When I first started out in affiliate marketing, I was broke. Every tiny bit of cash I earned was greeted with cheers of joy, and deep breaths of gratitude. Occasionally, a check would arrive in the mail for $10, and I’d be skipping down the driveway into my house, waving that check as though it were a million dollars. Unfortunately, in the beginning, the money drifted in pretty slowly. One of the reasons for that was because each affiliate program generally had a payment threshold that was set semi-high. If I hadn’t earned $100 for that program yet, I wasn’t going to see any money from it until I did. Each program’s threshold is different, with some as low as $25, but most are in the $50-$100 range. Because I was a member of different programs, I might have reached the threshold if they’d all been counted together, but separately, I was often out of luck. Sometimes, I joined programs just because they had low payment thresholds.

One of the programs I’ve belonged to for years is the one from LinkShare.com. I’m late to the news, but I just learned that a few months ago, they’ve started a new payment plan, in which the payment threshold is only $1. In addition, they are now paying weekly. Weekly payments with a super-low threshold can be very encouraging to a newbie. You can really see your efforts pay off before you have a chance to get discouraged. (Note that international affiliates might not like getting small payments due to bad conversion rates, but for US affiliates that won’t matter).

Linkshare has tons of niches available, able to accomodate almost any niche you might be passionate about. Many of the programs offer more than simple text links or banner ads. Some allow you to link directly to specific products, some offer coupon codes, and some have dynamic rich, interactive multimedia ads. Some even offer storefronts, which are premade pages of hot products for that program. You can get really creative and stand out in a crowd by utilizing some of these advanced techniques.

Getting creative is a key to doing well with affiliate programs. You really need to put some work into it. Don’t just throw a few links around and think you’ll get rich. Well, you might, but it’ll be pure luck. In general, you need to create original, compelling content. That content needs to draw traffic, and once there, give solid reasons for clicking through to the affiliate product you are promoting. Because Linkshare has so many options for creatively promoting products and programs, you stand a better chance at being able to provide original content that brings in traffic and leads to sales. Once you make those sales, you can now look forward to quick payment. Gotta love that!!

Sign up with LinkShare.com.

(from Smash Mouth. "AllStar" Astro Lounge. Interscope Records, 1999.)

Posted on January 7th, 2008 by DazzlinDonna
Filed under: Making Money Online