10 tips for Affiliate Marketing

1. Target Market

Why are they coming to your site? What do they need?

Make sure the product you are promoting matches the content of the site.  A particular poker affiliate may have a high payout, but if you’re writing about gardening you may not be attracting the right people.  The more relevant the ad is to the content of your site, the higher chance of generating a click on your ad.

2. Trust Building

Content will be your friend here.  Each repeat visit will improve the chances of traffic through your banners.  A page of ads won’t hold anyone’s attention, plus would you visit a page again that is no use to you?

3. Site Priority

The affiliate ad should compliment your content, not the other way around.  A well written article with a relevant affiliate banner has been proven to work.  Don’t expect a list of your favourite films along with a DVD affiliate link to pull in your readers.  A detailed review will be a lot more appealing.

4. Own up

Let your affiliations be known and your readers will appreciate your honesty.  If they know they will be supporting a good site they will feel better about clicking on your affiliate link.  If you hide your affiliations, your readers will just go straight to the source.

5. Choose wisely

Try different affiliate programs, match your target readers and change ads around often.  Experiment with different graphics and text to find which works for you.

6. Try Different Programs

If one particular program doesn’t seem to be working for you, try another one.  Also see if places you shop have an affiliate program.  If you shop there, maybe your target audience does too.

7. Write Timeless Content

Timeless content is always relevant.  Dated content can force a user to leave the site quickly.  Linking your old content to new and ensuring your page shows your most recent articles first is a way around this.

8. Patience

If you’re writing quality, up-to-date content on a nice looking site, your time will come.  Affiliate programs are not “get rich quick schemes” so be patient and wait for your site to work for you.

9. Relevance

Not only should the content be up to date, the affiliate links should also.  Check in with your affiliates, contact them for un-advertised offers.  If you don’t, someone else will.

10. Content is Key

As I have mentioned a few times, content comes first.  Without it you have no visitors so no one to click your banners.

THIS IS YOUR HIGHEST PRIORITY.