Barter For Business – Cost Free Trading

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: General | Response: 0

Whether you are a designer, traffic broker, content provider or, web host the one thing that will connect your business in some form is that other webmasters at some point, will want the services and products that you offer. With this in mind, you are instantly at an advantage the reason for this advantage will become apparent in this brief article.
Bartering Goods And Services.

Bartering is a business practice that is as old as mankind itself, from the stone age right up to the present day individuals have been trading their goods and services for other goods and services of like value. This is where your advantage comes into play. Perhaps you are a web hosting company in need of design work or, perhaps you are a designer in need of traffic, either way, there will always be other webmaster who want the services you offer and, in return they will offer services that you require. This is the absolute fundamental basis of the barter system, trade one product or service for another in order to improve the way in which you do things.

Finding A Company To Barter With.

The problem that so often arises when bartering is involved however is finding a vehicle for you to start the bartering process. More often than not you can find someone on a message forum that will be willing to barter your services however, this is not always the case and so, you should turn to email to instigate the initial contact.

Asking For A Barter – How To.

First and foremost, before sending an email or making a post asking to barter your services or products you should compile a list of items that you need, this could be content, advertising, graphics work or even web hosting, either way, by having a clear concise list of what you are in need of and, more importantly, what you can offer in return prior to sending an email will help you out immensely.

Now that you have your list of services you require and what you can offer in return it comes to the initial contact, the first thing you should do is explain what it is you are proposing as clearly as possible, explain why a barter with you will become a win/win situation for the both of you as well as making sure you drop a compliment or two about their company in the email. Also, you should prove why offering your services in exchange for theirs will be a fair trade, by doing all of this at the first point of contact you stand a much better chance of them accepting your trade proposal.

Bartering – Recap.

Bartering is a strong tool that can help you build your business from the very second you start it however, with this strong tool also comes the opportunity for it to become a strong negative when running your business. To much time concentrating on bartering services can take away from running your business to its fullest, rather than trying to barter services all the time, ensure you build a good capital up so you are able to invest in services to build your business. Either way, whether you choose to barter or not, this method has been proven in success for thousands of years, why not try it out for yourself?

Article written by Lee.

Whats A Twink

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: General | Response: 0

I think you would be surprised at the number of times I have been asked, “What’s a Twink?” Or my, personal, favorite “So how do two men have sex?”

If you know me, you know I am never really bothered by questions – I never mind people’s candor. What does bother me, though, is the bulk of the people who ask are trying to work the gay market. Unsuccessfully, I might add.

So, let’s expand our webmaster knowledge. Don’t worry, I am not about to explain how two men have sex (that I will save for my story site LOL)

I have decided, however, to give you a Gay Glossary of sorts. There are many terms that can be included here. But, I thought to start off, we will hit the basics and add to it as time goes on. Keep an eye for future articles and additions on Gay Wide Webmasters.

Here is a list of the most common terms on the Gay Adult ‘net:

• Twink – A buff and lean young man; a 20 something. Age and leanness make the guy a twink. The best example is your typical bar room stripper.
• Teen – This is the same thing as in EVERY market, hot young and under twenty – but LEGAL at 18.
• Hunk/Stud – Beautiful, built and beefcake. The guys commonly posing for calendars and such.
• Chubs (or chubby) – Just what it sounds like, a larger man. Not just muscular weight, most often heavy set.
• Bears – This is a HAIRY man. Not a young guy, most often over thirty, sometimes with a husky build (but not always). You will probably see this niche sold as “Real Men”.
• Cub – This is a YOUNG hairy guy. Sort of a HAIRY TWINK…
• Daddies – Daddies are men over thirty, who like younger guys. (Just a side note here to clear up some misconceptions, not all gay men want to do young guys!)
• Sons – the young male counterparts to Daddies. The young of the two can be a twink, cub or teen – makes no difference. This term is based on the visual couple. For our non-gay friends think of this as an example: the businessman who goes away for the weekend with his NEICE. See the comparison? LOL
• Transvestite – is a man who dresses as a woman. Whether it is simple underwear or all our female attire. A lot of webmasters confuse this with Transsexual.
• Transsexual – is a person who has decided to make the complete change and have a sex change.
• Trans Gender – this is a more general term for people who live life as the opposite sex. They are in the process of, or have completed, a sex change.

