One of the saddest things that I witness day after day is affiliate marketers who really struggle to make sales. They send out email after email, promotion after promotion, yet often make very few sales.
This is not only sad, it’s also needless “practice bleeding.” Making affiliate sales is easy when you know the secret. It’s even very scientific and does have fairly predictable results.
Let’s look at what most affiliates are doing wrong, what I’ve termed “dumb affiliate marketing” and how that can be easily corrected.
Before I offend anyone, I should explain that when I use the word “dumb” I mean untargeted. I come from a military background, and I think of “dumb bombs.” Those are bombs that are dropped off of an airplane and they tumble unguided towards a target. They may or may not hit the target but once they are released they get no guidance.
A “smart” bomb often has a built in navigation system, and after it is dropped from an airplane it often flies a precise, pre-programmed route of flight to a target – often getting satellite GPS updates enroute. A smart bomb can be dropped from miles away, and be steered right though a window on a building that the pilot flying the aircraft never even sees.
Your affiliate marketing can be just as on-target when you acknowledge and harness just a little know-how.
Promoting an affiliate product no longer needs to be a gamble.
First of all, you need to tap into data that is readily available on which products are already selling. One source of this data is the blogs maintained during many affiliate sales contests. Monitor these to see how well a given product is selling, and to see if you want to invest your time and effort into setting up a protracted marketing campaign. You can market many of these products after the big initial launch is over – often with lessened competition.
I personally also rely upon my network of friends who readily share with each other which affiliate products are proven sellers. Many of us are members of a Facebook Group called “Affiliate Products Proven To Sell.” If you are on Facebook, you can join this group for free by registering at http://timic.org/APPTS
Many affiliates also struggle because they use marketing methods that are outdated, and simply no longer work. One newer method that works like CRAZY is using quality videos. You can now have CUSTOM videos created for you for under $50 each, and that includes professional voice talent. For that,
I personally use Jason Anderson’s team at: http://timic.org/ProVideos
These are not PLR videos. They are produced from scratch and are mini-commercials. Mine are 1-minute because, just like your audience, viewers of my videos have short attention spans. So, take a clue from the television industry. They’ve mastered getting the message across in 30 seconds to 1 minute. You need to do the same.
Another fact that you need to “get” – a fact most struggling affiliate marketers still refuse to acknowledge is that your promotion needs to be for just ONE product. If the purpose of a solo mailing or ezine issue is to promote a specific product, then just mention that ONE product in the email.
Without fail, when I’ve tried to promote multiple products in an email, even if they were all free, overall response rate significantly decreased. I think that it’s because when you promote several products in an email, it comes across as too desperate. Be laser focused rather than using the shotgun approach.
Many affiliate marketers fail to make sales because they promote something that they like rather than something customers are ALREADY buying. With so many great products out there, I do not believe in being the guinea pig. You should only promote affiliate products where the product owner has thoroughly tested market demand AND his conversion process.
It’s foolish to put time and effort into promoting unproven products when you can just pick the low-hanging fruit by offering your customers the products that they’ve proven to you that they want.
Given that often there are numerous affiliates for a product that’s a proven seller, you may need to differentiate yourself from all of the other affiliates. One easy way to do that is to offer a valuable, related bonus. I like using unique audio interviews or related courses as bonuses.
If you’ve taken the time to actually communicate with your subscribers and customers, your offer isn’t identical to that made by others marketing the same affiliate product anyway. Just the fact that it’s YOU, whom your clients have grown to know, like and trust, that’s marketing the product… makes it different. The difference is that purchasing through your affiliate link is less risky.
That is one of the key factors in smart affiliate marketing. Earn their trust and the sales come a lot easier. I actually have subscribers email me doing a big product launch ASKING for my affiliate link. Over the past 13 years, I have built that kind of customer loyalty. If you work at doing that, everything else will fall in place.
Now that you know the secret, it’s time to stop doing dumb marketing. If your sales aren’t what they should be start by looking at WHAT you are marketing. Is it something that your customers really want? If it is, then next look at HOW you are marketing it. Read back thought this article for tips on the profitable way to do that.
Willie Crawford is a seasoned affiliate marketer with 13 years of experience selling goods and services online. He now spends several hours many days mentoring other online marketers on a private discussion forum that’s part of a tight-knit membership community called “The Internet Marketing Inner Circle.” Join them at: http://timic.org/
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The End Of Dumb Affiliate Marketing
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The End Of Dumb Affiliate Marketing
Unsuccessful online marketers are notorious opportunity seekers – giving an opportunity only a couple of weeks to start showing results, before changing directions to chase the next flavor of the week. It almost seems that the majority of online marketers are chasing get-rich-quick schemes, rather than trying to develop a legitimate business.
