each sale is great, this can also mean the product is over priced and will therefor be a tougher sell. And if a visitor to your site did purchase an item that a few days later they found somewhere else at 25% less, do you really think they would ever return? If the product you are selling is fairly priced, or better yet a good deal, those same visitors may send more buying traffic to your site increasing your sales and profits. You can affiliate for the short term or you can Affiliate 2 Success by making wise and prudent choices. Check out our site map for the affiliate programs we make our living from. They are all top quality programs.

Payouts

There are 3 basic ways you can earn from traffic you send to a merchant. You can get paid per click, per lead or per sale. Pay per click means exactly that. You usually get paid x number of cents for each unique click that registers on a merchant site as coming from your link to them. Paid per lead is usually a flat rate commission for any purchases made by one of your referrals. Pay per sale, which we like most, is based on the affiliate receiving a commission of either a percentage or flat rate for every product sold that their lead generates at the merchant's site. This maximizes the potential payout because the merchants are only paying on actual sales. This allows them to pay you more!

Now let's examine payouts a little closer. Basically most affiliate programs offer you a single or 2 tier payout. Single tier means you get paid only for any direct sales or traffic that comes from your link. 2 tier means that not only do you receive commissions from sales or clicks generated by you and your site, but now you can also earn commissions from sales made from purchasing traffic from other sites that you introduced the affiliate program to and who joined. For example if you joined and were impressed with a program and showed it to a friend and he also joined (using your referral link) then in a 2 tier system you could earn from sales generated not only from traffic from your links but also from your friends.

Another thing to watch for in any affiliate program are payout minimums. These minimums are the total owing you before you reeive your payment. Most companies pay once a month and if say they have a minimum payout of $50. they only pay those affiliates that reached that total owing at payment cutoff time. So under this scenario, if you had say $48. owing because you had not reached their preset minimum of the $50. you would not receive a check that month and your balance owing would be carried forward to the next month. So unless you know you will be generating plenty of sales look for programs with low payout minimums. Payouts can range from $10.00 on up.

Recap

In short look for programs that will be:

* of interest to your sites traffic

* are reasonably priced

* 2 tier programs are a good option for generating extra income

* look for companies that offer low monthly payout minimums.