So know go have some fun. Try to classify your friends and lovers in these terms! I enjoy it when a webmistress comes up to me and says, “I heard your interview and I think my husband is a bear. But he’s a little twink-ish. What do you think?” This just makes my day! I have to laugh at the look on their husband’s face when they think I’m going to ask to examine them or something. “Turn you head and cough – OH! You’re a Twink…”

Along with what works, I have to offer some terms that DO NOT work. If used incorrectly or out of context, then your attempt at marketing to gay men can be dreadful.

• Faggot – I hate this word, personally. This is a word that is as derogatory to the Gay Community as other words are to a race.
• Nancy boy – a typically non-US term that basically is used as a derogatory manner.
• Lil Boys – a derogatory term used primarily in the Southern and Mid-Western US. It’s derived from the negative connotation that gay men are pedophiles.
• Gay Owned and Operated. Allow me to be blunt – If it is not true, do not say it. This is probably the most OVER used phrase in the gay adult market. So much so, it is relatively meaningless today.

We all need to remember from time to time, the key to success in any business is knowledge. Whether you are up selling to a sponsor or designing sites, knowing some of the more common terminology in the gay community can only help your ventures in the gay adult market. And remember, do not be afraid to try and NEVER be afraid to ask.

As always, good luck!

Article written by Gary-Alan

Thumbnail Preview TGPs And The Gay Market Place

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: TGP | Response: 0

One of the latest crazes to hit the gay adult market from a webmasters point of view is that of the thumbnail preview TGP and, more surprisingly than this is the fact that this new breed of gay adult TGP seems to attract more traffic than the standard format TGP ever did so, what is a thumbnail preview TGP and just how do you go about making one of your own? This is what we will investigate in this article.

Thumbnail Preview TGP Basics.

A thumbnail preview TGP is just as the name suggests, a standard TGP with one main difference, the TGP itself doesn’t list gallery descriptions rather a small preview image of the content placed on each of the galleries submitted. This thumbnail preview is usually size between 100×100 pixels and 60×60 pixels in dimension however, the thumbnail preview size can be determined by the webmaster owning the TGP.

How Do I Start My Own Thumbnail Preview TGP?

In order to start your own thumbnail preview TGP you will need a couple of things, first and foremost, a domain name to run it on, the current trend in the gay marketplace is to name your TGP something short, memorable and, well, brand able so, the domain name you choose for your TGP should take all of these aspects into consideration. The next thing you will need in order to run your own gay thumbnail preview TGP will be the script which you use to manage the TGP itself, for this purpose I would highly recommend Autogallery MySQL from http://www.jmbsoft.com it is affordable and, easy to maintain which is a must if you are wanting to run a sizable TGP. One other thing that you may also like to consider investing in for your thumbnail preview TGP is a design, in fact, most of the ‘good’ thumbnail preview TGPs whether they are focused in the straight or gay market, have a clean, almost pay site quality design aspect to them. Of course, you do not need to keep up with the joneses however, if it works for other people, then why not see if it will work for you also?

Thumbnail TGP Structure.

So you now have a domain and have purchased the script and / or design that you want to use on your thumbnail preview TGP what next? Well first things are first, you should take a look at some of the other sites that currently exist and see how they do things, find out what things you feel they are doing wrong and, capitalize on that.

You should also make some decisions now as to the look and feel you want your thumbnail preview TGP to have, how many galleries are you going to list on the front page each day? Will you be utilizing the archives feature of your TGP script? What limitations do you want to put on submissions from other webmasters? These are all aspects of running a TGP that you need to think of prior to opening your site up for general submissions.

