If you’ve been affiliate marketing – or if you’ve just been looking into it – then you’ve likely come across information at one point or another that has told you that pay-per-click (PPC) is the way to go.  There are some major things to consider, though, before you actually sign up for that form of advertising.

For one thing, it is the oldest surviving form of internet marketing that can be used by affiliate marketers today.  Though not as widely used today as it once was (due to the misuse of pay per click advertising by scam artists) it remains an effective and ever-growing technique that can help you to get much more out of your affiliate marketing campaign than you otherwise could.

Furthermore, you can make sure that you profit every time by signing up for a pay-per-click affiliate program that pays you every time you send a lead in their direction.  This means that if you’re using a pay-per-click advertising program in order to earn from a pay-per-click affiliate program, then as long as you’re being paid more than you’re paying out then you’ll always know that you’re making money.

The trick is to choose the right keywords to advertise the most effectively.  Do your research and find out what words are searched the most often and which ones are the most relevant to the product that you are attempting to sell for your affiliate merchant.

There are over 500 pay-per-click search engines available online.  I recommend that you create an account with the most popular pay-per-click search engines:

• Google Adwords
• Microsoft Ad Center
• Yahoo Search Marketing

Article marketing has proven to be one of the most effective tools to use in your marketing campaign to drive traffic to your sites and increase conversion rates.  The best part of article marketing is that it does not cost anything but your time to create the articles.

The idea behind article marketing is to submit well written articles to article directories and listing sites for readers interested in your content to find your articles and visit your sites through the links you provide in the author resource box.  A typical resource box is 3 to 4 lines long.  Here is an example of a resource box I have included in my articles.

Trevor McHaffie is a successful Internet business marketer who has created an in depth affiliate training website called where you can learn how to promote products online and make money. To access this FREE training head over to HotProfitAffiliates.com and register today!

Once you have your article(s) ready for submission you visit articles directories like ezinarticles.com, goarticles.com or articlesbase.com.  There are several directories available to submit your articles.

Submitting your articles manually to these directories can be very time consuming.  I use an article submitting service through ArticleMarketer.com that submits your articles to over 70,000 resources.  This is a paid resource but does provide results and statistics to see the penetration of your articles.

When you visit these site to submit your articles generally the ask for your name, email address, website, article title, the article body and author biography or resource box.  Each directory will have their own requirements for submitting articles.  Most directories have a minimum article length, some require your link in HTML format while others want plain text links.  Research the directoies you want to submit to and make sure your format your articles properly to speed up the process.

There are some software’s available that claim to help with the writing of articles.  I believe that the best results come from articles that your write your self as you will give the content your own feel and readers will appreciate that.

Head over to HotProfitAffiliates.com and sign up for your free membership to access a great report I put together to help you create some great well written articles.  If you are already a member…visit the members area and download your copy to start creating great articles!

Trevor

At some point in your research about affiliate marketing, the odds are that you’ve come across some mention of keywords.  If you’re wondering what they have to do with your efforts to earn more money online, then you’re about to find out the answer to your questions.

When you are creating an affiliate marketing campaign, your goal is always to make sure that your message is placed in front of your target market.  To do this, you will want to ensure that your articles, websites, or other online pieces will be in the top of search engine and other searches whenever members of this target market perform a query.  The only way to make this happen consistently is through the use of relevant keywords, used naturally throughout your promotional materials.

For example, if you were selling purses for your affiliate merchant, then you will want to make sure that you are at the top of the search results when your target market is searching for purses online.  This means that you will need to identify the right purse-related keywords, and weave them appropriately throughout your articles, press releases, or other online marketing content.

Keywords can consist of either a single word – such as “purse” – or can also be key phrases – such as “black purse” or “designer black purse”.  They should be relevant to whatever it is that you are promoting, and should be used in a natural way within your content (lest you be penalized by search engines for unnatural or overuse of keywords).

Before beginning to promote any product, make sure that you use the techniques at http://HotProfitAffiliates.com to become familiar with the methods you require for properly using keywords to maximize the potential of your affiliate marketing.

A product endorsement is a great way to promote products online.  A great alternative to writing a product endorsement is to use a product comparison chart.

The product comparison chart is a side by side view of several products that list all the features and benefits of each one.  The best part of the comparison chart is that you can rate each product and include your affiliate links on each product!

Here is an example of a basic comparison chart layout you can try:

Comparison charts are know to convert sales well especially if you can write engaging reviews and make the chart appealing to your readers.  The more experience you have with the products your are promoting the more trustworthy your chart will feel to your readers and convert one or all of your products into sales.  If you can express your thoughts and findings in the first person your readers will truly believe what your are trying to say.  Honesty sells!

Give this a try and see if your sales increase.

Trevor

Instead of taking the traditional sales pitch to your visitors or list why not write a review or endorsement to promote your products.  It has been proven that honest and sincere reviews and endirsements will increase your conversion rates.

In order to for your endorsement to work you should have personal experience with the product.  When you write the review be excited about the product and deliver that in your message.  Most times you can purchase the product using your affiliate link and receive the product at a discount.  Also, you can use the cost of the product as a tax deduction later on.  Use, read or study the product so that you can write about it and know all the features.  Write about the good features as well as the bad.  You readers will appreciate your honesty.

