Single or Double Opt-In — Which Should You Use?

Is Affiliate Marketing A Waste Of Time?

Affiliate marketing is not a waste of time. It can bring you massive rewards (high incomes) if done correctly. Here are 10 mistakes both in your approach and methods you need to avoid if you are to do this and realistically earn decent money online.

Mistake 1 — Expecting an instant return

This is the first crucial reason why so many new affiliates leave the industry after just a couple of months. They don’t recognize the need to build your presence on the web, demonstrate your own expertise to your visitors, and allow your site to grow organically in your niche circles and with search engines. This means you are not going to make any money for the first month, maybe two, maybe three, but if you persist, and put yourself out there, then the returns will be just around the corner. You really do get what you put into your marketing strategy- remember there is no such thing as the holy grail of an overnight, automated, turnkey profit machine which so many new affiliates spend their time and money searching for. Be ready to Get Rich Slow, not quick, and think about the long-term gains rather than the short time losses.

Mistake 2 — Giving up too early

Due to this short-term outlook, many people leave the industry after getting disheartened due to the lack of any tangible short-term return. But you wouldn’t give up on a good strategy and product if you were running a brick-and-mortar business, would you? In the same way, you must stick at it and dedicate yourself to marketing your selected product for however long it takes — if you don’t see the required success after a few months only then should you think about moving on — you must really ask yourself though if you have tried everything you can to make that project a success. Just think that one day you could get that backlink to overtake your main competitor and the sales would come rolling in.

Mistake 3 — Failure to research

One of the reasons many people do fail is because their niche and product selection are both poor and lazy. Spending a few quality hours researching beforehand can save you many more hours when it comes to actually market your product. If you are in an overly competitive niche with low returns, or your product sales copy is obviously poor, you will be wasting your valuable time trying to penetrate an impenetrable market. To find the best products you need to look away from the obvious sources like ClickBank and try to tap the neglected niches which bring the super affiliates their success.

Mistake 4 — Not knowing enough about affiliate marketing itself

In the same way, it pays to read articles like this one which helps to expand your knowledge of the affiliate industry and find new, more effective techniques in affiliate marketing. Keep on top of any new developments by reading forums, articles, and blogs on pertinent issues, and don’t get left behind by new changes. Marketing weapons like social bookmarking are making many affiliates very rich and you should aim to capitalize too.

Mistake 5 — Failure to learn from mistakes

Sometimes however your product promotion will fail despite all your preparation and research. It is often difficult to understand exactly why this is but it is essential you really study where you have gone wrong, learn from the mistakes you made, and make relevant improvements to your future marketing campaigns. As I said, just giving up quickly is not going to get you anywhere and all your effort will go to waste. For example from my own experience I have found in the past, I wasn’t preselling my products enough on my website, writing too many low-quality articles, and also not spending enough hours on some parts of my marketing strategy. I have consequently amended my approach to affiliate marketing and as a result, I am now really starting to see the results- it is no coincidence that the most successful affiliates have had a spectacular amount of failed projects but have learned from these mistakes. This article highlights the most common mistakes, so use this article as your perfect head start.

Mistake 6 — Wasting too much time building your website

This is a problem most beginners suffered from and one which afflicts many online entrepreneurs  — in the early days I was always trying to play around with my website, making it look nice and adding loads of cool features. You honestly don’t need to do this, even if it is more fun than writing adverts or articles. Your time is far better spent on marketing your site and getting people to start reading your content. Only once your traffic is in the thousands should you ever start to think about your website’s attractiveness and functionality — you should just be using some simple presell pieces of high-quality and relevant content in the beginning.

Mistake 7 — Looking for the easy way out

This is another big mistake plaguing the majority of new affiliates. What I mean by the easy way out is all those products that are quite obviously far too good to be true. You have to work hard for targeted traffic, backlinks, sales, etc. so stop believing the ridiculous hype surrounding most affiliate marketing and website promotion products. For instance, you will not get 1000 targeted visitors a day for just $20; you will not get good backlinks for paying a nominal fee to some bloke sat in his pajamas; no product will convert at 25%, and you will not make money from anything taking only 5 minutes each day. I went through a period buying a lot of the garbage out there and wasted a lot of my time and money — I know you’re desperate for success but there is honestly no easy way to get there. The easy part only comes when you’ve put a lot of hard hours in and your traffic and sales can start to sustain themselves organically.

Mistake 8 — Buying Get Quick Rich style affiliate guides

This is very much linked to the point above but I feel deserves a special mention. Again, I have purchased a few of these guides myself and have taken very little useful information away (and filed for quite a few refunds along the way). Put it this way — if you possessed the secrets to making thousands of dollars on autopilot, would you sell them to your competitors for $40 each? No, I thought not, and that’s why I recommend you steer well clear of the Get Rich Quick nonsense.

Mistake 9 — Thinking only in the long term for planning

This is a slightly more complex psychological issue with affiliate marketing. The problem is that too many people focus on their long-term dreams and get caught up — they begin to dream of quitting their job, buying a Ferrari, traveling the world or whatever else it may be, and forget the sensible plan they drew up. It is therefore more sensible to keep your focus on long-term objectives and then you do not become disappointed by the slow rate of growth you are likely to experience in the beginning. Setting short-term targets like reaching your first sale, writing 10 marketing articles or posting in 10 different forums for your niche, will keep you motivated and will lead, eventually, to you fulfilling your long-term dreams.

Mistake 10 — Inability to innovate

Innovation is becoming more and more important as the affiliate niches become more and more crowded. Like in any other competitive industry it pays to set yourself apart.

How about:

• Offering a free e-book selling your links inside?
• Creating a free report, detailing your customer’s current status and preselling your products which will help him improve it.
• Offering a useful complementary service to go with your affiliate products?
• Demonstrating your expertise in private lessons?
• Even creating videos and software promoting your product?

It really is the case that the more ways you can think of to create an online presence the more traffic and commissions you’re going to have.

To conclude…

I hope you can take these mistakes and their solutions away with you and really start to make a career in affiliate marketing. There is real money to be made out there and if you are dedicated and learn from your mistakes then the sky’s the limit.

Good Luck in your online marketing journey.

Get in here for the most effective method in Online Marketing.

Get in here for software with Proven ways that will solve your affiliate marketing problem forever.

Go here for more articles.