How to Earn Affiliate Income Online

You have your own website or blog and you put up a few affiliate links hoping to earn affiliate income online by selling other peoples stuff. After all, there are thousands of companies online offering an affiliate program in just about any niche imaginable. Unfortunately, you find that no matter what you do your affiliate income is next to nothing.

Have you ever wondered what it really takes to make money as an affiliate? Successful affiliate marketers such as Rosalind Gardner and Travis Sago prove that affiliate marketing can be very lucrative but the truth is only a small percentage of affiliate marketers are making a decent affiliate income online. Luckily there are ways that you can increase your odds of building residual affiliate income if you are willing to educate yourself.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Follow the leaders. Do a search on Google for names such as Travis Sago (bum marketing expert), Rosalind Gardner, and successful Squidoo marketers Tiffany Dow and PotpieGirl and you will find that many of them have blogs that you can follow. They often share tips filled with residual income opportunities such as earning affiliate income online. So join their email list if they have one or subscribe to their blog to stay up to date with what they are doing to succeed.

2. Narrow down your Niche. Those who have dabbled in affiliate marketing know that the key to successful affiliate marketing is finding products related to their niche. However, by narrowing your niche down even further your visitors will be more targeted. For example, instead of building a blog about skincare you could narrow it down further by promoting specific products such as "skin care products for acne prone skin". This term may get less searches on Google, however, not only is there less competition but your visitors will be more targeted since they are searching online for a very specific type of product. Plenty of targeted visitors plus the right affiliate products equals the potential for a decent affiliate income online.
   
   There are many keyword research tools to help you with niche research. Visit the resource section below for more information.

3. Build links with article marketing. There are many ways to get targeted traffic to your website but one of the best ways is also free: article marketing. Write articles related to your niche with links pointing to your home page and/or specific pages of your website or blog. Submitting articles to article directories will not only bring immediate traffic but will also help you rank higher in the search engines.

4. Reinvest in your business. When you start earning an affiliate income online you can save a lot of time by outsourcing your work. For example, writing new articles to submit to article directories does tend to be time consuming so you can hire someone to write articles for you, which will give you time to focus on other tasks.

Tips & Warnings

• Many successful internet marketers use pay per click to drive immediate targeted traffic to their affiliate sites. While this is a good strategy, it is best to stick with free traffic techniques until you have a firm grasp of affiliate marketing.
• When you join an affiliate marketer's email list he or she will often offer products they have created or recommend. Just be sure to buy with caution. If you aren't sure about an affiliate marketer's reputation search Google and see if you can learn more about them.

Resources

• Free Squidoo Guide from PotPieGirl
• Google Keyword Research Tool

[mysunnyshine]

on 2/12/2010 This is great information since I don't have much background in this.

[newstime1999]

on 1/28/2010 Very good article. It is very informative and attention grabbing. I know one affiliate marketer who has been doing an affiliate for about nine years. They make pretty decent money too.

[smoot27ryan]

on 1/14/2010 good article... read it, rated it, and recommended you

[varietywriter]

on 1/12/2010 Thank you for the great tips!

[ladym33]

on 1/11/2010 This is very descriptive, nice job!