Associate Programs Newsletter #14
CONTENTS:
1. Autoweb associate gets good results
2. One for webmasters – ArtToday
3. DatingCash forms strategic partnership
4. Making money from misspellings
5. FriendFinder says it pays more
6. One at a time, says AIS
7. Getting nervous about Virtual Merchant
8. Making money on the Net is hard work
9. Snippets
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1. Autoweb associate gets good results
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If you haven’t been visiting the Associate Programs Message Board (there’s a link at the top of every page at AssociatePrograms.com ) you’re missing out on some useful gems.
For example, here are some snippets taken from messages posted by Leonard Farneth of https://usedcar.com :
“I recommend an outfit called Autoweb… they pay $2 each time anyone gets a price quote and $5 for each time someone places an ad. They have realtime stats and without a hell of a lot of promotion I rang up $150 (1 month) in revenue for my site. Although I have a number of advertisers now, they are one of my favorites. I have since spammed my site with links to them and have seen up to $16 dollars a day twice in a week.”
I asked Leonard what traffic he had to achieve those sales.
“For August I saw 26,000 unique host visitors overall and I guess about 15,000 of those had been to pages that contain a link to Autoweb. So something like 500 a day but I expect that unless your site is automotive targeted you would probably see a little smaller return. Still click for click they are paying out about $50 per thousand (They show total hits too) which is great. My link to them says ‘Buy a car’ so people are pretty well qualified when they go there.”
Thank you, Leonard, for taking the time to make such a useful, detailed post. You can see how Leonard links to Autoweb at https://usedcar.com
Autoweb
https://www.autoweb.com/
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2. One for webmasters – ArtToday
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I came across another good associate program this week.
Called ArtToday, it will be ideal for sites which attract people interested in art, web page design and construction, desk-top publishing and similar fields.
ArtToday offers 659,647 images and 1,700 fonts, ready to download, and free samples. Partners earn 10% commission on gross sales to customers. That’s a minimum of $US3 per customer.
When you join, ArtToday makes everything extremely easy for you, providing links ready for pasting into your pages. You don’t even have to save the graphic to your server. You can promote ArtToday using banners, buttons or text links – and promote it in your newsletter too.
Online statistics are provided, updated at 3am each day.
As you can expert from graphic art experts, the banner ads are very professional. I’ve put the one I like best at the bottom of AssociatePrograms.com/web-design.html
For appropriate web sites, this program looks excellent. My only grumble would be that there is no second-tier payment, so I don’t benefit from the sales you make.
I’ve signed up.
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3. DatingCash forms strategic partnership
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TargetMatch, which runs DatingCash, has formed a strategic partnership with search directory LookSmart and now receives excellent publicity on the main page at Looksmart.com.
“We recently became the exclusive content provider in the Romance and People & Chat categories for LookSmart,” says DatingCash Program Manager Yoav Dror-Freeman.
See datingclub.com/looksmart for a good example of clear, attractive design.
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4. Making money from misspellings
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Here’s another useful hint which was posted on the Associate Programs Message Board:
Mike Benavides writes:
Take a look at https://www.Chevorlet.com
One very resourceful affiliate of ours began buying up “car misspeller domains”. He is one of our top 10 money-makers (he makes ~$1500/mo.) – which would suggest that there are a ton of people out there who have trouble spelling . . . and even more opportunity on the Net for creative business souls like him.
My best,
Mike Benavides
AutoFusion, Inc.
https://www.CarPrices.com
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5. FriendFinder says it pays more
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No matter how good your business is on the Net it doesn’t seem to be long before someone pops up claiming to do things better. Here’s a snippet from matchmaker FriendFinder.
Andrew at Friendfinder writes:
Hi Allan
1. we pay 35-55% commissions depending on traffic
2. we have 5 sites to choose from (soon to be 6)
3. “general” signup page is friendfinder.com/partners/
4. according to your site, one-and-only.com pays 3.1 cents/click:
$1131 per year
——————– = 3.1 cents/click
365*100 clicks per year
Our average per click payout is 6.17 across our 4 live sites. This includes several sites which sent 10,000+ clicks w/o signups (cheaters).
Excellent site!
