Free Articles continue to be one of the most effectiveways of quickly generating traffic and sales, withoutpaying for advertising.

Free Articles continue to be one of the most effectiveways of quickly generating traffic and sales, withoutpaying for advertising.

But how can you use free articles to promote anaffiliate link? Putting your affiliate link in yourResource Box is not going to work, for a number ofreasons:

- people can easily remove your affiliate ID

and just visit the main website of the affiliate

program (you get no commission)

- an affiliate link makes you look like just another

beginner, instead of an expert with something

unique to offer

So how do you use articles to promote affiliateproducts? Here are some strategies:

(1) Turn your website into a 'Marketing ResourcesDirectory'

On your website display book covers and provide briefreviews for a range of eBooks or software that dealwith web marketing.

You could divide your directory into categories: WebMarketing (general), Affiliate Programs, Search EnginePositioning, Email Marketing, Copywriting, EzinePublishing, etc.

In your Resource Box at the bottom of your article youcould say: John Doe shows webmasters how to succeed inonline business. Visit his collection of marketingresources at: http://www.yourdomain.com

(2) Write a Free Report

Write a free report on web marketing and turn it intoan exe format free eBook.

Your free report might have 5 or 6 chapters, eachchapter dealing with a different aspect of webmarketing (Affiliate Programs, Search EnginePositioning, Email Marketing, Copywriting, EzinePublishing etc).

In each chapter you would include recommendations (andyour affiliate link) for eBooks or software that dealwith that topic.

Your Resource Box could say: John Doe shows webmastershow to succeed in online business. Download his freereport, 'Web Marketing In 5 Easy Steps':http://www.yourdomain.com/free_report.html

(3) Customize the affiliate links in Free eBooks

Most web marketers produce free or trial versions oftheir eBooks, and in many cases the order links inthese free eBooks can be customized with youraffiliate link.

You could build a directory of these free eBooks, eachcustomized with your affiliate link.

The Resource Box at the bottom of your article mightread: John Doe shows webmasters how to succeed inonline business. Visit his collection of free eBookstoday: http://www.yourdomain.com

(4) Use your Resource Box to get new subscribers toyour Newsletter and then promote your affiliateprograms in your Newsletter.

This is the strategy most people use. But promotingyour affiliate links in a weekly Newsletter is asubtle art - the best way to learn is to join theNewsletters of marketers who specialize in this andstudy their techniques.

The Affiliate Game

Are you frustrated with your affiliate programs?

I used to be. Very frustrated! One day, in sheerdesperation, I wrote to one of my affiliateprograms and suggested that the market was nowsaturated with their product - it was no longerpossible to sell it.

The next day I received a very nice reply. "TheInternet is HUGE", they said. "We predict it willbe five years before the market is saturated withour product. And long before that, we will haveintroduced our next product." They were right, ofcourse. The problem was not with the market (theInternet is huge). Nor was the problem with theirproduct. The problem was in the way I waspresenting it.

Since then, my affiliate sales have soared. Why?Because I learnt a few secrets to winning theaffiliate game. Here they are:

1. Choose affiliate programs that relate veryclosely to the theme of your website. Let me giveyou an example. Of the three affiliate products Isell from my web site, the one that does best bya long way is an eBook that shows people how togenerate free Ezine advertising. Why does it doso well? Because my website is a directory ofezines and most of my visitors are alreadyinterested in Ezine Advertising before they evenarrive at my website - I don't have to persuadethem very much.

2. Buy the product yourself! Research acrossdozens of affiliate programs shows that at least70% of sales in any affiliate program are made bythe small percentage of affiliates who actuallybuy the product they're selling. It makes sensedoesn't it (how can you recommend somethingyou've never used)?

3. Banners - they don't work anymore, and someexperts believe banners will actually damage youraffiliate sales.

4. Personal recommendation. The human factor isvery important on the Internet - people want toknow that someone else has bought the product andthat it worked for them. But to write aconvincing personal recommendation, you'll haveto buy, read and use the product you're selling.

5. 'Over-selling' - this is the most commonmistake of affiliates. Keep in mind that all youneed to do to succeed with affiliate programs isto get your potential customer to click throughto the affiliate website in an 'open-to-buy'mindset. If the affiliate program is good, theaffiliate website will make the sale. So don'ttry to sell the product from your website - justaim to get a click on your affiliate link.

