WordPress Affiliate Manager

Affiliates Management Plugin for WordPress

Running and Monetizing a Niche City Portal Site

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My first affiliate commissions from the beginning of my online career came from running a city portal site and although I have since sold the site for a tidy profit, it continues to make money in much the same way.

For the longest time I was making money referring people to hotels, motels and hostels in my city and making referral commissions from TravelNow.com. I was able to brand my pages on TravelNow to look similar to my site but I found conversions to be higher when I didn’t.

At any rate, people that look online for accommodations have many more ways of locating deals that the SERPS aren’t always where they start looking. The site I ran used to get organic search engine traffic for phrases related to {city name} + hotels or {city name} + {hotel name}. With folks being more online savvy in general, a different approach was needed but is still effective.

Mostly now I see city portal sites asking people to use their hotel links to help support the site. The site best have some really good unique quality content for people to want to support them. Plus, the owner must be keeping track of the best deals from across the web (and being an affiliate at several booking sites) to offer the most value.

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Marketing for an Iconic Brand Case Study

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It’s easy to play armchair quarterback. We can talk theory all day long and it’s when the rubber hits the road that we learn what really works. Here, I apply my experience and education to one of my favorite places before getting off of red meat – White Castle. I’m anxious to read how you can apply the lessons from this case study.

Introduction

The strategic marketing issue that is addressed in the White Castle Restaurant Case is that given the consumer attitudes towards fast food and the overwhelming competition from national purveyors of fast food with their franchises; what White Castle needs is a focus on their core strengths and tight market niche as the low cost value meal for low to upper-low income consumers.

In response to this issue we would deliver a marketing campaign that would emphasize the strengths of the franchise and target the niche market. To accomplish this we recommend using Television, and print advertising, and point to the company website on these advertisements.

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Affiliate Storefronts for Online Fundraising

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Online donations are fast-becoming a major way to generate money for causes; in 2013, charities such as the National Christian Foundation and Habitat for Humanity International reported an individual online donation of $100,000 or more, and the University of Michigan noted that Internet giving rose an astonishing 296 percent.(1) Not bad at all.

While other methods like face-to-face interaction, mail-in forms and social media promotion are still in use and serve as helpful extras to complement a fundraising effort, giving over the Internet –if these examples are any indication– are proving to be effective and well-worth exploring.

If you’re familiar with typical retail sites such as Overstock, then you’re on your way to understanding how it can work for you. Quite simply, you create a storefront, which is essentially a web site, with an appearance similar to Overstock or Best Buy. Just like them, you’re showcasing what you wish to drive interest in. The main difference is that the affiliate links will be displayed, so everyone gets credit where credit’s due.(2)

Ready to jump in? Take these key points in consideration before creating your affiliate storefront.

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What is an Affiliate Link?

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We sometimes see (or more like, *should see*) labels next to those blue underlined words that say (affiliate link), but what does that mean exactly?

I know many of you who have been around awhile are probably thinking that this is as basic as it gets when it comes to articles on affiliate marketing. And you may be right. But I encourage you to stick around anyway, I bet you’ll learn something. [Read more…]

Is Eliminating Long Affiliate Tracking Links an Advantage to Affiliates and Merchants?

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In this article I would like to discuss the debate regarding the use of plain links as affiliate links. First though, a quick run-down of what that is exactly.

Some affiliate management tools allow the affiliate to register a domain name (or sub-domain), or in some cases, a specific URL, in their account. The more sophisticated tools will automate a verification process to prove the affiliate does in fact have access to the domain or web page in question.

Now, once registered (and approved), the affiliate can send traffic from that domain (or page, etc. – I’ll just say “domain” from here on out), but the links don’t have to be true affiliate links. They are just plain links to the store homepage, or deeper product links. [Read more…]

How to get started with affiliate marketing. Step one: Stop the excuses

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I read more than once that when polled, those interested in affiliate marketing, failed to start for one of two reasons (and in some cases both): time and/or money. My response is: they are either making it more complicated than it needs to be, or they are just making excuses. Perhaps fear of failure plays into it. Whatever the case, I want to eliminate some of the excuses for you in this hopefully quick article.

I have written tons about what affiliate marketing is but in a nutshell it is simply: promoting other people’s stuff and getting commissions for the referral, in most cases in an automated unattended way.

There are countless ways to get involved in affiliate marketing, but again it can be summarized in a sentence: find something to promote, and promote it in some way. A standard approach is to build a web site and discuss a product (preferably one that you use or have used), use your affiliate link to link to it, and then send traffic to that page. There are free ways and paid ways. There are expensive ways (in terms of time and money) and there are free/quick ways. In some ways it is like pushing a snowball down a mountain, you just need to get it started.

Amazon doesn’t pay high commissions but people trust the company because they know it and you as an affiliate get commissions on all purchases made by the customer that you refer, not just the product you refer them to. Amazon encourages the customer to add more to the cart, you are rewarded for all items even though you were likely just suggesting one of them.

Beyond that I like promoting high ticket items (usually digital products or services) that offer a residual (on-going) income. Those are the “top shelf” items to promote. If you are a healthy eater, look at it like you might consider “wild foods”… the cleanest, healthiest foods on the planet… the best for you. But chomping on a french fry you find on the ground may still keep you alive, for a little while.

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