Andrew
CEO Friendfinder, Inc.
https://friendfinder.com/partners/
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6. One at a time, says AIS
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Last week I reported how processing company Virtual Merchant was suffering from growing pains and suggested you could also sign up with AIS Merchant Services to try them both.
Whoops! As an alert reader points out, I should have read the contract more carefully.
Hi Allan
I thought I’d point out a clause in the contract with AIS . . . I’m currently with Credit-Cards-Online and Virtual Merchant and feature both on my websites. I don’t remember seeing this clause in their agreements. :)
“I agree not to start, nor to be involved in a business similar to that of the Company during the period of this Agreement. I agree that upon the termination of this Agreement, I shall not compete with the business of the Company, or its successors or assigns . . .”
Keep up the good work.
Neil.
Thank you. If you had included your URL I would have published it. Rule number one in marketing – always include your signature, even to friends.
I reckon it makes sense to do research and then promote one credit card processing company which seems to offer the best deal.
Judging by my e-mail this week, a few people have switched to AIS but most are sticking with Virtual Merchant although it pays a lower commission. Very interesting!
[UPDATE: The AIS Media program has closed.]=========================================
7. Getting nervous about Virtual Merchant
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According to my online statistics I have now achieved 18 sales in four weeks with Virtual Merchant. The very professional looking site gets great results. However, all of the sales are still listed in my online stats as “pending” – unverified sales.
If they are all eventually verified, I will have earned an amzing $US2700 in four weeks on a site for webmasters which attracts about 12,000 unique visitors a month.
Also, I now have 102 people who have signed up under me. I’m supposed to earn $US25 from each sale they make but apparently not one sale by them has been verified yet – or if it has no one has told me.
As I reported last week, Bill Long of Virtual Merchant says they are working 15 to 18-hour days to improve the system.
My recommendation: Cross your fingers or say a prayer, or do whatever else seems appropriate. If you’re addicted to gambling, sign up and join the fun:
[UPDATE: I never received a cent from Virtual Merchant.]=======================================
8. Making money on the Net is hard work
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Not everyone who joins associate programs makes money. Here’s an anonymous letter I received this week:
“Regarding the Virtual Merchant! It sucks! I had my Virtual Merchant about 1 to 1 1/2 months now! I have submitted the heck out of it and I had 1 hit – it was me checking to see if the link worked! ALL the programs I am on are NOT producing anything for me! In the last 3 months I have worked 12-16 hours a day and not ONE of my programs has produced one single penny, EXCEPT for Click Trade $1.26! For 3 months of VERY hard work! Everyone who hears I am working on the web says oh you’re making the bucks – BULL I’m making time that’s all!”
Hoping to try to work out why this obviously frustrated and disillusioned correspondent wasn’t making money, I asked for the URL of his/her web site and also asked what marketing methods he/she was using so unsuccessfully.
Unfortunately, I didn’t receive a reply, so I can only guess what’s going wrong. Here are my guesses.
WHY YOU’RE FAILING WITH ASSOCIATE PROGRAMS:
1. You haven’t built your own web site, so for each person whose attention you attract you have only one brief chance to make a sale. Using that method, you aren’t building trust or loyalty, or attracting revisits. If you also aren’t making sales, what the heck are you achieving?
2. You think posting a whole lot of ads to newsgroups is serious marketing. Think again. Have a look at Dejanews.com and do a search for “Virtual Merchant”. The results are depressing – all those people posting the same advertisement with the same heading, over and over again. (If I’m wrong here, and this method achieves sales, please tell me quickly, someone!)
3. Your web site doesn’t attract enough visitors. Take some advice from Neil Shearing of Scam Free Zone – https://www.associateprograms.com/scamfree . He’s the person who eventually persuaded me to sign up for my best money-earner, Corey Rudl’s marketing course, https://www.associateprograms.com/corey after others had failed to convince me. I like Neil’s straight-forward approach – he warns people that you need 500 visitors a day to make good money from the program. (My commissions from Corey have varied from $US195 to $US845 monthly and I’ve hit 500 visitors a day only once, but I suspect my results are better than average.) Want to boost your traffic? I’ve collected hundreds of hints:
satcom.net.au/success/tips-tricks-tools.html
4. Your site doesn’t attract the right sort of visitors. I read an analysis of one site’s sales which showed that visitors coming from a search engine are far more likely to buy your product than bored people reading links on a free-for-all site. Perhaps you need WebPosition.
