Affiliate Links And How To Protect Them From The Commission Thieves

By Eugene Barber

Number One Affiliate Advertising Danger

It isn't what you think it is. The number one danger to your affiliate commission is not the boogie man. It's not the competitor. No... it's the one that you have spent so much time trying to reach. The person you have been marketing to. They are the number one danger. Affiliate links matter to online marketers.

You may be saying, “How is this so?” Well, let me explain. You see the internet is this wonderful reservoir of information. This is good for so many reasons. It allows you to reach people like you have never reached them before. Also, information is easy to access. And this is where it gets tricky.

Introduction To Information Overload

You see the same people you are marketing to... well everyone else is also. In this pool of information you will find that the consumer has access to not only your information, but also the competitors.

What this means is that after they've read your article, there may be a good chance for them to read your competitions. This means that they may click their affiliate link, or even go directly to the website destroying your chance of getting your hard earned commission.

Almost Seems Unfair Doesn't It?

All that work for no return. That is the name of the game. Everyday hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of commissions are lost to this travesty. However, don't despair. There are some things you can do to ensure your commissions are not lost.

Here are some power tips that can help to ensure that you do not share the same fate as so many unfortunate internet marketers.

Protect Your Affiliate Links

This may sound like basics, but trust me in the long run its the best advice I can give. You can cloak your link with many different tools out there on the market. One of my favorites is to setup a custom URL to the offer allowing me to brand while directing traffic to the offer.

Promote Yourself First

This is another simple method that seems simple at first but many don't follow this rule. You should build your list first. This allows you to capture a consumer's information, and repeatedly market to a warm lead.

You are building a relationship with this lead which builds trust. With trust comes commissions as they will follow your link to your offers.

In Conclusion

The two above methods are just a couple of ways you can protect your links and get you commissions. The lifeblood of an affiliate marketer is reciprocity. If they are not clicking on your links and purchasing you are not making money.

For the best way to protect your affiliate link from the commission thieves click here now, and begin protecting your profits.

Article Source: https://www.amazines.com/Affiliate_Programs/article_detail.cfm/6246257?articleid=6246257

The 3 Best Website Traffic Sources

By: Jim Edwards

Not a day goes by that any serious website owner doesn't wonder how to get more traffic to their site.

This intense desire to generate more clicks makes virtually any online entrepreneur easy prey to many of the traffic schemes and scams that pervade the Internet like conmen on a carnival midway.

Promises of fast traffic and big bucks often separate even the most savvy business person from their money because they want to believe the promises made by these traffic hucksters.

However, rather than thinking "complicated equals better" in the traffic game, the best website traffic sources rate extremely easy to separate from the useless garbage traffic.

Fact: "Good Traffic" equals "Targeted Traffic!"

That means the visitors come as a result of desire to find out more on a specific, niche topic, not as a result of "exit" traffic or membership in a "safe" list where members simply pitch each other in an incestuous spam fest.

Good traffic comes from people clicking links on topics targeted to their interests and getting directed to a website containing information they want and expect as a result of clicking the link.

Bottom line, when you get right down to it, the best, most dependable sources of targeted traffic come from links that people click.

So, next time you're considering spending money on a traffic source, understand that unless it involves a targeted link that a targeted visitor can click to get to your website, think twice before opening up your wallet.

To my knowledge, only three ways exist to get a link to your site: buy it, "voodoo" it, or grow it.

** Buy Links **
Buying links actually rates the fastest way to get traffic to your website.

You simply sign up for Google AdWords at Google.com or you open an account with Overture.com.

You then run ads with a link on those sites and any time someone clicks the link, you pay for the click through a relatively straightforward bidding process based on the popularity of the keyword.

You can also buy links in ezines, newsletters, and on other people's website either on a per-click basis, for a period of time (a week or month), or in exchange for paying them a commission if a sale gets made as a result of a click on the link.

** Linking "VoodDoo" **
Linking "voodoo" refers to attempting to manipulate the search engines into displaying links to your website.

You can find a large number of automated software programs online at any given time that will claim to help you get more search engine traffic.

