Select an Affiliate Network to Join

How To Start Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Marketing is probably one of the easiest and fastest ways to start your own online business. You don’t need to have any product or much money to start, it’s easy to get into it and you can make huge profits easily. I will quickly tell you step by step how to start affiliate marketing.

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Basically you promote other people’s products. When someone buys a product through one of your links, you get paid commissions for that.

How To Start:

1. Select an Affiliate Network you Want to Join
   There are many ones out there that is free to join. I suggest Clickbank.com, because they sell digital products  that you can get instantly and they pay very high commissions. (50%-70%) They also have a wide range of products.

2. Choose Products or Services You Want to Promote
   Look at the popularity of the product and do your research properly, before you make your decision. When  using Clickbank.com, you can use the Marketplace to search products. Choose one that has a gravity of at least 50. I also recommend you choose a product that you already have, or that you know a lot about. You can buy a Clickbank product and test it out for 60 days and then return it for your money back. It will make it easier to promote the product with confidence when you start affiliate marketing. For instance you can promote a product in the fitness niche, for instance Truth about Six Pack Abs or the home business niche like The  Clickbank Code.

3. Promote Your Affiliate Links
   After you chose your product, you can start promoting your affiliate link and get commissions when people buy the product, but in the long run you will make a lot more money when you start affiliate marketing if you make a money making website of your own. Get a website from a reputable hosting company like Justhost.

4. Create a Web Page About Your Experience with the Product
   People like to see personal proof, before they buy something. You can even make the deal sweeter by offering an exclusive bonus for buying through you. Then you just insert your affiliate link in your webpage. More people will buy your product this way, instead of just getting sent to the main pitch page of the product. When you start affiliate marketing you should create as many web pages as possible to put up some quality content on your site for the search engines.

5. Make a Squeeze Page to Promote
   Set up a web page with a good autoresponder form to get people to “sign up” to your web site for some kind of free offer, like an ebook or training or something else that would be valuable. This way you build a list of targeted prospects that you could market to later. This is a very important aspect when you start affiliate  marketing. It could really boost your profits in the long run.

6. Market Your Affiliate Web Pages
   Probably the most important thing to do after you start with affiliate marketing is to promote it like crazy. There are many ways to get free website traffic and if you get more capital, you can also start using paid advertising like Google Adwords.
   Important: Don’t start with this if you are not sure what you are doing, you could lose a lot of money really quickly. I recommend you educate yourself properly first and get a good guide that tells you how to use Adwords properly and then you could really boost your sales astronomically. I suggest you check out extensive proven guides like Commission Blueprint, Clickbank Affiliate Blueprints, or The Clickbank Code. Compare them first and then decide. There are also others.

Tips when you start Affiliate Marketing:

• Keep it simple
  Start with only a few products (I started with 4 you can see here) and make sure you write loads of articles and post them on Ezinearticles, linking to your affiliate web pages.

• Set yourself goals
  Make sure you stick with your daily goals, even if it is only to write one article, or a few forum comments per day.

• If you see a product is not converting, see what is wrong and fix it
  Maybe it is the product or maybe you can create a better affiliate page. If you get less than 1% conversion on your hits, you will usually not make money.

• Don’t ever give up
  When you start with affiliate marketing, it could feel like you are working hard and not make enough money, but if you follow this set of steps, you will make money, even if it takes weeks to make your first sale. Never give up!

• Simplest way to start Affiliate Marketing
  Check out ClickbankPirate. They give you easy converting squeeze pages, builds a list for you and markets to them. So you can make a nice extra income on autopilot. They do 99% of the work for you, you only need to promote the links. I would only suggest this for the really lazy or newbie affiliates who are looking for some quick income.

Now that you know how to start affiliate marketing, I wish you all the best of luck. Remember, there is no such thing as an instant way to get rich. You need to put in hard work in order to make good money with your online business.

For other valuable insights to the Web Marketing Business see the column to the right

 Claudiu Geanta is a serial entrepreneur and founder of Design by Satori Inc. & Satori CG Inc.. He helps businesses promote their presence on and off line. He is also an accomplished web designer, book writer and photographer. You can follow him on Twitter.
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