Associate Programs Newsletter #215
You're lucky you got a newsletter today.
Joanna persuaded me to buy us both roller blades for her birthday. At 50-mumble, we're younger mentally than physically and I fell over, hurting my typing hand. It's OK now but we decided to postpone our next skate until after I'd written this newsletter.
I often receive emails from affiliates who have trouble deciding on a topic for a web site.
Today I have 6 tips to help you - and a free trial.
CONTENTS:
1. NEW: Affiliate manual - free trial
2. 6 ways to find topics for affiliate web sites
3. Affiliate sites large or small?
4. 200-for-$29 hosting deal to end soon
5. Top Internet marketers confess their biggest mistakes
- so you can avoid making them
6. It's now easy to find merchants who pay via PayPal
7. Google PageRank analyzed in detail
8. Affstat 2003 Report available now
9. Useful free resource: Google WebQuotes
10. Thought for today: Success
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=============================================
1. NEW: Affiliate manual - free trial
=============================================
As you've probably heard, Chuck McCullough of AffiliateMatch has written a
superb introduction to earning money with affiliate programs.
It's called "Affiliate Mistakes: Maximizing Your Profits From Affiliate
Programs".
Perhaps you've wondered whether you should get it. If so, here's something
to help you make up your mind.
You can now download a free trial.
You'll get:
* Table of Contents
* Introduction
* Chapter 1 - Affiliate Mistake #1
The free trial will give you a taste of Chuck's writing style and the
quality he offers.
You have absolutely nothing to lose and a lot to gain.
(Unfortunately, this offer isn't for Mac users.)
[UPDATE: This product is no longer available.]
======================================================
2. 6 ways to find topics for affiliate web sites
======================================================
A number of affiliates have told me they need help deciding on a topic for
a web site.
If you grabbed the recent Site Build It! 2-for-price-of-1 special
or if you've bought a 200-sites-for-$29 web hosting deal, you're probably
looking for new ideas for sites.
Here are 6 ways to choose a topic for a web site:
* PROMOTE THINGS YOU LIKE.
Look around you. What products do you use and like?
What clothes do you wear? What do you eat and drink? Chocolates? Candy?
Wine? What books and magazines do you read? Recipe books? Instruction
manuals?
Videos? CDs? DVDs? Movies?
Where do you go for holidays? What services do you use? What tools do you
use? What software? What other equipment? Bath products? Cosmetics?
Find a quiet, peaceful spot and picture a typical day or typical week.
Think about your work, play and hobbies. The more you think about it, the
more possible options you'll see.
If you're successful at something, what tools or courses or books helped
make you successful?
Build a site describing how you use some of these things and explain how
they help you.
The easiest and most persuasive affiliate product promoting is done when
you're genuinely enthusiastic about a product.
For example, I love promoting Corey Rudl's private site of success
stories - http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/success-secrets
I always rush to read his latest success stories because I know they'll
be jam-packed with specific, practical tips I can use to increase my
income.
They are stories told by people who have been there, done that, and many
have $100,000 incomes to prove it.
You can join the program here:
http://AssociatePrograms.com/coreys
* USE YOUR EXISTING KNOWLEDGE.
You probably already have a heap of knowledge right inside your head that
you take for granted.
If you sell insurance, for example, you could build a site about
insurance options.
If you're a school teacher, you could build a site about best teaching
methods, teaching tools, books, magazines etc.
If you build web sites for a living, you could recommend the software and
web hosts you use.
* FOLLOW YOUR PASSION.
You've heard this before, but it's worth repeating because it works - and
because it's more fun than any other option.
Choose a topic in which you have a passionate interest.
I did this for my first site, back in 1996. Although I've badly neglected
the site, hardly touching it for years, it still holds No.1 and No.2 spots
in Google for "gluten-free recipes".
When you follow your passion there are many advantages.
For example, if you adore Britney Spears and decide to build a site about
her, you'll find that writing articles, doing research and creating web
pages about her is fascinating, like a hobby, not work.
Finding affiliate programs for books, magazines, videos and posters of
Britney will be fun.
When you inevitably strike problems - as we all do - you'll be more
likely to persevere because of your deep interest in the topic.
In contrast, if you choose health insurance as your topic and you haven't
the slightest interest in health insurance, you'll have to force yourself
to start work each day.
To find your niche, ask yourself: "What books do I like reading? What
magazines do I read? What topic do I like talking about?"
In your research and brainstorming, don't be too quick to reject ideas
that appear unlikely to succeed.
Unless your hobby is REALLY unusual, you can probably create an affiliate
site and generate useful income from it.
Who would have thought that being a dance DJ was a good topic for an
affiliate web site? My assistant Rupert proved it is.
Today his first affiliate site is No.1 on Google for "dj tips" and it's
consistently earning hundreds of dollars a month.
* FOLLOW THE MONEY.
Find out what people want, and sell it to them. Debt reduction, online
gambling, sharemarket tips, digital cameras, viagra, DVD players,
whatever.
Keep an eye on the major portals such as Yahoo! and see which products
are consistently promoted in prominent positions.
If a lot of money is consistently being spent on advertising them, you
can be sure a lot of people are buying.
* SEEK HIGH COMMISSIONS.
Look through the AssociatePrograms.com directory for affiliate programs
that pay high commissions, in dollars, not percentages.
This is a popular tactic of affiliates who build mini-sites and pay for
traffic.
* FOLLOW NEW TRENDS.
Keep an eye on TV, magazines and newspapers for articles and
advertisements to help you spot trends.
For example, camera phones are growing hugely in popularity. Research
firm Strategy Analytics says 147 million phone cameras will be sold
worldwide by 2007.
