David Fiske Affiliate marketing & web development musings from Fiske Towers

I was reading Multiple Streams of Internet Income: How Ordinary People Make Extraordinary Money Online last night and something was mentioned that intrigued me:

Let the merchant get on with their job, you focus on yours.

So what does this mean?
 
Quite simply, most people think of affiliate programs as something where you add a banner to a page and wait for the money to roll in.

And wait.

And wait some more.

Okay, it will never pour in without real work and effort.

However, as an affiliate, it is not our job to sell the product or sell the merchant. If it were, then we would be selling the products ourselves.

This is a common mistake made by a large proportion of affiliates.

Multiple Streams of Internet Income: How Ordinary People Make Extraordinary Money Online coins the phrase 'presell' which is exactly what the job of an affiliate site is. It is providing the visitors with enough resources and advice to help them make a decision. People do not search for phrases like "cheap iPod Photo 60GB" if they are looking for a banner.

They would be looking for a list of benefits and reasons why they should buy. Use personal experience to help persuade them, if appropriate. For me, I like a good looking site that shows me where I can buy products for cheaply. I like to know what I am getting and what the pros and cons are of my prospective purchase.

Apply all this to a car - specifically, a Lexus LS460. Essentially, an affiliates job is to promote the car brand and the realities of owning such a car.

Lexus have a nice flashy website that oozes class and sophistication. They have all the stats there about fuel efficiency and costs. What point would there be to me creating a Lexus LS460 site with near enough the same content? That constitutes selling and I am not a car salesman.

I would want to create a site about how great it is owning the car. I would want to tell people a bit about what Lexus explain, but I would also want to add content such as how many cup holders it has or what colour the interior lights glow. My job as an affiliate would be to encourage the visitor to book a test drive. That is the presell in this scenario. It is then the job of the Lexus salesman to convince this person to buy the car.

(Lexus don't run an affiliate program but 10% commission on the Lexus LS460 is £5,700. I would be quite happy promoting Lexus if they asked me to!)

On a smaller scale, take the Nintendo Wii. It is receiving tremendous press coverage at the moment and would be a great product to promote. As an affiliate, you should be explaining to visitors what this can and cannot do why they should buy one and why they should use one of your 'panel' of retailers.

it is then the job of the retailer to convince the visitor that they should buy from there. Free delivery or free accessories usually do the trick here.

So the advice I want t impart here is remember that as an affiliate, your job is to make friends with your visitors. Do not push them sales speak. Do not try and sell the product so much but try to sell the retailers so to speak. Think about what you would want to know if you were a visitor to your site. Would you rather see a dozen retailer banners or would you rather see good, honest copy that made you want the product even more - today - from the panel of specifically chosen retailers!

As a sidenote, you may wish to take a look at the Affiliates4u Forums.