ACHIEVING SUCCESS PT-8

AFFILIATE MONEYMAKING BUSINESS

If you're not yet ready to develop your own business product or service, then launch your business as an Affiliate. It is simple, cost-effective and requires no start-up budget. In most cases you don't even need to have a website to get started. The affiliate program you join might assign you with a unique website template and URL. All you do is promote a product or service that has already been created. 

UNLOCKING THE AFFILIATE MONEYMAKING MACHINE CODE

Affiliate marketing as a “get paid for performance” business:

Affiliate marketing is a method of promoting Internet businesses in which an affiliate (you, for instance) is rewarded for every visitor, subscriber, customer, and or sale provided through your efforts. You earn commission based on a certain value for each:

• Exposure — Cost Per Thousand or CPM

• Visit — Pay Per Click or PPC

• Registrant or new customer — Pay Per Lead or PPL

• Sale — Pay Per Sale or Revenue Share

• Or any combination of the above

Presently the most active sectors for affiliate marketing are the adult, gambling and retail sectors. Other sectors such as the mobile phone, finance and travel sectors are expected to see growth. The software, entertainment (particularly gaming and music) and Internet-related services (such as broadband) sectors are also growing in the Internet marketplace.

You simply partner with a company to promote and sell their products or services online, and you earn money for your efforts. You are the one between the Affiliate Merchant and the Customer. You are the Middleman or Salesperson. The interesting part is that you don’t have to travel to the company to collect samples of the products they sell, and go from door to door to sell. The marketing strategy depends on you, and the company will help you with marketing strategies. In most cases you don’t need to have a website to become an E-Rep for a company. The company will provide you with a unique template loaded with web content. This is quick, and you don’t have to deposit any money to sell products via your affiliate link.

RULE #1: Never pay money to any company simply to sell their products.


RULE #2: Always remember Rule #1.

Some companies will charge you to join their affiliate programs. That is sheer nonsense. Never pay a dime for any affiliate program. The only money you should have to deposit is the cheque you’ll receive from your affiliate earnings… which you should deposit into your personal bank account. As an affiliate you do not resell products. All you do is to educate and direct the consumer to a product, and you get paid. The more sales you direct, the more money you and the merchant will reap.

Getting started?

You need one basic thing to get you started… and that is an access to a computer with a connection to the Internet. If you own one, that’s excellent. If you don’t have a PC that is connected to the Internet, visit an Internet lounge. Getting started depends on your particular circumstance. If you own a PC and are connected to the Internet, then you can work from the comfort of your living room or garage. Design a simple website to promote the affiliate programs you subscribe to. This would cost you less compared to using an Internet lounge where it is a pay-as-you-go business.

Deciding on what to sell — choosing an affiliate program

There are quite a large number of affiliate programs out there, each inviting you to apply and promising there is so much cash to earn through your efforts. The Internet marketplace is very huge, and so is the competition. You need to decide what to sell. The products and services you want to promote and sell online should suit your interest. Don’t follow the crowd, and decide to sell just anything. If you are an architect, you wouldn’t want to promote a porn site just because it is promising so much cash to affiliates. Would you? Practically you want to sell what you’re interested in, so that you can promote it with passion.

Don’t fall for the vague impression that all that is required to start reaping money from an affiliate program is simply plugging a link or a banner onto your website, and then you would start downloading money onto your desktop. That is not the case. You need to develop strategies to promote your affiliate website. More importantly, either your personal business website that links to your affiliate website or the actual affiliate store must be of an acceptable standard. Visitors to your website would judge you according to the theme of your website templates. Always assume that you have only one chance to impress. You have to be selective, and fussy about quality standards. The Internet is a vast business world, and very public. Do something silly, and your website will be in a topic-related online forum. You’ll become a topic… And you will be discussed. You’ll be named and embarrassed.

In terms of keywords, make a list of products and services you are interested in or that relate to your profession or website that you want to sell. Then use one or two of the popular search engines to look for Affiliate Merchants. In deciding what to sell and whose stuff to sell, put your interest first. When it comes to Affiliate Business, you come first. Trust me. Read the terms and conditions set by the Affiliate Merchant thoroughly before accepting their policies. Do not rush into anything. Affiliate merchants run affiliate programs simply to acquire customers. Some merchants design their programs such that the affiliate website may be cut out of the loop on subsequent purchases. This then becomes a monkey works, baboon draws business. If you’re looking for long-term relationship with the merchant, ensure you carefully read their terms.

