Affiliate Marketing Services

 

While it is possible to "get by" as an affiliate without investing any money upfront, it's important to remember that there are tons of amazing time-saving services out there that can make things so much easier for you to start seeing some profit!

 

Also, deciding on whether or not to pay for services that will help you make more money requires knowing right off the bat if this will be a casual hobby on the side, or a legitimate business with infinite potential. It's up to you, and either one can be fun and rewarding. But...if you're going to build a business, remember:

 

"An entrepreneur afraid of risk is like a bodybuilder afraid of weights."

 

Yes, it's a risk to invest some money into services that are made specifically to save time & energy, but if you have a plan and use them properly, it will be worth it many times over! Not to mention the fact that compared to any "traditional" business model, Affilate Marketers have it easy! Think about how much it would cost to setup a store on a street in your city...you'd have to pay for rent, utilities, employees, inventory, etc. The list goes on and on. Now compare that to how I run a full-time affiliate marketing business on about $180/month worth of services! It's unheard of...

 

Now, don't worry. You don't have to spend $180/month, or even half that to get started. In fact, some of the services on this page are free, or very cheap. However, consider that spending about $60/month is less than most people spend on their cell phone bill, but talking on a cell phone doesn't usually make people rich. =)

 

Here's a quick rundown of the top services you'll want to consider when getting started:

 

1) Host Gator - Host unlimited websites with unlimited files & traffic for only $9.95/month!

2) ClickTale - Amazing website optimization tool! Ask them to create a custom cheaper plan and try it...you will be blown away!

3) GetClicky - My personal favorite for website analytics. Check out their service comparison to see why.

4) AWeber - Build a subscriber list and automate newsletter courses with AWeber to profit wildly by helping people more

5) PPC Bully - Great web-based tool to analyze other affiliates' advertising campaigns so you don't make the same mistakes they do!

6) Automatic Sitemap - Update your XML sitemap every week and submit it to your website on autopilot.

 

Want to read more? Learn more about these services and more to filter through the massive number of offers out there, and focus only on the best:

 

 

Web Hosting

 

Having a website is, in my opinion, one of the best ways to make a killing online. It is NOT required, but it's VERY helpful. I know people who have built entire businesses on submitting content to other websites, only to find out that one day the site banned them! If you don't want this to happen to you, consider that the safest, most reliable way to build a legit business online is to have your domain names hosted by a reputable company.

 

If you're getting nervous about setting up websites, stop it! It's waaaay easier than people make it out to be, especially nowadays. There are free tools that anyone able to make a Word document can use to make nice, professional-looking websites in mere hours.

 

So, what was that reputable hosting company I was talking about? Well, after trying a few myself (and scouring through dozens of reviews), I found that the absolute best webhosting company for Affiliates is HostGator.com.

 

Host Gator allows unlimited domain names, unlimited traffic, and unlimited storage for only $9.95/month!

 

I personally use their $14.95/month plan for a few added features (like being on your own dedicated IP address), but it's up to you. They also give discounts for paying for more than one month at a time ($7.95/month if you pay for 3 years at a time).

 

Setting up your web hosting is the first step to making the big bucks, so take action and sign up for Host Gator now:

 

 

Note: if you have already considered signing up for Wealthy Affiliate, know that web hosting does come with the membership. You cannot host unlimited sites, but it could be enough to get started. I personally decided to sign up for the membership and check it out, then found that Host Gator was still very worth it.

 

 

Website Optimization

 

In my opinion, the real difference between making $200/month with a website, and making $2,000/month with the same website, is optimization. There are so many things that you put your time and energy into with your website, yet you couldn't tell me how they work in detail, could you?

 

How many people click on that button? Do people skip over that section of content? Do your visitors read your intro? How many people are clicking through your affiliate links? Do people scroll down the page? Are there profit leaks on your pages?

 

It's literally impossible to know some of these things, but they can mean the difference between barely turning a profit and making enough to support the lifestyle you've been dreaming about, so don't you think that'd be worth the investment? I really wish I would have realized this sooner than I did...

 

Though I've looked for others, ClickTale is the only service that offers answers to all of these questions for a reasonable price.

