| What is
an affiliate program? The
best way to understand affiliate
marketing is to think of it as a
referral. You refer people to a website and
are paid a commission if some
sort of action is taken, such as a
purchase or a lead submission. Merchants have found
that affiliate programs are a great way
to drive traffic to their website. It's
a win-win situation. Affiliates get paid
simply for sending traffic to a site,
and merchants don't have to pay you
unless you perform (which is why some
call it performance marketing).
There are
several types of affiliate
programs, including
pay-per-purchase, pay-per-lead, and
pay-per-click (although pay per click is
practically a thing of the past due to
fraud -- it was simply too easy to cheat
the system). Pay per purchase means you
get paid when someone buys something.
Pay per lead means you make money when
someone fills out a form (usually
information about themselves) and the
"lead" is sent to the
merchant.
Affiliate Programs
are a great way to make money.
It's
relatively easy to make money, which is
why affiliate programs have become so
popular. Here's
how it works: you go to a merchants
website and sign up for their affiliate
program. You are then given a special
URL to use. This URL will send customers
to the merchant's website, while
tracking that customer's action. If they
buy something, or fill out a lead
(depending on the program) you get paid.
Simple as that.
And the
best part is that you don't really have
to "do" anything. Think about
it... once you send the user to the
affiliate program website, the merchant
completely takes over. You don't have to
carry any inventory. You don't have to
ship any merchandise. You don't have to
take back any returns. You don't have to
handle any customers, staff a customer
service department, or even answer the
phone. You just wait for the checks to
arrive, and enjoy life. It's truly a
beautiful thing. :-)
While
it's true
that pharmacy
affiliate programs are hot right
now, you can make money with lots of
other types of affiliate programs too.
To find a list of them, check out this affiliate
program directory.
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