In general however, you will find that most thumbnail preview TGP sites will have roughly 100 thumbnail images on their front page of the site with any additional galleries being listed in their archives section again, you should decide on how you want to maintain your own site.

Getting Traffic To Your Thumbnail Preview TGP.

Now you have hopefully set your thumbnail preview TGP live you need to do one final step in making the TGP itself a huge success, get the traffic flowing, one of the best ways to do this, as with any other type of site is to ask your friends and associates to trade traffic with your site however, should this not be an option then you should use more conventional methods such as submitting galleries to other TGP sites ensuring that you use a recip to your TGP on each gallery as well as utilizing other forms of traffic such as cheap brokered traffic, top lists, web rings and, even counters, within a month or so you will soon start to see a steady flow of new webmaster gallery submissions and, with each new submission comes more traffic and ultimately, more income from your site.

Article written by Lee

Building A Surfer Trap – Stage 5

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: Traffic | Response: 0

So we hit stage 5 in this surfer trap tutorial.

It was brought to my attention this morning that we never added any ALT tags to our single FPA link so, in a change to the planned tutorial I am going to touch on this stage as, once the search engines get to our surfer traps this is going to be a crucial aspect on how highly we get ranked.

So what’s next?

Ok, now what you have to do is go back to manually editing the FPA’s (All of them!)

What you need to do is this…

Take the Multi-Site FPA first then, on ALL of the links that lead to the single site FPA’s you need to add the ALT tag. Again, in the same way as we did originally however, instead of using this tag on the images we will use this on the actual TEXT of the link so, for example the link which may be:

‘Voyeur Porn’ leading to the FPA you have for the Voyeur niche in the HTML coding will already look like this:

<a href=”mydomain.com”>Voyeur Porn</a>

Will get turned into:

<a href=”mydomain.com” ALT=”More Niche Related Keywords”>Voyeur Porn</a>

The reason we are going back over these links now and not earlier on is because you should hopefully have started to get a small amount of traffic from your counter impressions. These counters are virtually ALWAYS being crawled by the search engines due to the amount of people linking to them so, by optimizing our site at this stage, it makes it less work in getting into the search engines.

One other thing that we can now start to do (as we did a couple of stages back) is to create some more HTML pages with some tables on them, however, these will be HTML pages on their own with no images on them. Again however, you should make them 4 columns across and two rows high.

What you want to add into these tables are NICHE links so for example, taking the TEEN niche we would make eight links like:

Teen Sex
College Girls
Erotic Teens
Teen Porn
Etc
Etc
Etc
Etc…

You should do this for each of the MAIN niches so you would have a table for Teen, Gay, Mature, Asian, Ebony, Fetish and one for General and again, these should link to the NICHE FPA’s that you already have created.

These tables will be used for another console on our surfer trap however, before we implement this console we are going to have some fun with them.

Article written by Lee

Using TITLE Tags effectively

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: Search Engine Optimization, WebDesign | Response: 0

Microsoft Internet Explorer has supported the TITLE attribute for links since version 4.0. Netscape began supporting it in version 6.0

The TITLE attribute allows you to enter descriptive text about a link that’s displayed when the mouse moves over the link. For an example, move your mouse over the link below:

The HTML source code for this link is shown below:

<a href="http://www.europeanwebmasters.com"
  title="Click Here To Learn Foreign Adult Marketing">European Webmasters</a>

If your browser supports the TITLE attribute you should see a small popup box appear, similar to the way alternate text for images is displayed when you move your mouse over the image.

This attribute is similar to the ALT attribute for the IMG tag, both in its appearance and its limitations. The value of the attribute must be inside quotation marks, and it can only contain plain text (no HTML tags). You can include carriage returns in the title, and these will be displayed in the text. The maximum length of the TITLE text for Internet Explorer is very large; we’ve tested it with over 500 characters. Try to keep your descriptions below 25 words, though; any more than this can be hard to read and, because the search engine spiders can read this text you may be considered as spamming the engines.

