The most cost-effective Traffic Generation Tactic

Targeted traffic is the lifeblood of any online business, without which, any online business will eventually go to the wall. Generating targeted traffic to their websites is also one of the biggest nightmares for any online business owners.

There are a myriad of tactics that online business owners can use to drive targeted traffic to their sites, but the cheapest is undoubtedly to "build an army of affiliates."

This can be achieved by implementing what is called an affiliate program. An affiliate program is without a doubt the best way to increase the exposure site, sales and profits.

For business owners, if you sell products that have a medium-high profit margin on the Internet, you will be much more profitable and successful if you start the implementation of an in-house, a two-tier affiliate program for reasons of which I'll outline in a moment.

Affiliate Program defined

What is an affiliate program?

An affiliate program is a marketing initiative, a form of performance-based advertising, which promotes the affiliate merchant's products and services, and in return, and depending on the type of program, the affiliate receives a commission from, or share revenue with the merchant for the delivery of sales, leads or traffic to the websites of the merchant. The affiliate can be paid a fixed fee or a percentage of the transaction.

It 'a mutually beneficial business relationship, and is also commonly defined as a partner, reseller, referral, or a partner program. A good example is Amazon.com, which is among the first to launch an affiliate program on the internet.

How does an affiliate program?

In a typical affiliate program, affiliates normally promote the merchant's products and services by including graphical links, text links and / or banners on their websites. They also advertise in ezines, submit letters of recommendation to their list of opt-in subscribers and customers via e-mail and / or autoresponders to drive traffic to the websites of the merchant.

The Merchant of which leads visitors through the sales process, closing the sale, payment processing, fulfills the order and handles all customer service issues. The dealer also keeps track of the affiliates that drive traffic through affiliate software. If a sale is closed, and calculates the merchant pays the affiliates as agreed.

Types of Affiliate Program

Affiliate programs can be classified into various types, as outlined below, and may be either single-level or two levels.

It is also possible to implement and manage the affiliate program yourself or outsource to third-party managers such as Commission Junction, LinkShare, etc. My suggestion is that you run the affiliate program in-house as it is more convenient and cost effective In the long term. Running the affiliate program in-house, you can eliminate start-up costs and the percentage of revenue payable to the managers of third-party affiliate program.

1. Pay-Per-Impression

Pay-Per-Impression is a type of affiliate program where the affiliate gets paid by impressions. Every time a banner or link will receive a visitor on the website of the branch, it is counted as an impression. The franchisee is usually paid a few cents per visitor, and the fee is calculated based on 1000 impressions, or CPM.

2. Pay-Per-Click

In this type of affiliate program, the affiliate is paid whenever a visitor clicks on the link or banner displayed on the website of the subsidiary through the merchant's website. The fee for the affiliate usually ranges from a few cents to few dollars per click.

3. Pay-Per-Lead

As the name suggests, the affiliate is compensated for every lead you generate for the merchant, as a visitor filling out a form on the affiliate's website.

4. Pay-Per-Sale

For this type of affiliate program, the affiliate is paid only when the sale is closed. This is the most convenient and profitable affiliate program and that's what I recommend, for reasons as outlined below.

Advantages of Affiliate

1. Increased Brand Awareness

An affiliate program will increase brand awareness. Building your brand requires the exposure of mass, and as such, an affiliate program is ideal because of your affiliate network. Such as your name, logo, and products have been promoted by your affiliates all over the internet, inevitably increases the brand awareness and mindshare.

Amazon.com is a good example. It builds its brand identity initially through its affiliate program. Amazon.com is able to do so because of its extensive network of affiliates. Its tens of thousands of affiliates is more than willing to promote its products because it benefits us in terms of perceived credibility by associating with and promoting the products of Amazon.com 's.

2. Higher Search Engine Ranking

Search engines much importance to the quality and the number of sites linking to you to determine your website ranking. An affiliate program well designed drastically increase your search engine link popularity because of the number of affiliates who link to you. This in turn increase your ranking resulting in more traffic to your website.

Moreover, with increased visibility in search engines, both organic and paid results, your brand identity will be further strengthened.

3. Advertising costs and very low risk

The cost of advertising is limited to what you pay for your affiliates when a sale is closed. Your buddies literally do all the marketing and pay all costs of advertising. Even when you spend money on advertising to promote your products, and not making any sale, will not cost you a penny because they are paid only on performance, ie, only when a sale is closed.

Therefore, it follows naturally that the risk is extremely low. The risk is limited to the cost of affiliate software and your time.

4. Leads and increase sales

A program afffiliate can literally grow your leads and sales exponentially. This is especially true with a 2-tier affiliate program, they begin to recruit sub-affiliates affiliates. The increase in the volume of visitors to your web site conversions web site will give a further boost. This means that sales, with next to no effort on your part. Sales never could have done without your affiliates you refer.

In addition, you can benefit from these customers by selling them over and over again with the back-end sales. You really gained new customers for life, without forgetting that your own affiliates are also your potential customers.

As you can see, an in-house managed two-tier affiliate program is undeniably one of the most convenient and profitable tactic traffic generation for businesses large and small.

Think about this ...

... You simply can not lose because you do not invest much money in advance, except for your time and cost of affiliate software, which in most cases is quite low, and that you can easily get back within a very short period of time .

Establishment of an affiliate program is definitely one of the most powerful online marketing, and is undoubtedly a win-win relationship for the merchant and its affiliates....