Depending on the intensity of competition in a specific market and the fact that search engines change their rules frequently, pursuing search engine links this way can quickly turn into the online equivalent of Alice chasing the rabbit down the hole.

** Grow Links **
I personally prefer this method to get links to my websites: growing them.

The best type of link to get involves one person telling another person, either explicitly or implicitly, they should click the link and visit the site at the other end.

One way to do this is simply to exchange links with another site which targets the same audience as your site.

You can manage this process manually or use one of the many software packages that will mange the process for you.

A search on Google.com for "reciprocal link manager software" yields a good start.

The easiest way to grow a link is through using articles other people post on their websites which link back to your website.

The reason articles work so well for "growing" links involves the numerous ways in which articles get distributed online, each of which can create dozens, hundreds, even thousands of different links back to your website by publishing a single article.

In fact, the following represent only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to all the places you can grow links by publishing articles online.

~ Blogs - Your articles can not only appear on your own blog, but get posted by others on their blogs with surprising ease.

The links in these articles can point directly back to your website.

~ Article Directories - Article directories such as IdeaMarketers.com abound online.

They not only provide an easy way to display your articles to allow others to pick them up for posting on their websites, but also in and of themselves attract readers searching for content.

~ OPS (Other People's Sites) - Popular websites like WebProNews.com attract repeat visitors by offering targeted content to their readers.

Since they can't produce all the content themselves, they publish articles created by others. Links from these sites can bring a steady stream of targeted visitors by giving you targeted exposure.

~ Ezines - By getting your articles published in other people's ezines, you can get a link on the most valuable real estate online, a targeted prospect's email "inbox."

Many ezine publishers run articles written by others to their targeted readers, and your link in the resource box can bring you a veritable avalanche of targeted site visitors when hundreds, even thousands of people receive your article at the same time.

Whether you choose to buy them, "voodoo" them, or grow them, getting targeted links to your site posted on the Internet represents the absolute best way to get steady traffic to your site.

Though not as fast as buying them or as exciting as trying to manipulate the search engines, growing links with articles gives you a long-term, dependable presence online.

Author Bio
Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and co-author of an amazing program that teaches you how to use free articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted visitors to your website, affiliate links, or blogs... without spending a dime on advertising! Click Here

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com

How To Bring Home HUGE Affiliate Checks

By: Matt OConnor

Affiliate marketing has long promised the ideal of bringing home lots of cash without having to actually put in that much effort. But is this the truth?

When you become an affiliate for a product or service all you have to do is paste a link to their site and watch the commission from orders gained through your site come flooding in, right? Well, not quite. It's vital to understand that affiliate marketing is like any other form of marketing - there are no shortcuts and your site still needs to be marketed in the usual ways or you will see zero rewards.

Successful affiliates in any affiliate program simply don't sit there and wait for money to come. Why? Because there is no money in simply sitting and waiting. If you really want to get hold of large affiliate checks then you have to be constantly thinking of ways to make your visitors click on those affiliate links.

Here are a few brief guidelines that should get you off on the right track.

Become an expert in your chosen field or affiliate product.
You can promote your merchant's product better if you know a lot of things about it. To become an expert, the best thing you can do is purchase your merchant's product yourself. Use the product inside out. That way you will get to know all the pros and cons of the product and this may enable you to write a testimonial on your site! Remember sometimes revealing the flaws (as long as they are minor) as well as the good points can make a review seem more believable and encourage your visitors to click on that link!

Write your own affiliate ads.
Many vendors won't mind if you get a little "creative" in your promotion of their products and this can be a great way to make your ads stand out from all the other people who are promoting the same product.

Participate in chat rooms, discussion boards, and forums related to your product.
If you used to ignore them before, then it is time for you to start focusing your attention on them. You can start your own chat room or join an existing chat room related to your product. It's a good idea not to promote your product straight away. Instead, build trust with your forum colleagues by giving out advice, then, over time, mention your affiliate product. Otherwise you just look like a spammer, not a good thing!

Create a free ezine or newsletter.
Ezines and newsletters are periodical publications whose aim is to inform a group of people about a certain subject. In your ezines and newsletters, you don't always have to promote your merchant's product for this may greatly annoy your subscribers.

