Too many affiliates are focused way too intensely on Google and it isn’t even their fault!  It’s our fault!  The so-called gurus of affiliate marketing…  We push and push and push Google Adwords and we are always talking about them, we talk about how big they are, how they control ~80% of the search market, our latest Google slaps, and more!  It seems like there is always something to say about the giant we all call Google.  However, even though they are the biggest and are extremely important to your business as an affiliate marketer, for some people (like myself) they aren’t even where most of their money comes from!  If Google was to go bankrupt tomorrow (just go with me on this…) I would still be okay!  Would you?

Another interesting fact about Google, is that out of the three major search engines, Google, Yahoo, and Bing (Microsoft) they don’t even have the best traffic!  According to a post I was reading on TechCrunch, Bing users are twice as likely to click on an ad then Google users!

There are so many different companies and opportunities to drive traffic to your affiliate sites that it can literally drive you crazy trying to figure out all the ways!  Hopefully this post can give you a couple ideas that you may not have thought of and can help you break the curse of having all your eggs in one Google!

Search Engines Besides Google

There are several search engines besides Google.  The two most talked about after Google is Yahoo Search, and Microsoft Bing (formally known as live.com).  However, there are even more sites, now I must say that as you move away from the top three, things can get a little more tricky and requires a lot more patience, split testing, and time to get them right…and sometimes you never can get them to work for you!

Just to name a few of the other search engines that I’ve had success with in some niches are as follows…

• Ask
• 7Search
• Looksmart

Ad Buys

Ad buys are basically when you do some searches in a search engine for terms relating to your niche, then you go to some of the top organic results and see if they offer advertising on their sites and buy direct from them instead of through a company.

There are plenty of benefits to ad buys, first off, you can typically get the advertisements very cheap and get some very decent traffic if you keep your eyes open and do enough digging!  Secondly, and this is purely from personal statisitics, but I’ve always had higher CTR’s and higher Conversion Rates when I do Ad Buys directly instead of using content networks to do it all.  Not saying that I don’t use the content networks and that they don’t bring in some niche bling!

However, one of the big downfalls to Ad Buys is that it can take a lot of testing and money to find sites that actually produce results and it can take a ton of time doing it if you aren’t careful!  Although, it does become easier to spot good deals and websites the more you do it, so the time thing kinda pays off if you stick it out!

PPV (Pay Per View)

Another method that isn’t talked about as much, but can produce some great results is PPV aka Pay Per View.  Basically PPV is adaware, which means that the person that’s gonna see your ad, downloaded a program that was free that is supported by ads.  I could write a piece about this here, however, Bryn from Bryn.me did a great writeup about PPV and what it’s all about and he even listed some of the companies he uses.  Instead of just rehashing his stuff, or writing up my own long thing on this, I’ll instead point you to his post on pay per view advertising!

Article Marketing

Article Marketing is basically where you write articles that you end up submitting to article directories that either A.) include links to your affiliate offer directly or B.) links to an affiliate website you have promoting an offer.  The article you would write would be about the niche that you’re promoting an offer for, you’d stick in a couple of links to your affiliate site, and submit it to some article directories.  This is extremely popular with BANS (Build a Niche Store) sites, however, I’ve seen it work and I’ve personally used it with several other type of affiliate stuff!

Again, since I’m just trying to give you guys a quick description of all the possibilities out there, instead of talking too much on this one subject, I’ll point you to a post about article directories and article marketing from a friend of mine named Alan, from Affiliate Confessions.  Now, in this post he is using the example of a BANS store as I stated before, however as I said, I’ve seen article marketing used in a lot more ways then just for BANS stores.

Mobile Applications

One of the more recent ways we are seeing affiliate offers being promoted is by companies that create an application for a mobile phone like the Palm Pre, the iPhone, the HTC Touch, etc.  They are building applications around a certain niche, let’s say an application that has recipes for cooking and such and then they are promoting cookbook offers, learn to cook membership sites, etc…

This isn’t something that I’ve had time to fool with yet, however, I have two friends that have released free applications for mobile phones and they have both done fairly decent with doing so.  Do realize however that this is a much newer form of advertising affiliate offers, and there isn’t a ton of data out yet, so it’s a ton of trial and error, however, that’s almost always the perfect time to make it big with a new traffic source if you’re willing to put in the time, money investment, and have the knowledge to figure it all out!

