Affiliate Marketing – Finding a good product
Affiliate marketing is the topic of this series and today the discussion is about finding a good product. First and foremost spending some time reading the various forums in your niche topic and finding out what people want is the first step.
Then you can go to the various affiliate programs to see what solutions are available. The biggest for digital products is Clickbank followed by PayDotCom. I usually look for digital products first simply because the commissions are higher for digital products than hard goods but your niche topic may be better served by physical products.
If you are looking for physical products then Commission Junction is one of the biggest affiliate programs for those types of products.
If you need more don’t forget our best friend Google. A quick search for “topic affiliate programs” can find other items that may not be involved with the bigger networks.
Once you start sorting through products I tend to check out how much each product pays per sale. Usually I want a minimum of $15 -$20 per sale to go through the effort of creating a system to promote the product. More is better but less than that and it usually is not worth the effort. (Oh yes affiliate marketing does take a bit of work to do it right as this series will show.)
Now I want to look at the sales letter and any affiliate tools the vendor provides. Often times the affiliate tools can make your job a lot easier so if the product has a good set of tools I am more likely to promote it. (Remember this when creating your own products.)
The sales letter needs to have a professional look to it. This includes a solid headline that grabs you right away. Good graphics that say quality. If the graphics look like they were done by a kid in paint this may not be worth the effort.
It needs to have solid benefits and a story that draws you in. If you start looking at it and don’t get hooked it may not be worth the effort. Finally I like to see good testimonials or proof that the product delivers what it says.
The next step most won’t like but you should then go grab the product. Go through the sales system and test the product. Yes you can sell products that you have never used but it is much harder to do and most can’t do it well.
If you are using digital products and it pays 50% you surely are planning to sell more than a few or it would not be worth the effort so consider it an investment. After all the only way to know for sure that it is worthwhile is to actually use the product or you can ruin your relationship with the list you will be building right from the start.
Now you should have a product or products picked so the next time we will discuss setting up a product pre-sell system.
As always your questions and comments are welcomed.
Mike Paetzold
Disclaimer: Some of the links mentioned within this post or posts it may lead to are my affiliate links and in such case I will get compensated for recommending those products. However, I will never recommend something that I don't personally believe in and I welcome your questions and feedback.
April 15th, 2009 at 10:27 am
Looking forward to your additional posts. Interested in how you evaluate CJ vendors that offer a catalog of products, rather than just one. Say for example an aromatherapy supplier that sells a wide variety of candles, essential oils, apparatus etc. What do you look for to pick between a half dozen of more similar vendors.
April 15th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Nice post Mike. I’m just looking into adding some niche affiliate products on my blogs until I have created some myself.
When I go to clickbank and look what is available I see some stats listed. Like:
Converts 12% That Sign Up. $31.75 – 35.00 Per Sale.
$/sale: $31.78 | Future $: – | Total $/sale: $31.78 | %/sale: 75.0% | %refd: 60.0% | grav: 52.80
What does that mean? The help page in clickbank doesn’t explains it.
Fred
April 15th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Mike,
Very good info. Had never thought about the process you are describing here for choosing an affiliate product to promote.
Great job….looking forward to more and to the answer to Fred’s question. I have often wondered the same thing.
Ron
April 15th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Great advice Mike. It is very important to check out the sales page for the product your looking to promote. I have seen many products which their sales page has all kinds of distractions and other “add-ons” which will only serve to lower conversions.
You have to think in terms of a customer, does the page draw them to purchase the product? Or will it tend to make them go elsewhere?
April 15th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
The stronger their salespage, the lesser amount of pre-sell an affiliate needs to do before sending them along to the merchant’s site.
Many super-affiliates won’t promote a salespage that has an opt-in form on it, as they feel they’re being used to build the merchant’s list at the cost of higher conversions – you agree or disagree with that, Mike?
April 15th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
I am really enjoying the series Mike. It has some stuff that I would have never thought of and some I can improve on. Can not wait for your next part of the series. Thanks for the information.
April 15th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
Great tips Mike!
I’m looking forward to putting some of this to use and can’t wait for the rest of the series.
Thanks for keeping us on out toes.
April 17th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Mike, I am looking forward to this series and suggestions on setting up a product pre-sell system. Thanks for the good advice – which you always give.