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Affiliate Programs… A Great Way to Make an Some Extra Cash
Affiliate programs are a great way to earn some extra cash by doing pretty much nothing. All you really need is some spare sidebar space on your site, and a somewhat decent and loyal user base. The key is to find and join affiliate programs that offer a reasonable payback and provide a product or service that that has some sort of relation to the content you provide on your site. Odds are that if the source of the affiliate program does well on its own, you will do well by advertising their product on your site.
Keep it Relevant
But what about the ever so popular Google Adsense? Personally, I hate Adsense… Its ugly and unpredictable. Yes, you can make a decent chunk of change from Google, but if I am going to make money from advertisements on a site of mine, I want to make it as clean, attractive and relative as I can for my users. Case in point are the links I provide on WPelements.com. You will have noticed by now that in my sidebar that I have a little block entitled “Recommended Links”. “Recommended” because I have personally used or currently use each product and site linked in my sidebar. This is another good way to ensure you are going to get payback out of your affiliate links. Odds are that if you are a personal fan of the products you are linking on your site, a good majority of your users will find them useful as well.
My Recommendation
One of my biggest earners is actually the “Premium News” affiliate program provided by Adii at PremiumNewsTheme.com. The Premium News collection of WordPress themes is a proven brand that I personally recommend to many of my clients. The Premium News affiliate program provides a 20% kick back for everything sold through your site which has been very generous from my experience on WPelements.com. There is also a wide variety of creative available in nearly any size which you could integrate anywhere within your site.
Conclusion
So, if you have a little space to spare and want to make some extra cashola, check into an affiliate program. Just remember to keep it above the fold, make it relevant, and make it look interesting. Mix in some free links along with the product links to make it look less “advertisement” like. And if you are running WordPress, there are several plugins available to make your life easier while managing affiliate ads. For 125 x 125 advertisements similar to the ones on WPelements.com, HackWordPress.com recently released a new plugin called Show125 that should do the trick.
7 Responses to “Affiliate Programs… A Great Way to Make an Some Extra Cash”
Leave a Reply
July 6th, 2008 at 9:49 pm
How much traffic is required to become an affiliate?
July 7th, 2008 at 4:59 am
That’s the thing… Traffic is not a requirement to become an affiliate, just to make money from being an affiliate.
July 7th, 2008 at 6:33 am
Thanks for the awesome words and vote of confidence bud!
I can second your reasoning behind only displaying affiliate ads that are relevant to your content, as judging by our top-earners (of which you are Top 5), most of them are on WordPress / web design-related sites.
July 7th, 2008 at 7:24 am
great advice… Thanks Jason
July 7th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
roll out with new themes pls!!
July 7th, 2008 at 1:49 pm
Hey You… Ok…
July 9th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Do you get an email from Ejunkie when something sales from your site or do you have to keep an eye out on your sales from the ejunkie site?