Getting paid

Hi Joe,

I believe what you're asking, "...how to monetize the link to Amazon.com?", you meant you might profit from sending visitors to Amazon.com and if they should purchase something their.

If that is indeed your question, the answer is as follows:

You become an Associate/Affiliate of Amazon.com.

And you do that by simply going to their Home Page and dropping down to the bottom of the page to the "Join Associates" link; then follow the instruction after landing on the page it takes you to.

Eventually, you will be assigned an Associate's Account with your very own number. Then you will be able to generate links, buttons, banners etc. that have that Associate's number embedded in it.

Then, when you wish to refer a book or item offered on Amazon.com you do so using a link with your embedded number.

Now...the very, VERY cool thing about this is that not only do you get paid if the visitor makes the purchase you refer them there for, but the link creates a "cookie" which lasts for 30 days and ANYTHING they may purchase on Amazon.com is credited to your Associate's account.

ChaaaChing!!!

I know many folks that do nothing more than Affiliate programs.

In any event, it's relatively easy, but if you have any difficulty please do not hesitate to contact me...if, of course, that was the intent of your question.

Best of success,

Lee

Just to add another great new Amazon feature if you write e-books- check this out http://www.createspace.com/

You can do your book on-demand printed and/or e-mail and Amazon will market them on their site.

I have not investigated this yeat but plan to do so soon!

Joe: I have an Associate/Affiliate account with Amazon and it is quite easy to do. You will need to have back door access to your web site in order to embed the Amazon shopping link to it but after that it is quite simple and as Lee put it "cha ching". You can constantly change the items that you recommend your blog readers purchase...from books, to CD's to household items.

Frankly Joe, it's associated w/ your biz and marketing efforts so I'd have a chat w/ your accountant as to precisely how to deal w/ it, but my guess would be "other income" and have it offset by some equal expense you more than deserve like a nice three or four day seminar you're going to conduct on a cruise up and back to Canada.

I'd be willing to bet w/ your expertise and the networking you've done here you could get the attendees and all you need is 16 or so and get yours paid for. Put on a little workshop for 2 hours twice a day for a couple days and enjoy the third.

Ooops...another tax write-off.

Later,

Lee

Joe,

That "cruise/workshop" should be a JV w/ other experts that can fill a schedule of 6 or 8 hours.

Just a thought.

Later,

Lee

Actually Joe, while Amazon has a wide variety of different affiliate items you can sell- the percentage of income is very low and the traffic levels needed to substantiate monetization is difficult.

Angel Djambazov here on Biznik is very knowledgeable in the affiliate marketing business and helped create popshops.com (which won the best affiliate tool of 2007). He and I had planned to do a cross online promotion / affiliate marketing class but we've both been swamped the past few months.

As far as other affiliate programs... only a few thousand or so... PopShops is a good start- followed by Commission Junction, LinkShare, Performics (which are some of the larger groups with 100's of affiliate programs coordinated under a 3rd partner platform)

Thanks for bringing this topic up, Joe. We did the amazon affiliate application and are finding what Barry is saying.

We would be very interested in a workshop on affiliate marketing. As we add more e-books to our marketingyoursmallbiz.com site, we are looking for ways to cross-promote through affiliate programs.

Yes Joe, as always you have brought up a terrific topic for discussion. As a professional organizer there are often items rather than books that I would like to cross-promote through affiliate programs and a workshop would help me get a better understanding of how to maximize the revenue for myself without having to offer the entire inventory of Bed, Bath & Beyond on my site.

Judy... With this talk about affiliate marketing, I feel the need to chime in.

It's evident that I probably need some marketing assistance because I scheduled a workshop on the very topic of Getting Paid through creating Multiple Revenue Streams while performing your regular business activities AND I've had absolutely NO INTEREST, so I'm canceling the event.

If other indies are truly interested in learning more about ways to Get Paid for affiliated activities, I would be happy to participate or even facilitate.

Hi Howard,

I am sure that your workshop covers a lot of good stuff. Bob and I went to a week-long conference in Florida last October and were educated (in depth) on back-end products, The Long Tail, etc. It was very informative and we learned a lot about recurring revenue streams, in spite of some of the speakers' hype about how easy it is to make money while you sleep or golf. (It is not easy. It takes a lot of hard work.)

But what I was more interested in here was just the mechanics of setting up and managing affiliate programs. I think I get the rest.

I don't understand why you got no response to your workshop. It's a relevant topic.

Judy... One of the reasons I decided to chime into Joe's thread here is that I am very interested in his question; "And, are there other affiliate programs out there that people do besides Amazon?"

Over the years (before the internet), I have always created business with a "vertical" marketing approach and developed methods to capture revenue associated with the marketing of a specific product or service. It has served me well.

I would like to collaborate with a group of people that are also interested in this facet of entrepreneurship and how to use the new affiliate tools that the internet provides.

If you, Barry, Joe, the two Lees, or anyone else out there is interested in pursuing this topic more in depth (a discussion group or event), please chime in.

Thanks, ....Howard

I would be good for having a round-table. Through-out the years I have always had a secondary income through affiliate channels, ranging from a few hundred bucks for the year, up to about 25k in a year.

I was only doing it as a part time analysis of the selling and marketing structures involved. I've successfully ran about five affiliate programs (but compared to other affiliate marketers, not an "expert" in the field). When I was selling web templates in college my affiliate channel represented roughly 90% of the sales of my personal designs.

Now over a decade later, I would actually say that affiliate marketing online plays into search and social media marketing with a 20% mix. All affiliate channels have the potential to be both SEO/SEM assets and social networking/buzz marketing extensions. That has required my knowledge of the affiliate end of things to come back up to speed over the past two years.

If the topic were narrowly focused on setting up and managing affiliate marketing programs (rather than teaching how to actually create the products, publish your book, etc.), I'd be interested in a roundtable discussion, if the date and time worked. Thanks, Howard, for stepping in and moving things along.