Promoting affiliate products can be a good idea:
- They’re instantly available
- Lots are excellent quality
- Commissions can be high and sometimes pay out instantly
And if you wanted the executive summary, that’s all you need to know. Go off and find some products to promote!
But if you’re the kind of person who wants a little bit more information – and I’m the first to admit that list is sparse – then read on…
Affiliate Products are often Instantly Available
Sure, you need to have joined the relevant affiliate network first but, depending on the network, that’s often a one-off process that allows you to promote all or most of the products on offer.
For instance, Clickbank has a whole host of products on a very wide range of topics – everything from raising your own chickens through to drawing cartoons or writing sermons. And a lot more besides. Almost all of which are instantly available the moment you’ve joined – I copied those links in a matter of seconds.
Others like Warrior Plus, JVZoo and Commission Junction require you to apply to each product owner separately. Some are instantly approved, others take a while to get approved and others decide they don’t want you to promote them (maybe they don’t know you well enough yet or their computer thinks you’re not a good fit).
Then there are private affiliate programs like this one in the self help industry where you apply and can promote just their range of products. Which could be a handful or it could be more. That depends on the individual program.
Recurring commissions are sometimes available – you’ll be told that on the individual product pages – and are a nice way to get a future income.
There are some directories out there that claim to tell you which programs offer recurring commissions but in my exerience they’ve never been particularly good at doing that and I find it easier to just use the affiliate networks I’m involved with.
Lots of affiliate products are excellent quality
Yes, the quality varies.
Which means you should do more than a cursory glance around the sales page unless you want your refund rate to be high.
But there are some absolutely superb programs out there that are sold via affiliates as well as others that fall slightly short of superb but are still excellent. And others all the way down the scale to not very good at all.
Once you start to get a track record as an affiliate you can often ask the product owners for a review copy and some will send you a copy whilst others will ignore you.
I find the ones who ignore me are worth avoiding anyway. Sometimes it’s because their customer service is below par, other times it’s because they’re secretly ashamed of their product and don’t want non-paying customers looking at it.
Either way, if there’s no response to a request for a review copy, they go on my avoid list.
Incidentally, a track record doesn’t have to be particularly long.
Years and years ago, I created a site promoting affiliate products.
I added a few reviews of products I’d bought myself, complete with affiliate links.
Then I used the site and those pages as my evidence that I was a genuine affiliate rather than a freeloader.
With a nicely written email and a link to the site proving that I was for real, I got maybe one in three products owners to send me a review copy.
Nowadays in internet marketing I get closer to a 50% success rate, maybe even higher as sometimes I’ll get sent a review copy “on spec” without even asking.
When you do get a review copy, take the time to do a check on the affiliate product rather than just assume that because the owner has sent you a copy it’s OK.
Commissions can be high and sometimes pay out instantly
Commission payouts vary by network.
Clickbank, Commission Junction and other big programs have a set time period before you get paid.
Others like Warrior Plus and JVZoo vary depending on the product owner but often offer instant payouts via PayPal. That can be a real incentive to you as an affiliate as well as helping cash flow.
Instant commissions depend on your track record – when you’re first starting out, chances are that you’ll be put on a delay. That’s for everyone’s protection as there are (unfortunately) scam artists out there who take advantage of instant commissions and then run away before the fraudulent transactions are discovered.
Once you’ve got a track record and have proved that you’re genuine, you’ll find an increase in the number of products who’ll offer you instant commissions.
The commission rate on affiliate products varies considerably.
Everything from single digit percentages right the way through to 100% or sometimes even more.
Some big launches will match your 100% commission with the same amount again or sometimes even higher once you reach a certain amount of sales.
Don’t count on that happening but it’s a nice bonus when it does.
And if you’d like help with your affiliate marketing, follow my affiliate marketing road map. It’s a fuller version (about 30 minutes long) of this taster video: