Selecting The Best Affiliate Programs

There are thousands of affiliate programs on the Internet today. Finding one that is related to your niche is as simple as typing the name of your niche into Google, followed by "Affiliate Program". This should bring up a list of merchants related to your niche that offer affiliate programs. You can then go through the list and pick out the best ones.

When selecting an affiliate program, keep the following points in mind:

1. Check out the merchant's website and ensure it is attractive. See how well the sales letter is written and what kind of sales pitch they're using. If there are a number of spelling and grammatical errors, you will probably not want to promote a product from that site. After all, you will be sending potential customers there so you don't want them to be immediately turned off
2. Look at the sales commission. Is the commission one time only, or is it recurring? Recurring commissions, for products involving a monthly subscription, are much more favorable over single, one-time commissions, for obvious reasons.
3. Look at the average sale amount. If you get a 50% commission but the product is only selling for $10, you will probably not want to waste your time trying to promote it. However, if the product is selling for $50 or $100, you will likely be more inclined to put in the effort.
4. Look at the refund rate. This is very important. If the product has a high refund rate, you may want to think twice about promoting it because it usually means the product is inferior. Not all affiliate programs will make this statistic available to their affiliates. If they don't have it, just keep an eye on the product as you make sales. If it seems there are a high number of returns, you may want to ditch the product.
5. Look for affiliate programs that use cookies. You want to make sure you get credited for every visitor you refer to the merchant's site that buys something. An affiliate program that uses cookies will be able to track a visitor coming from your site, even if they don't buy anything. If they don't buy something right away but return at a later date and make a purchase, you still get the commission. An affiliate program that does NOT use cookies will only credit you with a commission if the visitor buys something when they come directly from your website. If the visitor returns at a later date to make a purchase, you DO NOT get credit.

Another advantage of using an affiliate program that uses cookies is you will get a commission for every single purchase the visitor makes at the merchant's site for however long the cookie is active (this can be as long as a year). So, all you had to do was send the visitor to the merchant's site one time, and you get a commission for anything they buy after that. Sounds great, doesn't it?

Other things to look for are how often the merchant pays out and if there is a minimum payment amount required. Some merchants will pay their affiliates daily while others only pay out every two weeks, or twice a month - it all depends on the merchant. Some merchants also require that you make a minimum number in sales before they pay you and they will hold on to any amount you have until you reach that minimum.

Another incentive that some merchants use is offering bonuses or rewards for the top selling affiliates? They will run contents every month and give a grand prize in the form of cash or merchandize to whoever sells the most that month.