Home Business Blog

Archive for the ‘Affiliate Marketing’ Category

Every day I look at my inbox and see dozen of offers to make me rich quick. Offers that say I need this to make my home business work, if I use this product I will get guaranteed visitors to my websites. I particularly dislike the ones that promise thousands of dollars overnight for the purchase of their product. Guaranteeing me the chance of a lifetime if I only follow their simple business plan.

If I signed up for everyone of these program or just a few, then I would be making someone rich, but not necessarily me. I am not saying that all of the emails I get are trying to sell me a bill of goods, but a great majority of them are.

So how did I pick the businesses I am involved with? I tried out a few of the emails that sounded promising in the beginning. I learned a lot through them on how I did not want to market my products, but earned no money.

First of all I had read years ago about a gentlemen who did nothing but affiliate marketing. Some people say that affiliate marketing is just selling a bill of goods to the next unsuspecting customer. Let me say that not all affiliate marketers are honest, not all affiliate marketers know their products. Most have never tried out the products they promote. I personally have not tried out all the products I promote. So how do I know they are not honest work at home businesses?

It is a matter of trust. Over the years I have come to know and value friendships with many online marketers. Many are hard working people just like you who want to help others achieve the American Dream of owning their own business. Most of the people I work with have tried the programs I offer and vouch for their authenticity. Some of the products I have tried myself so I know they are honest companies.

Let us say for the sake of conversation, that you purchase a product from my site. Over the next couple of weeks you feel that the product is not living up to your expectations and you are feeling cheated. What can you do…simple every program I offer comes with a complete money back guarantee with no questions asked. Be sure and read the refund guidelines before you join any program so that you understand the process needed to get your money back.

I offer a couple of “free” programs such as SFI. I have been with SFI for over 5 years and if you have read any of my reviews on the program you will see that I haven’t always been happy with them. But as a company as a whole, they are worthwhile. They have so much to offer and the training is excellent. Follow their guidelines and in a couple of months you will see some income. And what is great is that income will just continue to grow over time.

Another program that I have recently joined is Maverick Money Makers. It is still to early for me to say whether it lives up to its hype, but I will say some of the training and support I have received from other members is great.

Obviously I am not a newbie to Internet Marketing or owning my own home business, so I am more in tune with how to earn money online, but it wasn’t always the case. At one time at the beginning of this adventure I did not know a search engine from a website. I read, listened, joined a few programs both good and bad, visited a lot of forums for information, tried not to ask stupid questions, and found a group of people who were just like me in wanting to earn money from home.

So take a look around my various websites and start your new career online. I have programs that sell health products such as Herbal Life, survey sites, drop shipping companies for an Ebay business, even sites that offer instruction on how to get the most out of your selling on Ebay. From working entirely online to combining working online and offline. Take some time to look around to find what you are looking for in a work at home business.

The one piece of advice I give everyone who signs up under me at any program is: DON’T SPEND MONEY YOU DON’T HAVE! SPEND YOUR MONEY WISELY!

Home Work For You

Two other websites that I have just for the fun of it:

Creative Crafting
Simply Cookbooks

There are many home business opportunities for those who want to work on the Internet. Becoming an affiliate marketer is one of the ways of having your own online business. Every affiliate marketer who has ever written an article, has written one about why they started a home based business. The reasons vary. Here are some of my reasons why I choose affiliate marketing for my home-based business.

1. Be Your Own Boss – This is my the main reason for being an affiliate marketer. Actually, it is what motivated me to become an affiliate marketer. I really am independent when it comes to someone telling how to do something.

2. The world is your store – There are no geographic limits on your sales area, because you never leave home. Promote your web site worldwide; every Internet user in the whole world is potentially your customer (and they call this a small business! The joke is on them!)

3. Set up costs are minimal – Most affiliate programs are free to join, so all you need to start your business is the Internet, a computer and a willingness to learn. You can work from anywhere in the world and it makes no difference whether you have an office or work from your kitchen table.

