Affiliate Marketing - Providing Value & Quality...Being Real.

[David Surk]

Recently I have decided to get back into affiliate marketing. I decided to shift back to affiliate marketing because I was unhappy with promoting CPA offers. Now I was making good money with CPA offers, but the problem was that over time I felt like I was not providing any real value to anyone.

That’s a big one for me, I want whatever I do or promote to provide a real value or benefit to the end user. I don’t want to lie to myself just to make a buck.

Over last few days I've been trying to find some quality digital products to promote for some pay per click campaigns, but I feel like I'm running into a brick wall. I've been looking at products in the clickbank marketplace as well as on regnow.

I've been trying to find products that seem to already be doing well for current affiliates and that have a decent commission. But when I examine these products more closely and do a bit of research to see how people who have purchased the products actually feel, I seem to find a lot of negative feedback.

Then I tried reversing things abit by looking at products in the markets I'm interested in that have positive feedback. At first this seemed like a much better approach, but what I'm noticing is that many quality products provide much lower commissions.

I'm trying to figure out what's the best solution for my dilemma. It's a weird situation because part of me has been trained over time to look for products based on monetary factors, popularity and conversions. I now consider those secondary (still important) factors; I just can't seem to find the right balance.

Am I making too much out of product selection?

I've looked a lot of the most heavily promoted products out there and I am surprised at how many people are actually willing to promote some of this stuff. It makes me question my own judgment.

Right now I'm thinking I may have to just change my approach to affiliate marketing. Maybe take a look at some in-house affiliate programs within certain markets. I've even thought about going the physical products route but that's not something I'm familiar with.

The problem is I feel like I'm wasting time and that I may be stuck on this product selection issue. Part of me keeps saying just promote something already dammit.

I could really use some advice and guidance from more experienced warriors who hear where I'm coming from...

Any and all help is much appreciated.

Much love,
Dave.

[Loren Woirhaye]

I feel you Dave,

Recently I was looking at Clickbank and I was surprised at how
many of the top Gravity products struck me as overhyped and
sort of scammy... particularly the water in your gas tank stuff,
diet stuff, government records, and so forth. I'm not saying these
things are outright scams anything but that it's peculiar that
B.S. seems to rise to the top on CB.

People don't change much... they still fall for offers that seem
to good to be true if they offer is presented in a certain way.

[Ralf Skirr]

If you feel a product isn't worth to be recommended then you shouldn't do it.

You may get along with it if you have anonymous sites, but if you go the better route to build a list and market yourself you'll ruin your reputation in the long run.

BTW: if you're so interested in quality products - have you considered creating products yourself? For many affiliates that's the next step in business development.

Ralf

[TMG Enterprises]

I am no where near an expert in affiliate marketing but wanted to make a comment on the following statements that you made:

I've looked a lot of the most heavily promoted products out there and I am surprised at how many people are actually willing to promote some of this stuff. It makes me question my own judgment.

Just because others are willing to promote something does not mean that it is a quality or ethical product. I don't care if it's being promoted by Joe Schmoe down the street or top name IM "gurus" - you can only be guided by your own conscience.

Don't ever question your own judgment when it comes something like this. You are the only one who has to listen to that small voice inside.

Tina G

[drkellogs]

You shouldn't spend too much time on selecting a product.

There are a lot of other (more important) factors you should consider besides quality of product.

Things like profitability! =D

As an affiliate, you should also look at payment frequency (for cash flow), reliability (are they actually going to pay?), conversion (is it actually going to sell?) and evaluate how you are going to hit the market, and how strong the competition is in this particular market.

Also don't be too quick to judge a product. Maybe something isn't valuable to you, but may be very valuable to a customer in that particular niche.

If you REALLY want to provide value, then you should consider blogging about that topic and providing unique value.

Let's face it. Affiliates don't really provide value simply by Direct Linking, or slapping together a products review page. (in most cases)

Affiliates should be thinking about making money first.

But in the end you have to make a decision. You either spend a long time doing product selection, which is in my opinion just focusing a lot of your time in the wrong areas.

By the way, if you're in a good niche, there should be plenty of fine products to choose from. Maybe you're just in the wrong niche, I don't know.

Affiliate marketing involves so much more. And your time would be better spent focusing on the critical areas that will make you a success.

My 2 cents