*Note: This is only useful if you are selling something. With affiliate program you can offer your visitors a chance to earn money by bringing you traffic. Affiliate programs are based on a pay-per-performance. You pay your affiliates only after they do something for you. You can pay them for:
- a number of visitors (pay-per-click) they send to your site;
- a number of leads* (pay-per-lead) they send to your site;
- a number of sales (pay-per-sale) they generate.
*Leads are visitors who interact with your website usually leaving their contact info.
Pay per sale affiliate program is the best, because you pay only when you earn money. In first two cases you are paying for traffic and leads which might earn you money, but also might not. And with pay-per-sale affiliate program you are always in profit. You only give a comission of sales to your affiliates and the rest of the money goes to you.
Affiliate program can skyrocket your internet traffic and improve sales and Pay-Per-Sale is one of the best ways to receive free traffic! I said free traffic because you are not really paying anything. :)
There are a lot of ways how to start an affiliate program. The easiest way is by using a third party site. This site will do all the work for you. They will sign-up your affiliates, track their sales and will be responsible for paying them. Of course for a small fee. Some sites will require an upfront fee and some will deduct it from earnings.
Since I put this information in Free Traffic section, I should normally mention only the second ones. :)
I have personally never started an affiliate program, but I'll try to be of help. You may check:
StormPay - Free Credit Card Processor with an option to integrate associate program to your website. There are no upfront fees. The only fees you will pay will be deducted after the purchase is completed. And you can easily withdraw funds to your bank account. StormPay is available Worldwide! Check out their Integration manual for more information.
You should also check Comission Junction, Be Free, Clickbank,...
If you don't want to use these services, you'll need to install a script to track your affiliate performanse. And you will be responsible for paying your affiliates. I prefer to use third party services. They charge fees, but they handle everything. You only receive money.
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