Areas worth investigating for your selection criteria:

1. When, how much and how do you get paid? — Does the affiliate program pay you fortnightly, monthly, quarterly, etc.? How much do you make per sale, considering the fact that you’ll be investing in marketing campaigns? What is the minimum payout amount? What are the modes of payment? Set up your own selection criteria, and match them against affiliate program offers. Put your interest above everything.

2. Is the affiliate company a reputable one? — A reputable affiliate company will have a well-managed affiliate program. They normally have dedicated staff that manages the affiliate programs, usually referred to as Accounts Manager or Affiliate Manager. Beware of affiliate sites that have no contact information.

Creating a win-win situation:
When you decide to become an affiliate marketer, you will be placing affiliate promotional banners and text links on your website and or ask the affiliate company to also place your logo on their website. The latter increases traffic for both… and hopefully increases sales. Ensure you have a rich web content to get a top web-based company to put their logo on your website.

Regardless of the fact that you want to increase traffic to your site, you need to be selective of which company you partner with. Affiliate companies are equally selective of who they choose to get on their affiliate programs. To be precise, you need to avoid creating unfair competition. Do not promote the same type of products or services or particular labels you sell on your website. You may offer similar brands through an affiliate program, but not the exact items you sell. You don’t want to perish your own market, do you?

Marketing campaign — promos:
Once your application as an affiliate is approved by the company you select, it’s up to you to get the word out via a number of different marketing techniques. Whether you use your own business website or your unique affiliate website, you’ll need to explore an extensive marketing campaign to get buyers to find you. I’ll put my thumb up on having your own simple domain name for your small but content-rich website rather than using the usually long URL the affiliate company assigns to your so-called unique website. You can place banners and text links to your own unique affiliate website on your content-rich website. Update your website regularly.

In later sections you will learn more about decoding the marketing campaign secrets; how to increase traffic and attract visitors to your website; and convert each click on your website into potential sales. You will also learn how to write a salesletter, and explore result-oriented marketing tools, such as email marketing, offline marketing schemes, autoresponder, etc.

Increasing and protecting your payments:
An excellent way to protect your payments from affiliate merchants is to sign-up for affiliate programs that are well-established advertising networks. It is also good to select the affiliate programs of other well-established sectors, if you want to get paid for your work. Above all, it is safe to work with major companies especially those in the ad network business. Google Adsense affiliate program, for example, is excellent for you to generate money that accumulates rapidly to allow you reach the payout threshold in a shorter time.



REMEMBER

"Never pay a dime upfront to become an affiliate. It should be absolutely free."



To increase your income, you can choose to partner with 100 companies. Target ad networks for advertisers who pay Affiliate Merchants hefty money, granting you the opportunity to get a percentage of their earning. Yahoo! and Google Adsense are typical examples. There are thousands of other affiliate programs on the Internet. Do extensive search to find the right ones that meet your particular interest and field.



*****

Thank you for your time. See you on Saturday March 6, 2010.
 
 
*****

REVISIT ACHIEVING SUCCESS

Dear Workshop Attendees:

1. 
   
   Today's posting is about revisiting Achieving Success Parts 1 — 7 and any TO DO notes you took along the way. If you've prepared any BUSINESS TO DO list and are yet to take action, please use today to drive your TO DO list forward.
2. 
   
   On February 22 from 8 - 9pm E/7C/5P, a FREE TELECLASS featuring Kathleen Gage, Christine Kloser and Lynne Klippel leads you to "How To Quickly, Easily And Affordably Grow Your Business By Becoming A Published Author This Year!" Learn more via http://tinyurl.com/becomeapublishedauthor. If you wish to become an Authorpreneur, which requires zero capital investment, then register for FREE at http://www.theauthorpreneurs.com/ to access related how-to articles for FREE.

See you next week.

Thank you for your time.

ACHIEVING SUCCESS PT-7

PRODUCT AND SERVICE DEVELOPMENT 2 - FINAL

Assuming your client or your business website ranks poorly and you want to increase traffic to your (or client's) website. First, you’ll want to make a list of the factors that cause poor web traffic and poor web monetizing. The main factors that cause poor web traffic and monetizing include the following:


• Inappropriate use of keywords

• Placing keywords in flash images

• High density of text, poor readability of text

• Poor web layout

• No contact information

• Inadequate product or service description

• Static information

• Dead links

• No feedback forms

• No refund-guarantee-policy

• Limited payment options on storefront

• This web page is still “under construction”

• No customer support

• Sorry “we are experiencing system error”

• “Check back for more information” messages

• “Enter credit card information again… and again”

• Etc.
 
