Articles in The 'affiliate marketing' Tag

Affiliate Marketing Best Practices: Putting Your Online Sales Force to Work

by April Nelson

In a recent post, we discussed affiliate marketing basics, including who should use affiliate marketing and why. But the key to affiliate marketing success isn’t participation, it’s optimization. In this post, we’ll look at the best practices for launching and running a successful affiliate marketing program.

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Affiliate Marketing 101: Using Affiliate Marketing to Build an Online Sales Force

by April Nelson

Internet marketers “in the know” have a secret weapon. Rather, they have many secret weapons – the affiliate marketers who advertise on their behalf in exchange for commissions.

Many big, well-known brands have been using affiliate marketing for years to supplement and complement their other digital initiatives, such as display advertising, social advertising, and content marketing.

If you’re unfamiliar with affiliate marketing, or want to know how it can play in the sandbox with your other digital marketing initiatives, read on; if you want to learn how to optimize your affiliate marketing program, check back soon for a follow-up post on that very subject.
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Affiliate Marketing Checklist for Q4 of 2013

by Alix Aranza

With the holidays and Q4 around the corner, all merchants should have a checklist to help them boost their sales during the last quarter of the year.

The following items should be considered for a healthy Affiliate program:

1. Set up auto deposit in anticipation of the increased sales you will see in Q4. Consider adding a secondary funding source to assure your affiliate links will not break.
2. Update and optimize your website for performance on mobile devices and computers.
3. Focus on getting special promotions and creative up and running before it’s too late for the affiliates. If you are planning to have a special sale during the season, don’t wait until a week before the promotion is running. Chances are affiliates won’t use it as they already have a calendar of all promotions they will be running.
4. Send a monthly newsletter to your affiliates with hot sellers, coupons, sales content, gift ideas, etc. Keep affiliates up to date with tips and ideas on how they can best market your products.
5. Book premium placements with affiliate sites when available to you. Some affiliates will charge you a fee to assure a good placement for your promotion or product.
6. Gain Exposure with Holiday Promotions:

• National Boss’s Day (October 16th)
• Sweetest Day (October 19th)
• Halloween (October 31st)
• Black Friday (November 29th)
• Cyber Monday (December 2nd)
• Cyber Week (December 2nd – December 6th)
• Green Monday (December 16th) (Typically, this is defined as the last Monday in December with about 10 available days for shipping – and is commonly one of the largest “Free Shipping” days.)
• Last Minute Monday (December 23rd)
• The day after Christmas (December 26th)
• New Year’s Eve (December 31st)
• Winter Season (January 2014)

7. Maintain Data feed

Pass along Gift Guides: Gift guides are a popular way to promote a specific selection of products. Create a storefront/collection of products or put together product recommendations for your Affiliates.

Creative Check: Double check that the landing pages for your creative are working and correct. Keep in mind that in some cases deeper landing links tend to convert better than those directing to the homepage, especially if the banner reflects a specific section or category of your website.

If your Affiliate Marketing Program is important to you as a merchant then what are you waiting for? See your affiliate sales boost and close the year with new orders and happy customers all around the globe.