The landscape of search engines have went through some drastic changes over the years. Not only with technology, but also with various partnerships between the many different search companies as well.
You might be running your search engine queries on a particular search engine, although who is actually supplying the results – it could be a different company altogether.
Below, is a list of the search engines that feed your precious keywords:
Yahoo Yahoo provides the primary search results for Yahoo search, Alta Vista, and AllTheWeb, and receives paid listings from Yahoo Search Marketing (formerly known as Overture).
Google Google provides the primary search engine results to Google AOL Search and also Netscape. Google also supplies paid listings to Lycos, Ask, Netscape, AOL Search, and HotBot. It also supplies secondary results to HotBot and receives it’s directory data from DMOZ.
Lycos Lycos receives the directory search results from DMOZ, primary results from Ask, and paid listings from Google Adwords.
Hotbot receives directory search results from DMOZ, primary search results from Ask, and paid/secondary results from Google Adwords.
Ask Ask provides primary results to Ask, Hotbot, and Lycos. It receives secondary search results from Teoma and the directory results from DMOZ, with paid listings from Google Adwords.
In relations to marketing, search engines can provide anything you want to know. If someone is looking for something, they normally refer to the search engines. When they type it in, the highest sites on the engines will show – which is normally where the visitor will go.
By keeping good position on the search engines, you’ll be near the first for visitors who are looking for a certain product. You can make a lot of money with search engines as well, if you know what you are doing.
Affiliate programs will enable a business to generate a lot of traffic and therefore boost sales through promotion by third party sales or sites. It’s also a cost effective way to advertise your products and services as you pay only for the efforts that actually turn into sales.
Setting up your own affiliate system can be either easy or overwhelming, all depending on how many affiliates you want to recruit, as well as your payment policy and the type of product that you are offering.
As for your affiliate systems, there are two options for your business – outsource the entire system or run your own affiliate system through your own web host. Each one boasts its own advantages as well as disadvantages.
If you have a small amount of affiliates, then you can run your own affiliate software. If you plan to recruit a large number of affiliates, then you will probably need to outsource. The reason for this, is because you’ll find it easy to deal with a large number of sign ups, track payments, monitor clicks, etc.
Types of affiliates There are numerous types of affiliates out there to choose from. There’s the pay per sale, there an individual is paid only if a sale is generated from the affiliate’s link. It’s the least attractive to people, unless the product is in high demand and the most profitable for business.
Another type is the pay per lead, where you pay only for traffic. With this type, the affiliate is paid only if a visitor is generated from the site of the affiliate. It’s attractive to affiliates although costly to web site owners due to the possibility of non sale visits.
Considerations When setting up an affiliate, something to consider is whether or not you’ll approve affiliates manually or automatically. It’s normally recommended to start affiliate programs with your established customer sites then progress to new ones.
If you are dealing with pay per clicks, you may have to control the affiliates as the quality of visitors will be a huge factor when it comes to the generation of sales. By manually reviewing, you’ll also be able to judge the website or individual affiliates to see if it’s in the best interest of your company.
If you decide to use your own affiliate system, one of your biggest challenges will be how to pay affiliates a percentage of what you end up receiving from customers. To do this, you can rely on software such as Affiliate shop to help you track and manage commissions.
Ask questions first before you join an affiliate program. Do a little research about the choices of program that you intend to join into. Get some answers because they will be the deciding point of what you will be achieving later on.
Will it cost you anything to join? Most affiliate programs being offered today are absolutely free of charge. So why settle for those that charge you some dollars before joining.
When do they issue the commission checks? Every program is different. Some issue their checks once a month, every quarter, etc. Select the one that is suited to your payment time choice. Many affiliate programs are setting a minimum earned commission amount that an affiliate must meet or exceed in order for their checks to be issued.
What is the hit per sale ratio? This is the average number of hits to a banner or text link it takes to generate a sale based on all affiliate statistics. This factor is extremely important because this will tell you how much traffic you must generate before you can earn a commission from the sale.
How are referrals from an affiliate’s site tracked and for how long do they remain in the system? You need to be confident on the program enough to track those people you refer from your site. This is the only way that you can credit for a sale. The period of time that those people stay in the system is also important. This is because some visitors do not buy initially but may want to return later to make the purchase. Know if you will still get credit for the sale if it is done some months from a certain day.
What are the kinds of affiliate stats available? Your choice of affiliate program should be capable of offering detailed stats. They should be available online anytime you decide to check them out. Constantly checking your individual stats is important to know how many impressions, hits and sales are already generated from your site. Impressions are the number of times the banner or text link was viewed by a visitor of your site. A hit is the one clicking on the banner or text links.
Does the affiliate program also pay for the hits and impressions besides the commissions on sales? It is important that impressions and hits are also paid, as this will add to the earnings you get from the sales commission. This is especially important if the program you are in offers low sales to be able to hit ratio.
Who is the online retailer? Find out whom you are doing business with to know if it is really a solid company. Know the products they are selling and the average amount they are achieving. The more you know about the retailer offering you the affiliate program, the easier it will be for you to know if that program is really for you and your site.
Is the affiliate a one tier or two tier program? A single tier program pays you only for the business you yourself have generated. A two tier program pays you for the business, plus it also pays you a commission on the on the sales generated by any affiliate you sponsor in your program. Some two-tier programs are even paying small fees on each new affiliate you sponsor. More like a recruitment fee.
Lastly, what is the amount of commission paid? 5% – 20% is the commission paid by most programs. .01% – .05% is the amount paid for each hit. If you find a program that also pays for impressions, the amount paid is not much at all. As you can see from the figures, you will now understand why the average sales amount and hit to sale ratio is important.
These are just some of the questions that needed answering first before you enter into an affiliate program. You should be familiar with the many important aspects that your chosen program should have before incorporating them into your website. Try to ask your affiliate program choices these questions. These can help you select the right program for you site from among the many available.
