Tuesday, August 12, 2008

5 Killer Affiliate Marketing Strategies You Must Know

By Rory Alexander

Affiliate Marketing is one of the most popular ways to make money online. Anyone around the world can jump online and realistically start making money online with affiliate marketing within 30 days. This is because you don't need your own product, sales support, website or list. However in saying that, Affiliate Marketing is just like any other business and it does require work and dedication to make it work.

If your ready to get away from the boss, the deadlines, the stress but your also ready to roll up your selves and put some work in, then I've got 5 killer Affiliate Marketing Strategies that you can use to help you make money online.

1. The first strategy is the most important, this will allow you to build up a list to which you can then promote other products. You want to set up a squeeze page. This is a page that captures your visitors name and email addresses in return for something like a bonus, a free report etc. In your case you want to write a simple report about your niche. For example if you are in the weight loss niche, then you could write a report "5 ways to lose weight from your stomach in 12 days", and all your visitor has to do is give you their name and email address to receive it. After they opt-in you simply direct them to your affiliate program.

Not only that, but once you have them on your list you can follow up with other offers and information. (More money for you!). Now I know that a lot of people say that you don't need a website for affiliate marketing, and whilst that is technically true, you are leaving alot of money on the table by doing this. Most people will not buy on the first meeting, but after more contact, they are far more likely to buy a product you recommend. Setting up a squeeze page is not as hard as it sounds. Use programs such as nvu as an html editor and aweber to capture leads.

2. After you have set up your squeeze page, its time to start driving traffic to your page. The first step to doing this, is through article marketing. Write good quality articles about your niche and then submit them to article directories like EzineArticles and goarticles. Then in your resource box, include a link back to your website. You can write articles yourself or get them outsourced at 5 dollars a pop at guru.com. The more articles you write, the more backlinks to your site, the more visitors to your site and therefore more money. Articles, if you write them yourselves, is a great free method of traffic.

3. Another great Affiliate Marketing Strategy is to use PPC. Although you have to spend a bit of money, you can literally have a lot of visitors to your website in 10 minutes making you sales. Set a daily budget limit and make sure you only use targeted longtail keywords. Eg- Instead of "make money" use "best way to make money online". Not only will the cost per click be a lot lower, but these visitors are more likely to be buyers.

4. Post regularly on forums. Search Google for "your niche"+forums. Sign up to as many as you can and join the community. Don't post spammy posts because these simply don't work. Instead try to answer questions the best you can and ask interesting and relevant posts. All you have is a link back to your website in your signature. Try to post a few posts a day on a number of different forums.

5. Create videos and post them to online video communities such as youtube, metacafe etc. These can be reviews of your affiliate product or a content video where you teach your niche something valuable. They don't have to be digital masterpieces, just use your webcam or a simple video camera and get it out there. Video marketing is becoming increasingly popular, with sites such as youtube receiving millions of views each day. Tip- Use a service such as tubemogul to submit your videos to multiple online directories for maximum exposure.

Incorporate a mix of at least 3 of these methods and send visitors to your squeeze page so that you can capture leads. The initial stages are the hardest but keep at it each and every day, and within a few weeks you will be getting a decent amount of traffic to your site and making sales. The best part about affiliate marketing, is that once you have set up one campaign, its easy to set up another in the same niche or in a niche completely different.
Armed with these affiliate marketing strategies, feel confident that you can actually start making money online in no time.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rory_Alexander

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