Sometimes it seems like the majority of online marketers change the program that they are promoting, almost as often as they are putting gasoline into their car. “Okay honey… I filled up the car today… it is time for us to find another business opportunity to promote…”
There is also another group of online marketers, who seem to make a real commitment to a specific business opportunity, but success continues to elude this group is well. The second group fails to make a commitment to a particular marketing plan that is designed to help them to achieve success. Like the first group, they change directions, as often as they put gasoline into the car.
Those who are successful online, are the kind of people who make a solid commitment to a particular business model and make a long-term commitment to a realistic marketing plan.
I am not telling you these things because I think I’m better than you… In fact, I am telling you these things because I am guilty of having done the exact same things myself.
Towards the end of 2001, I finally started making serious money online, after having spun my wheels online for more than four years, chasing one opportunity after another, until I made a commitment to a particular business model.
I managed to increase my income year-over-year, and in March of 2005, I quit my job and started working full-time online. I have continued to earn a nice living online, ever since.
My 2009 revenues were down, but primarily because I was working less than normal… In November 2008, I learned that my father was ill… I had my suspicions right away, but we did not have verification of cancer until February 2009. (Contrary to popular belief, he was a non-smoker.)
As 2008 wound down, I made a commitment to my father that if he needed any assistance whatsoever, that I would make myself available to help him. That meant, if he needed transportation to and from doctors’ appointments, I would drive the one-hour to his house, and then take him wherever he needed to go. If he needed me to come to his house to help him with anything whatsoever, I would come to his house to help him.
I made the commitment to him, and I honored that commitment to him.
My online business suffered considerably, as a result of my making that decision. But, I have no regrets… It was the right thing to do, and I am grateful that I did it.
My dad passed away in November of 2009.
I continued to miss work, through November and December of 2009, while doing those things that must be done in relation to matters of his funeral and his estate.
Just a couple weeks ago, I sat down and calculated exactly how much time I actually spent outside the office in 2009.
Not all of my absenteeism, during 2009, could be attributed directly to the time I spent assisting my father during his illness. In March of 2009, I had missed two weeks when we moved across town. My websites had also suffered a 16-day shut down in May, because I was unable to update the DNS records for my domains, when my web hosting company migrated my account to a new server. When I went to do the DNS updates, I discovered that ICAAN was in the process of shutting down my domain registrar and moving my domain registration information to a new domain registrar. Unfortunately, during a move of that type, updates cannot be made to the DNS records. So, my websites were offline until ICAAN finished its work.
All told, I missed two weeks while moving, two weeks while waiting for ICAAN to get everything moved so that I could update my DNS records, and another 12 to 14 weeks while assisting my father and taking care of the things that I needed to take care of after he passed away.
During the course of the last eight years, there has only been one year in which I was not fully committed to my business. That year was 2009. I did not walk away from my business, but I had made the decision that taking care of my family was more important than my business.
While my business, my reputation, and my income suffered tremendously in 2009, due to my frequent absences and slow responses, the commitment that I had shown my customers in previous years helped my business survive 2009 intact.
Now that I have returned to my business full-time, my revenue is starting to bounce back.
The past nine years has been a wild and exciting ride. The thrill of growing a business from nothing to something worthwhile has been an awesome experience for me.
But to the point of this article, this story would have been very different if I had not committed to a specific business model in 2001, and it would have been very different if I had not committed to a specific marketing plan for the promotion of that business.
If I had not made the commitment to develop a viable business model and commit to a specific marketing plan, I would have probably still been working 60 hours per week on a job when my dad got sick. If I had still been working in the brick-and-mortar world of retail sales, I would not have had the opportunity to help my dad when he most needed my help.
Then again, I would have had a different job than I had previously, because my last employer went out of business in January 2009.
With all that has happened in the last 16 months, I count among my greatest blessings the care and concern that was shown to me by my clients. Sure, some of the new people had absolutely no patience for my absences… But, I received a large number of personal phone calls, snail-mail letters, e-mails, blog comments, and tweets from my clients and people that I know from online, who wanted to offer their support to me, during my emotional roller coaster ride.
My greatest blessings have been realized in 2009 and 2010. I am blessed by the wonderful people, whom I have met online through my online business. And I am blessed to have a business that was strong enough to survive my frequent absences, during the last 16 months.
Those blessings were available to me, because I made a commitment in 2001 to stop chasing new opportunities every couple of weeks. I made the commitment to a business model that I believed could be successful, and I made the commitment to promote that business in a consistent and reliable manner.
