Associate Programs Newsletter #211
Super affiliate Rosalind Gardner’s sales conversions are 3 to 5 times higher than those of the average affiliate.
As you may have read in Corey Rudl’s private site, Rosalind generates $30,000 to $50,000 a month in affiliate commissions.
I knew you’d want to know more about that, so I asked her how she achieves those high conversion rates.
She reveals her tips today.
CONTENTS:
1. 10 Ways to Gain Visitor Trust and Increase Your Conversion Rates
2. Chance to have your say on scumware
3. Search Term Suggestion Tool can mislead you
4. Four alternatives to AskMe.com
5. Bob Massa sues Google
6. Do it right, and the search engines love you
7. Useful free resource: Ad Tracking SuperTips
8. Thought for today: Big people and little people
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1. 10 Ways to Gain Visitor Trust and Increase Your Conversion Rates
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By Rosalind Gardner
Lack of consumer trust is still the biggest obstacle to online
sales. Judging by the amount of spam and scams flying about in
cyberspace, surfers are right to remain wary.
Savvy online shoppers, however, know how to determine a
merchant’s credibility with onsite information and by asking
pertinent questions.
Super affiliates anticipate their visitors’ concerns and address
questions before they arise. In return, these customer-oriented
affiliates are rewarded with sales and conversion rates much
higher than their counterparts whose focus is elsewhere.
Here are 10 ways you too can increase your conversion rates
by improving visitors’ trust in your sites.
HONESTY: Visitors should know exactly what to expect before they
get to your site. Dishonest advertising wastes their time and
your money. They’ll leave without buying, or plans to return.
SUPERIOR KNOWLEDGE: Affiliates with high conversion rates
usually own the products they sell. First-hand knowledge lends
credibility to their personal reviews and sets them apart from
the crowd.
INVITE FEEDBACK: Testimonials from happy customers are an
excellent way to build trust in your product reviews.
SELL QUALITY: Complaints, refunds and charge-backs lower your
reputation, as well as your revenue. Sell only high-quality
products.
KEEP DESIGN SIMPLE: Gratuitous animated graphics scream
“Webmaster Kindergarten”. Focus on your products, not fancy
gimmicks.
SHOW RESPECT: Broken links, graphics and forms are frustrating.
Pop-ups, music and noise are maddening. Respect your visitors’
time and space. Make sure your site is free of errors and other
annoyances.
BE AVAILABLE: Make it easy for visitors to get in touch with
you. A highly visible contact link on every page is usually
enough to let visitors know that you are readily available.
EXPOSE YOURSELF: It’s a psychological fact that trust increases
with exposure. Stay in touch with your visitors by sending them
useful information through your mailing list.
STRETCH: Affiliates often receive emails better handled by the
merchant partner. Don’t ignore those emails. Relaying the
message promptly brands you as a professional with both the
customer and your partner.
GIVE TREATS: Freebies are like chocolate samples. Few folks will
turn them down, and your reputation goes up when they’re good.
As you can see, gaining your visitors’ trust is simple. Simply be
trustworthy. Incorporate one or all of the above methods and
watch your credibility, conversion rates and sales increase.
Article by Rosalind Gardner, super affiliate,
web developer and author of “123eBusiness:
A Beginner’s Guide to Starting a Lucrative
Business on the Net”. https://123eBusiness.com
* Discover how Rosalind generates $30,000 to $50,000
a month in affiliate commissions.
https://www.associateprograms.com/rosalind
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2. Chance to have your say on scumware
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The four main affiliate networks will meet in New York on November 7 to try to establish some rules on dealing with scumware, also known as predatory advertising, parasite-ware, thiefware, stealware, etc.
As I described last year – How to stop scumware – scumware defaces your web site and robs you of commissions.
You don’t need to be a mental giant to understand that’s not fair.
Shawn Collins of ClubMom and Elisabeth Archambault of BuckWorks.com will represent the affiliate community at the meeting, “Defining the Rules of Engagement for Software Technologies”.
Also participating will be Commission Junction, Be Free, LinkShare and Performics.
Wayne Porter, Vice-President of Product Development for AffTrack,
will facilitate the talks.
Here’s Ralph Wilson’s sober summary:
https://www.associateprograms.com/hijack
Be Free’s proposal on how to solve the problem:
https://www.befree.com/proposal.htm
Shawn says this meeting will be a “monumental event” in affiliate marketing.
I hope he’s right.
If you act now, you can have your say.
“Since we are representing the affiliate community, we are collecting opinion papers (500 words or less, November 1 deadline) from affiliates at https://iAfma.org/papers , which will be incorporated into our arguments,” Shawn says.
If you’re as disgusted about scumware as I am, be sure to have your say. I have.
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3. Search Term Suggestion Tool can mislead you
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If you’re using Overture’s “Search Term Suggestion Tool” –
https://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ –
for niche keyword beware. It’s not always totally reliable.