How many people are searching for phone cameras or camera phones?
Overture's Search Term Suggestion Tool -
http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ -
shows these monthly searches:
3113 phone camera
2212 cell phone camera
Here's a useful article on new trends:
http://www.clickz.com/tech/lead_edge/article.php/1561851
(To be continued.)
IN THE NEXT ISSUE...
6 more ways to find topics for affiliate web sites.
[UPDATE: Here's an article with even more website ideas.]
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==============================================
3. Affiliate sites large or small?
==============================================
As well as finding a topic for your affiliate site, you'll have to decide
what type of affiliate site you're going to build.
If you're just planning a one-page mini-site, it won't matter much if you
find the topic boring.
The two main choices are:
* Mini-sites. They're cheap and easy to build. If you want to beat the
competition to a new affiliate program, or test the interest in an obscure
niche, this is a good way.
You'll probably pay Overture and Google Adwords for traffic to your
mini-sites, so you'll need Phil Wiley's expert advice on how to make them
work.
Phil is the expert on fast, cheap mini-sites -
http://AssociatePrograms.com/phil .
* Interesting, useful sites - good enough to be listed in Yahoo! and
designed to get tons of free traffic from high rankings in Google.
Ken Evoy is the expert on these. Download his free "Affiliate Masters"
course here...
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/articles/302/1/Free-Affiliate-Masters-Course
==================================
4. 200-for-$29 hosting deal to end soon
==================================
Floyd Morrissette offers a wonderful web hosting deal where you can host
200 mini-sites for only $29 a month or 1000 sites for $49.
He has told me to warn you that he's going to put the price up soon.
So if you're planning to create a bunch of mini-sites, grab his
200-for-$29 bargain now before the price goes up. I have!
http://AssociatePrograms.com/cheaphost
===================================================
5. Top Internet marketers confess their biggest mistakes
- so you can avoid making them
===================================================
I've made a LOT of mistakes since I began marketing on the Internet in
1996.
I look back and shudder when I think of the way I fumbled along, making
one ghastly error after another.
Back in May, 1996, when I sold my first ebook, I hadn't even heard of the
word "ebook". It was just a collection of plain text files, not even
zipped. When I eventually zipped it, I discovered that my "electronic
book" was useless for Mac users.
That was just a tiny mistake compared with the one I owned up to
when Rick Adams interviewed me for his book "Costly Online Blunders and
How to Avoid Them: Confessions of Top Internet Marketers".
The mistake I describe in Rick's book cost me thousands of dollars and
wasted months of my time.
Rick has gathered together a collection of blunders made by 18 "top
Internet marketers" including Terry Dean, Yanik Silver, Jim Edwards and
Rick Beneteau.
I must admit I loved reading all Terry's mistakes. That guy is so
successful now, and yet he's not ashamed to own up to a heap of mistakes.
As well as describing their blunders, these top marketers tell you how
they learned lessons that save money, increase profits, and increase
productivity.
I was specially intrigued by Fred Gleeck's unusual tip on post-sale
upselling. Fred's a very smart guy and that tip could be worth many
thousands of dollars to just about any company selling anything. I hadn't
seen it in any book anywhere.
One expert calculates that he lost a minimum of $1 million due to one of
his blunders.
If you want to succeed online, it's absolutely essential that you learn
how avoid other people's mistakes.
This ebook shows you how.
http://AssociatePrograms.com/coblunders
=============================================
6. It's now easy to find merchants who pay via PayPal
=============================================
Some non-U.S. affiliates have told me they're hunting for affiliate
merchants who pay via PayPal.
We've made it easy for you to find them.
Just go to the AssociatePrograms.com directory and type "paypal" into the
search box.
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/directory/
If your affiliate program should be on the list and isn't, please tell me.
Put "PayPal" in the subject line.
Check out PayPal here:
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/pal
__________________________________________SPONSOR__________
Shocking Report: Affiliates dubbed as "Net's No 1 Loser Strategy"
Why did this well known Internet Millionaire say that? I just had
to find out - and I did! My research revealed why 95% of
Affiliates fail to make money - how the Merchants they represent
are ripping them off - and the basic mistakes they make that
keep them in the losers' class! Apply what I learnt and join the
top 5% earners - like me! ___________________________________________________________
===============================================
7. Google PageRank analyzed in detail
===============================================
Here's a lengthy analysis of Google's PageRank. It's a bit heavy going,
not for the faint-hearted, but it includes ideas I hadn't read elsewhere.
http://pr.efactory.de/e-pagerank-implementation.shtml
===============================================
8. Thought for today: Affiliate marketing
===============================================
Shawn Collins has announced the results of his survey of more 100
affiliate program managers - the "AffStat 2003 Report".
The report enables affiliate program managers to compare their results
with others.
The report includes stats, resources, and an extensive "best practices"
section where affiliate program managers can get tips on how to improve
their performance.
Judging by the results of the survey, many managers need to study the
"best practices" section.
Learn more about the report here:
http://www.AssociatePrograms.com/affstat2003
===============================================
9. Useful free resource: Google WebQuotes
===============================================
Google has a new gimmick - a fast way of finding out what people
are saying about you - or about anyone, or anything.
It's called Google WebQuotes.
When I did a search for "Allan Gardyne" I was surprised to see that the
top search result was a snippet of a page that has a Google PageRank of
ZERO and does NOT mention the words "Allan Gardyne".
What that means to search engine optimization experts, I can only
guess.
Have fun with this one.
http://labs.google.com/cgi-bin/webquotes
===============================================
10. Thought for today: Success
===============================================
"Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let
go." - William Feather.
All the best
Allan Gardyne