4. Selection of products and services – All you have to do is decide what you think people will want to buy, just about everything is available online. With affiliate directories it’s easy to find products to sell.

5. No inventory to stock – You don’t need to worry about purchasing products that you then have to store in your home. Sell any item, large or small without having to worry about storage space.

6. Astronomical income potential -With your own affiliate business your income level is limited only by you and your desire and effort – not by a salary structure or office politics.

7. No wholesale account or billing required – Forget the problems connected with invoicing, collecting payments and processing credit cards. The wholesaler handles all payment processing; as an affiliate, you never have to worry about returns, fraud or losing your account.

8. Extremely low overhead – Apart from a reasonable budget for advertising and the cost of your Internet connection, you have nothing much in the way of overhead. You work from home, so the big expense of renting office space is eliminated and it is possible to get income tax deductions to cover office expenditures.

9. Open for business – As an affiliate, your business is running for you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, when you are sleeping, vacationing with your family and all Holidays. You don’t have to worry about business hours or delivery deadlines it is all on autopilot. You don’t have to worry about scheduling employees: as a matter of fact you don’t even need any employees!

10. YOU ARE THE BOSS! – This is the best reason of all! You are completely responsible for your own success (or failure); no one can tell you when you have to be at work, when you can have a day off, how much you will get paid, no stress, no pressure, and the list goes on….

Starting a home business would of course require a lot of things, the most important of which is you need some money. To make money requires money is as true on the Internet as a starting a business offline. But of course, with the variety of resources that the Internet offers, there are many ways you could find that could help your site or business in generating traffic.

While there is ways to jumpstart your traffic, not everyone has the resources that others have to generate more traffic for your site. You don’t have to spend a dime; all you need is the proper mindset and a lot of eagerness. You also must have the determination and perseverance to do hard work and research to generate more traffic for your site.

Having more traffic for your site without spending a single cent is extremely rewarding..  Many sites have articles that offer tips and guidelines in how to generate traffic using only free methods. Because it is possible, you don’t need to speed a single cent, it may take time, there is no way around that fact. You get better chances by paying for your advertisements, but at least you get a chance with some of these free methods outlined in this article.

Online forums and other online communities such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, any social networking site will target a select group of people that will fit your needs. So take full advantage of this type of market.   Offer opinions and ask questions about your niche and offers.  There is a wealth of Internet marketing knowledge on these types of sites.

An advantage of online communities and forums is that you can build a reputation for your company. Show them what you are made of and wow them with your range of expertise about the subject, with that you can build a reputation and build trust with potential customers.

Newsletters provide people with a catalog of your products and interesting and entertaining articles. If you make it really interesting and entertaining, more people will sign up for your newsletter and recommend it to other people. The more people who sign up for your newsletter, the more people there will be going to your site thereby increasing your traffic.

Another great idea is trading links with other sites should cost you nothing. Contact webmasters of sites similar to yours and ask them if they would like to exchange links with you.  A link exchange is a win-win situation for both parties. Someone who puts your link on their site opens up the possibility of a customers clicking on your link and visiting your site.

Writing articles is an excellent way to draw the attention of people that have interest in your product.  When submitting article to Ezines on the Internet be sure to include in the resource box a link to your home page along with a brief overview of who you are and what it is you do. Many sites offer free submission and posting of your articles, these sites are known as Ezines.

Good content is key to getting search engines to notice you.  Many search engines track down the keywords and keyword phrases your site uses and how they are used. It is not a requirement that content should be done by a professional content writer. You could do your own; it should provide certain requirements as well as great quality. A good way to have a keyword relevant site is to write the keywords you want to use down first, before writing the article.  Do not saturate the article with the keyword, but do make sure it is at the beginning and end of the article. When search engines scan your site for content these are the two areas they look at the most.

Generally, Internet users use search engines to find what they are looking for. Search engines in return use keyword searching in aiding their search results. With the right keywords, you could get high rankings in search engine results without the costs.