Ending Statement

So, above are just a couple ways besides the normal traditional methods that I’m sure you’ve read about a hundred times and hopefully you’ll be able to use one of them to spark something new in your mind that can get you going in the right direction!  There are so many ways to advertise affiliates offers, and I’ve only touched the tip of the iceberg, so make sure you keep looking for new opportunities and you’re sure to do fine in this industry!

There are two changes that are being talked about, the first one being…

Ad Position CTR being MORE precise.

More precise Quality Score calculation
Clickthrough rate (CTR) is the most significant component of Quality Score because it directly indicates which ads are most relevant to our searchers. As you probably have observed, ads in high positions typically earn better CTR than those in low positions, because ads in high positions are more visible to searchers. To calculate the most accurate Quality Scores, it’s important that the influence of ad position on CTR be taken into account and removed from the Quality Score.

CTR (Click thru Rate) plays a big factor in your quality score when it comes to PPC companies.  In fact, I believe it’s one of the most important things.  Also, you’ve probably noticed that the higher your ad position the higher your CTR…I know rocket science right???

Well, Google knows this as well and so they judge if your CTR is good enough or not based on what ad position you are in…They have improved this they are saying which will give us more precise calculations.  They are saying this will now allow for more fairness in their quality scores.

The second change will allow for more ads to appear above the Organic Search Results!

Higher quality ads above the search results
We’re also improving the way we determine which ads show in the yellow region above the search results. These positions are particularly valuable to advertisers because they are prominently positioned on the page. Given their prominence, it’s especially important that these ads be high quality; we therefore place extra emphasis on quality when determining which ads to show in this location.

To appear above the search results, ads must meet a certain quality threshold. In the past, if the ad with the highest Ad Rank did not meet the quality threshold, we may not have shown any ads above the search results. With this update, we’ll allow an ad that meets the quality threshold to appear above the search results even if it has to jump over other ads to do so. For instance, suppose the ad in position 1 on the right side of the page doesn’t have a high enough Quality Score to appear above the search results, but the ad in position 2 does. It’s now possible for the number 2 ad to jump over the number 1 ad and appear above the search results. This change ensures that quality plays an even more important role in determining the ads that show in those prominent positions.

Currently in order for an ad to appear above the Organic Search Results it must be ranked the highest and meet a certain quality score, however, now Google will be allowing ads with just a high enough quality score to jump over ads if it has to in order to appear above Organic Search Results instead of only on the right side of the page.  So in essence, ad 2 could now jump over ad 1 if ad two met the quality score requirements.

Honestly, I believe this is simply being done so that Google can earn more revenue and profits by giving more ads a shot a being displayed and clicked on.  I believe this is why they are going to allow more ads to appear above Organic Search Results.  I also don’t believe that the normal affiliate will see a huge change as many seem to think they will…I think this will only benefit top affiliates in top positions and I’m not even sure if it will benefit them!

I’ve never had much lucking being placed above Organic Search Results…I always seem to get a lot of “blind” clicks.

1. Affiliate Marketing in the United Kingdom:

The United Kingdom is one of the countries that I see touched on quite a bit. I’ve seen several other affiliate recommend that if your not currently running any offers targeting the United Kingdom crowd, then you’re missing out on a great opportunity.

The cost of running offers on the PPC network’s in the UK is significantly lower than the prices you would pay for click for US offers.

There are over 15 million people in the UK with online access and out of these 15 million people, 84% has a high-speed internet connection.

2. Affiliate Marketing in Canada:

As I said above, the UK is a country that is talked about at least somewhat in the affiliate industry, however, when it comes to affiliate marketing and Canada, most of you have not read a thing on it I bet. This is the market I really wanted to touch on as there is a huge opportunity here and it may not last long so you need to get in while you can!

I read a report the other day in Search Marketing Standard that said,

The latest PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Entertainment and Media Outlook predicts that online ad spend will grow faster in Canada than anywhere else in the world over the next five years!

24 Million Canadians are currently online which is equivalent to 73% of the population of Canada! 85% of these households are running on a high-speed internet access.

Again, as with the UK, the prices you would pay for a click is massively lower than what you would pay targeting the same exact niche here in the United States. However, the CPC is even lower when targeting the Canadian market.

Conclusion:

The opportunity is out there for you to create a killing if your willing to take the time to learn how each of these countries work. You’ll need to research which landing page colors work best, which ad types work best, how to funnel your visitors correctly, etc. The problem lies in the fact that these markets can be quite different from the United States, thus, leading to affiliate marketers never getting into them.

I would highly recommend that you take the time to learn these different markets and take the time to learn them well. You’ll thank me later for it!

