David Fiske A subtle blend of affiliate marketing and web development

I thought it would be interesting to develop a who's who of affiliate marketing (in the UK) and where they are making their money.

I will also take a look at each business model and offer my opinion on it.

I will be using my affiliate marketing blogroll as a source of UK marketers.
 
Before I go any further, the following information has been taken from blogs run by the individuals concerned. I am not saying this is a complete list of every UK successful affiliate marketer nor am I saying this is a complete portfolio for each of those listed. I have listed each affiliate marketer in relevant categories based upon the information provided on their website.

PPC Business Model

Kieron Donoghue has to be the most famous PPC marketer I know of and he seems to have had some success too!

Christ Frost (AdWords Qualified Individual) appears to do a lot in the way of PPC though like Kieron he does have a portfolio of affiliate sites.

PPC as a business model is sustainable at the moment though you have to be on your toes. You have to be obsessed with ROI in order to make the most of your money. The thing with PPC though is it can eat your money fast. If you have poor keywords, a poor landing page or even a poorly worded advert, you can kiss goodbye to your cash.

PPC also requires a bit of investment to begin with. Say you have £100. You could spend that in an hour, let alone a day. Your aim is to double that each day/week/month and then reinvest the profits. So for example, we have £100. By the end of week 1 it has all been spent. We made £150 in commissions so our profit is £50 (£150-£100). The next month we spend £50 and generate £250 of sales. Therefore, the next month we could spend up to £200 without 'loosing' any money. But to get rich quickly, you need a stash of cash you are willing to risk. The very nature of PPC means you could blow this entire stash - could you afford that?

I would like to propose a minimum 'stash' of £3000 which equates to around £100 per day over a month. By the end of month1, I would at least like to see £3000 in sales (£0 profit) with a preference of up to £6000 in commissions, dependant upon the market, keywords, commission rates, etc.

Discount Codes

Raymond Theakston runs Shop Codes and Chris runs Discount Codes.

As a business model, it may be sustainable but I'm not sure for how long. Tesco recently announced they prohibit voucher codes being advertised by affiliates. What with voucher code theft, merchants might just turn around and stop publishing codes.

With the rise of cashback sites, revenue from discount code sites may diminish.

Niche

Chris runs Adopt an Animal (adopt erm, an animal!), Bingo In UK (a bingo site) and Share The Profits (a site about cashback sites).

Clarke Duncan is the name behind UK Internet Sites Ltd as well as the affiliate network Paid On Results. Most of Clarke's websites are niche as can be seen here.

Jason Dale is the chap behind Best For Broadband, Donate To, Bingo Blog, Prize Bingo, UK Hotel Breaks and Mobiles and Phones.

You can't talk about niche and not mention Stu Foster who's behind Bridal Shop West Yorkshire, Financial Help Loans, Guaranteed Secured Loans and Wedding Insurances.

Keith Bond is also a niche man with the following sites under his belt: Baby Names and Meanings, Fashion Style To You, Ferry Price Search and Vintage Tee Shirts to name but a few.

John Lamerton is behind Bet 123.

Rob Powell is behind Buy Art, Phones With Free Gifts, Go Firefox, 12 Month Contracts as well as many more listed here.

Niche can be slow going as far as a business model is concerned. Pick a niche like mobile phones and you'll have the audience but how many visitors will you have given the competition for mobile phone phrases in search engines? Also, if you have a good status in a niche, what's to say it won't dry up? It's risky putting all those eggs in one basket.

Product Feed Based Sites or Price Comparison Sites

Flowers For Mums is run by Chris as is Makeup Bits. Both these sites are product feed generated and resemble catalogues.

John also runs Save Pounds.

I like price comparison sites. More specifically, I like the ease at which a product feed based site can be maintained and I like getting my hands dirty with some clever coding. The only problem with product feeds is that it leads to duplicate content. Plus, the competition from the big boys like Kelkoo is fierce. Having said that, price comparison is great for attracting recurring visitors and potentially recurring sales if your site is the bees knees of price comparison.

Competitions, Freebies and Surveys

Jason is behind Loquax and Clarke is behind Free UK Stuff.

Chris lends his name to Cash for Questions.

John also runs Free Kaiser Chiefs CD, Our Survey Said and Prizebug.

Whilst competition sites may not be what they used to be, the concept behind them is simple. Regularly updated, relevant content for your visitors. A combination of this, together with either user registration or email newsletter registration, carefully timed and produced email campaigns and referrals can help to grow a site. There has to be a reason for visitors to come back and those who do can often generate more revenue for you if your site a) gives them a good reason why they should come back and b) is monetised somehow. This is crucial to online marketing activites and is why this is a sustainable business idea.

Websites About Topical Events, People or Celebrities

Chris runs a website about Paul Potts though it isn't yet monetised. Possible monetising solutions would include linking to the Amazon sales page, HMV sales page, etc. The only problem with a domain like this is that if Paul is a one hit wonder, the profitability of developing such a website would be extremely low. Having said that, if he has hit after hit, Chris can run an unofficial fan site about the fellow and could probably generate a steady stream of income.

Ray runs Drunk Celebs.

As explained above, some sites can be dead before they've come alive if the event is short. A site about someone or something that goes on for a while is more likely to make more money.

A good example is Big Brother. A campaign a while ago was run on Webgains where you could earn commission for every competition entry - the prize being Big Brother tickets. Imagine the level of commissions generated by the fans sites and Big Brother news sites around the UK?

Summary

Whilst there are masses of affiliate based businesses around the UK, most affiliate business models can be segmented into a few categories. Some are risky, others are only risky if you rely solely on them.

To be successful if affiliate marketing, spread your eggs around a few categories and make sure you concentrate on being innovative and quick. Those who do will prosper.