Affiliate Program Marketing

Affiliate programs are the way in which most people make money on the internet. 

For years the concept of the net struggled with an effective model for making money.   A few high profile stores set up shop and offered items for sale, but at that time shopping carts were custom built applications and not easily obtained by most merchants. 

The companies which had products to sell found themselves hidden away from the rising growth of internet users, struggling to reach an audience.

Banner Ads

The banner ad, now ubiquitous, solved that problem.   Big companies could get ads for their products placed on sites of all types.    One of the first big players in the banner ads game was doubleclick.  By providing tools to serve ads on websites, they provided a way for site owners to display products or colorful links and a way to track what had been searched.    The early phases of affiliate marketing were in play.

It didn't take long before users started to ignore the ads, and blinding garish ads which blinked incessantly became the norm.   Affiliate programs were not as we see them now.   There was no real way to tell what ads would be served on what sites, or if they would be of any interest to surfers.   It was a sheer numbers game and it wasn't long until it was realized that a more sophisticated model was necessary.  Modern day affiliate programs work in a variety of different ways.  

Contextual Link Advertising

The random banner ads have been replaced by contextual links using such programs as  Adsense and Chikita.   The ads actually trigger based on the pages content, and more recently on information that has been collected about the individual surfer.

Affiliate Merchandising

Another form of affiliate program, affiliate merchandising is a more evolved form of the random and garish flashing banner ads  also gained wide acceptance.   The program put out by companies like Pepperjam, Share-a-sale and Commission Junction stayed with the banner ad concept but evolved it.   These companies work as an interface between advertisers who want their products shown and publishers who provide content throughout the internet.   Ads come in a variety of shapes and sizes.   To monetize a site through these programs, the ad companies set up an interface where individual contracts can easily be set up.   A publisher can browse through the catalogs for companies who sell products that make sense for the site and ad codes can be downloaded directly from the affiliate program provider.

Ad Tracking Technologies

Sophisticated ad tracking technologies allow the provider to track both ad impressions, clicks and sales.    Typically affiliate programs pay a percentage, in the form of a commission, on each sale.  In some cases they will pay for prospect leads, impressions or clicks.  Due to widespread abuse of the click and impression models through cheating, those models are typically limited to affiliates with an established track record and demonstrated integrity.

Alternative affiliate systems

Affiiliate systems are also found in a wide variety of other forms including video ads, sales letter presentation and new models which are at the cutting edge of web technology.  This site will detail various types of affiliate programs, the pros and cons of each, where to research them and sign up, and explore the benefits of various models of advertising.