Let's look at these one at a time.

Is the affiliate program you are considering related to the main focus of your site? This question assumes that your site has a focus -- every successful site must have a focus or theme, even the cluttered portal sites. What is yours?

My site focus is providing top quality e-commerce and Web marketing information. These are some of the programs I have found most successful:

• Web marketing and E-Commerce Books through Amazon.com (Click here.)
• WebPosition Gold excellent search engine positioning software (Click here.)
• Ken Evoy's Make Your Site Sell book (Click here.)
• Cory Rudl's "Internet Secrets" course (Click here.)

Now I've tried a lot of affiliate programs that didn't do much, but these programs work well because they have special appeal to people who are interested in Web marketing and e-commerce. They probably won't do well on your site unless your focus is similar. Site focus is crucial.

I subscribe to the theory that if you throw enough mud against the wall, some of it will stick. But then I want to examine the mud and the surface to understand WHY it sticks, so I can do better the next time. Here were some of my "mud" experiments that didn't stick.

BottomDollar.com. Last December I wanted to get in on Christmas shopping on the Net. What better idea, I thought, than to put a product comparison shopping agent on my site? I selected BottomDollar.com that pays when one of my visitors actually conducts a product search. I placed it on every page of my site for a full month. I think I made $11 for December.

Oops. Good idea, but wrong site. People don't come to my site to shop for computers and perfume. They come to learn about Web marketing and e-commerce. Anything else is a distraction.

Drugstore.com (Click here.). Here's a program I would love to see work. Why? Drugstore.com currently pays 15% plus $2 or more for each new customer (rates subject to change). Everybody needs personal items from the drugstore. Many people regularly purchase prescriptions, and others are attracted by Drugstore.com's line of GNC vitamins. Prices are good, shipping is reasonable, and 15% is a pretty nice percentage. But though I've displayed tens of thousands of banner ads, according to Drugstore.com's records, I've only brought them 139 visitors in four months, and made absolutely NO sales.

Why? The kinds of people who come to my site aren't there for a health- or beauty-related reason. Have I given up? I probably should, but I'm not quite finished. Through the end of the year Drugstore.com is offering a $10 discount coupon to new shoppers. THAT ought to attract some traffic! (I used a similar coupon myself to get acquainted, and was delighted with their products, speed, packaging, and service.) Will it work? Here's the URL in case you'd like to try out Drugstore.com's $10 off coupon. Click here. (Make sure you cut and paste the entire URL, even if it laps over a line.)

Affiliate programs seem to work better when links to the merchant are woven into the content of the site. I've been doing that throughout these articles, you've probably noticed. Do you have product reviews? Put links there. Does your Civil War History website have links to a store that specializes in authentic and reproduction belt buckles bearing the letters US and CS? The closer the integration to your site content, the better results you'll have.

I've set up a banner serving program to place banners on nearly every page on my site, but I'm careful to limit the banners to site areas best targeted for the product or service. Banners are really second best, though. Tight integration is better.

For an affiliate program merchant to be attractive to your visitors, however, it doesn't necessarily need to be related to your site focus. But it must connect with your visitors. For example, if you have a site designed to teach parenting skills to twenty-something couples, you might want to join eToys.com affiliate program, since these same people will want to give gifts to their children this Christmas. Click here. If you have a golf site, why not consider a financial services affiliate program, since your site visitors probably have an interest in investing.

All things being equal, you ought to look for affiliates who offer a generous commission structure. Some of these are Drugstore.com (15%), Amazon.com (5% and 15%), MicroWarehouse.com (2% to 7%, depending upon product type, but these are often big ticket items), and there are many others. Merchants with high ticket items can sometimes afford to pay higher commissions, but not always.

One so-called affiliate program that doesn't quite make sense to me is Affinia.com (Click here.). It allows anyone to quickly set up his own "store" on the Web, made up of affiliate links to products. But it pays the "storeowner" only pennies per sale. Huh? Someone's making money here, but I don't see how you will, since you're one step removed from the affiliate programs themselves.

An important consideration: does the merchant pay regularly? Some independent programs are administered by overworked staffs that don't quite get around to issuing checks on time. Beware. You can get news on merchant problems if you regularly read Allan Gardyne's weekly e-mail Associate Programs Newsletter (Click here.). It's the best single resource I know to keep you on top of affiliate programs.

Two extras are desirable if you can find them: (1) A few programs such as Make Your Site Sell (Click here.) allow you to keep your customer for life. That's pretty nice. I believe Drugstore.com began with this approach, but their latest affiliate agreement no longer includes it. (2) Two tier programs pay you for (a) sales from your own links, as well as (b) a small amount for sales by those who came to the program via your links. This isn't really classic MLM, since the pyramid doesn't go on and on but is limited to only a second tier. Your links to sell the merchant's products are still primary, the extra income is usually just a minor bonus.

I really ought to highlight the Make Your Site Sell "5 Pillar" Affiliate Program. Dr. Ken Evoy, author of Make Your Site Sell ((Click here.)) has taken affiliate programs to the next level, with weekly newsletters to help his affiliates develop and improve. He's extremely serious about build a strong, professional sales force of affiliates, a goal that's pretty rare among companies. The tips he offers to his affiliates can help you do better in all the affiliate programs you belong to.

The final thing to look for is good reporting. I REALLY like the full way Amazon.com e-mails me a weekly report. Most other programs have a Web interface to view your real-time statistics which has the same effect. But if you don't know what is working, it's hard to maximize your sales.

It's important that the affiliate site reflects your own website's values and philosophy. Does it jar you to see a particular company's ad along with your site's content? Is the affiliate's point of view and way of marketing congruent with your own? Maintain your integrity. Integrity is worth much more than whatever money you might earn. Integrity is priceless.

The bottom line, of course, is: How much revenue does a particular affiliate program generate? If you have a banner serving program such as (Web Adverts) or (Central Ad 4.0), you'll be able to monitor the click-through-rate of each link and banner on your site. This gives you excellent clues as to what your visitors are interested in so you can find ways to increase sales.

However, I've found that good click-through-rates don't necessarily equal good sales. So monitor carefully how each affiliate program is performing, and how much revenue it is generating. When you find a program that is doing well, find ways to maximize its exposure on your site and better its performance. When affiliate programs don't perform well, drop them and fill their space with something else, either a proven performer or a new test.

I've worked hard trying to find an affiliate program that will be attractive to visitors to my Christian Articles Archive (http://joyfulheart.com). It produced 44,500 page views in September 1999, with a 1.51% click-through rate. But I haven't seemed to turn that traffic into affiliate program gold. I've tried:

• Christian charities (no affiliate program here)
• Amazon.com (Christian books)
• Drugstore.com, natural vitamins, (on the theory that Christians are always hitting me up for the latest nutritional supplement MLM plan) <grin>
• Christian Artist CDs (Amazon.com)

This fall I think I'll try toys, books, art, and other consumer items, since at Christmas time I have a lot of visitors reading the Christmas collection there (http://joyfulheart.com/xmas/). Maybe I'll find something that fits my visitors well. I hope so. Then again, I have a feeling that this site can fulfill its chief purpose just fine without generating a dime. :-)

Make sure your selection of affiliate programs is principled, that is, guided by the six basic principles of affiliate program selection:

1. Is it related to the main focus of your website?
2. Can you integrate it into your site content?
3. Is it attractive to the interests of your visitors?
4. Is the merchant considerate of the affiliate's needs?
5. Do the merchant's values reflect your own?
6. Does the program perform well on your site?

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