The TITLE attribute is useful in places where your HTML design limits the length of your link text. That’s often the case for links in a navigation bar, especially if your page has a multi-column layout. Try using the TITLE attribute to give your visitors extra navigation information.

In addition you can also use the TITLE tag on standard text for extra information where you just don’t have the space to be as affluent as you would like. An example of this is shown below:

Use of the TITLE tag on plain text

The HTML code for this is also shown below:

This attribute is part of the HTML 4.0 standard. Internet Explorer, Netscape 6.x and Opera (Version 3.0 or higher) support it. However, the attribute degrades gracefully, visitors with non-supporting browsers (like Netscape 4.x) would see the link as if you hadn’t used the attribute.

As you can see from the above examples by using the TITLE tags effectively you can double, if not treble your use of keywords however, caution should be paid when using these features of the tag so that you don’t inadvertently spam the search engines.

Article Written By Lee

How To Use ALT Tags On Your Sites

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: WebDesign | Response: 0

One simple technique can improve your search engine rank, make site navigation easier, and increase the accessibility of your site to disabled visitors. Yet, as many as 78% of sites don’t use it! Boost your site’s profile with human visitors and search engine spiders with the <ALT> tag.

Inserting ALT Text

Adding <ALT> descriptions to your <IMG> tags is quick and easy. You don’t have to do any complex HTML coding. If you can describe your image or link, then you can add ALT tags to your code.

We’ve used some examples below:

<img src="thumbnails/porn.jpg" 
  width="100" height="78" ALT="Explicit Teenage Sex Pictures">

You can also include an ALT tag when your image is a link:

<a href="porn.html"> 
<img src="thumbnails/porn.jpg" 
width="100" height="78" ALT="Explicit Teenage Sex Pictures"></a>

Ideally, your ALT text descriptions should be complete sentences, rather than a list of keywords or obscure phrase like “company logo small 2.” Remember that all visitors are likely to see (or hear) some version of your ALT text so be sure that it’s meaningful.

Optimize ALT Descriptions For Search Engines

Besides helping human visitors, ALT descriptions help you rank higher in some search engines. AltaVista and Google are two of the search engines that use ALT descriptive text when they rank Web sites. The growth of search engine/directory partnerships means that a high rank in one engine can often translate into an improved rank on its partner sites.

Search engine algorithms calculate the number of times keywords are repeated and give higher rank to pages that use them often. Keywords in the ALT descriptive text help you increase their frequency on the page. Search engines assume the terms are more relevant and important if they’re used in the page content, not just listed in the META tag.

For instance, the descriptive text in the example code uses keywords and keyword phrases from the META keyword tag: Explicit Teenage Sex Pictures. Since these are relevant to the site’s content, they’re easy to include as descriptive text.

If you’re having problems choosing relevant, targeted keywords, refer to this article, How To Pick Your Keywords. It provides helpful tips about selecting keywords and using them to improve your search engine ranking.

Make Your Web Site Sticky

ALT tags help you promote your site in another way too: they help make it “sticky.” Sticky means that visitors stay at your site longer so they see your advertising and purchase your memberships. Visitors who feel comfortable at a site will stay longer – and hopefully return more often to make further purchases.

Disabled visitors who use text-only or spoken word browsers rely on the ALT text for clues about the image’s content and function. This can be a lucrative audience: they represent a worldwide audience of 750 million and spend twice as much time online as the average user. But it isn’t just a disability issue: ALT tags make your site more accessible to everyone.

Visitors see your ALT text while the images are downloading or when they mouse over images. The descriptive text helps them decide if they want to wait for an image to download or move on to a different page. If your image is also a link, then visitors can read the explanatory text and quickly jump to the section they want.

Site navigation is easier, so impatient visitors are less likely to leave the site.

Don’t Follow The Crowd

ALT tags are a small addition to your HTML code that can make a big impact on your site. Since many of your competitors don’t use them, give your site and edge and include them on all images.