5. You haven’t chosen the most appropriate products to complement your site. Products and services for webmasters do best on my site – they may not on yours.
6. You haven’t tried the products and services yourself, so you can’t write a personal recommendation, which would get much better results.
7. You’re just posting banners, instead of adding value. Add interesting, helpful, useful content which will attract visitors and lure them to stay longer. For an example, see the article I added this week: Prism Air’s Nightmare Ends, which pretty much tells you how not to start an associate program, and just happens to conclude with a banner to Affiliate Link software, a good way to do it right. Subtle, huh?
8. You haven’t started your newsletter yet. It’s not only an excellent way of reminding people that your site exists, it’s also a selling tool. Got nothing to say in a newsletter? Sure you have! If you’re lacking in confidence, just aim to publish three items each week: (a) A brief description of the one new page you added to your site this week. (b) A contributed article. You won’t have any trouble finding people willing to contribute free articles, but if you’re worried about that, you can always choose an article from Angela Smith’s World Wide Information Outlet – https://certificate.net/wwio/ . (c) Read one book each week on the topic your site covers and write a book review. (Join the Amazon.com associate program and you can make that review a money-earning link.)
9. Perhaps all sorts of other things are wrong with your site, creating an amateurish image. Find a friend who is willing to tell you the honest truth. Actually, you can get away with having a pretty awful looking site if the content is excellent, as Mark J. Welch demonstrates brilliantly – Adbility.com (He’s a sort of competitor, so don’t stay there too long.)
OK, you’re right. Making money on the Net is hard work. It just seems easy after you’ve done all the hard work, when those commissions start arriving regularly in the mail.
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9. Snippets
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PRISM AIR’S NIGHTMARE ENDS
Most people have no idea what starting an affiliate program entails and are quick to judge when things aren’t perfect immediately, says Kristine Lammy of Prism Air who had a nightmarish time getting her program up and running smoothly.
AssociatePrograms.com/search/prism.shtml
INTERNATIONAL PARTNERS OK
Worldwide Superstore, which sells 55,000 computer products, has updated its partner program to include international partners.
WorldwideSuperstore.com/partners.htm
TRUCE CALLS IT QUITS
Stuart Whitmore, President of UniNova Services Corp. says the TRUCE service is being cancelled due to lack of interest. TRUCE was a sideline, so closing it “does not represent a significant failure or damaging situation”.
uninova.com
SPREE.COM MAKES A FRIEND
Spree.com, which has upset a lot of people because of problems apparently caused by growing too fast, has announced a strategic alliance with HotBot under which Spree.com’s movie, electronics and long-distance phone service offerings will be promoted on the HotBot Shopping Directory.
internetnews.com/ec-news/1998/09/0301-spree.html
AMAZON.COM GOES CLASSICAL
Bookseller Amazon.com, which recently began selling music, has added 42,000 new classical and opera titles to its selection of CDs.
internetnews.com/ec-news/1998/09/0902-amazon.html
SEARCH ENGINE TIPS
For some good advice on getting well ranked in search engines, see “Discover The Best Kept Secrets For Top Placement On Search Engines” by Patrick Anderson and Michael Henderson.
hitstosales.com/2search.html
TITANIC PRICE WAR
Reel.com is selling the movie Titanic at a loss for $US9.99, plus shipping. Spree.com has gone 25c better – $US9.75. I hope the staff aren’t too swamped to serve you.
FREE AUTORESPONDERS
An autoresponder is a valuable Internet marketing tool and a convenient “automatic email answering service” for anybody. It’s like a secretary, working for you 24 hours a day. You can get one free.
MyReply.com/
COMMISSIONS WITHOUT SELLING
I like associate programs which enable you to earn commissions without selling anything. Here’s one. You earn $1 for everyone who signs up for freebies and discounts at CoolSavings. I’ve signed up.
directcoupons.com/cgi-bin/ads2.pl?advert=cd173
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Please visit this week’s generous sponsors
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Visit gatecomm.com/3.html and complete a simple form.
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Earn 25% commission on every sale. Just display
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Add another income stream to your site
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jde-publishing.com/reg.htm
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RETAILERS: add another income stream:
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It’s original, simple and fun. No special equipment is
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All the best
Allan Gardyne
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