adwords with affiliate progams

advice and experiences

[proboscis]

I'm a publisher not an advertiser, and I've been noticing a lot of advertisers on my site are just using adwords to promote affiliate programs that they've joined.

Then I thought, maybe I should do that too, but can you really make money as an affiliate through adwords?

Anyone have any advice or experiences that they can share? Thanks :)

[skibum]

You can do it but its good to have a fairly large learning & testing budget to play with till you find something that converts and makes money. You also have to be able to float whatever you spend on advertising until you get paid. You'll have to wait 2 weeks to get paid by some programs and 3 months or more with programs like Amazon if they still allow direct to the site.

Keep this stuff [webmasterworld.com] in mind and use it to your advantage. Ignore it and you will lose your shirt.

[proboscis]

Thanks! I think I know what to do now. I make a campaign for a very specific product that doesn't cost too much, then I bid on highly specific keywords in hopes of getting low clicks. Is that right so far?

But, I don't know how much to spend when I test out a campaign. Is $100 enough?

[koncept]

You can definitely make money from affiliate programs through adwords, but if you are just starting out in affiliate marketing then I have a different suggestion.

If you are publisher then you already have a head start. I believe all new affiliates should try building a site, or use an existing site, to market affiliate products/services first (if not only). This has some excellent benefits: You can test out a few different products within the same niche to find the best converters (which you may then choose to try marketing directly with adwords), and you won't have to compete with other advertisers using the same landing url.

Remember - g only shows one instance of url per search, so if another advertiser is sending traffic directly to the merchant from adwords you would have to bid higher to have your ad show. I have been involved in this kind of competition and it can really drive up your costs.

Also, be prepared for a lot of trial and error!

[smallcompany]

Can you make money as an affiliate on Google AdWords? Yes.

Approach? Here is our suggestion:

Start with search only (both Google and Partners), forget about content for now.
Go through all companies (merchants, advertisers) you are affiliated with and check their policies. Those that allow you to link directly from paid search are the best to start with as each click onto your ad will turn on the tracking. That means that your click conversion will equal to their sales conversion. If you use your site, your click conversion can be anywhere between 15% and 85% (don’t take this as granted). That means that of 100 clicks onto your ad on Google, maybe 30-50 of them will click through your affiliate links.

In addition, by linking directly, you will be almost 100% sure that you won’t need to worry about minimum bids. Many affiliate sites have been “killed” by minimum bids on Google AdWords, regardless of content – no rule so far – simply because either the team of Google AdWords has not figured the best quality score formula yet, or they play something we are yet to figure out. Why? Go out and you will see some of the worst possible results (meaning sites, including some cheating like framed sites) out there advertising in their full power, while some folks that have been crying here for some time, are running decent sites with decent content. Go figure.

Start with direct linking if you can, at the same time think about site you would build (or already have) and work on it so you can use either way. That will give you the best picture what works for you. One more thing about your own site – that is the best way to ensure you will not get covered by some other ad with same display URL. Also, by having a site, you are sure you have something to work with in cases where advertiser (merchant) decides you cannot use their display URL.

Later, based on results, you can choose your main path.

Good luck!