Article Written By Lee

Using Mainstream Sponsors On Adult Sites

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: Sponsors | Response: 0

With the adult industry moving more and more into the mainstream web every week that passes as late i thought it would be an idea to show you guys how it is possible to use mainstream sponsor programs on your adult sites to build up a steady commission check even when a surfer going to your adult site doesnt actually buy anything from your adult sponsor.

Mainstream Sponsor Programs – The Choices.

The first thing that you need to do is to choose a mainstream sponsor that offers you a good choice of products / services to market to your surfers mainstream affiliate programs such as Click Bank, Commission Junction and, Amazon.com are all good places to find a selection of mainstream products and services you can offer your surfers in addition to the adult sponsors you currently use.

Mainstream Affiliate Programs – Setting Up.

The first thing that you need to do however in order to offer the mainstream affiliate program products to your surfers is to register a generic, non-adult domain name and, instantly get this domain setup on your current web server.

This will be the domain name you use for all correspondence between the mainstream affiliate networks and yourself in addition, this will also be the ONLY domain that you utilize the mainstream linking codes on.

Using Mainstream Sponsors – Getting Started.

The first thing that you need to do now you have your domain and mainstream affiliate networks sorted out is to build a couple of specific ‘doorway pages’ on your new generic domain name. This could include something like an article or product review or perhaps something as simple as an image of the product and a short description which you can use to lead the surfer into the mainstream affiliate programs site, either way, the idea is to have the root of the domain 100% free of adult content and utilize specific doorway pages which you can link to from your adult sites.

Generating Mainstream Traffic.

Onto the really easy part, your current free sites all have an enter and exit link correct? If so then you are already half way finished, all you now need to do is to ensure that EVERY SINGLE exit link goes to your mainstream doorway page for a specific product or group of products. Make sure that you do not link to the root of your generic domain at any time but only to specific doorways and, that each of these doorways has a link to the root domain.

By linking to your generic site in this way, you are enabling the surfer to choose whether they first of all, want to look at your adult site or, they want to leave the site and go to your mainstream affiliate network sponsor in the process giving you the potential of making a sale at the mainstream affiliate program.

Mainstream Sponsor Programs – An Overview.

By utilizing mainstream affiliate programs in this way you are not only potentially increasing your bottom lines but, you are also utilizing every single click that you get both to and from your site, to often webmasters send their exit links to places like disney.com or google.com and in doing so, they lose out on potential incomes, hopefully when you start marketing your exit links in the manner explained above you will begin to see the benefit of how both adult and, mainstream sponsors can be used in conjunction with each other in order to increase your bottom line profits.

Article written by Lee

Domain Name Renewals – The Basics

Date: 2011.02.22 | Category: Domain Names | Response: 0

As an adult webmaster there is one thing that we all own which we build our businesses on, a domain name and, with this comes the responsibility to ensure that as long as we are running our business from any given domain that we ensure they are constantly under our control this is where domain name renewsl come into play.

Domain Name Registration Periods.

Almost all reputable domain name registrars will allow you to purchase a domain for anywhere between one and ten year periods. Many webmasters however only choose to register their domains for one year at a time and this, is where many webmaster can run into problems with their domains. More often than not webmasters will either forget to renew their domain names completely or, are not aware that they are even coming up for renewal. For this reason it is usually best to ensure that you register your domains for a minimum period of two years, this gives you a good time frame to start using the domain as well as ensuring you have enough funds available by the time the domain name comes due for renewal.

How To Stay On Top Of Your Renewals.

The simplest way to ensure that you keep on top of the domain names you own and when they are due for renewal is to keep a written document detailing as much information as possible about your domains, this document should include information such as the domain name itself, the registrar you used to register your domain name, the cost of the domain name and, most importantly, where the domain is pointing to, the period of registration and, the date when the domain needs to be renewed. By having this information readily available and, by keeping this document up to date with each new domain name purchase you should be able to ensure that no matter when your domain/s become due for renewal that you are on the ball with paying the domain name renewal fees.

