Profiting With Private Affiliate programs
Is this you? So, you have a great niche you want to market….now where do you go? How do you make this a successful online business?
Maybe, you already have an online business and it’s not being successful, you want to give it another try and you stumbled onto affiliate marketing….whatever your reason is to being here….welcome!!
Here it is plain and simple….
In layman’s term, Affiliate simply means you’re an agent for that product.
What is Affiliate Network ?
- Acts like a broker between affiliates and companies.
- Networks usually have several hundreds of programs available for the affiliates
- Thousands of affiliates
- Majority of these programs focus for merchants (companies) because they make more money from the companies
- On the whole, more detailed reports. Sometimes complicated terminology which require explanation from affiliate manager
- Kickbacks are sometimes smaller than Private Affiliate Programs.
- Offers a wider selection of programs
- Networks most well known:
– LinkShare
– Commission Junction & BeFree
– ShareaSale
– Performics
- Walmart is on linkshare as their affiliate network….(not Private Affiliate Network)
- Homedepot is with commission junction as their affiliate network (not Private Affiliate Network)
What is Private Affiliate Programs:
- Not associated to affiliate network (i.e. clickbank, commission junction etc.)
- Directly associated to the product (i.e. affiliate program resides on the same eCommerce site, in other words they’re not using clickbank, commission junction, anything like that)
- Have their own in-house affiliate program
- Have their own software that runs on their own website
- Don’t rely on any 3rd party merchants
- Deal with all transactions, handle all the payouts, handle all the affiliate links
- Buy software to manage the affiliate program, make their own graphics, commission structure…everything
- Amazon is Private Affiliate Program
Reason why you want to switch to Private Affiliate Programs
- Not an affiliate network
- You have more control
- More affordable…. more cost effective
- Typically less competition in terms of amounts of affiliates that join the program
- Payouts are typically larger. The commission structures are usually higher percentage because they have taken it in-house.
Example:
Amazon’s commission structure may be from 4-10%. A private affiliate program can be 30% or higher because they can afford it. Larger because they don’t have to dilute it to affiliate merchant network.
- Some have more support.
The affiliate manager of an affiliate network may have to deal with many types of affiliates with many different products
- Some have better training.
Look at Wealthy Affiliates …what you’re looking for are incentives, they might have an entire course, might let you try their products. They might have videos you can watch and listen to.
- Some may have more links, better graphics….makes awesome resources
- Amazon may not be ‘allowed’ in your area. Some products may not be allowed in your state, etc.
- Affiliate networks can be confusing!
It can be real confusing for a beginner affiliate’s standpoint because of terminologies used in affiliate network.
Where can you go to find private affiliate programs?
- Do a simple search on Google.
- Search the following: e.g. (niche) affiliate program
Make sure there is space between affiliate program
- Also search it in quotes ‘(niche), affiliate program”
(niche) = YOUR NICHE
- Look at Your competitors
What affiliate programs are they using?
- Communities that are industry related. These are associations and forums which you can join and ask buyers if they know of any merchants who have Private Affiliate programs.
- Trade magazines
- Look in the back of the magazine for product directory and visit their site to see if they have an affiliate program. Then contact them.
- Product website search
Ok..so you have a large merchant and you’re not sure if they have an affiliate program so here’s what you do…
– go to Google
– enter site:productwebsite.com
– this searches only their site for the word ‘affiliate’.
Because of the ever growing number of people purchasing products online, more merchants and companies are increasingly understanding the importance of having affiliate or referral programs. They’re buying software to look after their own affiliate program.
Ok…so now you found a private affiliate program, now what?
What you need to do now is research. You need to realize that not all Private Affiliate Programs are the same.
- some are good
- some are not so good
Before you sign up, here’s the due diligence you need to look for:
- Payout (Read their terms and conditions)
– Is the payout daily, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly. Do you have to have a certain reserve, like make 50.00 or 100.00 before they pay you? how often do they pay out. Is it daily, weekly, monthly?
– What currency…is it Canadian or US dollars, peso, etc.
-What’s the form of payment (paypal, cheque, bank transfer, etc)
- Support
-Do they have a support channel or a dedicated affiliate manager where you can get the support you might need in case you might want to promote one of their products and services.
-Can you contact them easily. This is really important. Go into their contact or go into their info@….send them a quick email message and see if you get a reply
-You need to also look at it from your customer’s perspective….assuming here you already have your niche.
- Resources
-Do they have a diversity of links (links to specific landing pages). i.e. can you create a specific link to one of their specific pages.
You don’t want the traffic go to their home page just to look for something specific like colour of the product, and then tell them how to navigate. Does it have the ability to have your affiliate link to a specific url on their website? This is really important because you’re not relying on them ( the company you’re promoting) to use great graphical interface to drive them to certain areas.
- Banners, images, widgets, etc. Do they have the support around them.
- Reputation
-Check their reviews and are they any good?
-Have they failed on payment dates, run out of money
-Look for red flags…..Do they change things often without notice? Are ommission structures, payments, price of the products changing? Are they getting recalls?
- Detailed affiliate page
-Is it a real intense procedure to join? Is it detailed like how you can join, how easy is it to join. Does it tell you about commission structure, when you get paid. What’s in their terms and conditions?
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