10 Requirements for Identifying a Profitable Affiliate Program
There are two kinds of affiliate programs available: pay-per-sale and pay-per-lead. There are also so called two-tier programs which consist of both of the before-mentioned. As an affiliate, it is your task to send traffic to the merchant (i.e. an Internet business that sells goods and services) in order to help him/her get new customers.
Whenever one of the visitors you refer buys a product from that merchant, you are credited with the sale and you receive a commission. This is the source of your profits. In order to make money with pay-per-sale marketing, you must know how to choose a profitable affiliate program, which have a good product you can promote. The following list is designed to help you in the search process so that you can distinguish the best ones.
1. Niche selection. This requires keyword research, which shows how popular a search term is. If the keyword is popular in the major search engines, it means that there is demand for this product in that certain niche. For example, the search term “people search” gives overall daily estimate of 30,875 searches in SeoBook Keyword Suggestion Tool. This is one of the very popular search terms and ACME People Search Engine affiliate program is in this niche. On the other hand, popularity of a product is also important factor. Buyers are attracted to buy popular products.
2. High-quality product and priced competitively. People are very willing to buy high-quality products and they can tell each others how good product it is they just bought. So a good reputation spreads across the markets. Compared to other similar products, it is priced reasonably. This makes selling of this product easier, i.e. it converts well.
3. Commission structure and conversion rate. When creating an income stream, it is important that you secure a commision structure, which is high enough. It would be also good to know what is the conversion rate? If you do not know, ask the merchant. The higher commissions you receive, the less traffic you need to meet your revenue goals. Commissions of digital products range from 40% to 60% of the selling price. In some cases even higher commissions are paid.
4. Growth potential. Seek programs within growing niche and with expanding product offerings. This will improve your revenue expansion. Yours customers will keep coming back to see what is new and exciting. Look for merchants who are dynamic and continuously expanding their product range.
5. Repeat business. Seek programs that offer you own web site as part of the program. Usually this is done through affiliate link, which is directed to merchant’s web site. So your prospects will return to the merchant’s web site. But this is not a good thing for your affiliate business in the long-term. You must collect prospects names and email adresses. To do this, you need an opt-in page, so that you are able to repeat your offer to prospects.
6. Two-tier programs. You can increase your revenue potential with two-tier programs. They pay you for both referring other affiliates to the merchant as well as customers who decide to buy your affiliate product.
7. Recurring commissions. There are many affiliate programs, which offer recurring commissions. Once a visitor signs up through your affiliate link then you get a commission every month as long as he stays with that company. For example web hosting companies and membership sites offer this kind of commission structure.
8. Research merchant. Find out information on the merchant’s reputation in the industry from both a customer and an affiliate standpoint. Seek reviews or customer experience reports about that merchant. In addition, look for what other affiliates of that merchant say about the affiliate program. Does the merchant pay on time? Does the merchant provide tools and support?
9. Good tracking system. Tracking of referrals and sales are carried out by a cookie. It is a small piece of text stored on a user’s computer by a web browser. When the person you referred visits the site you are promoting, the cookie with your affiliate ID is planted in his/her computer. Different affiliate programs have set different durations for their cookies. In general we can say that the longer duration, the better. The affiliate program must also offer realtime statistics, so that you can see how many visits you are converting into sales.
10. Community support. It is the merchant’s interest to provide support for its affiliates. A good affiliate program has a forum in order to provide place for information exchange between affiliates. In addition, their offer news and expert advice from more experienced super affiliates.
These guidelines will help you to identify a profitable affiliate program and improve the quality of your choice. Where to find these profitable affiliate programs then? There are dozens of affiliate program directories, where you can seek new products to promote. In addition, there are affiliate networks like ClickBank, Commission Junction and PayDotCom, where you can search for products.