5. Standard Ads. When you join an affiliateprogram, you'll probably be given some standardads to use. Don't use them! Why? Because yourpotential customer has probably seen those exactsame ads on dozens of websites and in dozens ofEzines. And if that standard ad hasn't led themto buy the product so far, it probably won't now.Something new and original is required.

6. Back-end sales. Once you're succeeding in oneaffiliate program, join another program thatoffers a related product and use the techniquethat marketers call 'back-end' sales. It's a wellknown fact that people are much more likely tobuy from someone they have already bought from.So when someone makes a purchase from youraffiliate link, send them a nice follow-upletter. At the end of the letter, tell them aboutyour other affiliate product and how it can helpthem.

------------------------------------------------------------
Michael Southon has been writing for the Internet for over 3
years. He has shown hundreds of webmasters how to use this
simple technique to build a successful online business. Click
here to find out more: http://ezine-writer.com/

Are You Ready?

 

Within 15 minutes of coming through the door from school, she has her neck crooked around the phone. A music CD tucked into the computer's drive drowns out all but the occasional giggles of that conversation. While her fingers fly over the keyboard, you risk a quick glance and count six open "chat" boxes. She's IMing (sending instant messages with) the friends she didn't get to talk to at school.

That's just how she communicates.

Once the "he said," "she looked" minutia of the all important social event (lunch hour) of the day have been dissected, the conversations begin to move outward. Movie trivia websites are visited en masse, and the merits of a certain pair of kahkis for sale on one site versus another found the day before cause more windows to be opened, as this virtual gaggle of girls move around the web together.

Sometimes, tasks are split. Three girls visit different movie theater sites where start times for this week's chosen film are carefully matrixed against which parent might be able to drive the group to which venue.

That's just how decisions are made.

Some people call her a tween. She's between 8 and 12 and attends middle school, Sunday school, and high school football games where she and her friends pay far less attention to each other's older brother on the team than their slightly older siblings. Usually that's all an anxious parent in this group is able to watch out for. They don't know the half of what she is capable of yet.

According to brand analyst and Clickz columnist, Martin Lindstrom, 22% of these tweens have already made an online purchase on their own. Lindstrom's study excerpt didn't discuss how they were able to pay for these purchases, but it's a good bet a majority of them were done using mom or dad's credit card. That's a pretty safe assumption when you consider that tweens determine what brand is purchased 60% of the time in a typical household.

60%!
Clothes, music, accessories, gifts, games and other entertainment used to be the exclusive province of the American teenager. The 13 and over crowd used to decide where those dollars were spent. But they're passing the baton to their younger brothers and sisters while they pursue their own, more diverse, interests, also online.

That's just where the teens and tweens are spending their time these days.

Tweens are even more intensely committed to the Internet than their older teenage siblings. Teens are spending in excess of 16.7 hours per week online according to a 2002 Yahoo study. That compares to 13.6 hours spent watching television, 12 hours spent listening to music and 7.7 hours talking on the phone.

Did you catch it?
Do you see what the real difference is between these two groups? And do you understand just how large, and just how evolutionary the impact of that difference will be on your business?

That's the piece of the puzzle that I think is being overlooked. It's been buried beneath an already staggering pile of statistics.

It's not about the numbers at all.

It's about the fact that tweens have already assimilated the Internet completely. It's about the fact that tweens have already begun to filter their media differently, and process that input differently. They don't surf websites anymore, clicking their mouse to zoom in to see the pocket detail on those jeans.  They "experience" a site clicking their mouse to turn 3d model images wearing those jeans, or clicking hotspots in panoramic images designed to make them feel as if they are in a room at a store.

They don't spend 16.7 hours on the Internet, then 13.6 watching TV, then 12 hours listening to music, then 7.7 hours talking on the phone. They spend 16.7 and 13.6 and 12 and 7.7 simultaneously. They move from one media to another effortlessly, automatically typing coherent messages for up to five conversations at once, laughing at a girlfriend's joke on the phone, and tapping their foot to the relentless beat of the music. At - the - same - time.

"Tween" is not just a convenient demographic catch phrase for a bundle of statistics. It's also a very apt description of where this particular generation will fall on technology timeline.  The web "experience" is likely to continue unfolding long after they have grown up and become everyone's prime demographic.

I have a tween in my house. And she really is somewhere between. Her reliance on a strong social network of girlfriends is as old as the hills. But her communication methods raise the bar on the definition of multitasking. Sometimes I watch her and wonder if we haven't finally broken through another old barrier. I wonder if she's tapping into, and effectively using, more than the 10% of our brains than science claims we use.

