One of the
income streams in my business comes from affiliate commissions, or money I make
from the referral of another's products or services. Affiliate commissions are a
very viable way to add another income stream to your business where you can make
a couple of hundred dollars a month to several thousand dollars a month,
depending on how much time and effort you want to put into the process.
Several years ago I felt guilty for sending others to a product or service
through my affiliate link because I believed I was manipulating them in some
way. However, now I have a clearly defined set of rules for myself before I
recommend a product to someone else:
1. I usually personally own or have used the product
2. If I don't own it or use it, I rely on many trusted reviews before deciding
to recommend. In most cases, I don't choose to send someone through an affiliate
link if I don't personally own or use the product.
3. I have either a verbal or written review/testimonial about the product.
4. I am honest about the product's pros and cons.
5. I can usually tell a story about how the use of this product/service has
impacted the business of one of my clients or my own business.
6. When responding to an email inquiry or forum/discussion list post, I
disclose my link is an affiliate link.
Because it's very easy to get caught up in the lure of affiliate commissions,
perpetuated by the constant bombardment of "opportunities" to promote someone
else's products and services, you must be very discriminating in the products
and services you recommend to your contacts. All is takes is one or two poor
recommendations, and you begin to lose credibility with your audience. Your
email list will also lose faith in you if you bombard them with affiliate email
promotions. In some cases, I receive more affiliate promotions than email
newsletters or announcements from some of the lists to which I belong.
Consequently, because of the trust my email list has in me, I rarely send solo
email affiliate promotions to them, preferring to make affiliate recommendations
in my ezine and on my website.
One problem that affiliate marketers often encounter is their visitor's aversion
to clicking on an affiliate link. The visitor will remove the affiliate portion
of the link URL instead of crediting you for helping them to find out about the
product or service. I find this a bit silly now, as they are paying the same
either way, but since I used to do the same thing (I have to chalk it up to
ignorance, I suppose), I know that it happens frequently. Or, the visitor will
attempt to substitute his affiliate ID in the URL. Most reputable businesses
now have a clause in their affiliate agreements prohibiting using your own
affiliate ID to make purchases for yourself. However, in many cases, it is
still possible.
Here are 4 strategies you can use to "cloak" your affiliate links.
1. Use a redirect service. Many affiliate links are long and
cumbersome. If you use a service like
TinyURL.com or SnipURL.com, you can
both shorten the length of the URL as well as prevent any URL tampering, as the
final URL provided by the redirect service gives the visitor no idea about the
final destination.
2. Simple website redirect. You may be able to redirect a long URL
through a page of your site with the commands in your web hosting control panel
or FTP client or through a 3rd party software loaded onto your hosting account.
3. Dedicated domain name. This is my favorite strategy. I buy a domain
name that's clearly seen as my brand, and add a defining word to indicate to me
and to my visitors about the nature of the product, and then use the services of
my domain registrar to forward it to my affiliate link. So, for example, if
you're a professional organizer and are known under the name "Best Organizer",
you might buy something like BestOrganizerAudio.com, for example, so that you
have an easy-to-remember domain name to which you can refer when mentioning this
audio recording product in client consultations, teleclasses, and articles.
You can check
out a few of my favorites at
GetMoreClientsCart.com and
GetMoreClientsAutoresponder.com.
4. Online Rolodex site. Create a site or a page containing all of your
valuable recommendations, and purchase a corresponding domain name to use with
it, i.e. JaneDoeRecommends.com. You can tell your clients that this site
contains your Rolodex of trusted resources or is your library of trusted
resources, and they can refer to the list any time they are seeking a trusted
resource or referral to help them solve a problem. You can see mine at
DonnaGunterRecommends.com.
Take time to set your parameters for affiliate recommendations and inform your
clients and email list of those rules. Then, use one of the affiliate cloaking
strategies to make your affiliate marketing as easy and painless as possible,
both for you and your contacts. As you begin to see your affiliate commissions
grow, you'll wonder why you didn't start this process sooner!
WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR EZINE OR WEB SITE? You can, as long as you include this blurb with it: Online Business Resource Queen (TM) and Online Business Coach Donna Gunter helps independent service professionals learn how to automate their businesses, leverage their expertise on the Internet, and get more clients online. To claim your FR*EE gift,
TurboCharge Your Online Marketing Toolkit, visit her site at OnlineBizU.com. Ask Donna an Internet Marketing question at
AskDonnaGunter.com.
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