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n the past few lessons we've shown you some examples of websites built by affiliates. Building a website is the most common way affiliates launch themselves into the affiliate marketing world, and if you're interested in creating a long-term business you'll inevitably need to put together a website at some point.
But if you're still learning about web design or you're simply not interested in building a website, there are other ways to get your affiliate links out there. Remember that all you need to do is get your affiliate link in front of an interested audience. How you choose to do that is completely up to you! Here are some methods you could try:
#1: Post on blogs and forums
This is a really simple way of getting a taste for affiliate marketing. All you have to do is find a product you'd like to promote, then start posting on blogs and forums with your affiliate link in your signature.
Here's an example from our very own forum: You can see that both Randy and Adrian have affiliate links in their signatures. They're both pretty active and respected members of the forum.
Of course you should only post on blogs and forums where people would be interested in the product. You're not going to get many bites for a dog training affiliate product when you're posting on a classic car enthusiast forum.
Similarly, you should avoid spamming these blogs and forums with useless posts just to get your link out there. You'll find that you have a lot more success if you're making useful and interesting posts and if you become a regular on the site. People will begin to respect your opinion and will be more inclined to click on your link. If you simply spam the blog or forum your posts will be deleted or you'll be banned, or both.
#2: Write a viral eBook or some other "viral" product
This can be a great way of getting your affiliate links out there without ever having to create a website. You can produce a short 30-page ebook or a "special report" on a particular subject, and insert links to affiliate products into it.
You can then distribute your book through whatever means you like, and tell people that they're welcome to give it away, sell it, put it on their websites if they want to. You can get it started yourself by selling it on eBay for $1.
If your book is informative and useful, not simply laden with affiliate ads, you might find that it spreads quite well.
Write ads or reviews for classifieds websites
You're probably familiar with using sites like Craigslist to look for old furniture or car parts, but you can also use classifieds sites to promote affiliate products. Consider writing ads or reviews for affiliate products and posting them with your affiliate link.
Some sites you might want to try are:
http://www.usfreeads.com
http://epage.com
http://craigslist.com
#3: Build a Squidoo lens
Building a Squidoo "lens" is a great way of getting started as an affiliate without needing to build your own website from scratch. A "lens" is like a 1-page mini website where you can talk about a subject you're passionate about (ie, your affiliate market and associated products!). It's hosted on the Squidoo site, and you don't need to know any HTML to make it look pretty professional.
Squidoo lets you ad ads, reviews and other content to your lens. But the best part is that Squidoo is also part social-networking site, so simply by being on Squidoo you will begin to attract traffic interested in your topic and looking for recommendations. Squidoo is especially easy to monetize, and Squidoo lenses have tended in the past to do pretty well in the search engines.
To sign up and start creating your lens, visit Squidoo.com.
#4: Promoting affiliate products directly through pay-per-click advertisements
We've left this method for last because, quite frankly, it's not one we recommend. This method involves creating pay-per-click campaigns through search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN and promoting the merchant website directly through your affiliate link.
So instead of using PPC to promote your own website, you send them straight to the merchant.
There are a number of downsides to this method.
First, with Google's AdWords in particular, there will only be one paid listing for a particular website displayed at any given time. This means that instead of competing against other advertisers for one of eight spots on the page, you're competing for just one spot. If you bid a large amount and write an attractive ad then you might see your ad displayed, otherwise you can forget it.
Secondly, you have no control over the quality of the merchant page. Increasingly the search engines are looking at the page you're promoting and deciding whether this offers a good experience for their users. If the merchant site has little content, or poor quality content, you could end up paying a much higher amount for your advertisements.
There are always new affiliates who see this as a fast and easy way to get started, but we really recommend that you try the other methods we've mentioned here first.
Lesson Summary:
In this lesson you’ve learned some ways of getting your affiliate link out in front of an audience without having to build a website, such as...
Posting on blogs and forums
Writing a viral eBook or some other "viral" product
Writing ads or reviews for classifieds websites
Building a Squidoo lens
Promoting affiliate products directly through pay-per-click advertisements |
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