But probably not. It's still clear that not all of her senses have been enhanced.

She still can't seem to hear me when I ask if she has homework.

Tips For Affiliates

1. Create an infopacked mini site. Build your mini site for a specific niche audience and then choose affiliate programs specifically for that niche audience.

2. Test and track your ads and promotions for your affiliate programs.

Tracking and testing your ads will show you exactly which ads, promotions and affiliate programs pay off the most for you and are excellent choices for you to continue to promote.

3. Publish an ezine.

Your ezine will give you a powerful way to promote your affiliate programs to your subscribers.

Choose affiliate programs that relate to the content of your ezine and that make it worth your while to promote them.

4. Promote your affiliate programs by recommending their products.

You could recommend your affiliate programs to your ezine subscribers in your publisher's note or you could create a recommended resources section where you promote your affiliate programs in every issue.

You could also recommend your affiliate programs to your visitors by creating a recommended affiliate programs section where you list your favorite affiliate programs along with descriptions of their products or services.

In addition, you could create a best affiliate programs section that helps you build up your second tier by listing the affiliate programs that have paid off the most for you.

5. Write product reviews where you detail the benefits you like about your affiliate program's product.

Make your product reviews honest and hype f~ree and post them on your site along with your other articles.

6. Write your own ads for your affiliate program.

A good way to create your ads is to look at the ad copy on the site of the business you want to promote and also ads they provide for their affiliates to use, and use their unique selling proposition or USP to write your ads.

Their unique selling proposition is a unique benefit that they promote in their ad copy that their competitors don't stress or offer to their visitors.

It could be that their product saves lots of time, is easy to understand, that their product is a complete answer to a problem, or it could involve their price.

Some businesses develop more than one USP so you'll be able to choose the one that you think works best in getting more targeted visitors to their site.

7. Try out the support of the companies you want to promote by asking questions.

This will help you to find out how long it takes them to respond to emails (if they respond to emails) and how professional they are.

8. Create freebies that promote your affiliate programs.

You could offer your visitors a f~ree email course, an ebook filled with your tips or articles or an ebook that provides your visitors with places to promote their businesses.

When creating freebies for an affiliate program that is 2 tier, increase your profits by letting your affiliates in your second tier use your freebies as a promotional item.

9. Create a directory.

Your directory could be an article, ezine, ebook or affiliate program directory.

List your own resources within your directory to increase your commissions. For example, you could add your own affiliate programs to your affiliate programs directory or your ebooks to your ebook directory.

Add a what's new section to your directory to garner more repeat traffic from your visitors.

You could also provide a tutorial on the subject of your directory, or add things to your directory that your visitors can use on a regular basis to get more repeat traffic.

10. Run ezine ads for your affiliate programs.

You could purchase sponsor, feature, classified or solo ads for your affiliate program.

Choose ezines with subscribers targeted to be interested in the products of the business you want to promote.

Run your ads for multiple issues in a row when possible to maximize the profit you get from your ads.

You can also run f~ree ads in ezines as many ezines offer
f~ree advertising on a weekly, monthly or per issue basis to
get more new subscriptions.

Running f~ree ads can help you find out which ads work best,
and which ezines are most responsive before you purchase
ezine advertising.

How I Started My Own Work At Home

Have you always wanted to work at home? Have your own business? Didn't think it was possible? No more commuting in traffic (plus gasoline prices right now are ridiculous). No more "business attire" (work in your jammies) and no more Corporate America breathing down your neck. I didn't think it was possible. I had always been a pessimist. Didn't think I could do it. Didn't have the knowledge or skills required.

I had worked in the travel/customer service industry for 25 years. I was laid off over two years ago after 9/11. I submitted my resume to countless job postings with no response. Obviously after awhile I was feeling unwanted, useless, and depressed. No job prospects, no money, no direction. I not only needed an income, I needed a purpose, a reason to get up in the morning other than the cats and bird needed to be fed.

What was I going to do?

The light bulb finally came on in my head and I realized that I had some resources right at home. A computer and internet access. I normally surfed the net to shop (shopping mind you, couldn't afford to buy) and playing computer games to pass the time.

