Commissions / Affiliate links

Affiliate programs, such as Click Here! Program, provided the first ways for early solo and small Web publishers to make a few bucks on their websites.Click Here! In these programs, an online retailer will pay you, the publisher, a percentage on sales made after customers click through from your website to the retailer's site.Click Here! Links can include traditional banner ads, search forms and links to individual products.Click Here!

Because you only earn money when sales are made, affiliate programs will work best for you if your site's readers are consistently looking to make high-priced purchases -- for example, if you run a product review site.Click Here! If you're interested in affiliate program, browse through merchant directories like Click Here! and LinkShare to find retailers that offer products that fit your site's topic and audience.Click Here!

Once registered with a merchant's program, you can create an ad or product link on your site using a snippet of Web code downloaded from the retailer.Click Here! Some merchants go further and allow you to create virtual storefronts that match the design of your site, but where the retailer still handles all the inventory and commerce.Click Here! Be careful setting up such arrangements -- unless you want customers coming to you for return and refund questions instead of to the retailer.Click Here!

You'll want to note what percentage of a sale the retailer pays back to you, as well as the length of time after a sale that you get credit for the purchase.Click Here! Some retailers limit credit to sales made on the initial click-through, but others will give credit for any sales made within a day or so. Also, some retailers will pay a commission on purchases you personally make after clicking your own links; others may kick you out of the program for doing that.Click Here! Check a retailer's affiliate agreement and shop around for what you consider the best deal before putting links on your site.Click Here!

Many publishers have found that links to individual products return more commissions than banner ads going to a retailer's home page.Click Here! But the additional money those links earn might not be enough to justify the extra time that selecting and maintaining them requires.Click Here!