When I brought commitment to my online marketing endeavors, I finally started to make money online. As I maintained that commitment over several years, I was able to grow my business to the point where I would be able to consistently earn enough money from my business, so that I would never have to have an outside job again.
To be honest, I believe that the reason my business continued to attract new customers through 2009 was because I had used article marketing to promote my businesses. The articles I write and distribute, for the promotion of my online businesses, seem to have real staying power.
The articles that I wrote and distributed, over the last nine years, continue to influence readers to visit my websites and to learn more about my businesses and what I can do for the reader.
Between September 2008 and January of 2010, I only wrote and distributed four articles for the promotion of my websites. During those 16 months, I barely wrote and distributed one article every four months, yet the traffic to my website was only diminished during May of 2009, when my sites were off-line.
I honestly believe that the reason my websites continued to attract new visitors and new customers, during this period of time, is because I had more than 150 articles online, posted on thousands of websites, doing the hard work of convincing people that they needed to visit my websites to see how I could help them to accomplish their goals.
When your articles are as useful five years from now as they are today, your articles will have the same potential of continuing to send visitors to your website for many more years to come.
If you are seeking true success online, and you are still chasing the flavor of the week in business opportunities, I strongly recommend that you pick out something that seems to have real potential for you and to make a commitment to see it through to success.
If you would like to learn more about how to make article marketing work for you in the same positive manner that it has worked for me, pick up one or both of my article marketing ebooks shown below in my author information.
I encourage you to download my free ebook, “Article Marketing: Beyond The Basics” ebook at: http://thephantomwriters.com/ebooks/advanced-article-marketing.html If you find my free ebook useful, and most people do, I would encourage you to purchase the more advanced ebook, “How To Use Article Marketing To Positively Impact Your SEO Efforts”. It is 70-pages of hard-hitting information about how to make your article marketing truly profitable: http://thephantomwriters.com/ebooks/article-marketing-seo.html My name is Bill Platt, and I have been earning a nice living from article marketing for more than a decade. In my ebooks, I try to share with you the lessons that I have learned about how to get the most from your article marketing.
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The Road To Online Marketing Success Requires Commitment
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The Road To Online Marketing Success Requires Commitment
Ever wonder how the pros find the perfect keywords for their website? What secrets or proprietary tools do they possess mere mortals like us do not?
The truth is, most search gurus don’t use any special keyword research tools. They employ the same set of tools available to you or me—most are even free to use.
This article will show you how to find high-volume keywords and determine if the competition warrants a realistic attempt at ranking for these phrases.
But before learning the tools of the trade, you need to get organized. Open an Excel spreadsheet and create six columns using the headings listed below:
- Keywords
- Average Monthly Searches (broad)
- Average Monthly Searches (exact)
- Advertiser Competition
- All in Title
- Word Tracker
Or you can download the keyword research template here to get started even faster.
Each column will serve a purpose in the keyword research process. Some identify competition levels, while others determine search volume.
Getting Started with Keyword Research
Keywords: The first step is to identify the keywords to analyze within the first column of the spreadsheet. The best place to start looking for keywords is the Google Adwords: Keyword Tool.
Begin by compiling a list of relevant phrases and add them to the Keywords column of the spreadsheet. To begin, find 20 – 30 keywords to analyze. You can get more in-depth later.
Average Monthly Searches (broad): When you enter a query into the Google Adwords: Keyword Tool, the suggested keywords will automatically be in broad match. Broad match in Google can includes synonyms, plurals, and other variations of the selected keyword so be aware that the results are generally bloated.
Nevertheless, average monthly searches is still a good indicator of high or low search volume for a keyword. Record this number in the Average Monthly Searches (broad) column of your spreadsheet.
Average Monthly Searches (exact): Within the Google Adwords: Keyword Tool, change the match type from broad to exact match. All suggested keywords should now be surrounded by [ ].
As the name suggests, this will give you the exact number of impressions per month for the keyword listed. Copy and paste these results into the Average Monthly Search (exact) column of the spreadsheet.
Advertiser Competition: You’ll also want to check the Google Adwords: Keyword Tool to get a rough idea of the advertising competition. While this tool does not directly reflect the competition within organic search results, it remains a valuable indicator. If there’s tough competition on the PPC side, it’s usually difficult on the organic side as well.
Within the Advertiser Competition column, record your findings from very low to very high advertiser competition for each keyword.
All in Title: The allintitle: search operator is a technique used to discover the number of web pages targeting your exact keyword phrase in Google. As you probably know, SEOs include important keyword phrases in their title tags to rank for specific keywords in search engines. This is yet another way to help determine the level of competition for a specific keyword.