I happened upon an opportunity to take surveys online. Sounded easy enough and for a $35.00 investment to access a database of survey sites I could start making some money. I registered with every survey site listed in that database. A tedious task! In two months time a made $102.50 and a $10.00 gift card. I wasn't going to pay the bills with that kind of money. Back to the same dilemma!

What was I going to do?

I started searching the web for information about working from home. To my amazement there are countless opportunities. Now the question was not if I could have my own business but what kind of business did I want? I'm not a salesman! I didn't want to have to worry about inventory, packaging, shipping, merchant accounts, etc. I had very little money to invest, so my out-of-pocket expenses would have to be low, really low.

What was I going to do?

I found a website which offered me the chance to start my own business with incredibly little cost. The following is what was provided:

1. A domain name registered for $30.00.
2. Hosting of my website at a low monthly fee of $24.95.
3. My website was created free of charge which included a free auto responder.
4. I had to join five affiliate programs (signup was free) which their links would be placed on my website. These were some of the top affiliate programs (paying good commissions with multiple income streams). I found many favorable recommendations for them at several different websites.
5. They immediately got me started on how to build a mailing list fast and how to generate traffic to my website.
6. I was provided a home business tips newsletter that goes out to my email list on a daily basis. I don't have to do a thing, it's automatic.
7. Plus, I am provided with more tools, tips, ideas and marketing strategies (from well known "Internet Marketing Gurus") than I thought possible. All free of charge.

They've done the research and testing to know what works and what doesn't. Just have to follow their lead. These people give you step by step instructions. Go to any internet marketing website and see how much information is given freely. I think you will be as amazed as I was and still am.

Now don't get me wrong, there are some costs involved. But I'm talking a couple of hundred dollars not thousands! I have been overwhelmed with information, ideas, tools and resources!

No one is going to do it all for you. You will have to spend time learning and working to promote your business. Point is YOU too have the opportunity to become your own boss!

Take action now, don't wait, and grab a piece of the internet boom for yourself. As I said before I was always the pessimist, but now I see a half full cup instead of a half empty one.

Debra Hamer is the owner of the {http://profitfromhomebiz.com} website where you can find lots of tips, tools and resources for starting your own work at home business.

Visit her PlugInProfitSite at {http://www.pluginprofitsite.com/main-4256} to have your own website setup and ready to go within 24 hours, complete with everything you need to start making a profit.

What Is It Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Marketing is having Affiliates do your Marketing for you. What I mean by Affiliate is someone who tells people about your product/service and you pay them for a desired response, such as a purchase.

Affiliate Marketing is one of the best ways to get the word out about your product/service.

The best way to pay Affiliates is pay per sale. This means that you only have to pay your Affiliates when they actually make a sale. This reduces your advertising costs dramatically. your Affiliates take on all the risks so you don't have to worry about wasting your money on advertising which may not produce any results.

Using Affiliate is a very cheap way to advertise, however it is very effective. The software required to start up your own Affiliate program can cost only about $50 per month.

Then after that just wait for people to start promoting your product/service for you.

Please remember that 5% of your Affiliates will do 95% of the selling. What I mean by this is that most of your Affiliates will just sit there and do nothing. This can be countered if you teach them what to do, exactly how to do it and providing everything for them so they have to do as little work as possible.

To find out about teaching your Affiliates please see the "How To Super Charge Your Affiliates" article

You don't have to use this form of advertising just to sell your product or service. You can also use it to grow your opt-in mailing list. This is discussed in another article.

How Much Should You Pay Your Affiliates

How much you pay your Affiliates really depends on how much your product/service costs, its profit margin, how much you're willing to give up and what action you want to take place.

Lets say that your product is priced at $100. Lets also assume that it cost you $10 to make it. This leaves you with $90 profit.

How much of this do you want to give away to the person that made this sale possible?

Personally, I believe that you should give a rather high percentage of the profits back to the affiliate (Depending on how many sales they regularly generate), because without them, you wouldn't have made that particular sale at all, so reward them for it.

A fairly decent reward is about 50% of the revenue generated. Your product is priced at $100 so a $50 commission is quite generous. It really depends on your other costs (such as a mortgage) you have, which would help decide on a fair commission to both you and the Affiliate.

Another factor which plays a part is how much additional advertising you do, such as pay per click. For example, if you rely solely on your Affiliates to Market for you, then you may want to reduce the commission you pay to them to help you survive. However, you may want to pay them more, to encourage them to send more sales you way. It really is a judgment call.