Rather, find a way to insert your affiliate ads and links on some portions of the letter. Also, don't forget to promote your ezine or newsletter on your website.

These are but a few guidelines on how you can increase your affiliate sales and continually grow your affiliate checks.

What's important is that you are able to find a way to: attract more traffic to your site, induce your visitors to click on the ads on your site, and be able to promote your merchant's products even outside the boundary of your website. If you can do this, there's no reason for you to fail in affiliate marketing.

Author Bio
Matt OConnor is the owner of www.the-complete-guide.com - pick up "How To Make A Six Figure Income Online" for FREE when you subscribe to the newsletter.

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com - Free Website Content

Paid Directory Submission Checklist

By: Lakhya Phukan

Every online business needs traffic, which comes with increased visibility on the web. One great way to get noticed is to get listed in the major directories. Links from good directories increases your site's visibility many fold.

There are thousands of web directories on the net and selecting the good ones to submit your site can be a time consuming task. Also there are free directories and paid directories. You need to submit to both types of directories.

The following checklist is for paid directory submission only. This checklist will help you choose the best and worthwhile paid directories on the net.

Submission Check List:

1. Check out if the directory is indexed in major search engines.

2. Check the robots.txt file. Make sure that search engine bots are allowed to crawl the pages where you intend to put your listing. Check the Meta tags to make sure that search engine spiders are not prevented from following links in it. A Meta tag with noindex/nofollow will not be indexed or spidered and links in that page are not followed by bots.

3. Check if the directory is being maintained regularly. Visit the directory from time to time to see if errors are getting corrected, site information is getting updated and the like. In short, look for positive activity on the directory.

4. Check if the listings in category pages match in theme and content or not. Directories with tight focus on relevant grouping of web sites are useful for visitors and tend to show up frequently in SERPs for keyword searches.

5. Check out the age of the directory. Do a whois search (http://www.whois.net) to get this information. Many new directories vanish after a few months due to lack of maintenance and promotion. With older directories you can at least be sure that your listing will remain visible for a reasonable period.

6. Check if the directory consists of too many empty categories - it is not useful for visitors and also does not send a too good signal to the SEs about the directory. Think twice before submitting to such directories.

7. Check if the contact information is available on the site. Proper businesses will provide you with some kind of contact information.

8. Check the Alexa rank of the directory - it is not accurate, yet you can get an idea of traffic the directory receives. Look for directories with decreasing Alexa Rank as it indicates that the directory is getting popular.

9. Check if the directory provides SE friendly urls. No JavaScript link or redirection. Also watch out for dynamic urls. Sometimes search engines find it difficult indexing or recognizing dynamic urls with parameters like http://www.&;lt;examplesite>.com/index.html?cat=1&p=12...
   An example of SE friendly URL is http://www.hedir.com/business.html

10. Check whether category pages have too many outgoing links. If your link is one of 100 links on a page, visitors will find it difficult to locate your site.

Author Bio
Lakhya Phukan is the webmaster of Hedir Web Directory. You can submit your site at hedir www.hedir.com

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com

Off Page SEO Strategy: Link Building Strategy For Higher Ranking In 2020

If You're Not Linking You're Losing Money

By: Robin Henry

If you have a web site and you're not actively linking to other relevant sites, you're losing a great opportunity to improve your link popularity, get targeted traffic and increase your income. Read on to find out why.

Why Link?
There are only a few ways you can generate traffic to your site. You can pay someone to generate leads, but you have no way of knowing whether your visitors are interested in your product, service or message. Some organisations that promise thousands of visits to your site deliver the goods, but the problem is, the people who visit aren't targeted to match your product, service or message.

You can advertise on or offline to generate leads, you can wait and watch and hope someone finds your site among the many millions, or you can actively generate traffic yourself.

If you create links to other sites with high traffic, some of the people who visit those sites will click on links and visit your site. Let's face it, if no-one visits your site, the chances of selling something or getting your message read, are minimal. So, creating targeted visitors should be one of your key priorities. By targeted visitors I mean people who have bought a similar product or service to yours, or who are predisposed to do so. Consider this example. I sell an ebook titled, "Winning That Government Job" which, as the title suggests, helps job seekers to understand the government recruitment and selection process so they can be competitive when applying.