 

 

Analytics

 

While most people just setup Google Analytics on their website and rarely look at it, I personally don't like how much information it gives to such a big company. Don't get me wrong: I love Google, and I'm not naïve or arrogant enough to believe that they're going to use my website's information to do bad things. However, I do believe that a computer is running the show, and the vast majority of the "decisions" that are made about a website's rankings and PPC Quality Score are based on the information gathered about the pages in question.

 

If including analytics code on your pages gives them the information that many of your visitors don't stick around very long, for example, you might not get the Quality Score you deserve, even though they could be leaving because you helped them quickly decide on the best product for them with a user-friendly comparison table, and they clicked through your link to check out the merchant's site! This means you helped your visitor, not that your page is low quality.

 

Anyway, I also enjoy the fact that Clicky offers the ability to email reports with any information you're interested in at any time interval you choose meaning you don't have to check in randomly. It's convenient, secure, and comes with more features, so it's my analytics weapon of choice.

 

 

Email Marketing/Autoresponder Service

 

Alright, this one's a bit tricky. You know when you sign up to a newsletter and the person includes your name in every email? Well, the key with that is they use software to send the same message to everyone, but with some simple code in it to insert the name each person entered in the newsletter subscription box. The tricky thing though, is that most the time, that newsletter is on autopilot, meaning the marketer created it all before anyone ever signed up!

 

Why would anyone want to go through the trouble of setting up a bunch of emails in a course format so people could sign up to their newsletter?

 

Well, many big businesses use this tactic to build a list of leads, or people that trust them and listen to what they say. That way, when the company has something to offer, like a sale or promotion for a partner company, they can send one email to their list of qualified leads, and a good number of them will buy!

 

Believe it or not, this is such a great way to earn a living, that most Internet Marketers say "the money's in the list"!

 

Here's the thing: you can work your ass off to get ranked for keywords in the Search Engines, or even pay for every click you get to your sites with PPC, but if you have a list of buyers, you can practically print money. If you treat your list well, you will make money just about every time you send an email with a promotion in it, and the bigger your list, the more you'll make. It's crazy...

 

The best part is, having an "Autoresponder" service means you don't have to do anything manually except set up the newsletter to begin with. Once you do, it's all automatic, and each lead sees the same course, over the same time interval. Think that's cool? What's cooler is that the best Autoresponder service out there charges only $15-$20/month!

 

This is more of an advanced Affiliate Marketing technique, but it's never too early to start building a list on your sites. AWeber is by far the best Autoresponder service on the 'net, and you can either pay $180 for 12 months ($15/month on average) or $20/month, so it's worth it for sure.

 

Check it out if you're interested in "Google-proofing" your business and building a list of people ready to buy from you every time you send an email:

 

 

 

 

Competition Analysis (PPC)

 

Whether you decide to do Affiliate Marketing on the side for extra cash or build a multi-million dollar empire, market research & competition analysis are the two steps that lay the foundation for everything you do, so do NOT take them lightly! Some affiliates try to make money for years and fail time after time, because they let their emotions and biases toward certain topics, keywords & markets get in the way of their projects. In order to avoid this, and be a LOT more successful as an affiliate, use these tools to perform market research and analyze your competition (and skip that whole failure thing...):

 

1) Google Keyword Tool - This is the best free keyword research tool, which will allow you to quickly scope out a market and drill down into some of the best keywords within it. Then, you can sort the terms and check out things like search volume seasonal trends, advertising bid prices and more. Bottom line: use it.

 

2) PPC Bully - Analyzing the adcopy, keywords and landing page combinations that work over time for your competition is a great way to form your own strategy and get off to a great start with your campaign. This is the best tool I've found to do so:

 

 

 

Sitemap Submission

 

We all know we're supposed to regularly update our XML Sitemaps, and post them to our website for the search engines to see our new pages, but it's tough to keep track of things like this sometimes. Automatic Sitemap does it all for you, literally.

 

Ask them about creating a custom plan if you have a bunch of sites with lower total pageviews than their standard plans, and they'll work with you.