Home Business Tips

Everyone has to start somewhere, but where? If you are new to affiliate marketing or simply want to try internet marketing, you will very quickly come to realize that the intenet offers anyone young or old an opportunity and a means to generate a second income, an income that many aspire to turn into their road to riches. The problem is however and there is no getting away from it, there are a multitude of “scams” on the internet. All of which are targeted at you the newbie. So let me give you a starting point to show you how to start in affiliate marketing without getting your fingers burnt.

Whether you have a bottomless pit of money to invest or you simply need to make some extra money on line to subsidize your income, you should be cautious about joining any programs that have a high joining fee or monthly subscription. You can very quickly eat up any spare money you have unless you know what you are doing. It would be more prudent to start out with a respected program with a minimal cost attached. Once you have learnt the principles of affiliate marketing, you can then branch out into the higher cost programs.

Okay, so where do you start? Where is a good starting point?

There are several options open to you, but this article will concentrate on three considered to be the cheapest and which offer the lowest risk.

1. Blogg
2. Website
3. Splash page

• Blog

The cheapest and perhaps the easiest starting point, is to get a blog. There are many places on the internet that offer a blog platform for free, the most popular being Blogger and Wordpress. You will find links to these at the foot of this article. Whilst I would recommend Wordpress as the preferred blogging platform, for anyone new to blogging, Blogger is perhaps the easiest to start with but if you feel comfortable with making your own changes, Wordpress offers much more versatility.

Okay, so now you have your blog, but how do you make money from it?

The first think you need to do, is to start writing content to you blog on a regular basis and submit this to the search engines so that you start to see visitors – people reading your blog. Once you start to see an increase in visitors, it is time to monetize your blog (you can do this at the start if you wish but don’t expect sales until you see vistors).

There are numerous ways in which you can monetize your blog, one of the most popular being Google Adsense (Adverts by Google). When someone clicks on these advertisements, you get paid a few pence per click. This can soon add up if you have plenty of visitors. Another popular way is selling other peoples products, by placing links (affiliate links) to the sales page of the product you are advertising. You can register with popular affiliate programs like “ClickBank”, “Commission Junction” or “Amazon” for free. Each time someone clicks on your links and makes a purchase, you get paid a commission.

Another popular way of monetzing your blog, is to advertise affiliate programs that you have paid to join. This is where you will start to make a residual or passive income as more people join under you and is your stepping stone to success in affiliate marketing. This is however, also the area where you should exercise caution when joining any such programs and in your early stages, I would recommend joining only tested and proven low cost programs. I have listed a few such programs at the foot of this article.

Ask any affiliate marketer and they will tell you that having a blog is an essential part of internet marketing. Not only does it offer a platform to advertise products or services which you sell, but as you write articles or posts and publish them to your blog you are at the same time adding fresh content to your website if your blog is hosted along with your website. This statement brings me on to the next starting point – website.

• Free Website

This starting point can be very rewarding, but again, requires a degree of caution as there are many opportunities to be found offering a free website. What you find after taking up some of the free website offers, is that in reality it is not free at all, in that you are required to pay either a subscription to join the opportunity promoted on your new free website or you have to pay a monthly administration fee.

A genuine free website opportunity will only require you to pay for the hosting of the website. This is totally acceptable as you would need to do this anyway if you want your own website. Another bonus to be found with some genuine free website offers, is that you are able to promote anything you want on your website and support is given to enable you to make the changes you desire. A totally free website such as this is a rarity and hard to find without getting your fingers burnt first. There are links to such sites at the foot of this article as well as links to reviews.

As previously mentioned, having a blog hosted along with your website enables you to add fresh content to your website as you post to your blog and this in turn increases your chances of getting a higher number of visitors.

• Splash Page

The final starting point is a splash page. okay I hear you ask, what is a splash page?

A splash page is basically a sales page – a single page of text or text and graphics promoting a single product (sometimes more than one product) designed to entice the reader to click through the links on the page and purchase the product you are promoting.

When you start to promote affiliate products, many of them have have a pre-designed splash page hosted on their website. You will be given an affiliate link which you can place in advertisements either by using pay per click advertising such as Google Adwords, or by using free traffic exchanges (there is a list of links to some of the better ones below). Using this method, enables you to earn money without the necessity for a blog or a website. You should exercise caution however, when using the pay per click method as this can cost you quite a bit of your hard earned cash. Make sure you budget accordingly.  As a starting point, I would concentrate on using the free traffic exchanges to advertise.

Useful Links:-

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Free Blog Platforms

Wordpress – Get a free Wordpress Blog

Blogger – Get a free Blogger Blog

Monetize With Free To Join Affiliate Companies

Google Adsense – click here

ClickBank – click here

Commission Junction – click here

Amazon – click here

Maximum Paid Surveys – click here

S.F.I. – click here

Monetize with recommended PAY to Join Affiliate Programs

Global Domains International – $10.00 per month click here (you get a free .WS Domain Name & Hosting)

3 Cash Machine (utilizes GDI) – $10.00 per month click here (you get a free .WS Domain Name & Hosting)

Empowerism – $19.95 per month – click here

Recommended Free Website

The Plug-In Profit Site – click here – Read a review on the Plug-In Profit Site Here

see my Plug-In Profit Site Here – Make This Your Home Business

Recommended Free Traffic Exchanges

Link Referral –

Traffic Swarm – click here

Click Crazy – click here

TS25 – click here

Dragon Surf – click here

I Love Hits – click here

Ad Land Pro – click here

Easy Hits 4u – click here

Hit Gusher – click here

Click Voyager – click here

Recommended Training Program

The Pips Power Group – click here Read a review on the PPG Here

I hope you have found this article and the links within useful. Please feel free to leave any comments and if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.

Graham Maddison

Make This Your Home Business

Maverick Money Makers