In it''s infancy, many people viewed the Internet as a vehicle for personal
communications and the ultimate media for freedom of expression. Today, with multi-million
dollar portal sites owned by media behemoths, the Net is viewed by many as
a revenue-generating juggernaut and yet-untapped goldmine.
For the thousands of faithful who still cling to the dream that New Media will democratize
communications and allow the widespread exchange of ideas and opportunities,
there are an equal number of netrepreneurs creating and implementing "partnerships"
with other netrepreneurs, small businesses, and even retail giants such as Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com
in the hopes of adding a stream of revenue to a site that previously may
have only offered content. To underscore this point, a recent study by Jupiter Communications (www.jup.com) has shown that
content ventures (many of whom get their revenue
from advertising) need to make themselves more like commerce sites in order to
reach and retain their valuable audience.
Accessing Affiliates
There are lots of ways to turn your content-based site into an income-generator.
The latest trend seems to be with the hundreds of affiliate partnerships that are springing
up all over the Net. So, how do you find out what''s available? To complement the
proliferation of affiliate programs comes the dozen or more sites that serve as virtual affiliate matchmakers. A couple of the
sites that I found very helpful were refer-it.com and linkshare.com.
Both help you to find ways and partnerships that can help add a revenue stream to
your site -- and present opportunities to have
advertising revenues and e-commerce sales that traditionally would not be available
to most start-ups. They''ll also help manage your enterprise.
Refer-it.com provides an in-depth search engine/index that lists hundreds of affiliate programs
ranging from art and photography to food and wine to Web tools. (Currently, one of the most popular affiliate programs is
offered by Amazon.com.)
More opportunities to produce revenue from affiliate relationships can be found
at LinkShare (www.linkshare.com). This site goes a step further by actually managing your affiliate
relationships. At linkshare.com, you can find hundreds of companies
and entrepreneurs with whom you can form a partnership.
How Do I Pick the Right Affiliate Program?
All it takes is a little ingenuity and creative thinking.
For example, if you currently publish an online e-zine or newsletter about "diet and
exercise", you might construct an affiliation with a vitamin or a natural foods
company. A site geared towards living "the good life" might partner with a cigar or wine
distributor. Or, at the very least, a literary site offering book reviews can
partner with the various online booksellers.
Method to the Affiliate Madness
The appeal of affiliate programs lies in its overall simplicity: Anyone with a
Web presence from the mega-media giants to the
mom-and-pop shops to personal homepages) promote and sell goods on their site without having to do much.
The opportunity presents virtually limitless avenues for promotion, access to
a sales force of thousands, and no out-of-pocket costs.
Affiliate programs work by allowing you to place advertisements from various
vendors on your site, and reap the rewards of traffic sent from you to "them."]
By participating in such a program, you can provide a "click through ad" on your site
which earns]a fee for every purchase (or, perhaps, every lead) that comes from
your site.
Creating affiliate relationships allows you to concentrate on writing or producing
your online publication while offering] products and services that you do not
have to actually produce, advertise or ship. In effect, its a commission system.
For example, LinkShare.com not only brokers the marriage of content and products but also
provides lots of services to make these] relationships work successfully.
Each month, they provide you with a statement of all transactions and traffic
generated from associations brokered on their site. This type of arrangement
is ideal for entrepreneurs who are looking for revenue but don''t want to]
manage "dull tasks" as accounting and contracts.
If you''re one of the many content producers who dream of turning your
Web site into an e-commerce/money maker, then an affiliate program (or programs -- why stop at just one?)
may be just the answer you''re looking for.
Don Sussis is an eCommerce advisor and business consultant. He
frequently writes about business over the internet.
He can be reached at dons@interested.com.
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