Blogs are a great way to get free traffic to your site.  Basically a blog is a tool to promote your articles, which in turn promote your website.  If you are hosting your own website all ready, you can self-host a blog through WordPress.com.   It is easy and fun; and a terrific traffic generator.

All of these methods and more will drive more traffic to your site for free. All it takes is a bit of effort and extended man hours. Learn all you can about the methods depicted here and you will soon have a site with a great traffic flow without the usual costs that come with it.

If you’re new to affiliate marketing, there are a few things that you need to know about marketing your affiliate products – because if you get these wrong, chances are, you’re never going to make more than a few sales.

Affiliate Marketing Mistake #1: Choosing the Wrong Product

This is a biggie, and probably one of the biggest mistakes that new affiliate marketers make.  How do you choose the best affiliate products?

There are several ways.  You could choose products based on their popularity (check out clickbank to see what I mean.)  Or you could choose products based around your current business.  (For example, if you run a business such as a beauty parlor, you could find a number of affiliate products…what about a book on hairstyles for weddings, or proms or braids?  Or you could sell a beauty book, or a book on skin care.  There are also physical products that you could sell.  The point is to look for affiliate products that complement what you’re already selling.

You could also choose affiliate products based on how much commission you’ll make – but think carefully before choosing this as your top method of deciding what products you want to sell.  Finding quality products should always be your top concern – because if the products you’re selling are garbage, the end result is that while you might make sales, you’re also going to get lots of refund requests – which means you’ll end up in the hole.

Affiliate Marketing Mistake #2: Marketing the Product the Wrong Way

We’ve all seen the ads that say “Make a Million Dollars with No Product and No Website” – those ads are usually about affiliate marketing.

But think about it for a minute.  If you could REALLY do that – wouldn’t everybody be doing it?  That old saying that “if something sounds too good to be true then it probably is” holds true when it comes to affiliate marketing.

The best way to market any affiliate product is to sell it where the customers are.  Which means that you need to know who your prospective customers are.  You need to find out as much information about them as possible – what they want, what their greatest fears are, what solution they’re looking for.  Then you need to know where they shop – if your affiliate marketing product is for consumers, then you’ll want to know where your prospect shops, what magazines they read or what Internet pages they visit.  Where do they hang out?  If you’re selling to business owners, then you’ll have to find out where they do business at.  And again, market your affiliate products there.

Affiliate Marketing Mistake #3: Not Writing the Right Kind of Sales Copy

Although it’s not absolutely necessary to hire a professional copywriter (especially if you’re just starting out and money is tight), it is necessary that you learn the basics about copywriting and write sales copy that will appeal to your market.

One of the first things you need to do is to “Continue the conversation that your prospect is already having inside their head.  That means that you need to know what kind of questions your prospect has about your affiliate product – and make sure that you’re answering them.  Think about what kinds of objections your prospect might have, and find a way of answering them, too.

Add social proof. (This means you want to show that other people have bought the product and love it.)  When you’re selling affiliate products, the really good marketers will provide you with testimonies that you can use, along with sales copy, email copy, etc.  (This is great because it’s often been written by a professional copywriter who understands the market.)

However, even if you’re given a sales page or email blasts to send out to your list, you don’t want to use it word for word.  Make a few changes it – give it your own original touch.  Make it fresh and original so that your prospect doesn’t see the exact same ad somewhere else – you’ll lose credibility if that happens.

If you’re offering a bonus for someone to buy your affiliate product, make sure that the bonus goes along with the product. Don’t give away recipes if you’re selling a book about hair care.  Make sure your bonus relates to the product and is useful to your prospect.  (For example, you could write your own Ebook that tells how to get the most out of the affiliate product.  That’s something that no one else will be able to sell, because it’s yours.

Whatever you do, when it comes to affiliate marketing, it’s easy to avoid making the three biggest marketing mistakes just by doing a little thinking and strategic planning before you get started.  And the truth is, you can make a very good living just from selling affiliate products, as long as you do it the right way.  Good luck!