If you are beginning your online marketing career by enrolling into an affiliate program, I would like to point out a few pitfalls in the area of affiliate business. Here are the top five problems with affiliate marketing today:
1. Most Affiliate Companies Compete with their Affiliates
Can you imagine this? We all have seen this happen. We pay money to get into the program and we try to sell the products. Often the companies themselves compete with us on PPC programs and on search engine rankings. It makes an affiliate wonder why we were enrolled into the program any way.
The truth is that if the company succeeds then it will not have an affiliate network. This does more harm to the company than good. In fact this money could be spent on the affiliate network and used to promote it. This money could be utilized in higher commissions, support etc.
2. Not Giving Affiliates Useful Information.
Most affiliates are hampered because of statistics not reaching them in time. The basic statistics needed by the affiliate are
Number of visitors Number of sales from different programs Commissions earned, product wise How the customer reached the site (from which link) so that leads can be developed Unique clicks The top performing affiliate, so that other affiliates know where they stand In case the program is a two tier one, commissions earned from 2nd tier affiliates and their performance. The funny thing is that this is standard managerial procedure in bricks and mortar businesses.
3. Not Providing enough unique ads and promotional advertisements.
People do get bored seeing the same banners all the time. The same ad is displayed on hundreds of websites. The human eye tends to ignore the familiar thing. So some creativity is needed here. Flash banners, JPEG images, fresh testimonials, revamping of the sales page, all this would help the cause of affiliate marketing.
4. Not having good support staff.
Most mails to affiliates take very long to come. This is the internet age and one does not have time to wait for replies and problems to be tackled. Again most of the support staff does not know what they are doing. Affiliates are freelancers and time is money in freelance business. So this is an area that needs to be revamped. These days, one wonders if support staff is outsourced, because most of it does not know about the product at all.
5. Lastly, the commissions are not enough.
The affiliate is selling your product to earn money. A higher commission rate would be most welcome in these hard days. Affiliates are working hard, competing with others round the world to sell your products. You could save money on SEO and spend the money on more promotional material and up the commission rate.
So when you chose your affiliate program, be very careful about the program you enroll in. Ensure that you are not going to encounter these common pitfalls and then join.
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