by Larry Hall

Created on: April 06, 2007   Last Updated: January 08, 2009

Affiliate Marketing Strategems

Every day someone discovers 'affiliate marketing' for the first time. Distributing products to the masses and taking a cut for each sale sounds like an easy draw. Easy dollars too.

That some day, there's at least one person who stares at his computer screen in a trance and wonders where are the bucks? Where are the invisible hordes of surfers who could buy those same products, but don't.

No matter which category you fit, I'd like to share some concepts with you that might make all the difference between the adrenalin rush of the concept and the too-easy despair of that stare at the empty commissions bucket. In fact, you just might learn from this article the one thing that helps you start earning real money.

It really all comes down these two beginners' mistakes:

1. Promoting to many products at once; 2. Giving up too soon.

These two mistakes are both related and self-reinforcing. It sounds obvious, but let me explain exactly how this scenario plays out.

Lack of Focus:

Experienced affiliate marketers do have the ability to promote several products, because they'd already learned and applied certain fundamental skills.

As a beginner, however, you're still learning what works and what doesn't. For that reason alone, you need a clearly defined testing ground a lab where you can work with a single chemical or a whole stew of chemicals. You're determining its boiling point, solubility, molecular weight...would it be quicker and easier for you to accomplish this by working with just that one chemical, or by juggling multiple, other chemicals all at the same time?

Well, the same is true for marketing. Just like the variables in your lab experiment, there are variables in every product promotion you undertake. The variables include things like traffic generation, conversion rates, advertising response rates and so on.

So, how much data do you want to juggle? Do you want to keep track of, say, Google Adwords performance for ONE e-book...or for a dozen of them spread across more than one niche? This is where a lot beginners get themselves into a rut. They try to juggle all of this information at once, get overwhelmed by it and simply give up.

Here's a way to success that requires patience, rewards focus, and sets up a steady income stream:

1. Pick ONE niche market 2. Pick ONE product from that market 3. Use just that one niche product as your testing ground, in order to solidify your skills as an affiliate marketer.

*Learn how to generate traffic on just one product *Learn how to capture subscribers to your opt-in list for just one product *Learn how to write advertisements and promotional copy for just one product *Learn how to track your advertising links and conversion rates for just that one product....

The key is to get some real results established in one place, and only then start building on that incrementally.

If you'll follow even just this one simple rule, I promise you'll see an increase in your commissions and you can drop that 'newbie' label for the title of: Successful Affiliate Marketer!

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