Domain Name Renewals Overview.

Regardless of when you register a domain name the one way you can be sure to be the owner of the domain for years to come is to ensure that you keep accurate, detailed records of each domain name purchase, whether you keep this written on a calendar, on a piece of paper or, somewhere else, you should make part of your monthly routine checking this document and making sure that the domains you own are all fully working and, more importantly, are fully paid up.

Article written by Lee

Penis Enlargement Pills

Date: 2011.02.24 | Category: Sponsors | Response: 0

Well if you’re a guy who had to shower after gym class, or woman with a boring husband or a gay man looking for Mr. Right we all know SIZE Matters!

Do I a have your attention? Good! Now, let’s get on with it!

Like many people, I have always experimented with secondary or even tertiary sponsors for my free sites. In my case most of them do not only pertain to a site membership. I have found success with things like, Viagra online; security programs to remove you net affairs; sex toys and videos; and, today’s’ latest a greatest is penis enlargement remedies.

I’m finding some astonishing success with these herbal penis enlargement products. I’m SELLING it not USING it! LOL. Some of us don’t need it <wink>. But I’m finding lots of my surfers do need it, or at least want it.

A couple of months ago after seeing an influx of email to Gay Wide Webmasters for hints on selling penis enlargement medications, I decided it would only benefit my member and myself to experiment. I used a sponsor on Gay Wide Webmasters, Albion Medical who boasted great returns and high payouts. Well what I was in store for was BETTER than I expected. By the way, here’s a little secret; I do sign up for my own sponsors but under my real name, so unless they really look hard, they do not know it’s me. I don’t go boasting with out proper backup = )

Amid my salesmanship attempts for surfers to “Sign Up!” I sprinkled my secondary ads for Penis Growth among the pics with lines like “Become Mr. Right – turn your dick into a DONG” or “Make your manhood massive… Even straight guys will look!” And to my surprise, it worked wonders. I know there is an attitude in the gay male community to seek perfection physical most of all. And it definitely came clearer to me with the number of sales.

It’s funny how many different ways you can approach selling things that will enhance a person. To me, telling me I need something to make me better pisses me off. Don’t try selling something to me by TELLING ME I’m not right. Or what I have is wrong. I’m definitely a person who marches to the beat of his own drum. And then there are people who NEED to be told they are not everything society expects them to be. That they are doing or have something wrong but it can be fix and you have the solution.

Like the examples above, “Become Mr. Right…” I took the effect that I was letting the surfer make up his own mind. Does he have an issue? It was entirely up to him to decide. Let me tell you, it works well on gay traffic. Let the gay surfer decide yes or no.

NOW, I tried a different approach and gauged the success/failure. I popped in text links like “Aren’t you upset by how small your penis is?” “Remember the guys making fun of you in the showers after gym?” or “Are you sick that you don’t fill up you the front of your briefs?” Well let me tell you the number of Emails I rec’d was “enlarged”! For the most part I was getting mail from men who felt I was exploiting them, even making fun of them. I made them feel inadequate and they lost their hard-on. My site was meant to entertain not disdain them. All I could say was WOW! I didn’t expect that kind of response. I will tell you that I was very happy that I didn’t do it across all of my sites and only a few. So I moved everything back to my “Let him decide” campaigns.

The affect of the sales on the “insulting ads” was evident. According to my traffic program it was apparent that these ads were NOT getting clicks. Instead the surfers clicked on my email link to voice their disgust.

The bottom line of all this? With the proper motivation, the right marketing approach, surfers enjoy the seclusion of buying penis enlargement aids online. It is a great addition to your web site income among other avenues.

