5 Common Mistakes Affiliates Make

Avoiding some of the common mistakes made by affiliate marketers
should quickly and easily improve your chances of making affiliate
sales. Here are five of the top mistakes:

Common Mistake #1:

Not researching the affiliate program before your start promoting it
- it really is amazing just how many affiliates grab the first
affiliate program that comes along or signup simply because it has a
high commission rate or promote it because every other marketer is
also promoting it. If the program does not complement the overall
theme of your site, you may find it difficult to convince your
subscribers to purchase the product if it does not have anything to
do with the area you are targeting.

Common Mistake #2:

Not using your signature file correctly - many affiliates will add a
signature file to all of their out-going email messages and message
board posts that is totally inappropriate. Twenty lines of text full
of affiliate links, is not considered a signature file - it's usually
considered 'spam.' Try keeping your signature file under five lines
with an attention grabbing or intriguing first line.

Common Mistake #3:

Not writing your own ad copy - there's nothing worse than seeing the
same advert all over the Net or in an email message from ten
different marketers. How much perceived value will your message have
when it arrives and the reader is seeing it for the tenth time? Take
the time to tweak the ad to suit your target area and readership
before sending it out. Personalize it; make the ad your own.

Common Mistake #4:

Not paying for your own domain name and hosting account - yuck,
nobody wants to visit a site that looks like
www.somefreeserver.com/thisavenue/overhere/mysite.html with a contact
email address of bobsnetbiz@somefreeemail.com. It's very
unprofessional and suggests to your subscribers that you haven't made
any money on-line because you don't know what you're doing and are
too stingy to spend any money on setting up your business properly.
$8.95 a year for a domain name at GoDaddy.com and around $4 per month
for a small hosting account won't break the bank; it may just help to
add to the bank in the long run.

Common Mistake #5:

Not capturing your leads before you send them through to the
affiliate product site - if you can actually get someone to click on
one of your affiliate links and they leave the product site without
purchasing, what have you gained? Nothing! Nothing that is, except
the expense and/or time to get that one click-through in the first
place. Set up a squeeze page so you can capture your lead's email
address before you send them onto the product site. That way, if they
don't buy, you can follow up with them later and try again (and again
and again and again). Priceless!