Affiliate Marketing Programs – The Lying Has To Stop.

Article by Jane Tompsett

Affiliate marketing programs are everywhere. You only have to look at sites such as Commission Junction or Clickbank to realise that both product owners and marketers each voraciously want what the other offers.

Website owners with original products strive to get affiliates to market them on their behalf and marketers desiring to make an income online but not having the time or expertise to develop their own products, see joining an affiliate marketing program as an easy route to online riches. But what each half of this equation doesn’t realise is that, in the main, they are being suckered into a belief system that simply doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny.

Whilst the Big Name gurus run massive affiliate programs and small site owners dream of emulating the guru’s income, the hard-working affiliate often finds that the reality of making big bucks online by being part of an affiliate marketing program simply doesn’t work out that way. The commissions offered may be attractively generous but their marketing efforts just don’t produce enough sales to generate the wealth they desire. And if your affiliates aren’t making high numbers of sales, then, as a product owner, you aren’t going to get rich any time soon either.

So let’s look at the reasons behind the lies before finding out whether there is any light at the end of the tunnel and what solutions are available to turn the situation around.

Firstly, exactly what are the lies that underpin so many affiliate marketing programs?

Well, the biggest, fattest one is that an affiliate marketing program will increase a product owner’s income massively without any effort on their part. How many times have you read the line that you need only pay out any money after a sale has been made? And for affiliate marketers, aren’t you sold the line that you don’t have to spend months developing a product of your own, that you need only promote a product after all the effort and costs have been borne by a website owner? All you need to do is take an in-demand product and market it for your sales to roll in faster than you can say ‘commission cheque’!

Secondly, when are these lies peddled?

All the time! The notion that having, or belonging to, an affiliate marketing program is highly lucrative for both parties has been been repeated so frequently means that it has entered into internet marketing folklore and become so deeply embedded that no one even considers challenging its truth.

Thirdly, why should this be? Why do these programs continue to make these claims?

Well, there could be two answers to this question – one straightforward and one a little less so. It may be that the companies selling affiliate marketing programs genuinely believe their own sales copy. They may have bought into the ‘internet marketing folklore’ themselves and truly believe that multiple benefits exist for both product owners and affiliate marketers.

Alternatively, they may be fully aware of the shortfall of the program that they are selling but actively choose to be economical with the truth as their goal is to make sales, not highlight the weak points in their system.

And finally, where will you see these lies?

Everywhere! In sales copy, on affiliate sign-up pages, delivered to your inbox, in Adword headlines, affiliate marketing articles, Adsense ads – the list goes on and on.

So how can you turn your affiliate marketing program around and actually start to make it work for you and your affiliate marketers?

Well, this is the Good News – you certainly can turn it into a win/win situation and you can do it easily, cheaply and most important of all, do it quickly. All you need to do is plug in some top-notch, comprehensive and creative training for your affiliates available to them free of charge.

If you provide good, motivational training that really stands head and shoulders above the usual marketing emails, banner and Adwords ads, provide highly targeted marketing materials and make the effort to school your affiliates in the most effective way of using them, they will be able to dramatically increase the amount of qualified traffic they send to your site. And once this happens you will see your sales shoot skywards. Your affiliates will be delighted to received big, fat commission payouts and will be highly motivated to re-double their marketing efforts.

So it really is easy to turn the lies into truths – you just need that one, secret magic ingredient that can kick start any affiliate marketing program and help it begin reaping massive financial rewards.

And that secret magic ingredient is ongoing training of the highest quality. Put that in place and you will not regret it.

About the Author

To get great, free affiliate training that will turbo-charge your online earnings, visit The Virtual Affiliate Trainer right away. This no-cost, hour-long video seminar shows you just what you need to do to skyrocket your income without spending a cent.