On the other hand, if you advertise in other ways effectively, then you can afford to pay higher commissions, because you're not putting all your eggs in one basket.

In the end it's all down to how greedy or generous you are. The best advice I can give you is to pay the affiliate what you think he/she deserves. Hopefully that way everyone is happy and earning their fair share.

That is the key to a successful affiliate program.

By Stephen Warren, the creator of http://www.marketershandbook.com, the completely FREE guide to marketing online, with useful articles and links.

Are you having trouble creating new product offerings from scratch?

Are you having trouble creating new product offerings from scratch?  Maybe you're not a natural writer or you're unsure of a topic?  Or maybe you'd just like a shortcut to some reliable revenue?

Not to worry, help is here.

And even if you're not stuck creating your own intellectual property, the concept of promoting other people's products and earning coaching income is an idea whose time is fast on its way.

Selling other people's products, and earning a percentage of the sales price for your efforts is what's referred to online as earning money as an 'affiliate.'

Within the next 12 months, the Internet is getting set to see a significant number of coaches begin to grow their one-on-one practices with the help of someone else's products.

In fact, it promises to be a big trend, and I hope you're one of the first.

There are two key things to know about selecting affiliate programs to support:

(1) Give more than a simple recommendation.  Use this opportunity to write an article. create a 3-page website, compile a PDF report, or even tape a brief audio about why your audience should sit up and notice this product.  

Speak from the heart about the difference it has made to you.   Tell a story.  Ask questions that engage the reader.  All of these are techniques examplifying a coaching approach.

Then embed the links for your recommendations within the body of your article.

In this way, you add value, and you're much more likely to create a connection that leads to real impact, and a purchase that leads to earnings for you.

(2) Especially if you are having difficulty choosing a niche market for your own practice, hunting for worthwhile affiliate programs can be a great exercise. 

Other people's work that deserves to reach more people can benefit from your energy and as you earn money through affiliate programs, you'll learn a great deal about what sparks your passion.

At the same time, by making a integrity-based recommendation, you strengthen your bond with your readers in a way that always results in more revenue in your other streams. 

You know how when you buy something from a certain brand that you end up liking, you go back and buy more of that brand? 

Same thing.  As your audience comes to trust your recommendations, they're more and more likely to purchase other things from you.

Win, win, & win. 

Andrea J. Lee coaches entrepreneurs and online business owners. As Thomas J. Leonard's General Manager, she helped build and manage the largest network and trainer of personal and business coaches in the world. Now the CEO of Andrea J. Lee Group of Companies, she writes, speaks and consults on Marketing, Internet and Business systems. This is an excerpt from the her NEW BOOK - Multiple Streams of Coaching Income, http://www.multiplestreamsofcoachingincome.com

Get Free 25$ AuctionAds Bonus For New Publishers!

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Please note if you signed up with us previously and have never earned a payout we will bump your current balance to $25 too! Our minimum payout is also being raised to $50 but everyone who hasn’t earned a payout to date will be halfway there already! By publicizing this promotion on your blog using your affiliate link you can take advantage of receiving 5% of all revenue generated by new AA publishers you refer for a full six months. Thanks again and look for more AA news soon.

Popup Killers

With the increased use of popups on sites - when you enter, when you leave, while you are there - Popup killers (or stoppers) are all the rage. 

Companies use Popup killers as a marketing tool for frustrated webusers  - they kill the Popup, the webuser uses their service be it as an ISP or Toolbar.

New ISP Disks, Toolbars, and Browsers all now come with some form of Popup killer.  While we all want to stop the frustration of having several popups being delivered while surfing around the web, to the webmaster a Popup killer can totally kill a site's normal functionality.

** What do I mean?

If I said rename a Popup killer to a Javascript killer, (which is how some Popup killers work), then you wil get the gist!

With some SEOs advocating hiding links that they don't want a search engine to spider or to hide affiliate links within Javascript functions, having a user visit your site with a Popup killer enabled could kill more than that annoying Popup.

It could mean that when a user clicks on your apply button or affiliate link, it won't work! The user can click on it as often as they like.  It won't work!

This could be costing you sales and applications.

** We tested it out!

We tested this on our Loans site www.polarloans.co.uk.  We delivered 1,000 visits to the site where the application process was a javascript function.  We had 1 application.

We then switched the apply buttons and links to a normal HREF link and sent another 1000 visits to it.  We have a 10 fold increase in applications.

