AFFILIATE MARKETING

AFFILIATE MARKETING
The business advantages for the Merchant explained:
If you run a company and you're looking for some online advertising, having an AFFILIATE PROGRAM is one of the best options around. The key feature is that affiliates only need paying commission for actual business which they attract to your company.
If you want your company to be able to sell online to a worldwide audience of potential customers, you need to have a website, as you might have guessed! But to really get some online interest generated, you should have an affiliate program.
With an affiliate program, thousands of independent websites will advertise your company for you and will just take their chances as to whether they do any good or not. You only need pay them if they make a profit for you.
You can have an affiliate program either independently or via one of the Affiliate marketing companies. Independent affiliate programs are generally less expensive, but you've got to find your own affiliates. For independent affiliate program software, see Affiliate tracker. For affiliate programs with affiliate marketing companies, you already have a great many affiliates looking to sign up to your program as soon as it is announced. You should shop around and compare the deals on offer at different Affiliate marketing companies. They vary considerably, in price and performance and quality of good management. Unlike affiliates, the affiliate marketing companies need to be paid on an ongoing fee basis usually, and you have to budget for this in the long term. An affiliate program is a long term investment, not just a quick flash in the pan kind a a fly'b'night kind of a thing. If you want quality affiliates, be patient, as it all takes a while to build up. Some of the companies I advertise have been here years!
One of the old problems with advertising has classically been the fact that only half your advertising is doing any good, and you can't find out which half it is! But now you can. With affiliate marketing program, you get huge great files of data about which of the affiliates are doing any good, and which products are selling well, and how the cost of the scheme is paying for itself. If you've made the wise choice of selecting "payment per performance" you are only paying for actual business which makes a profit, and you're not paying for loads of silly splat advertising pop-ups which annoy people and don't bring many sales. The affiliate business is in stark contrast to such ideas as sending spam as a marketing effort.
* An affiliate program is a long term operation. Good affiliates are attracted to long term affiliate programs.
* Try to avoid making your affiliates sign contracts that are too long-winded and restrictive. Affiliates are a funny set of folk to deal with and some get upset by too much legal stuff in the contracts.
* Avoid signing any "exclusivity" clause yourself! If an affiliate marketing company expects you to sign such a thing, beware! Go with somewhere that has an open policy. As well as allowing you to move at some time, this also allows you to have more than one affiliate marketing company working for you at the same time.
* Don't worry where the affiliates live. Their websites are omnipresent and are like radio stations on the Long Wave which can be picked up on receivers worldwide. It doesn't matter where the affiliates live, but where the VISITORS live.

* Provide plenty of good shpiel! Many good affiliates are keen to tell the world all about your company history and the products you have and what they are like. Text is good! Some companies have provided huge amounts of text material and have seen this turned into an affiliate Feature here! (The shpiel is best if it's still going to be true in years to come).
* If you have a corporate makeover, don't expect all the affiliates to change all the stuff overnight. It'll be months before it gets sorted out. In any event, always have some generic banners available, rather than all flashy offers.
* Customer testimonials are good. If you have some, written by customers, send them in! Also, some companies have the double edged distinction of having an active affiliate as a customer. This can result in a customer testimonial being written from personal experience by the affiliate. MOST of these are generally positive about the merchant!
* You can talk to your affiliates. Good diplomacy is good for business!