Will an Affiliate Program Boost Your Business?

If you sell products or services online, you may have considered starting an affiliate program. However, you may not have been certain that it was the right decision for your business. Paying affiliate commissions may seem like too much of an expense.

The benefits of an affiliate program greatly depends on the kind of business you are in. You have to consider the costs and benefits just as you would those of any other advertising campaign. After all, that is the point of having affiliates – you are paying them to advertise for you. Fortunately, you only have to pay them when they generate a sale.

Affiliates can generate tremendous new traffic for your website. They will think of ways to market your products you never would have thought about. This also means you need to have solid policies about obeying legal restrictions, such as spam laws, and enforce your policies so that your business does not get into trouble for the actions of your affiliates.

Cost is of vital importance. You will have to decide whether to join an affiliate network and have them help you find affiliates (you may still want to market it on your own at least a little) or use a program to keep yourself independent. There are benefits to each.

Joining an affiliate network, of course, means ongoing costs to remain a part of that network. Running an independent program means you have to maintain the technology yourself and deal with any support issues that come up for your affiliates.

Affiliate networks can be relatively inexpensive or cost quite a bit. For purely downloadable or online products, ClickBank is relatively inexpensive to get started, and they include payment processing, which saves you the need to find a company to handle that for you.

If you sell physical products, you may want to consider ShareASale if your budget is not too large. This is a somewhat smaller network, but the costs are lower and it is quite popular with affiliates, particularly since they do not approve of parasites.

If you want a major affiliate network, Commission Junction or LinkShare are quite popular. Costs are quite a bit higher, however, but so is the profile, so you may get more affiliates.

Choosing a software solution can be rather more difficult in its way, but then you have total control over how the program is run. You first need to consider the available features and figure out what you will need. Are you going to offer a two or three-tier program, or just pay the affiliate for their own sales? How good is the tracking? How easy is the software to use?

Next you have to decide on how much you will pay your affiliates. Take a look at other sites running affiliate programs in your industry. You need to be competitive with them in order to attract affiliates. Commissions can run anywhere from a few percent for merchandise to 75% for some downloadable products. Alternatively, you can pay a set price per sale.

After considering all the costs and benefits, you may or may not decide that an affiliate program is the right way to manage your business. Many companies have realized increased sales and profits through this method, but nothing is right for every business.

Software Solutions

Mal's e - Basic version is FREE. Paid version gives you more control over payment options and other benefits. Allows you to create a full ecommerce website.
Affiliate Management Software - Highly customizable and affordable. No annual fees - buy once and keep using it. Allows tiered sales.
Synergyx - Very flexible, allows you to add an autoresponder series through most autoresponder series if you want to keep in contact with your customers. Allows you to add a download code to protect digital products.
Groundbreak - Lots of features, handles affiliate payments according to schedule you set. Graphical stats, so they're easier to read. You can run up to five copies, so if you have multiple programs you want to run this one can be quite a money saver.
AssocTRAC - A complete affiliate management solution. 90 day risk-free trial. Very customizable and easy to make changes, add products, etc.

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