Here’s how to use this advanced search operator. Let’s assume one of the keywords you’re considering is the keyword phrase: dog walking. Go to Google.com and enter the following query into the text box:
allintitle:”dog walking”
After clicking the search button, look to the right side of the results page to find the total number of web pages targeting “dog walking” within their title tags. Here are the exact results I found in Google:
Results 1 – 10 of about 293,000 for allintitle:”dog walking”. (0.26 seconds)
For the phrase “dog walking” there are about 293,000 other web pages targeting the term. Record the number 293,000 under the All in Title column of your keyword research spreadsheet.
Wordtracker: There is a free and paid version of the Wordtracker keyword discovery tool online. You can find the free version here: http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/. Like the Google keyword tool, Wordtracker can help you figure out how much search traffic a keyword might deliver.
When you enter keywords into the free Wordtracker tool, remember the search results are based on a 365 day period. You should divide this number by 12 to make an apples to apples comparison to the Google estimated monthly search volume.
It’s smart to use a tool like Wordtracker or Keyword Discovery to double check Google traffic results. Google traffic estimates are extraordinarily high for certain keywords. By verifying search volume with another source, you can be more confident about the accuracy of projected numbers.
Analyze Your Data
You should now have enough information to decide which keywords should stay and what will go. Remember to keep in mind things like searcher’s intent when selecting keywords. The intent of a query like dog walking tips is very different than hire dog walker. Also, remember the inbound links and age of an existing website will be an enormous factor when determining the odds of ranking for a desired key phrase.
Add Your Own Metrics
Don’t limit yourself to the keyword research tools listed above. More columns are easily added to your keyword research spreadsheet more in-depth reporting. Experiment using metrics from Google Analytics or testing additional advanced search operators like the allinurl: query for deeper analysis.
Remember, each SEOs keyword research formula is a little bit different, but almost every optimization expert uses a mutation of this basic strategy.
So there you have it. The “secrets” to performing keyword research like the pros are now in your hands. Now get out there and start researching for your website!
Brett Lindenberg is the owner of StartSEOCompany.com, a website providing instruction and templates for starting an SEO business. Lindenberg also consults and develops internet marketing strategies for a number of small businesses.
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How to Conduct Keyword Research Like the Pros
How to Conduct Keyword Research Like the Pros
If you’ve been involved in sales and/or marketing for any length of time, you’ve probably heard the term “Unique Selling Proposition.” But just in case you haven’t, let me explain what a USP is.
A Unique Selling Proposition is what makes a business unique and/or different from all other businesses in its category. For example, the USP for a high-end restaurant, might include the exclusive clientele it serves, a specialized menu, white glove service, as well as other exclusive amenities.
Two Classic Unique Selling Propositions
To further illustrate what I’m talking about, following are two examples of the most famous and successful USP’s in the history of advertising:
You get fresh, hot pizza delivered to your door in 30 minutes or less – or it’s free.
That USP allowed Domino’s Pizza to take over and dominate the pizza delivery market. And it clearly differentiates Domino’s from its many competitors.
Here’s Another Classic
When your package absolutely, positively has to get there overnight.
When they developed that USP, almost overnight, Federal Express (FedEx) became the dominant force in the overnight delivery industry. How dominant? It’s safe to say, the term “fedex” has permanent residence in the American business lexicon.
So, why is having a USP so important? Because with tens of millions of websites on the Internet all vying for attention, and thousands more signing on by the minute, if your business is the same as everyone else’s in your field, you might as well be invisible.
And if you don’t differentiate your business from the rest of the pack, I can almost guarantee, you will be invisible.
Giant Lollipops
Allow me to tell you a true story. When I was a child, I remember my mother taking me to the new doctor in town, Dr. Vosburgh to get some type of childhood vaccine. I was petrified. Like most kids, I hated needles. And each time the doctor tried to vaccinate me I’d pull away.
After failed multiple attempts to vaccinate me, the frustrated doctor said, “If you sit still while I vaccinate you, I’ll give you a lollipop, afterwards.”
“I’ve got lollipops at home,” I defiantly replied. “Not like mine,” the doctor responded teasingly. He then reached into his desk drawer, and pulled out the biggest lollipop I’d ever seen in my life. I’m not kidding.
That lollipop was so big and round, it could have easily covered up my entire face. It was a giant white lollipop, flat like a pancake, and it had a rainbow of different colors swirling all through the middle. Needless to say, I let the good doctor stick that needle in my arm.
Anyway, that new doctor quickly became the most popular doctor in town. All the kids liked him. And for some strange reason, I didn’t mind getting vaccinated anymore after that.
