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All too often, many affiliate marketers discover that an
affiliate program's promises of high converting sales simply
never materializes. They followed all the instructions, used all
the affiliate marketing tools & tips offered by the program, and
learned everything they could about profiting with affiliate
programs but still ended up losing - both money put into
advertising and faith in the concept of making money online. So
what went wrong?
Let's say you sign up for an eBook affiliate program where you
can earn $20 per sale. If the average conversion is claimed to
be 1 out of 35 visitors to the site, then you know you'll have
to refer at least that many people to make a single sale. This
might be ok if you are simply putting a banner on your site or
writing an article which doesn't cost anything, but if you use
PPC engines to drive traffic, you might find that it's just not
worth it.
So off you go to Adwords, find a few keywords to bid on and see
that you have to spend $0.25 per click in promoting that eBook
affiliate program just to average 15 clicks per day. That right
there is $3.75 per day you'll be spending. But wait, that was
only 15 visitors. Because the average conversion is 1 out of 35
visitors, you're likely going to have to spend $8.75 more to
meet that number. Add it all up and you've spent $12.50 to send
those 35 visitors. Your actual profit is knocked down to $7.50
per sale at this point. But that is only if you get that steady
1 out 35 people converting into buyers. Not as exciting as it
first sounded right?
But that's not all. What do you do when you realize that it
actually takes 45, 50, or even 100 visitors just to make that
one sale? You'll end up losing more money than what you'd ever
make in commissions. This doesn't even include the amout of time
you've invested just in tweaking your ad copy for the campaign,
testing different keywords, etc. Now I know there are some nuts
who will dump $1000 into a campaign just to make $1200, earning
them a profit of $200, but for most people (especially those
starting out) it's just not realistic or financially feasible.
It's a huge gamble. What a lot of people don't realize is that
when an affiliate program is claiming very high conversions,
they aren't basing it solely on affiliate conversions (that is
if they are being honest and basing it on anything at all).
These "conversion" figures are often used to manipulate new
affiliates into signing up.
Another form of manipulation is the claim of top affiliates who
earned $10,000-$30,000 or more in a single month. Sounds good,
but what they aren't telling you is that only a very small
fraction of affiliates ever make that much, and of those that
did either had websites directing 1000's of visitors every day,
or they spent $1000's in advertising. The affiliate program
owner isn't going to say "The affiliates who earned $30,000 last
month had to invest $25,000 to make that much, equating to an
actual profit of just $5,000". Are there really people who
invest that much money? I'm afraid so. I personal am not that
brave nor rich. I would rather take that money and put it into
developing my own products, which is far more rewarding and has
more profit potential any day of the week.
Hype is hype - and it sells well. That's business, nothing
personal. Whether it's hype about the product itself, or hype to
recruit affiliates - it's all part of the game. Of course,
nobody really wants to talk about this because it sheds a
negative light on these affiliate programs and discourages
sign-ups, but for those who already have trouble making ends
meet and hoping to find riches online, these are things they
need to consider before jumping into the affiliate marketing
game.
In conclusion, these low-ticket items really need some
evaluation and the conversion claims need to be taken with a
grain of salt. It is wise to test affiliate programs first using
free methods of promotion like writing articles or putting a
button on your site. Get those first 35-40 targeted visitors
rolling in and see what happens. If the sales do start to
accumulate, then you know it might be something worth investing
in. If you want to try out PPC advertising options, set a budget
and stick to it. Crunch the numbers yourself and figure out what
a reasonable investment would be. This little bit of time
quality spent with a calculator can go a long way in not only
helping you work smarter, but helping you realize your goals
more quickly as you can dump the poor performing programs and
focus on more profitable ones.
About the author:
Carole Nickerson has been a successful internet marketer since
1998. To learn more about internet marketing, affiliate programs
and making money online, visit: WealthAddict.com or visit
the new High-Ticket Affiliate Marketing Blog at: http
://best-internet-affiliate-programs.blogspot.com
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