Article written by Gary-Alan

Choosing The Right Sponsor For Your Site

Date: 2011.02.21 | Category: Sponsors | Response: 0

Affiliate programs (also frequently called referral or associate programs) have grown today to become one of the most popular ways for you to earn an income from your web site’s traffic. Most affiliate programs are designed to allow you to simply set up and begin earning commissions on visitors and sales you refer. However, the quality of the programs, and the results you will see, very greatly from program to program, making it important to choose wisely which are best for you and your site. It is the purpose of this article to help sort through many of the programs, and offer assistance in determining what to look for.

My personal experience with affiliate programs goes back over a year and a half, pretty long in Internet terms. Over this period, I researched many of the affiliate programs available on the Internet and, tried to best determine what works best. From my experiences, here are several of the top factors you should take into consideration:

1- Stability of the company and program

What I found to be the one of highest priorities for most webmasters is the stability of the affiliate program, and the company. This should be one of your top considerations when evaluating programs. Is the company stable and financially sound? Do they offer assistance with promoting the opportunity? And, do they pay in a timely fashion? Often, webmasters have been lured in by offers of high commissions, only to find out they will never see a paycheck, despite referring hundreds, or even hundreds of thousands, of visitors.

2- Synergies with your site

I am a big proponent of this. All too often, I see sites sign up for every affiliate program they can, figuring if they make a few bucks on each, that they will be profitable. For a select few, this may very well work. However, for most sites it will not, and many cases you will turn off your audience because of the ‘over-commercialization’ of your site. As you are considering the various affiliate programs available, be sure to consider what exactly your audience, your visitors, might be interested in clicking on, and eventually buying.

For example, if your site caters to a general audience, then perhaps general affiliate programs such as Adult Revenue Service, will be effective. Or perhaps Evidence Eliminator, which allows you to sell privacy / security software. If your site only caters to a specific niche, programs such as Adult Revenue Service should be excellent money-makers as they have a wide and varied selection of adult sites which you may promote. The key is to not just think of the affiliate program as a way for you to make some easy money, but rather an extension of your web site, a service you offer your visitors to help them find the products or services they are interested in, at good prices, and with a company they can trust.

3- Commission Tracking

An important aspect to consider is whether or not the affiliate program offers some way for you to track your sales, and even the number of visitors you refer. There are several ways this can be accomplished, such as real-time, online reports showing you sales and your commissions. Or perhaps sales can be tracked through a simple email each time you receive a new customer. This can be very important for allowing you to test and evaluate the effectiveness of the program, make comparisons with other programs or advertising opportunities, and give you piece of mind that you are receiving what is fairly do.

4- Opportunity for Repeat Sales

As any business person knows, a business can not generally survive on one-time purchases. Instead you have to find ways to not only attract new customers, but also keep the ones you have. This is also very true with affiliate programs. One of the largest complaints many webmasters have had with sponsors is that they refer a customer once, see their $35 commission, but in the process the customer bookmarked the Sponsors tour page. The next time the surfer is interested in buying a membership, they return to the sponsors site through the bookmark, and the webmaster never sees another penny.

Several programs have tried to alleviate this. Programs such as Adult Revenue Service avoid this problem by offering services (Daily Updated Pictures, Email Newsletter) which customers, once signed up for, use month after month. This allows them to pay residual commissions for as long as the surfer maintains their free membership to the site or, alternately, keeps returning to the page. This helps turn average programs into exceptional opportunities, because you can earn for months, perhaps even years, on referrals you made in your first, and subsequent months.

Other Factors

In summary, it is important to look at all of these main factors and several others, including the commission rates they pay (I didn’t discuss this because they are generally easily comparable), the frequency of payment checks (they generally range from weekly to quarterly), and/or the minimum dollar value you must accumulate before receiving a check (they range from nothing to $50). A couple of other important factors: be VERY wary of any program the requires a payment or ‘membership fee’ for you to join or act as an affiliate. And, be sure to check what method they use to track sales themselves. Programs that require the visitor to remember your name, or your site’s name, and enter it in when ordering, will result in many lost commissions.

Article written by Lee.