I was too young to realize it at the time, but that doctor had a Unique Selling Proposition – giant rainbow lollipops. And they worked like a charm!
Barack Obama’s USP
Here’s a more recent example of the importance of a USP. Before he was elected the 44th president of the United States, then candidate Barack Obama wisely positioned himself as the candidate of “change.” He captivated the nation with three little words, “Yes, We Can!”
Whenever he appeared on the campaign trail, huge crowds repeatedly chanted “Yes, We Can!” Hip-Hop producer and founding member of the popular singing group Black Eyed Peas, Will.i.am even created a viral video around the phrase. Needless to say, it was absolute smash hit online!
That catch phrase not only caught on like wildfire in America, people around the world soon began chanting “Yes We Can!” That catch phrase, along with his message of hope and change was Obama’s USP. That’s what made him different.
Obviously, he had other important qualities as well. I mean, you don’t get elected president of the United States simply because of a catch phrase.
That being said, you could reasonably argue that without that simple catch phrase, Obama might not have gotten the attention of millions of Americans. And as a consequence might never have been elected president.
And here’s an interesting bit of irony: Reportedly, Obama hated the “Yes, We Can” phrase when it was first presented to him by his campaign manager, David Axelrod. Obama thought the phrase was corny.
However, instinctively savvy Michelle Obama told her husband the phrase would work. Obama eventually gave in, and the rest as they say is history. Such is the importance of having a Unique Selling Proposition – and an instinctively savvy wife!
Unique Selling Proposition Defined
This is what brilliant advertising executive, Rosser Reeves wrote in his book, Reality in Advertising:
“Each advertisement must make a proposition to the consumer. Not just words, not just product puffery, not just show-window advertising. Each advertisement must say to each reader: “Buy this product and you will get this specific benefit.”
The proposition must be one that the competition either cannot, or does not, offer. It must be unique – either a uniqueness of the brand or a claim not otherwise made in that particular field of advertising.”
That’s an accurate and profound observation. However, it’s not enough to just have a USP. You have to flaunt it. You have to constantly remind people what makes your company unique. You have to tell them over and over again everyday – until they get it. And when they do get it, you have to tell them some more.
You Have to Flaunt Your Uniqueness
Unfortunately, many businesses don’t communicate effectively enough how they’re different from the competition. They expect consumers to just know that they’re different. And as a result, consumers assume that your business is just like every other business in your field.
You see, unless you tell them differently, consumers generally perceive one lawyer to just like the next, one mechanic to be like the next, and one plumber to be like the next. And if you haven’t told them otherwise, why wouldn’t they? Indeed, why shouldn’t they?
By demonstrating how you’re different on a consistent basis, the value of your business will rise in the eyes of your target audience. And when your business value rises, so too will your profits. The two go hand in hand.
By the way, a Unique Selling Proposition doesn’t have to be an material object like a giant lollipop, or a sequence of words like a catch phrase. A USP can be virtually anything that makes your business unique and interesting.
Another Effective USP
For example, a friend of mine, who is a website designer has a very interesting and gutsy USP. Before meeting with prospects for the first time, he builds actual turnkey websites with the prospects company colors, logo and even some basic content. These websites often take up to a week to build.
But here’s the kicker… his prospects don’t even know that he does this. The completed-in-advance websites are a complete surprise to them, when they actually meet. So, in essence, my friend is taking a huge gamble, using his valuable time building websites without so much as a small deposit.
When I asked him why he invested so much sweat equity into building websites for free, he told me that since he started using this technique, his prospects are so impressed with his designs and initiative, over 70% of them end up purchasing the websites on the spot – over 70%!
That’s some closing ratio! He said his conversion ratio is twice as high as it was before he started building websites in advance. I guess you can’t argue with success.
So there you have it – the importance of having a Unique Selling Proposition. So if you haven’t done so already, get to work on developing an effective USP for your business. I’m not promising it will get you elected president of the United States…but hey, you never know!
About the author:
David Jackson is a writer, marketing consultant and entrepreneur. Which online services can you trust? Find out here: http://reviews-by-customers.com
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Obama, Giant Lollipops and Unique Selling Propositions
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Obama, Giant Lollipops and Unique Selling Propositions
Facebook. MySpace. Insert the name of your favorite social networking site here. These Web sites allow you to connect with contacts of all types — old college chums family members acquaintances co-workers perfect strangers — but they also largely have something else in common advertisements. How are you supposed to promote yourself and your professional services if these social networking sites are so preoccupied with their own marketing agendas Find out if you should be Clocked In instead….
Charter Business Bundle ® Bundle Services for Only $89/Monthly! Get High Speed Internet and Telephone.
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Should You Be Clocked In?