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Affiliate Networks

Tuesday, 26 December 2006

Thinking of earning some income through Affiliate Programmes? I've just did some research on which Affiliate Network is the top 5. So far I've uncovered a few. I've also joined ClickBank, but at the moment I don't have any intention to start Affiliate Marketing - well at least not now. Read through the article on what I have found.

Affiliate marketing is an online advertising channel in which advertisers (online merchants that sell products or services) pay publishers (independent parties that promote the products or services of an advertiser on their Web site) only for results, such as a visitor making a purchase or filling out a form, rather than paying simply to reach a particular audience. This “pay-for-performance” model is in essence the modern version of the “finders’-fee” model, where individuals who introduce new clients to a business are compensated. The difference in the case of affiliate marketing is that advertisers only pay their publishers when the new client introduction results in a sale or a lead, making it a low-risk, high-reward environment for both parties.

How it Works

Advertisers in Affiliate Network, populate their ad links in the interface, making them available for placement by publishers. Each link is assigned a commission, such as a fixed amount per lead or a percentage of a resulting sale on the advertiser's Web site. Publishers looking to monetize their traffic apply to join an advertiser's program. Upon acceptance, the publishers select and place the advertiser's links on their Web sites, in their email campaigns or as part of search listings.

When a consumer clicks on a publisher's link, a cookie is set on the visitor's browser that identifies the advertiser, the publisher, and the specific link and payment rates. When the visitor makes an actual purchase online or fills out a form, that transaction is tracked and recorded. Upon recording the transaction, the Affiliate Network Program handles all of the collection and processing required to ensure fair and timely commission payment for the publisher, and all of the administration and verification necessary to ensure quality sales and leads for the advertiser.

Some of the top rated Affiliate Networks:

LinkShare, the web's largest affliate network, is based on the pay for performance model. LinkShare has big name merchants, such as Zales, Hallmark, Orbitz, and Target, just to name a few. LinkShare, as a top affiliate network, offers some of the best reporting tools available today, allowing affiliates to track their links. Also, LinkShare claimed to have the most reliable and accurate system in the industry. They also claimed that they have an extensive list of Fortune 500 clients being recruited everyday.

Next up in line is ClickBank. ClickBank mainly deal in digital products. From what I've seen on the website, most of their product is either an e-book or software for sale. They claimed that your will have instant access to over 10,000 products with commission up to 75%. The advantage of selling a digital product is, there are no shipping costs. ClickBank pays their affiliate twice a month and the best of all, joining is FREE.

Commission Junction also has big name merchants, such as eBay and Home Depot, and operates on a pay per performance basis. Commission Junction makes it easy to choose profitable affiliate programs, by publishing payment and conversion statistics for each advertiser, and each ad. In fact, the reporting tools at Commission Junction are second to none. Commission Junction now owns Be Free and Bfast, making it one of the net’s largest affiliate networks.

Next is Performics. Performics is now owned by DoubleClick, and is a pay per performance based network. Performics also partners with big name merchants, such as America Online (AOL), CompUSA, and L.L. Bean. Performics provides affiliates with timely payments, real time sales tracking and reporting, and quite a bit of affiliate support. All of this combined serves to make Performics one of the leading top affiliate networks.

Finally, ClixGalore network is a pay-per-click, pay-per-sale, pay-per-lead, and pay-per-impression network, which gives webmasters many more options. ClixGalore has over 3000 merchant programs that you can promote. The ClixGalore offers a wide variety of tracking and reporting tools, as well as link building tools. As a top affiliate network, ClixGalore offers quite a bit of support to it's affiliates and merchants.

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