What Is An Affiliate Program? The Positives And Negatives

At its core, the what is an affiliate program question is easy to state:

It is a system where someone gets paid (or rewarded) to send traffic or a specific response to a specific vendor.

Investopia state the same: “An affiliate program is a marketing arrangement by which an online retailer pays a commission to an external website for traffic or sales generated from its referrals".

An affiliate program can be anything from ebooks, email sign ups, software, demos, freemium products or just traffic. It can be online (more common) or it can be offline.

In essence you are a sales person. Clearly there are lots of positives:

selling someone elses "product". You can sell brand name products without the expense of licensing
not having their inventory or infrastructure
not having to manage customers
low start-up costs
you only earn when someone buys
you only sell what you are comfortable with and what aligns with your values
it can be "passive". In other words it might not be 100% leave on autopilot, but some links can generate sales over time with very little change to those links or the process that has been set up
you can scale. Once you realise what works then why not replicate that to other products? Whey not add more traffic generation techniques and then increase the sales?
a lot of products are affiliate based. You can choose products from a huge range of sources
accountability. If you don't sell you dont get paid. So you need to know the start process of selling, you need to know how to sell and place the right minded customer with the product that fits them
global. Selling online can take affiliate selling to a worldwide audience. Sometimes that audience is undeserved
analytics. With a touch of a button you can figure out what works, what doesn't, who you are selling to, what they like to buy and a whole range of other data that can increase your selling processes.
content. Affiliate links can be anything- text, videos and pictures. So you dont have to have a blog, you can have a Youtube channel. In some cases you don't need any website- just send traffic to websites through adverts

What is an affiliate program- the downsides

A lot of websites will state that affiliate selling is easy. It is...but. They are coming from it with an established base- a trusted base. Affiliate selling (without direct advertisement selling) is based upon trust. People buy from who they know and they buy if they have an issue that they need fixed or to better that issue.

So you can have positives but you can also have negatives of affiliate programs:

commission. Depending upon the product commissions can be low. You have to figure out if your time is worth some products. Can you sell more of a smaller price or more of a larger price with the same amount of effort?
competition. Competition is high because people think that it is a get rich quick scheme. Its not. The problem with lots of affiliate products is that there is rarely any cap on the product being sold. If you are selling an item then it is likely that 100+ more people are selling the same item, usually in the same way. Its good for the vendor, kinda iffy for the seller.
control. Because you are selling someone elses product then they have control of what that product is, how it is sold, the sales page, how customers are handled and if they pay you on time. They can also change commission structures, remove products or even in some cases terminate seller accounts for random reasons
data. Data is currency- knowing data- as stated before, is huge because it tells you a lot about the customer. But you won't really know the sales side because the vendor has that information. They also have customer details (if you didn't collect them) to sell to them again- without your link
traffic. Traffic is the lifeblood of the Internet. It is traffic coming past your shop. Without it you are not in business. If your traffic source changes or gets more expensive then the profit of your sales goes down or stops. Affiliate selling is directly related to traffic- especially consistent traffic.
lifespan. What most sellers will not tell you is that many to most products have a lifespan. If you are not keeping abreast of new products or similar products then profits will decline just due to the inevitability of the products lifespan. And this is not counting on fads- like the fidget spinner.
fraud. Sometimes oddly called BlackHat the idea is to try and trick people into buying through your links, or tricking search engines to give you more traffic. Never works and is not sustainable however the Internet is littered with multiple sites and videos that give you the next "wonder thing". Never is.

Sounds bad right? But don't be worried. Come at this with an open mind. First read up on the topic, read and then start to think what you would like to sell. The best products are:

ones that you already use and love

Thats it. We all have computers and probably many peripherals that go with it. You might really love a certain book or a movie. You could be sitting on the most comfortable chair ever. The sleep that you had last night? Was on one of the most sleepiest beds ever- and those pillows? The finest and most knock you out pillows ever. The bed sheets, just make my bed so cool in the summer but so warm in the winter, its amazing how people have not talked about it.

So in that one paragraph there are a potential 7 categories of products that you could sell. Each one you know and love. Come at it from trust.

Now that you have an idea of what you would like to sell, or at least, have an idea, then you check up upon if it is viable or not. So you do your research. Look on blogs, videos, Google Trends and see if people are looking for the solution to the issue that they have- that your products could solve.

But!

Never search for an audience for your product. Have an audience wanting a product- it is sooooo much easier.

Then you figure out how to get in touch with that audience.

That is affiliate selling.

So what is an affiliate program? You selling something that you trust to someone who can use it to help themselves.

For updates check out the Jasonera blog here.Check out more affiliate sales articles here.