The problem is, there are a multitude of scams, targeted at you, the newbie. So allow me to give you a good starting point with focus on free or low-cost methods. Regardless of the amount of money you're willing to invest in affiliate marketing, starting out with these low-cost methods is definitely wiser. The learning curve in affiliate marketing may take weeks, months or years for you to understand, depending on the effort you put in as well as the system and support of the programs that you join. Until you have learnt the principles of affiliate marketing, I humbly suggest that you start with small investments before moving on to more expensive programs with bigger pay-outs.
Where to start affiliate marketing?
This blog focuses on low-cost and considerably the cheapest options there is:-
- Blog
- Splash Page
- Social Networking Sites
- Article Directories
- Free to join Traffic Exchanges (with low-cost monthly membership upgrades)
There are a lot of sites offering free blog platforms, most popular are Blogger and Wordpress. I prefer to use Blogger for its super user-friendly interfaces as I have basic html knowledge and it'll be great for newbies as well. Wordpress is fast gaining popularity and suitable if you are comfortable doing your own fancy changes to it since it's more flexible.
Before you start promoting your blog, you should at least have a few pillar posts which will provide information to your readers. If they find that your posts provide the information they need, they'll stay for long enough to check out other deals on your blog. Update your blog regularly and submit your articles to search engines until you get traffic coming in.
Next, you can focus on monetizing your blog. There are plenty of options here like Google Adsense, for which you display ads by Google and you get paid for the click-throughs from your blog. Another popular way is to be an affiliate and sell other people's products and/or services. Popular sites for this free to join are Clickbank and Amazon. Once you have established both traffic and list, you may want to consider earning more by offering advertising space for other products. Say, $10 per small banner or text link ads for each space for a start.
The best way however, is still to advertise affiliate programs which you signed up for. Gentle reminder, start with proven low-cost programs to start with. See the links at the bottom of this post which are free to join and provides great resources for newbies. Some of which even create your own splash pages, give free rotator software and great e-books!
Any affiliate marketer would agree that having a blog is definitely essential; for free advertising and building up your list and followers.
2) Splash Page
What is a splash page? Oh, I bet you've seen it before! It is a page designed to "do the selling" for you where you see all those write-ups on how the program works, what freebies they'll offer when you sign-up, testimonials and at the bottom of it, is where the check-out link is.
So in essence, it is a sales page, designed to entice your prospects to buy the product(s) you are promoting. Most of the affiliate programs that you join from this blog have pre-designed splash pages with your affiliate id included in the url. You just need to include this link in all your advertisements whether through Pay-per-Click or Traffic Exchanges.
I highly recommend the latter since they're free to sign-up and your audiences are targeted so what you get are FREE TARGETED TRAFFIC!
3) Social Networking Sites
Social networking sites have thousands and millions of members worldwide and are good sources of free traffic. The fact that they create a naturally viral effect makes it easy for you to spread your word around. It is also a good platform to connect with friends with similar interests and interact with other affiliate marketing communities. Some of the sites I recommend actually pays you to refer others to join you. How good is that? :)
4) Article Directories
Submitting your posts or articles to various sites provide back-links when you include the source - your blog and this'll increase its traffic. Hubpage and Squidoo allows you to submit your articles and build a fan base from which you can get more prospects.
5) Traffic Exchange
Traffic exchanges are great for free advertising. Created by affiliate marketers for affiliate marketers, you can be sure that your audiences are interested in what you have to sell. My favourite is Traffic Swarm since it's been helping me bring in lots of traffic and sales. Apart from that, it's really easy to use and comes with your own ads rotator software plus lots of great tools for starting out. Another fav is LeadsLeap where you can place your free text ads in the first ever viral blog.
So there, choose any of the following combinations to get started on the right foot in affiliate marketing! There's a lot more to learn but the last thing you want is to be swarmed with information and offers that you'll get back to square one. Baby steps now...
Useful Links:
Free Blogs:
Blogger
Wordpress
Free to join Affiliate Programs:
ContactThem
EmailCashPro
EzWealthSolution
Powerof3
PaidGamePlayer
Clickbank.com
Amazon.com
Free Traffic Exchanges:
TrafficSwarm
LeadsLeap
TrafficDigger - Thousands of Free visitors Daily!
Social Networking:
Friendster
MySpace
Tagged
Yuwie - Get Paid to Refer!
6*dgr - Get Paid to Refer! $4 on your first level! Check out details at the site.
Hope you find this useful! Feel free to comment or ask questions :)