Affiliate marketing programs have sky-rocketed in popularity in the past few years. As one of the fastest and easiest ways to start an online home business people are jumping on this wave by the millions. Affiliate programs offer merchants the opportunity to employ vast armies of sales people who get paid for the results they achieve.
The rewards for affiliates can be very good, and the skilled affiliate marketer can earn many thousands of dollars per month. This win-win situation has led to an explosion in the number of affiliate programs that are available to affiliate marketers.
With this growth of affiliate opportunities have come many questions, such as: how do you go about choosing the right affiliate program for you? What qualities should you look for in a program and which gives you a good chance of making a sustainable income? Below are some tips that will help you to evaluate affiliate programs, and help you to avoid wasting time and money.

What Commissions Does the Program Pay?
It is very important that you know how much you can expect to earn from a sale. There is no point in spending time and money promoting a product that pays very small commissions. You could end up spending more on marketing than you make on sales. It is probably best to stick with marketing products with a high commission value, unless you have found a niche market where you can sell vast quantities of product, and make substantial commissions on your volume of sales.

How Much Traffic is their Website Getting?
Try to discover the amount of traffic the affiliate owner’s website is already receiving. Alexa.com is a very useful tool for doing this research. If the website is ranked in the top 100,000, the merchant is getting a good volume of traffic, so it’s possible that there may already be too many affiliates. If it is ranked below 500,000 it may be no good, or it could be a golden opportunity to make some real money by becoming one of the first affiliates!
Always research a merchant’s product if their website has a low traffic ranking. It may be a good idea to buy the product yourself if you can afford it. Otherwise you could do a search to find out if there are any negative reviews about it on the internet. Be careful who you listen to though because many people are in the habit of bashing affiliate programs with nothing to really support their comments. If you find a large amount of negative reviews with little positive ones then it would probably be a good idea to stay away from that affiliate program.

How Often Are Affiliate Commissions Paid?

Some affiliate programs pay commissions every week; some once a month, others only pay every quarter. It is important that you know how often you can expect a pay check if you are going to have financial control over your business. Do you have the financial resources to continue to market a product if you have to wait a long time before you get paid? It would also be wise to find out the minimum commission that you have to earn before you get paid.

Does The Affiliate Program Use Tracking Cookies?

Many customers do not buy on their first visit to a merchant’s website. It is important therefore that the merchant uses cookies for their affiliate program, so that you get credit if the customer returns and buys at a later date. Check out how long the cookies last. The longer the cookies lasts; the better the chances of you getting paid!

Does the Affiliate Program Pay on Subsequent Sales?

Some programs will only pay commission on sales that come through customers visiting their site via a direct link from your site. They pay you nothing for any subsequent purchases that the customer makes if they visit the merchants site directly. It is important that you get paid no matter what route the customer returns by if you are to build a sustainable affiliate business.

What Marketing Resources Does the Affiliate Program Offer?

Look at the type and quality of the marketing resources that they provide. Do they provide articles, advertisements, or other content that you can use to put on your site? Do they provide free guides, special offers, free viral e-books, or product samples that you can send to your list? If the marketing material they provide is good then it is likely that the business will provide good support for their affiliates.

Finding the right affiliate program for you can be tough to do. The best advice is to do your own research, follow the advice above, and listen to your instincts. Use the above questions as an aid to finding an affiliate program that enables you to reach your financial goals. You never know… You might just strike affiliate marketing gold!



Click the link below if you want to make $100 per day.
http: //fumacrom .com /1BgNW (remove space)
 

Chibson

VIP Contributor
This is a very good piece you have written here. Affiliate marketing is undoubtably a very lucrative venture and if anyone wants to venture into it he has to choose the best platforms that give the highest commissions and also other support. I always like to use clickbank whenever I want to promote my affiliate marketing product because it is definitely one of the best and their commission is very high.
 

Jasz

VIP Contributor
Nice! You listed almost every important thing:
You need to cosider how their commission is, choice of product, mode and time of payment, if ppc or based on conversions. You need a website to promote your business. This can be a full scale, high traffic site or it doesn't always have to be!.
It will be more easier and profitable to build around your niche, as you can either promote peoples product or yours instead. You will need to learn how to select trending topic with tremendous demand that is also easy to write about and has low levels of competition. The two critical keys to success as an Affiliate Marketer are visitors and targeted qualified visitors.
You can also use these method to generate a list of audience/customers.
If you are interested in becoming a successful online marketer, there are many different ways you can go, but most techniques rely on having a large list. This requires you to have a lead capture page that collects email addresses and other information from your potential customers. When they do sign up they are given an affiliate link which they can use.
To be successful in this you need to have a good experience, you can learn by reading related materials online or pay to learn the course. You need to be patient to be successful.
 
Top