Rob Long explains…
“I thought I’d found a couple of awesome – and relatively untapped – niches recently, only to find the demand for search terms were dramatically overstated in Overture’s August database.”
For instance, a search in the Suggestion Tool in August for “dog bark collar” (a dog training aid to reduce Fido’s yapping) at Overture showed 226,000 searches.
“Darn nice niche I’d say,” says Rob.
However, a search on the same term a month later showed only 1,219 total searches – a difference of 224,000 searches!
“Can there really be that much difference in demand for this niche over two months? Or, did Overture have some real problems with August numbers?” Rob says. “I’d chalk it up as a one-time anomaly if I didn’t have three other cases of weird numbers sitting next to me on my desk.
“Bottom line: Working from August numbers I was very excited about a couple new niche opportunities. Now, I’m re-evaluating all these opportunities with September numbers. You and your readers may want to as well,” Rob says.
Thanks for the tip.
I’ve occasionally seen really weird numbers in the Search Term Suggestion Tool. I suspect some of them are caused by people inflating the numbers with robots to draw attention to certain phrases.
If you’re going to spend time building a web site, it makes sense to use the best research tool available.
When I want to research profitable keywords, I use the tool in Site Build It!
You type in one phrase and it shows you dozens of keyword phrases – usually including many you hadn’t thought of – and it shows you how they compare for potential profitability.
You can see at a glance which ones have high demand and low supply.
This is a HUGE time saver for anyone researching small niches. It’s a fabulous tool for any affiliate.
Check it out here.
https://www.associateprograms.com/buildit .
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4. Four alternatives to AskMe.com
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Internet marketer Mike Merz of https://www.im4newbies.com helped build his reputation by helping others and being seen as an expert on AskMe.com.
(See “How AskMe.com helps build a reputation” –
Build your reputation )
He says his two years at AskMe enabled him to:
* Catapult his exposure by using a respected, high traffic platform.
* Build trust, respect, and credibility.
Unfortunately, as the New York Times reports, AskMe is closing down. So if you want a labor-intensive way of boosting your profile on the Web, you’ll need to find similar sites.
[UPDATE: The AskMe service has been discontinued. A similar service is provided by https://www.askmehelpdesk.com ]================================
5. Bob Massa sues Google
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Bob Massa, president of SearchKing and PR Ad Network, has filed a lawsuit against Google on the grounds that Google arbitrarily and purposefully devalued his companies’ and his customers’ web sites, causing his business to suffer financially.
Bob alleges that when Google found out about the PR Ad Network, which was selling text ads based on the PageRank of the page where the ads appeared, it “purposefully” reduced SearchKing’s PageRank.
Here are two versions of the story…
https://www.searchking.com/news/sknews.htm
https://news.com.com/2100-1023-962913.html
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6. Do it right, and the search engines love you
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There’s been wailing and gnashing of teeth over recent changes to Google’s algorithms and changes in the way Yahoo! presents its search results.
While others are complaining, we’re celebrating. All our affiliate-driven sites – large and small – are now doing even better at Google and Yahoo!
The lesson to be learned from this?
Concentrate less on search engine tricks and more on providing value. Build useful, content-rich, keyword-rich niche sites with at least 12 or 20 pages of good, solid information.
Do it right, and the search engines love you.
That’s exactly what my assistant Rupert did when he followed the instructions in the Site Build It! manual and eventually earned his first affiliate commission.
(“Rupert celebrates his first affiliate sale” –
Affiliate sale for Rupert )
That was in May. Five months later, Rupert’s two sites attract a total of over 1,100 visits a day – with NO paid advertising.
Even better, he’s now achieved $78,573 in affiliate sales.
How’s that for a newcomer who knew nothing about Internet marketing, search engine optimization or affiliate programs!
He did it by following the Site Build It! instructions.
Remember all the hassles you had building your first affiliate web site?
Build your next one hassle-free.
Here’s the best piece of advice you’ll ever get. Use the suite of tools we use and recommend – Site Build It!
It’s a fabulous tool whether you’re a newbie or a veteran.
Learn more about it here:
https://www.associateprograms.com/buildit
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7. Useful free resource: Ad Tracking SuperTips
===============================================
I’m sure you that you can use ad tracking to see which links on your site and in newsletter ads get the click, but did you know there are 23 ways you can use an ad tracker? And that’s just online.
As Harvey Segal explains in his new book, “Ad Tracking SuperTips”, there are even more ways you can use ad tracking offline.
Without hype, he analyzes ad trackers, explains which ones are best and why, and describes ways you can profit by using them.
If you haven’t looked into ad trackers in depth, Harvey’s book will surprise you.
It’s free, and you can customize it with your affiliate links and give it away, too. It’s an exe file.
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8. Thought for today: Big people and little people
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In hundreds of interviews with people of all levels I’ve made this discovery: The bigger the person, the more apt he is to encourage YOU to talk; the smaller the person, the more apt he is to preach to you.”
– David J. Schwartz
The Magic of Thinking Big
All the best
Allan Gardyne