The one thing that most affiliate marketers don't realize is that affiliate marketing in the "traditional" manner really won't get you decent commission checks.
The traditional method of PPC advertising going to a lead generation page, from which you can market a variety of affiliate programs to … just isn't enough. When I explain why, it'll likely be an "AH HA moment."
I'm going to go one step farther and say that if the above is your approach, you're probably only barely etching out a few dollars worth of profits a month unless you're doing this for A LOT of programs and spending A LOT of money.
In other words, you may be making some money, but your net profit margins are likely RAZOR thin.
Let me ask you a question: Have you ever heard of a company by the name of Digital Research?
This company made the best DOS operating system HANDS DOWN back before and during the "windows" days. This company attempted to get their operating system onto people's PC's using their own efforts. They went it alone.
Now, you ever hear of Microsoft? Despite having a far inferior product (in my opinion), this company flourished. They did so because they leveraged the worldwide reach and global sales forces of what was then one of the most successful companies on the planet, IBM.
Microsoft succeeded through leveraging other people (IBM's salesforce). Digital Research failed because they tried to go it alone.
Most affiliate marketers spend WAY too much time trying to go it alone … hence the lousy checks.
To use leverage, you simply MUST "go viral" … or in other words, leverage other people.
The thing is, doing so isn't that hard. You start by creating an ebook for your target market that gives much needed information. During the course of it, you talk about yourself and your website, giving links to it. You also talk about a few of your affiliate programs, and give your affiliate links to those.
Now what you do is allow FREE rebranding. In other words, for nothing more than giving their name, email address, and affiliate particulars, you'll create a rebranded version of the ebook with THEIR affiliate links.
So, you give away the ebook to as many people as you can for free and you rebrand for free.
Why would you do that?
Simple, remember when I said that you talked about yourself AND your sites AND GAVE LINKS TO IT?
That part DOES NOT get rebranded. Also, all those people that ask for a rebranded version ALSO go into your mailing list.
You're going to let people distribute the book FOR YOU. It'll have your website links in it.
You're helping out the people that rebrand by giving them something they can make money from, and you benefit from the HUGE viral effect to your site. If in the ebook you give a link to another free downloadable, you can capture A LOT of new email addresses everyday which you can then sell your affiliate programs to (ideally via autoresponder). THAT will give you a mailing list large enough to make a MASSIVE improvement in your affiliate sales virtually over night (and again, if you use an autoresponder, on full autopilot to boot).
So here's how it all works in a nutshell.
1. Create a free ebook
a. Put in links to your site
b. Put in three or four links to affiliate products
c. Let anyone rebrand
d. It MUST be in PDF format (you can get PrimoPDF for free at www.primopdf.com)
2. Make sure that people that rebrand AND people that visit your site from the links go into the same mailing list.
At this point, all you need to do is get your ebook into the hands of as many people as possible (more people into your mailing list if you're smart). Now that of couse does lead into traffic generation, but that's another article :-)
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Danny is possibly the reigning viral marketing king. You can get his ebook on viral marketing "7 Days To MASSIVE Traffic" completely free by going to: http://www.dannywall.com/7days.html
