Making compelling headlines
In order to entice affiliates to join your affiliate program, you need to write compelling proposals that will make your offer stick out in their inboxes and force them to open that email and read it word-for-word. The only real way you can do this is to hone your copywriting skills and continue practicing writing those proposals.
Like writing compelling ads and email messages, the first key to getting your proposal read is to come up with a terrific headline that will compel the prospective affiliate to open up your proposal and read it.
You definitely want to write a headline that is compelling and stands out from the crowd of emails that is likely in your prospective afiliate’s inbox. Utilizing any swipe files and ebooks you have on compelling headlines would certainly help you create an appropriately compelling headline.
Without that compelling headline, you have virtually no chance of getting that prospect to open your email and begin reading your proposal, so just like a sales letter, writing a compelling proposal with a poor headline will be virtually a waste of your time, so focus on that headline first.
After you’ve come up with several compelling headlines, then you can focus on the rest of the proposal. In it, you should tell why his/her promoting of your products would be great for him/her and his/her subscribers and why your affiliate program is one program they cannot afford to pass up on joining. You’ll have to promise big benefits and opportunities in order to get them to successfully join and then deliver on those promises, and more, to successfully keep them.
For more information on sites you can check out to help you write compelling headlines and more information you need to include in your proposal, check out “Managing Your Affiliates.”
Creating relationships
Affiliate marketing, like Internet marketing, involves building relationships if you truly want to earn substantial profits online.
This means that you need to be committed to your affiliates for the long-term, not just for your current product launch. After all, you’re not likely going to get rich enough to retire from one product launch, so to gain more substantial profits in the future, you need to enlist the abilities of your affiliates for all future product launches as well. In addition, it’s quite easy for affiliates to jump from one affiliate program to the next, promoting another Internet marketer’s products.
Therefore, it is essential that you keep your affiliate program top-notch and up-to-date, as well as ensure you have a good working relationship with your affiliates. This includes being courteous to them, answering any questions they may have, assisting them whenever possible, and making it as easy and as profitable as possible the task of promoting and selling your products.
The more positive relationships you can develop with your affiliates, the harder they will work for you and the more profits they will bring in for you. Additionally, they may also put in good words with friends of theirs, who are likely affiliates for other Internet marketers. If they find out that your affiliate program is a quality program and that you appreciate all the hard work your affiliates do by presenting them with bonuses, gifts, advice, and encouragement, chances are that you will gain new affiliates without actively searching for them.
The old saying goes, “Relationships open up opportunities,” and that goes the same for recruiting affiliates as well.
For more information on increasing the size of your affiliate sales force, read “Managing Your Affiliates.”
How to Overdeliver
If your affiliate program is new and you are just recruiting your first affiliates, you may have to really “overdeliver” in order to get people to join your affiliate program.
Just like with buying a product from a new Internet marketer who you’ve never heard of before, it’s likely most people will be overly cautious when hearing about your affiliate program, since they are not familiar with who you are and what your products are all about.
It would be helpful if you had some publicity about your reputation and ability to deliver quality products in the past. This would include some publicity on forums and blogs that relate to your industry and target market. Additionally, if more prominent Internet marketers are willing to vouch for your reputation and the quality of your products, it will likely be easier to obtain quality affiliates.
Therefore, before you begin promoting that you have an affiliate program, it would be wise to spend some time building a quality reputation and delivering quality products over a period of time so that you are not so “brand new” out there that most affiliates don’t just ignore you or overlook you because they are concerned over your lack of experience or their lack of information about the type of business you are running and the quality of products you are delivering. Essentially, you need to have a bit of a track record before you begin your own affiliate program to have the best chance of recruiting the best affiliates available. Just “coming out of the clear blue sky” will likely not net you any quality affiliates who can boost your profits.
For more information on building a quality affiliate program and recruiting top-performing affiliates to it, check out “Managing Your Affiliates.”
