It always brings me great pleasure to introduce written pieces from my husband, Glenn, who is a regular contributor to my blog. This particular piece is his take on affiliate marketing for those starting out and a refresher/reminder for the seasoned veterans and players…

“Affiliate Marketing is an intricate job which requires time and effort to succeed. It is one of the official businesses of Internet marketing that requires time and effort to make it successful. Affiliates have a responsibility to themselves to bring enough traffic to their sites. They have a responsibility to make the site interesting through the presentation of its content and its design. The affiliates are also responsible for accepting payment and delivering the product to the customer.

We can divide the affiliates into two groups, the first is the merchant and the second is the affiliate. The merchant is the owner of the product and the affiliate is the person who promotes the product. Affiliates are inbetween these two groups and their main job is to sell the merchant’s products.

Affiliates have to be intelligent and hardworking. They have to be seasoned marketers with sound strategies and they have to be veteran to the field of affiliate marketing. These people granted, will still need to learn the ropes of the business.

The drawbacks of affiliate marketing is that the affiliates have to share their profits, if they are successful in promoting the products. As for the merchants, he or she has to share with the affiliates the percentage of commission in each sale. These two parties have a symbiotic relationship and each party feeds the other.

Success of affiliate marketing lies in the proper use of technology and the internet. As technology grows, the use of internet in advertising will grow with it. People who are involved in affiliate marketing knows that the success of affiliate marketing lies in the proper use of technology and the internet. As business is being done online, it is also bound to have an online component. Thus, it is the responsibility of the affiliate to utilize the technology and the internet in their business.

Affiliate marketing is a popular name of a business done online. It is a popular name of a business which involves a partnership between a merchant and an affiliate. In this business, an affiliate acts as a website owner, in charge of managing and operating the website of the merchant. There are three ways in which an affiliate can earn, by the affiliate program, by displaying advertisements of the merchant or by Modifying the performance based on performance (myth) as per mutual consent.

Before you venture into this business, you must learn and know everything about Affiliate Marketing. If you are new to affiliate marketing, then you will be required to become knowledgeable about technology, the internet and the market as well as the players involved.

Affiliate marketing is a wasting ground for affiliates and a pitfall for merchants. Many affiliates become so frustrated after some time of not getting money for their efforts. The main reason is that they are searching the wrong techniques. This information is normally readily available from affiliate networks and the merchants themselves. Sometimes, it is not packaged well and the affiliates file for their useless information in about 15 minutes. They learn nothing new and they lose the faith and trust of their audience.

5% of affiliates are highly successful and they build substantial incomes from this business. But the remaining 90% in spite of the huge efforts they put in, become unsuccessful and eventually quit.

It is interesting to note that the merchant shares 50% of his total income with his affiliates. While he has to share with the affiliates another 50%, he saves his time and becomes extremely rich.

How can affiliates become successful?

Affiliates must choose the right product. The product should be popular and increasing in demand. What will not work is an affiliate promoting a product that has scores of affiliates but not enough sales. This will force the affiliates to work harder and at the end of the month, the merchants will be reaping the rich rewards.

Before you join any affiliate program, you should read all the fine print. Make sure that you will be paid my commission on the scheduled time. If you find that there are no affiliate programs that will pay on time, then you should not join such a program.

Before entering into an affiliate marketing business relationship, the affiliate must ensure that the product advertiser is trustworthy. Affiliates can try contacting the merchant to find out how well he is taking care of the affiliates. If the merchant is customer oriented, he will be glad to answer all the questions. If, however, an affiliate finds that there are many aware of him, then he has to avoid such marketers.

The last task before becoming a good and reliable affiliate marketer is to choose a program whose keywords he writes are similar to his niche. Since, most of the times, he has to promote products within a similar category, the chances of making sales are higher for him.”

Glenn Riley.