Affiliate Program - Adding Links

Remember, if you have questions then email us at at any time. So read on, to learn how to maximize your affiliate revenue today:

Text Links Generate Sales

Recently, we reviewed more than 250 of our affiliates, and we noticed that 80% of the affiliate revenue was earned by less than 20% of the affiliates. So what were these high performing affiliates doing that other affiliates were not?

It's simple. They were recommending our products in a text format, rather than relying on a banner to generate revenue.

So instead of adding a banner like this...

They added text links like this...

And that's where we had the revelation...

We realized that banners are no longer effective in generating affiliate revenue.

It's text links that are generating all the cash for our affiliates. After further investigation, we found that other companies have had this revelation as well. So after an intensive period of research, we've concluded that there are 3 reasons why text links are more effective than banner links:

1. Text Links add value:

    Take this scenario: You're searching the internet and you come across two separate websites. On the home page of the first website is a bright and bold banner advertising our products. It's blinking on and off to attract your attention. And on the second website is a text link that fits in with the rest of the content on the page and it recommends using our products. Sure, you're most likely to notice the banner before you notice the text link, but which are you more likely to click on.

   The text link right? It's because the banner looks just like normal advertising, yet the text link looks like someone has genuinely cared enough about a product to add a recommendation to use it. You're genuinely interested in what the product is that they have recommended, so you're more likely to click on it.

2. Text Links are more informative:

    When you add a text link, you can tell the visitor where they will go when they click it, why they should go there and how it will benefit them. This gives them greater confidence that you're directing them to a page that will be of benefit to them. Your link appears "helpful", boosting the value of your page to the visitor.

3. Banners add clutter:

    Four years ago when we offered affiliates our new banners for their websites, banner advertising was just taking off, so banners were relatively new. And they were effective. This is because they were unique, attractive and they stood out. Whereas today, there are so many banners on the web, that visitors see them as clutter and they just "shut them out" when reading a page, making banner advertising a lot less effective than it use to be.

Tips for Making Money

We've noticed that our most profitable affiliates don't have a single banner on their website. A visitor wouldn't even know that they make money through advertising. They have achieved this by adding the following types of text links to their website.

Add Subtle Links

Within your current web pages, add simple text links to our website by inserting new sentences like:

These types of links are treated positively by your readers, as it looks like you're being helpful.

Make Recommendations

One of the best ways to convince a person to go and buy our product is to recommend the product to them. Our high performing affiliates do this with great success. Simply add a few sentences on a couple of pages on your website, recommend our products. It could read something like this...

The reason why recommendations are frequently clicked is that Visitors are intrigued by them. They wonder what the product is and their curiosity gets the better of them. They just have to click the link! And the fact that you've recommended it gives them confidence that the product is more than half reasonable, so it dramatically increases their likelihood in buying it - thereby earning you a commission.

Use Bullets

If you have a lot of content on your web page and you want your link to stand out a little, then a great way to do it is to use bullets. Visitors love bullets, because they can scan them quickly as they view the page. Also, bullets stand out. Here's an example of using a text link with bullets:

List on Partner Pages

Most of our top performing affiliates have added a "Partner" page to their website. The great thing about a Partner page is that you can list and describe our offerings in depth, without it looking like advertising. Or if you want, you could list all of your affiliate partners on a single page, and just brief details for each. Another advantage of creating a partner page is that your visitor can learn more about our products without having to leave your website. So when they do decide to click on the link, they are much better informed and therefore more likely to buy products from our website, earning you a commission.

Create a Web Page

If you want to go the next level, then create a customized web page that directly offers our templates for purchase. Here's an example of an affiliate that's done it: http://www.klariti.com/templates/Project-Management-Templates.shtml

Show the Templates Kit Box

Add our templates kit box to your website. It stands out and will have a reasonably high click through, giving you a great chance of making money.

More Top Tips:

Here are more Top Tips for creating effective text links on your website:

• Affiliate ID: Remember to add your affiliate id to all of your text links. That way, we'll track the visitor as yours and give you a commission on the sale.
• Traffic: Your home page is the best place to add text links, because it's your web page that gets the most traffic and is therefore the page that will generate the most affiliate revenue.
• Bolding and Italics: If you make your text links bold or italics, then they will stand out from the rest of the content, therefore generate more revenue.
• Bullets: Remember to also add links as bullets, because bullets can easily be scanned by a visitor and are more highly read.
• Insertions: If you're inserting a text link within a paragraph, then make the text link the same font type and size as the rest of the paragraph around it.
• Columns: If you have left or right columns on your website, then add a text link to one of these columns.
• Logos: Sometimes, it's nice to add a logo to the text link on your website. Here's an example from an affiliate:



• Anchor Text:

  "Anchor text" is the label that appears when you hover your mouse over a text link. While you can create text links without using anchor text (i.e. hover text), we recommend you always use anchor text for your links. The reason is that it provides the user with yet another prompt to click the link. In short, anchor text increases the authority of the link and results in more sales. Here's an example of what the user sees, when they hover over a link which has associated anchor text:

  

  To make it easy for you to add anchor text to your links, we've provided the HTML below. This HTML is for the link Project Management Templates and all you need to do is to replace the XXXX with your Affiliate Id and you're ready-to-go:

  <a href=" http://www.Method123.com?AID=XXXX " title="Project Management Templates">Project Management Templates</a>

The best tip of all

In the old days, if you become an affiliate then you would add a single banner to your website and then leave it to see if it generated sales. But things have changed. To become a top earning affiliate, you need to remove the existing banner and add multiple text links to your website.

The reason for this is simple. If on 5 pages of your website, you had 5 different text links, then you would have 5 times the chances off making revenue. And by making them simple text links, your visitors won't even notice that you've added them in lots of places. They will look helpful and informative and will take up less space than banner links. So more people will click your links and buy our products, earning you a great commission. It's a win-win for everyone.

So the best tip of all is to use all of the techniques we've described above, on your website. Don't just add a single text link, or use the same text link on each page. Instead, work smart by adding a variety of different types of text links on different pages. That's what our high earning affiliates have done and why they earn a great monthly commission as a result.

Next Steps

Use the tips described above, to add a variety of text links to your website. When you've finished, remove the existing Method123 banner from your website if you have one there already. The greater the variety of text links you add, the greater the commission you will earn.

If you need help or advice, then email us at to conduct a free review of your site. We'll email you some relevant text links to add to your site, to save you time.

And remember, we're here to help. So get in touch with us at any time, to help you earn a great affiliate commission each month.

Kind regards

Jim Lombardi, President
www.Method123.com