There are truly thousands, if not millions, of affiliate marketing programs available to the enterprising internet marketer today.
Beyond selecting your business niche, appropriate keywords, and developing your website, how can you start making money from affiliate marketing programs of high repute and the best potential to earn a good income?
The answer is research, research, research. Here we provide some resources so you can learn more about affiliate marketing programs of interest.
1. Ask Current Affiliates
One of the best sources of information is the affiliate partners themselves. The marketers who are currently working with a company can help you learn about a program, so seek them out and ask away. You can find them in several places, such as members of an affiliate marketing aggregate site like Clickbank, in online forums, and a simple Google search to find affiliates already selling the products. Look for groups concerning affiliate marketing which you can join at social media sites such as Facebook and MySpace, too.
2. The Better Business Bureau
Located in the United States, the better business bureau is the go-to place that provides a lot of information regarding any complaints against a company. Partnering with a business that has a bad reputation could make your site lose ranking and be a big waste of time and money. You could also do a search for the company’s name + “complaints” to see if there are any disgruntled partners or customers willing to provide the details of their problems.
3. Online Reviews Of Affiliate Marketing Programs
Researching companies and affiliate marketing programs can also be accomplished by reading through online product reviews. You will find these at any number of aggregate sites and group forums related to affiliate marketing. Look for both the positive and negative reviews and consider them all before making a decision; there could be one dissatisfied partner posting multiple times to make a particular company look bad when he or she is actually the exception to the rule.
4. eBooks
For what is usually a nominal fee you can also opt to purchase an eBook written by an established affiliate marketer who provides the pros and cons regarding the various programs currently available. This allows the beginner to learn from someone else’s mistakes – and successes.
Online companies also provide affiliate marketing statistics details that may be available for download which can be a great help for determining the best programs to join.
It is unlikely you will find success as an internet marketer if you choose the wrong affiliate program to partner with. Do your research and thoroughly investigate both the company and the terms of the partnership before you sign up to promote products or services. There is lots of money to be made by promoting affiliate products online, but only if you choose the right affiliate marketing programs.
Sean Rasmussen
Aussie Internet Marketer
Learn Affiliate Marketing with Year Of The Affiliate © 2012
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
Very wise advice, Sean, for any venture of life, and especially when choosing who to learn from. High repute is gained from ‘High’ results.
Researching our options and knowing we are choosing well, means we have solid and firm foundations when we start to expand our knowledge.
I was interested to learn today about the ‘better business bureau’; a very handy and commonsense tool. When we do something, anything at all, its more satisfying when we know we are on the right track.
Have a great productive day everyone.
.-= Jo Carey-Bradshaw´s last blog ..Empowering Mindset – Imagination =-.
Certainly pays to spend some time investigating the product, the company and what other people are saying before promoting a particular product Jo. As you can see in the article, there are quite a few ways of doing so.
As you mentioned in Point 1 and 2 Sean, I usually do a search for the product name, owner of the product or company and look for anything interesting such as product complaints, spam complaints, negative reviews experienced by other, etc.
This method usually indicates pretty quickly the legitimacy and reputation of the product or service.
.-= Cemil´s last blog ..Following a Entrepreneurs Mindset =-.
It’s usually a pretty quick way to find good or bad reviews of a product or company Cemil.
Hi Sean,
This is great advice. There are a lot of affiliate marketing programs out there and you really want to make sure you’re partnering with the right one. Social media makes it a lot easier to find the information you need before you commit to selling anything.
Like Cemil, I also do my research online and look for reviews of the product or people I am interested in working with. The thing is though you may have to go back a few pages.
These people are savvy enough to manipulate the front page so that it only shows you what they want you to see. You’ll be amazed what you can find out if you’re prepared to spend the time researching affiliate marketing programs.
.-= Jazz Salinger´s last blog ..Learn and Earn – It’s a Marathon Not a Sprint =-.
Hi Sean
There is a huge amount of affiliate marketing programs out there, and unless you you want to promote the wrong persons and product, you must check out both .
I leant the hard way the importance of researching the products, and the people selling them. these days I look before I leap.
I had not thought about the Better Business Bureau so that is another safe guard I will now follow up on
.-= Rita Pepper´s last blog ..Your Next Holiday Destination =-.
Hi Rita,
I’ve learned the hard way as well. Sometimes I think it doesn’t hurt to get taken once because you’ll never forget it. It’ll remind you to do your due diligence each time.
Also, I think it gives us an edge because we see these people coming the second time around. Now, I research everyone and their products online before I get involved.
.-= Jazz Salinger´s last blog ..Finding Your Passion =-.
Hi Sean,
This article has 4 very good research techniques to follow. It’s good advice to research a product or an affiliate program before deciding to partner with somebody.
Doing proper research could help save time and money. Research avoids making mistakes or dealing with someone who has a bad track record.
.-= Jill Brown´s last blog ..Couples Marry at Common Law =-.
Thanks for this advice as I definately don’t do enough research with a company before I join their affiliate program. I usually look for the product I want to affiliate to without looking at the reputation of the company. In future I will be doing the research.
.-= Jackie Stenhouse´s last blog ..Types of Child Anxiety Disorder =-.
It is amazing what you can find out simply on Google. The quality programs often rank high, and there are usually sites that reveal about scams, waste of time etc.
I hadn’t heard about the Better Business Bureau before, but I think it is a great tip to learn about affiliate marketing programs and their reputation.
And as with every thing you plan to buy or on-sell – you need to know everything there is to know about it before you take your decision to go ahead with it. So I agree – research, research, research.
.-= Renee´s last blog ..Self Improvement Books – What Are Your Favourites =-.
There is usually some form or equivalent of a Better Business Bureau in most countries or States that you can check out a compnay on.
Also you can search ~company name+scam and see if anything comes up.
Often too a company that uses sponsored ads on Google et al will be fairly sound – but that is only an indicator I suppose.
If they rank high on Page 1 and have a high page rank (3+) it usually means they have been around for a while.