No matter how profitable you think your online business is, you can increase the flow into your bank account and make it all much more lucrative if you also have a successful affiliate program. Note I use the word ‘successful’. Getting it right will reap big rewards but getting it wrong will lead to a low amount of traffic to your site and low sales to match.

So let me give you a few tips and ideas on how to crank up your affiliate program to a much higher level.

Make It Attractive for People to Sign Up to Your Program.

If the only effort that you put in is to have a link where they click to sign up as one of your affiliates then don’t be surprised if not many people join. They need an incentive. However, if you take the time to write a few paragraphs stating the benefits of your program (much like doing a sales letter for a product) and confirming your commission rates, then there will be much more incentive for them to join. Don’t forget to stress the fact that they will be able to earn money without having to come up with any products of their own.

Make Sure Your Affiliates Have All the Marketing Materials They Need

You know your product best and you know the best way to promote it. So make sure that your affiliates do too. Give them everything they will need to make more sales – press releases, articles, email promotions, adverts – whatever you would use yourself to promote your product. Make it easy for them. The less work it is for them, the more likely that they are going to make more sales. Let them know that you’re not taking them for granted. Encourage and help them, and they will respect you more for it.

Look at it this way . . . however hard you work at promoting your product you are limited by the number of hours in the day that you can work. Now imagine having 10, 50 or even 100 affiliates out there working for you. Do the maths. I’m sure you can work out the effects that a much bigger marketing force could have on your bank balance. By all means write a promotional article but make sure that you give it to your affiliates as well so that they too can spread it over the internet. (By the way, if you are at all worried about writing articles yourself you can always search the internet for the Elance site and hire a writer to do the job for you.)

Keep in Touch With Your Affiliates

Simply keep your affiliates details on a separate list and email them all on a regular basis. Remind them of the best ways to promote the product; keep them up to date with any new marketing materials or new products that you may have produced, and don’t forget to remind them of the commission that they can earn on sales.

Why not have regular competitions between your affiliates? Pay an extra commission to the affiliate who earns the most in each week. Make sure that you keep all of the other affiliates informed of the name of each week’s winner because there’s nothing like a little competition and a healthy reward to motivate your affiliates to try harder and harder. Everyone wants to be the “Affiliate of the Week” and if it boosts your profits along the way, then why not?

To summarize:

Make it attractive for people to sign up to your program.

Make sure it is easy for your affiliates to market your products.

Ensure that you keep them motivated so that they work hard for you.

This is all really simple stuff so don’t be afraid to give it a try. You can make serious money online if you get your affiliate program set up in the way I’ve explained. Done properly, these methods can reap results beyond your wildest dreams! So . . . what are you waiting for?