If I advertise in the employment pages of the Saturday morning newspaper in Sydney (the most populous Australian city) it will cost me $200 for one edition. I usually generate several dozen sales, but as soon as I stop advertising, the sales drop off.

If I link with another organisation having something to do with job seekers, numbers of their visitors visit my site and buy my publication. It costs much less than successive $200 adverts. Imagine what happens when I link to a dozen similar sites? I think you can see the benefit of linking.

Making Links
When I began linking I would place a keyword in a search engine and then look for sites that were suitable to exchange links. I'd find several sites, email them and occasionally get a response. I tried to find link partners for whom my products and services were complementary - so they could add value for their clients while doing me a good turn.

The process worked, but I had to spend an inordinate amount of time doing it, so I looked for a better way and couldn't believe my luck when I found a software program designed specifically for this type of activity. The program automates much of the process so, one evening per week for about two or three hours, I work with it to find and contact potential link partners.

Measuring Progress
At the end of every month I measure my site popularity, links, traffic volume, sales, expenses to sales ratio, pay-for-click search engine placements etc and compare statistics with the previous month. Slowly, but surely, my site is getting a higher position in search engines and I'm getting more referred traffic from sites with which I have exchanged links.

Link management is a huge topic. If you'd like to read more and download a free software program that will find out within minutes how many sites are linked to yours, visit this page www.dwave.com.au/link-management.html

Author Bio
Robin Henry is a HR specialist who helps businesses improve performance through implementing smart technology and processes. Find him here www.dwave.com.au

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com - Free Website Content

What Is Page Rank?

By: Kimberly Bodane

Page ranks are defined numerically, from 1 through 10 - 10, being the highest. Very few pages have a page rank of 10, and anything above a 6 is considered very good. There are many factors that determine a page's rank, but the main variable seems to be based on how many websites link to your page. The higher page ranked sites that link to your site, the better. In other words, 10 links to your page from high ranking sites like CNN.com, Yahoo.com, etc, will easily outweigh five times that amount of links from unknown sites with low page ranks. And, just to make it trickier, the amount of "credit" your site gets from incoming links, is also divided by the amount of sites you link OUT to.

Equally important, is your site's actual content. It needs to be information that people can use and take active interest in. Having content that matches your keywords should also go without saying.

Why Is This Important?

Page rank is extremely important, in that it determines how high you get on search engine results. And just as it's helpful to have your incoming links be from reputable, trusted, relevant sites, your outbound links will also be more valuable to those pages you do link out to. This is important when negotiating for link exchanges with other sites. The higher your page ranking, the more desirable a link from your page will be to others - Including those willing to pay for said link.

Are There Ways To Generate Better Page Rank At No Cost?

Absolutely! To follow are some of the simplest steps you can take.

Build more pages: The more pages your site has, the more content it is generally considered to have. If your site only has 3 pages, the maximum page rank would be a 3. Make sure to have at least 8 relevant pages including the main page, in order to have a healthy amount of content.

Avoid Dead-end Links: Let's say you've worked real hard to get 8 good pages. Your page rank ideally has the potential to be a page rank of 8. However, if half those pages are not leading anywhere, you've got a problem. When the search engines "crawl" your site, they want to go from one page to the next. You can have a really great page, but if it has no other link on it to go somewhere new, it will be considered by the spider to be a dead-end page, which will hurt your site's page rank. Make sure every page has a door out, other than a back button (which to the bots, will generate the equivalent of a good old "Nothing more to see here" type statement). Combat this by making sure you at least have a link back to the index - or better yet, a site navigator at the base of each page with choices between the main pages of your site (ie. FAQ, About Us, Contact Us, etc). Again, these are pages that add convenience to your human visitors as well.

Create Internal Links: Remember to make links to yourself whenever relevant. For example, on your About Us page, don't just mention your online ordering system - hyperlink to the page where your visitor would need to go in order to begin an order. Not only are you creating another link for the crawler, you're also making it convenient for your guest to find that page right then and there, if they so desire.