The only on-page changes were the Apply button links and we drove the visits via PPC spend.

** What can you do?

It maybe time you looked at the major links on your site to your product sale pages on affiliate links.  If they are running as Javascript functions it may be wise to try switching them to normal HREF links and test the results.

You can always change them back if you need to but consider the potential revenue option.

It certainly has worked for us!

 Jason Hulott is Director of J2 Squared, leading specialists in Internet Consultancy  whose specific aim is to drive more revenue to websites. Their main area of focus are the insurance, finance, and automotive industries.

Whos Really Making The Money?

There will be a million and one affiliates out there who will tell you that the affiliate program they promote is going to be the best one for you.

But have you considered who is really making the money and who gains the most out of affiliate programs.

Let's take a step back and look at the AFFILIATE.

What exactly is the role of the affilate?

* The sole purpose of the affiliate is to PROMOTE the product and/or service

What are the benefits of being an affiliate?

* Get paid a minimal commission that is regulated by the owner of the product/service

In short, As an affiliate it is your responsibility to make someone else rich whilst doing all the hard work. You take on the expenses of advertising, you are the one who usually misses out on subscribers if you haven't first made them your client before they buy the product/service you are promoting.

And all this for what??? Maybe $20 per sale if you are really, really lucky.

You also need to remember that when you are an affiliate, YOU are not the only person promoting that very same product/service.

So what will make your offer any different to someone else who is promoting the exact same product, usually using the same sales technique, offering it at the same price.

To be in the top 5%, which is the amount of affiliates who make more than $100.00 per month, you need to first have a really good, clean, targeted subscribers list of more than 50,000 subscribers, know exactly how to gain targeted traffic, and have a huge advertising budget.

For the other 95%, the only way you are going to make alot of money from and affiliate program is to OWN YOUR OWN.

It really isn't as hard as you might think to set up.

So in conclusion, the best AFFILIATE PROGRAM, obviously is the one you OWN.

About the Author:

Gillian Tarawhiti, is Founder and CEO of Community Training Centre, an Internet Marketing firm providing Online Training and Support to the new and not so new netpreneurs. Gillian is also the author of eBay Billion Dollar Goldmine and the creator of the Multiple Ripple Effect System © 2004.

Affiliate Programs

Everywhere you look you see affiliate program offers for every product or service that you can think of. Some have fully automated systems that sell high volumes of hard products all over the world. In case you don't know, "hard" products are those that you can touch...unlike an ebook or downloadable web template. Many affiliate programs have several thousand affiliates and one or two of the bigger companies have over one million affiliates.

What are the advantages of joining an affiliate program?

They provide a ready-made business. This is a very big plus for those people who want to earn some kind of living off the Internet but lack the knowledge or inclination to set up a business by themselves.

Commissions and rewards are generally good, and the more established programs offer a real chance of advancement to higher and better-paid levels.

Other affiliates are usually on hand to offer practical support.

What are the limitations?

You are restricted in your promotional activities due to the fact that you do not actually own the affiliate site they give you. You won't be able to put such things as banners, images, links, meta tags, etc. onto your page. The URL of your affiliate page is often either too long or contains such awkward things as question marks, which many Search Engines will not index.

Any promotional ads or articles have probably already been used by thousands of other people and consequently may have lost its impact, making it more difficult to achieve sales or referrals.

If the program you have joined has not yet established itself (or in some cases even if it has), then you may encounter problems with payments owed to you not being honored. You also run the risk of low quality products or sub-standard statistics that do not accurately record how many referrals or sales you have made.

You may be required to purchase a minimum quantity of the product on a regular basis before you start to qualify for commissions or even before you can become an affiliate. You may not get the technical or affiliate support you might expect from the company. This may be due to inadequate staffing, or the company's negligence.

Other people in your downline do nothing to promote the program.

At least four of the above limitations can be overcome with a little time and effort. You could, for example, come up with fresher ads to promote the program (provided this is allowed).

If the company supplies the email addresses of people in your downline, then you could offer to help the less active members. Very often these people are passive not because they are lazy or apathetic but merely because they don't know HOW to promote effectively! your guidance could mean the difference between no sales or referrals and healthy downlines and residual incomes.

As regards promoting your actual page, here are a couple of little tricks that should overcome a number of restrictions:

Cloak your Affiliate URL to stop hijackers Affiliate Masker While this will not help you to get listed on the major Search Engines, it will make your web page easier for prospects to remember and type into their browser's address bar.

