Affiliate Marketing: An Introduction

Affiliate Marketing: An Introduction

Affiliate marketing can be thought of the advertising of products, opportunities, and services, using the internet as the communication (or delivery)channel. If you want to find out more about Affiliate marketing, what it involves, and how to increase your chances of success as an online business person, I think you’ll find this article educational.

One mistake that some entrepreneurs make is that they believe the internet itself is a business, or a marketing model. That’s not necessarily true. The Affiliate is a messaging channel, not a stand-alone business model.

This is a great realization, because it means that there are a number of business models that can succeed through the net. Let’s imagine that you have a brick-and-mortar business. Let’s say…a massage parlor.

Of course, the net isn’t your business model-you can’t offer a massage via the net. But, you can reach (communicate) to your local market through the Affiliate, using a variety of Affiliate marketing methods.

The same Affiliate marketing methods can apply to event organizing, non-profits, and educational institutions.

On the other hand, there are businesses that rely on the Affiliate as a crucial component of their business model.

Amazon.com is a good example of this. Another example is eBay, which relies on it’s shoppers to find it’s site through the Affiliate. YouTube,which makes money from monetization of banner ads, delivers it’s videos through the Net.

Keep in mind that those are only the major brands you recognize. There are also a number of smaller businesses that require the use of the ‘Net as their main communication channel.This is where those who would like to successfully set up a business have a chance.

One opportunity for you to earn an income is affiliate marketing.

The core concept behind affiliate marketing is that if you send your site’s traffic to the site of a seller or a business that sells a product or service, and your referrals buy, you earn an affiliate commission. Affiliate marketing is a viable online business model, has been around for over a decade, and has been the vehicle of many successful entrepreneurs.

Are you an expert at something that people value? People may want to learn what you have to share, and even be willing to pay for it. There’s an online business model that’s built upon information marketing model isn’t restricted to to books: people are willing to invest in video courses, DIY instruction, webinars, and even online seminars.

These can all be delivered via the Affiliate. There are many entrepreneurs who either turned what they knew into a source of income, or packaged certain knowledge into an informational product, and offered it and made a fortune.

In any case, you should have a business model.

One other thing you need to have, which can even tell you which business model you use, is knowledge of your ideal prospect. Business can be boiled down to a simple sentence: Discover what your prospects want or need, are willing to pay for, and deliver it to them.

That’s the foundation of Affiliate marketing.

Once you know who your target market is, what they want, and what that market is going to pay for it, you need to do a few more things. First, you need to either create what they’re looking for, or find someone who’s offering it, and see if you can also offer it and earn money as an affiliate or reseller.

Now, you know what your ideal prospects want, you know how much they’re going to pay, and you have it (or know who has it), and can sell that product or service to them.

Obviously, at some point, you need a site. Having a professional presence is crucial for your Affiliate marketing success.

Next, you need to bring people (drive traffic) to your site. There are basically 2 ways to do this: free and paid. The main benefit to paid traffic is that paid traffic generation is fast (if you can first get your site approved). Perhaps the biggest disadvantages to paid traffic generation is that, depending on the market, it can be costly, and if you don’t watch your limit, it can be exceeded very quickly.

Although free traffic from the search engines is generally slow to establish, once you get things rolling, it can be an ongoing source of free traffic, buyers, and profits.

Another thing we should mention is the issue of competition. If there are too many other marketers selling the same thing that your business has to sell, it may be harder to attract a profitable share of visitors and prospects. There’s a trick to good online marketing: find a niche of buyers, where there aren’t a lot of other sellers offering them a solution.

You just read about some of the components of a successful e-commerce business.

Essentially, you need to find what people want/need, and are willing to pay for. Then, you should create or find what it as they need.

The next step is to create a site that sells it to them. After that, you need to attract visitors to your site.