Utilize Free Directory Listings: They may not always be big high ranking sites, but they are an easy way to get your name out there. You never know when someone might end up using one, and thus find you in the most unexpected of ways!

How To Generate More At Cost: Getting a high ranking site to link to you isn't always the easiest thing to do. Sometimes it is necessary to buy that privilege via ads. There are literally 100's of different options to choose from, however the most effective method these days is by purchasing text based links to your site. For the largest comprehensive list of quality paid link directories along with page rank statistical information visit: http://www.helpmyhits.com/paid-web-directories.php Some tips to stretch you advertising dollar as far as it will go would be linking to different pages of your website (not just the index) and also using different keywords in those links.

As you can see, page rank is a very real and vital aspect of web development that should always be kept in mind. Without it, your chances of being found easily on search engines is compromised. With it, you'll be on your way to a highly successful website.

Author Bio
Kimberly Bodane - www.helpmyhits.com

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com - Free Website Content

7 Steps To Running a Killer Link Exchanging Campaign

By: Anik Singal

It's no secret that one of the best ways to get traffic online is to trade links with other related websites. Not only does this help you get targeted traffic, but it helps with your search engine optimization as well.

Well, there's a right way to link exchange and a wrong way, if you want the most out of your linking, then be sure to follow these 7 steps:

1. Develop a spreadsheet file (in Excel) and create the following columns:

Website URL
E-mail
Contact Name
Website PR (we'll talk about how to figure this out in a minute)

Contact 1
Response to Contact 1

Contact 2
Response to Contact 2

Contact 3
Response to Contact 3

2. Finding a Website's PR.

Go to Google and download the free toolbar. This toolbar has a feature on it that will tell you the PR for any website you visit. If you plan on optimizing your website for search engines, this tool is a MUST.

3. Choosing websites to link to.

Go to any search engine and start typing in keywords for which you'd like to rank highly. Visit each website and add them to your excel file. Once you hit 50 websites, spend some time contacting them. We recommend contacting each website personally and not using any automated software (it's very easy to see when someone uses software).

There are many programs out there that will do a mass link exchange mailing, but we strongly advise you NOT to use them (at least in the beginning). These programs can get you in a lot of trouble with SPAM laws. Also, if each email is personal, you are MUCH more likely to get a link back.

4. Write your contact email.

Make sure to address the email to someone specific. Always insert some details that you enjoyed about the site. It's evidence that you actually visited the site and made a conscious decision to link to it.
Briefly introduce your website, and send them the URL of your link to their site. Finally, ask for a link back to your site.

TIP: Give them specific directions on how to link back to you, what keywords to use, and what URL to link to. It always helps to give them the exact HTML coding that they would need.

5. Respond to replies.

If you get an acceptance of your offer: Thank them, and add them to a separate Excel file. This will become a list of people you will constantly stay in touch with (to submit articles, free viral reports, etc.). Register the reply in your "Reply to Contact 1" section. This way you will know NOT to send a follow-up email.

If the person rejects your offer: Add that note to your Excel file so that you don't contact them again. A good technique is to highlight that entire row with a red highlighter so there's no danger of a mistake.

If you get no reply: Follow step 6.

6. Send follow-up e-mails.

Wait one week to follow-up with those who have not replied. This is the second contact. In this e-mail, state that you wrote to them the prior week. Rephrase the email to keep it fresh.

Wait for replies, then repeat Step 5. Do not contact a "no-reply" website a third time unless you have a very good reason to.

7. Find more web sites.

After finishing your initial batch of 50, repeat the process for another 50. Once you begin getting incoming links, you will slowly start seeing similar "link exchange requests" coming to you. This will decrease your leg work.

There you have it, those are the 7 simple steps to starting an effective link exchanging campaign. Remember, a small percentage actually accept and respond, that's OK. The trick to getting lots of links is to send lots of requests so make this a daily habit.

Author Bio

This article has been authored by Anik Singal, an extremely successful and young internet entrepreneur and affiliate marketing consultant. Anik has developed his own affiliate marketing system that helped him earn over $10,466 in 60 days – Enroll in his FREE course today... www.AffiliateClassroom.com/free-course.html

Article Source: http://www.ArticleGeek.com

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