Take time when you are writing your reviews.  Plan out what you want to say and how you want to say it to your visitor or list members.  If you can anticipate your readers thoughts and possible concerns about the product, address them in the review before your readers have questionable thoughts and leave your site.

The most important aspect of your review or endorsement is the personal flavor that you give to it.  By writing a compelling personal testimonial of how you benefited from the product your readers will feel like you are trying to protect them from other inferior products and relate to your experience.  People want products that will improve their lives and want honest answers and opinions.

As long as you are sincere and honest with your readers you will gain their trust and ultimately turn the into customers.

TIP: Watch some infomercials on T.V. to get some ideas on writing compelling product endorsements!

To your success…

Trevor

Now that we have created some content are creating our website for our visitors there are some “Must-Have” pages that you need to include on your site.

Many affiliates miss some of these basic pages which i nturn can cost them money and sales.  Take some time and create these pages properly.

1. Contact Page – This is an important page for your visitors.  When visitors take the time to submit questions to you they demonstrate an interest in your site and any product you are offering.  You should respond to your visitors’ questions in a timely manner to increase the chance of converting that visitor into a customer.

When creating your contact page avoid using clickable email links.  I would recommend using a contact form or text explaining how to contact you.  Contact forms will eliminate a lot of spam that is generated by email harvesting programs.

2. About Us Page – Many visitors want to know about the owner or group of the site or product they are interested in.  It is human nature to want to learn about others they don’t know.  It is important for your visitors’ to feel like they can know who you are.  If they feel like you are hiding behind the annonimity of the Web, your visitors will not trust you or trust the products you are promoting.

By having an “About Us” page on your site your visitors’ will feel more comfortable with you and will likely increase your conversions.  Try and include pictures of yourself and some of the reason why you created your website.  This gives an personal touch to the page and you visitors’ can relate to you.  They will help improve your credibility and trudt level with your visitors’.

3. Disclaimer - If you are promoting business products, healt related products or any product that may take claims about successful achievements you should include a disclaimer page on your site to protect your self against legal action by association your site with a particular product.

4. Privacy Statement – Every affiliate website needs to include a privacy statement to explain how information collected from your website will be used and protected.  This page has specific language that is used by the site owner to the site user which is legally binding.  The privacy statement will increase your vidsitors’ confidence and trust, will reduce liability and ultimately increase your conversions.

You can search and find templates on the Web to create these pages or you can use software programs to create the documents for you.  The About Us page will be the only page you will need to design completely.

I use a program called AutoWebLaw to create all of the above pages.  You can see this program here: http://www.trevormchaffie.com/Recommends/AutoWebLaw.

Till next time…

Trevor

To re-tool your content essentially means to re-use content your have previously used.  What we need to do is re-master it into new content.  You can do this by re-writing portions of content or use it in different ways like creating reports.

By re-mastering your content you create new formats of material you have already used and extend the use of it by reaching and increasing your audience.  You will create new users to your content and re-engage your current audience.

Here are some ideas on how to re-tool your content:

• Use articles and combine them into a report or ebook.  You can offer this as incentives to join your site or make it a full blown paid product.
• Break up your articles and use them in your autoresponder follow up series.
• Create audio recordings of your material and upload them to your site.  Many people these days would rather listen to articles and book than read them.  If you have a lot of content your can even create a podcast for your audience to subscriber too!

These are a few ideas…if you uses your imagination and get creative you can create many new uses for content you already have!

Till next time…

Trevor

Another technique you can use if you do not want to create your own content is to use articles that have been posted on article directories and the author’s allow you to use that content free of charge.  You can visit sites like ezinarticles.com, GoArticles.com or a number of other article sites. 

You can use these articles as long as you use them within the author’s guidelines and stipulations.  Most time these stipulations require that you use a resource box with the author’s information with a link back to their site. 

The problem with this technique is that you now have a link that leaves your site.  These link are nit usually affiliate link so you do not want to include link that do not make you any money.

The way that I use this technique is to use the ideas and concepts and then create my own articles.  This is easier than creating your own content as most of the work and research is completed for you.  Then you create your own articles in your own words and thoughts.

In the next post I will show you how to re-tool your content and create unique articles, posts, etc.

Trevor

If you do not like to write or are uncomfortable writing content you may want to hire a Ghostwriter to create your content for you.  You can hire a ghostwriter using sites like Guru, Elance and Rentacoder.  Many marketers choose to use ghostwriters for content creation because it frees up their time to perform other tasks.

Ghostwriters can create content on a variety of topics.  They will perform the research around your topic and then write the media tyoe you requested.   You can hire ghostwriter to write  400 word articles for around $3-5 each.

Now be aware when hiring a ghostwriter because their writing ability varies widely.  You can get great material or very terribble material.

To avoid getting the terrible material it is imperative that you write a good project proposal that clearly identifies what you want and what your expectations are.

Here is an example of a posting I used to create several articles in the affiliate marketing niche.

I am looking for someone to write a series of articles on Affiliate Marketing. I will require 50-100 articles on various topics within the Affiliate Marketing Niche. Topic examples included affiliate marketing tactics, in’s and out’s of affiliate marketing, etc.