Go to your affiliate page. Place your mouse pointer anywhere on the page and right click once. In the drop-down box choose "View Source". This will display the HTML for the page. Save this to your hard drive as a HTML document using the "Save As" function. Upload the page to your  web site. If you don't have a web site then get some free web space from one of these:

• http://www.tripod.com/
• http://www.fortunecity.com/
• http://www.hypermart.net/index.gsp
• http://www.coolchat.com/
• http://www.crosswinds.net/
• http://www.htmlpublishing.com/
• http://www.freehomepages.com/
• http://www.pageproducer.com/

Submit your 'new' page to the Search Engines. You are also now able to place banner codes, links, images, testimonials, in fact anything you want onto these pages, because you are in control of the HTML. A word of caution, though. Don't change the actual HTML of your original affiliate page. Just put the other stuff, like banners etc, around it.

Making this "mirror page" of your affiliate page will dramatically improve your advertising options.

You have permission to publish this article in your ezine or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the byline is included and the article is included in it's entirety. I also ask that you activate any html links found in the article and in the byline.

You may not use this article in any publication that is not-optin (spam). A courtesy copy of the publication or link to the website you use my article on would be appreciated.

Earn Money?

It surprises me that many people fail to grasp this concept as they first set out to start their own businesses. Thanks to the power of the Internet, anyone who has a computer and an Internet connection can now START their own online businesses with little investment. However, generally speaking, it is a given that you have to invest money into your business to if you seriously want it to grow.

Affiliate marketing is a great way for ordinary people to start making money on the Internet. After finding an affiliate program that offers products you are interested in promoting, you can start an online business with just a website. So your total investment up to this point may simply be registering for a domain name and paying for a web hosting account.

But then what? You have to start marketing the products and getting people to your website! A lot of people are turned off when they discover that this is a demanding process that requires a substantial amount of hard work, time, AND money!

Let me give you a specific example. As all experienced Internet marketers know, "the money is in the list." Simply put, you want to build a mailing list of people who may be interested in what you have to offer.

One of the most effective ways to grow your mailing list is to use a pay-per-lead service where you PAY a company to bring targeted subscribers to you. The company will run an advertising campaign for you and deliver motivated, opt-in subscribers to your list. The cost can vary greatly depending on the information you require. The e-mail lead packages I have been using recently range from $.10 to $.35 per lead.

Other areas where you MAY want to invest money in include: logo design, web design, web promotion, and useful tools such as a graphics editor and a powerful autoresponder. However, there are plenty of free resources on the Internet and I encourage you to seek them out.

The saying, "You have to spend money to earn money," generally holds true for ANY business! An Internet-based business is no exception,whether your are promoting your own products or someone else's.

It is also important that you re-invest a portion of your profits into your business! That way, not only will your business continue to grow, but its GROWTH RATE will also increase! This in turn brings in MORE profits, which allows you to invest MORE into your business... Do you see a pattern!?

The key is to invest money into your business wisely while staying within your budget. If you believe in your business, you are bound to be successful!

To Your Success! Byron Wong

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The Benefits of Publishing an Online Quiz Versus a Printed One

Well, the first benefit of publishing an online quiz that comes to mind is the fact that it's an outstanding way to drive traffic to your web site. People love quizzes and they take ones that are printed in magazines all of the time. It's reasonable to assume that if these same people knew about the existance of an online quiz that they would beat a path to your home page.

Another great feature of offering an online quiz is that you can change the subject regularly. In fact, you could offer a subscription where members sign up to be notified whenever a new online quiz gets posted.

An online quiz can also be used as a sales tool. One of the best ways of accomplishing this is to link your quiz questions to affiliate sites where you earn money when people make purchases. Then you can have a "scavenger hunt" online quiz where people have to visit those sites to find the quiz answers.

People also like to take an online quiz because they can get instant scoring without having to turn the page upside down, or flip to the end of the magazine, to find out how they did. You can even design your online quiz so that it gives instant feedback after every answer is entered.

One last thing to consider is that you can create keyword-rich versions of your online quiz and then post the URLs to search engines. That way you will not only get search traffic from people who like quizzes, but you'll get traffic from people who are searching on the terms that you include in your online quiz!

So, while it's not likely that a printed quiz is going to become obsolete any time soon. The Internet has once again forever impacted the way that we communicate. Today's latest example? The online quiz.