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Personalised Service |
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To be successful in affiliate marketing you must have to start it properly. To start you need to do more than just buying it. The immidiate next steps are
1. Install the affiliate software in your web server
2. Integrate the tracking codes and ensure it tracks every affiliate clicks and sales
3. Customize the affiliate area to match your website
4. Complete the configuration part along with general cookie and commission setting
5. Create banners, text links and other promotional materials
6. Run email campaign or other advertisement to request people to become your affiliates
Even if you are expert in affiliate marketing you may not be able to do all by yourself. If you hire an experienced developer they may not be able to help you in most aspects.
So it is very important the Affiliate Software Vendor must help you in all above points without charging a lot. |
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Linking Options |
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Normally owners of a professional websites are very much link conscious. They never put any link from any of their page if there is a chance of losing credibility to the search engines or to their visitors. So they avoid putting any big banner or image that looks like an advertisement because it may kill their brand image. They avoid linking to a general landing page which goes against SEO rule. Rather they prefer natural link that does not look like an affiliate link. Direct link (no trailing tracking code in the query string) or deep link (link directly to a page which is related to his site page content) or any custom module that works in their website will only help to get business from these giant affiliates. |
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Commission Tools |
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While doing affiliate marketing you may find 100s of affiliate joining but the fact is that 90% of the affiliate sales will come from 5-10% of your affiliates. It is quite likely that they high traffic website owners will burgain for special deal on affiliate commission. If they do not feel they are getting special benefit they will not promote your product with full hearted attempt. You must have to offer special deal. If your affiliate software is not flexible enough on affiliate commission setting you will simply lose that mega affiliate.
Affiliates with normal website normally do not bother about 2nd or 3rd tier. They hardly bring 2nd or 3rd tier sale. But if you target the affiliate network sites, news sites, blog sites, forum sites etc then 2nd tier commission is really important to them. Though you will rarely pay (may be less than 1% of your total affiliate commission) 3rd tier commission but you have to have this provision as most merchants give it. |
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CRM Tools |
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This is a must. If you do not listen to your affiliates then you will surely fail. In most cases they ask for help on affiliate-how-to. But they may come to you for special partnership. In first case they will not be able to promote your site until you help them. In 2nd case they will not promote your site until they are satisfied with the deal.
But if you try to communicate with them via email then you will be simply lost. If you have 5-10 affiliates you may be able to manage but with the increase of number of affiliates you will start miss important messages from important affiliates. If you hook a third party support system that will require separate login that may irritate your affiliates. |
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Control Panel |
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Is the day to day operation is simple enough and not time killing? |
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Reports |
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To take future action plan hundreds of reports will not help you but you will need to concentrate on few basic reports. If the basic click (traffic), sales, commission, affiliate reports are not complete enough you will not be able to draw solid conclusion what worked and what did not work. If the reports are user friendly and give a clear and holistic picture you can take future action plan to extract maximum from your existing affiliates and/or run campaign to attract more new affiliates. |
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Software & Data Reliablity |
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This is very important point to check. In fact the basic tracking technology used by all of the affiliate software’s is cookie. But there are so many ways of tracking cookie. First party is reliable but 3rd party cookie is not. Most of the user browser rejects 3rd party cookie or cookie set for lifetime or long expiry date.
If you install the affiliate software in the same merchant domain (from where you sell products and services) then it is likely that you will get first party cookie benefit. But if you use a hosted affiliate service then there is a question on first party cookie tracking. You may not enjoy the first party cookie tracking benefit for the add-on domains even if the affiliate software is installed in your web server. If the cookie tracking is done at merchant domain then only first party cookie tracking is possible.
In addition to normal cookie tracking, flash cookie tracking, IP tracking, unique-customer-ref checking (for repeat sales only) can add extra reliability to your tracking method. |
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Future Compatiblity |
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Support of multiple and currency is very important even if you are currently selling through only one website and currency. Here is why?
If you do well with your current website it is quite likely you may plan to find market the same product in other country. For SEO and brand positioning reason you will have a new domain and sell in their local currency. You also may need a new domain to market a new product.
Though you always have option to buy a separate license but there are several reasons not to go for it. The biggest drawback is from management point. You will need to login and manage everything separately that will simply kill your time. 2nd big reason is cost and service point. Your affiliate software vendor will cost at least 50% more for every add-on domain. |
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Custom Module Development |
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can you get a widget developed at low cost? |
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Language & Software Platform |
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If your website language is other than English and if you want your software to be in the same language please check that affiliate software you are going to choose support it. |
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Basic Features |
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