In the world of building your website, driving traffic to your blog, and, you know, making sure that people actually read your stuff, you may come across the concept of affiliate marketing. What is it, exactly? More importantly, do you need to offer some kind of affiliate setup?
Let's explore the dos and don'ts of affiliate marketing for your website (namely, your blog).
Affiliate Marketing Mistakes
What better place to begin than with the mistake that you might make while setting up an affiliate marketing program?
1. Rushing It. Okay, so, you want to get a lot of really great bloggers to send traffic to your website through their own blogs. So, you set up an affiliate program and offer some kind of incentive. But, you don't really think that incentive through, and you wind up offering nothing or giving away too much – neither option is good. Spend some time building your affiliate program the right way.
2. You aren't selectively choosing affiliates. Any kind of affiliate is a good kind, right? Not necessarily. You'll want to make sure that the links headed back to your site are positive ones. Links that come from high ranking and relevant websites are the way to go. Links that are coming from spammy sites are a bad idea. Be selective here.
Good Affiliate Marketing Ideas
1. Money is always a good idea. If you offer your affiliate partners a percentage of click sales, that's not a bad thing. The trick is to go after the really high-ranking bloggers and marketers that you want to work with. Offer these people something that's hard to pass up (like money), and you'll wind up with a win-win.
2. A thought out plan. If you've spent some time going over possible affiliate marketing plans with your entire team, you've probably built out a solid plan, right? That's the kind of affiliate marketing that you want to create. Work with your team, build something that makes sense.
3. Take some tips from the pros. Look at what Amazon does. Amazon does affiliate marketing right. It's not always easy to compete with the likes of Amazon, but you can try, right? Or, better yet, just learn and observe what Amazon does. You'll quickly understand the best way to set up your affiliate marketing program.
Getting the Word Out
Now that you know what to do with an affiliate program, you'll have to get the word out about your program – otherwise, who's going to see it or use it? Spend some time targeting your market, find out what makes those people tick, figure out where those people spend their time, and go from there. This is how you make an affiliate marketing program work for you. Set it up, spend the time, and get that traffic the right way.
You're competing with a lot of different hosting companies, so you have to make sure that your site really stands out. The best way to do this is with an affiliate program that generates those natural links. Need help? Just ask!
Photo by Ivan McClellan Photography Via Flickr Creative Commons
