Affiliate marketing is an extremely popular method of trying to make money on the Internet and its popularity is growing every day.
This is because it costs nothing but time, after you have a computer and you are online.
This makes it very appealing to people who have just lost their jobs, the young, the stay-at-home parents and the millions of people in the Third World to whom a few dollars more means such a lot.
All this competition means that the affiliate marketer has to work a great deal harder to make a living and so has to be more choosy about the item that he promotes.
This in turn encourages the distributor to produce better promotional material and give higher commissions, which all feeds the stimulation for more people to give Internet affiliate marketing a try.
In Internet affiliate marketing, the promotional material is normally provided by the distributor or manufacturer at no charge, which means that every marketer ends up employing the same creative displays, advertising content and pictures.
I get hundreds of emails a day and whenever an Internet guru brings out a new promotion, I get emails from dozens of hopeful people around the world all beginning with something like: 'Do you know my eminent friend So-an-So, the most successful Internet marketer in the world? Well, I twisted his arm to allow me to offer you his top secret plans for only $49! Blah, blah, blah'.
These gurus must get sick of having their arms twisted by so many friends all the time.
These emails go straight in the bin.
And so will the majority of yours if you just follow the herd and send out the same old copy that your distributor has given you.
You have to be creative and I think that you should not tell lies, although many, many do lie on line.
'...
my eminent friend So-and-So...
', what rubbish.
My first two tips to any would-be Internet affiliate marketer are: 1] be creative and as original as possible 2] work hard at it.
Too many people send their adverts out by the thousand and sit back and wish for the best.
If it was that simple, millions would be doing it, which of course they are, but 98% of those people are failing as well.
Unless you are innovative in your work and unless you work hard at marketing it, you will join the ranks of those millions who get up to impatiently check their inbox for a sale's confirmation, only to find it full of other optimistic marketers' spam.
And after a couple of months of that, it is depressing, believe me.
This is why most people fail at Internet affiliate marketing.
Another tip is to only market something that you comprehend or that fits in with your website.
If your web site is on handmade Moroccan leather shoes, but you learn that a marketing guru is offering $50 a sale on his software, do not just stick his advert up on your website and hope for the best, create a new website about it.
Keep your websites and sales letters on target - it works much better.
How many websites have you stumbled upon that are covered with banners and other creatives promoting everything from fishing hooks to model aircraft and vacations in Barbados? Are they not appalling? Nobody buys anything from these websites.
I know, I used to have one.
And it was quite popular at 1,500 visitors a week.
I did not make enough to buy a pizza a week.
So, tip number three, is to advertise what you know about and if you do not know about it, investigate it.
Sell what fits into your existing structure or make a new one for it.
All this takes more work, so work harder.
Now, I am sure that you are starting to see why people fail at Internet affiliate marketing.