The ISHIKAWA FISHBONE diagram for the above problem would look like:
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

Based on the above fishbone for the Web Traffic Improvement problem, you’ll want to consider the following during your brainstorming sessions:

1. Understanding how search engines work?

2. Exploring keyword research tools.

3. Understanding search engine optimization (SEO).

4. Writing down appropriate keywords for your web site.

5. Placing the relevant keywords in page titles, meta tags, and web content.

6. Calculating keyword density for each web page.

7. Ensuring your storefront or eCommerce feature is user-friendly and fully functional at all times.

8. Optimizing the structure of your web site, and updating information periodically.

9. Submitting your site to search engines.

10.Monitoring your web site using appropriate tools.


CREATING AN ORIGINAL PRODUCT OR SERVICE

Refer to your Concept Folder, evaluate your ideas and expand on the excerpts you’ve written for each product or service idea. You’re not going to develop a product or service overnight. Rome was not built in one day. Poco-a-poco... and you’ll get there someday. Continue to brainstorm, putting required product or service components under each product heading in the folder. You can play around the fishbone diagram to help you list the features and benefits of your products or services. Be creative.

As you progress, continue to assess the commercial viability of the product or service you want to develop. Marketing ideas will spring to mind; put them in a separate notebook or folder labeled as Marketing Ideas.

 

Adopt the Fishbone diagram technique for the product or service you want to create or redesign.

 

 

Thanks very much for your time. I wish you success. See you soon.

ACHIEVING SUCCESS PT-6

PRODUCT AND SERVICE DEVELOPMENT

This section is to help you learn how to capitalize on your constructive ideas… and to translate them into products and services without paying a fortune to a consultant. All you need is to open your mind to new window of opportunities.

If you possess the ability to come up with great ideas, and you’ve not been able to create as many products or services as you want, you are about to learn how to do so in simple and straight-forward steps. Do not keep a database of ideas in your head. Put them on paper and start to develop them. This is what makes you innovative and unique.

Have the following ready and next to you for your reference:

1. List of your interests and strengths.


2. List of the firsthand keywords or keyword phrases that describe your interests and strengths.


3. List of your targeted core customer base.

Take a few minutes to ponder over what kind of products or services you want to create. Have a notebook beside you, and write down anything new that comes to mind. Most of today’s hot products and services in the marketplace came from ideas that sounded absurd on Day One. In essence, write down those crazy ideas that might have a serious marketing potential. Give your notebook a title: Concept Notebook. Alternatively, you can use a physical folder for this purpose. If you are comfortable with a folder, write across the front cover: Concept Folder.

Next: In either the Concept Notebook or Concept Folder, write down all your good ideas, bad ideas, and the crazy ones too. The following rules hold:


Rule Number 1: No idea is a bad idea.


Rule Number 2: Always remember Rule Number 1


Next: Write an excerpt for each idea. Each excerpt should list the product or service benefits to the end user (the customer or client). Remember to always seek benefits to the customer or client rather than brag about features of your product. This translates into the “Customer Comes First” thing. The client or customer is prepared to spend money to get your product or use your service. He or she asks: “What do I get in return?”

Exploring problems to create a new product — quality indicators

Set aside a second folder or notebook. Label it Quality Indicators for Performance Excellence. In this folder you are going to make a list of the products or services you and or your family use a whole lot, but actually spend more time whining about their poor performances.

How many times have you been using a particular piece of equipment in your local gym, and said “Who on earth designed this stuff? It could have been done this way or that way”? The stuffs we identify and complain about everyday are actually good stuffs. This shape is not too cool, that part should have been designed this way and that way, that knob is under stress and should have been placed the other way round, and this and that blab blah blah… We call them quality indicators. We need to hear about product or service complaints in order to improve product design concepts or services.

Make a list of the products you and others complain about due to poor quality. Assess your capabilities, and ask yourself whether you have the required knowledge to improve the quality of those products. If you answered a BIG YES, then the next thing you’ll want to do is:

1. Make a list of the things you and others complain about those products you’ve listed.

2. On another page in your product development book, give each product a unique name.

3. Next, label the complaints for each product as quality indicators, and place them under the respective products with unique names. At this stage, you now have your own product names with quality indicators to help you create new products that will solve the problems the original ones have failed to solve.

4. Brainstorm for solutions you can factor into the new product to eradicate those product complaints. Remember to take into consideration your strengths and interests and the needs of your targeted core customer base.


Thank you for your time. See you next Saturday 13 February 2010 for:

ACHIEVING SUCCESS PART 7: PRODUCT AND SERVICE DEVELOPMENT 2