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I see affiliates from two
perspectives.
Firstly as an affiliate, I
see myself as a business partner to those merchants that I
promote. I send them traffic, and if I make sales for
them, I expect to be paid for my efforts in the form of a
predefined percentage or lump sum.
As a merchant, I see my
affiliates as partners and value the traffic they send me.
My utmost priority is to make sure that any sales that are
made are credited to the affiliate that sends me the
traffic. This is essential if my affiliates are going to
trust me and put effort into promoting my products. This
is essential if I want my business to grow!
Most of my own products are
related to internet marketing and webmaster tools. Because
of the nature of these products, those visitors are likely
to be knowledgeable of affiliate programs and probably
Clickbank as well.
Imagine this scenario:
Joe goes to Google and
searches for "webmaster tools". Something caught
his attention over in the Pay Per Click ads, an affiliate
link to a product that promises to make link exchanges
easier.
"Hmmm" thought
Joe. "That looks like a great tool".
Joe clicks on the PPC link
and is redirected to a sales page. Scrolling to the bottom
of the page, Joe sees that the product is $97.
"I want this",
thought Joe, "but $97 is a bit steep".
Joe searches the webpage
for that magic link, and he finds it easily.
"Great" says Joe
out loud. "A link to a Clickbank affiliate program,
and this program pays 50%".
After a few minutes, Joe
has signed up for the affiliate program, created his own
affiliate link, typed it into his browser, and revisits
the sales page.
Joe's mouse clicks the buy
link. He fills in his credit card details and clicks the
purchase button. Closing his browser, he checks his
e-mail. He watches as two e-mails are downloaded to his
machine. The first is the download information for the new
software he purchased, the second one is an e-mail with
the Subject "Congratulations Joe, you have made a
sale".
Joe checks his stats online
for this new affiliate program and sure enough, he has
made $48.50 commission on this purchase. In other words,
he only paid $48.50 for the product.
OK, what is wrong with this
scenario?
Is it fair that Joe used
his own affiliate link to make a purchase?
What about the affiliate
who advertised this affiliate program at Google? That
affiliate paid for the click that started the sale
process, yet did not get the commission.
What is going through the
minds of merchants who place links to their affiliate
programs on their sales page?
I would imagine that some
merchants think about these points:
* I want to make $48.50 per
sale minimum.
* If I offer it for $97 and
give 50% commission to affiliates I will make my goal of
$48.50 per sale.
* By adding an affiliate
sign up link to the sales page, I can encourage people to
sign up for my affiliate program, buy through their own
link and get the software for the real price of $48.50,
but the customer will be happy thinking they saved $48.50.
*Great plan!
I am sure that a lot of
merchants don't see things this way - they just don't
think hard enough about their affiliates.
A merchant that uses a link
to his/her affiliate program on the sales page is using
affiliate traffic as free traffic (whether they intend to
or not). After all, the merchant does not need to spend
time optimising pages or buying traffic - their affiliates
will do that and send the traffic to the sales page for
free. If an affiliate sends someone who becomes a
customer, the merchant will make their money.
The big problem here is
that being an affiliate is hard work. You do have to
create content, buy and review products, possibly even pay
for advertising. If YOU are doing these things as an
affiliate, is your merchant doing their bit to protect
your you? Unfortunately the majority of Clickbank
merchants don't, and affiliates waste their time building
pages and buying advertising to promote merchants who
don't deserve it.
The bottom line
If you are promoting
products aimed at webmasters, the traffic you send will
likely know how to "steal" your commission. In
this situation it is vital to only promote merchants
without the affiliate sign up link.
If on the other hand you
are promoting products to the general public, e.g. weight
loss products, dog training eBooks etc, this affiliate
sign up link poses less of a problem since most of the
traffic you generate wont be affiliates themselves (most
wont even know what an affiliate is) and wont have the
necessary skills to sign up at Clickbank, create a link
and purchase through their link just to get a commission.
What can you do?
If you find a merchant that
you want to promote and they have an affiliate sign up
link on the sales page, contact them. Tell them about your
concerns and that they should treat you as a partner, not
the source of free traffic. Suggest that they remove this
affiliate sign up link.
The usual reaction I get
Merchant: "I get a lot
of affiliate sign ups from this link, there is no way I am
removing it!"
Ask the merchant how many
of those affiliates ever make a sale or ever send any
traffic. This is exactly my point. The merchant is getting
a lot of sign ups purely to get a discount. For every
person who signs up as an affiliate to get a discount,
there is one affiliate somewhere being robbed of his/her
rightful commission.
Most of the
"affiliates" you get via a sign up link on the
sales page are only signing up to get a discount, they are
unlikely to ever try to sell that product.
The only affiliates who
will promote the product, are those that buy the software,
use it and like it. They see the benefits and can sell it
well to their visitors. These are the only affiliates
worth getting, and you wont get them from an affiliate
sign up link on the sales page.
The best way of getting
hard working affiliates is to protect your affiliates from
this type of link hijacking, gain their trust and do
everything you can to help them out. Build a relationship
with your affiliates and most of all, make sure they are
rewarded for the traffic they send. To this end, remove
that affiliate sign up link, and when someone buys your
product, send them an e-mail outlining the benefits of
your affiliate program. Active affiliates respond well to
knowing their merchants are protecting their interests.
A final thought
If there are two similar
products, similar price, similar commission, one sales
page with an affiliate sign up link, one without, which
would you prefer to promote? If you want to make money
online with affiliate programs, take it seriously and
start contacting merchants.
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About
The Author
Andy
Williams is author of the free, ezSEO
internet
marketing newsletter, offering
subscribers up-to-date
information on all aspects of internet
marketing. |
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