Also, most people don’t like that idea of sharing which keywords are converting with these companies that allow you to track for free.  For example, Google Adwords Pixel, Yahoo’s Pixel, and even Tracking202.  This is where Prosper202 comes into play.

Prosper202 is a free PPC keyword tracking application from Wes Mahler and his crew.  It’s the same people that created Tracking202 only this tool (Prosper202) allows you to host the application directly on your hosting account if your not willing or are feeling nervous about your keyword information being out there on someone else’s server.

You can visit their site for more information about the product and all of it’s features, as I’m only going to touch on a few of the products features.

• Works with Every Single PPC Network Out There!
• Cloaks Keywords from Advertisers and Affiliate Networks keeping them a secret!
• Works with Landing Pages or With Direct Linking!

Again, it seems like a great tool, I’ve only been able to play around with it for a little while but I definitely think you should check out the service being provided by Prosper202 if your in need of a great keywords tracking application.

Also, just to give you guys a little recap and to give a little more insight on some of their other “202″ tools they have available…

• Tracking202 – PPC Keyword Tracking tool that is completely FREE of charge.  This application is hosted on their servers.  Good if you don’t have a server to put Prosper202 on and you wanting to use this program.
• Prosper202 – Same thing as Tracking202 only you can use this version on your own server thus allowing you to keep all your secret ninja like stuff from getting into the wrong hands.
• Export202 – Allows you to easily convert campaigns from one PPC campaign to another.  Currently works with Google Adwords, Yahoo Search Marketing, and MSN Adcenter.  Again this program like the other two is completely free to use.

Again, I think Wes Mahler and the team are doing a great job and I can’t wait to see what other tools they release under the “202″ brand.

First, let me come right out and ask you all a question. Why would you only do one or the other? Now you may have a very valid reason for doing so and I’d love to hear it, however, I personally use both PPC and SEO to my advantage in my affiliate marketing career. Thus, this is what I recommend you do and I’ll explain why in this post.

Let’s get started with PPC first.

Advantages to using PPC (pay per click):

• Instant Traffic! Your ads are visible and clickable within minutes. Visitors will be to you site within minutes of setting up a PPC campaign.
• Extremely targeted customers. Since you choose the keywords you know your visitors will be looking for exactly what your selling/offering.
• You Control Everything! Unlike SEO, you decide where your ad is placed, how it looks, what it reads, the price you pay, the amount of time it runs, etc.
• You only pay for Clicks! You don’t pay unless a visitor actually clicks your ad when your advertising via PPC.

Disadvantages to using PPC:

• It’s Not FREE! Unlike SEO, this traffic costs you something and you have to be careful about going over your budget or spending more than you make!
• There is a Danger of Losing Money! While it’s easy to setup a PPC Campaign, it does require time and experience to learn how it works and how to use it effectively.
• Requires a lot of Tracking. When your using PPC you need to track everything!  You should be tracking landing pages, ads, and keywords to see which is converting better.  This means you should be split testing your landing pages and ads.

Now, let’s move onto SEO:

Advantages to using SEO (search engine optimization):

• Completely FREE Traffic! Unlike PPC, the traffic that you receive via your SEO efforts is completely free.  Doesn’t cost you a penny.
• Can Lower PPC Costs! When used in conjunction with PPC it can help you increase your quality score in Google Adwords thus reducing the amount you need to pay in order to secure top positions in PPC.
• Excellent long-term Potential! Although SEO takes a while to rank for certain keywords, the benefits can last for years to come.  With PPC you will always pay for clicks, with SEO, you will always receive those clicks for free.  So, its a great way to build a long-term campaign.

Disadvantages to SEO:

• Requires Time! Unlike PPC, SEO can take some time to rank for certain keywords, as much time as a month to several years!
• Requires Extensive Knowledge: In my opinion, learning SEO will take you a lot longer to learn than PPC.  There are tons of factors to SEO, whether they be big or small, so be prepared to spend time learning!

Now to wrap up this post!  The reason I listed the advantages and disadvantages to each is because well, there isn’t a right or wrong answer as to which one you should be using.  That’s a decision you need to make.  As I said above I personally use both methods and in the next paragraph I’ll explain why I do and why I think you should as well.

PPC and SEO go hand in hand the more intelligent algorithms become.  Google Adword’s Quality Score looks at tons of factors to consider how much you should pay for a top spot in their PPC engine.  Some of these factors include things like Ad CTR%, Bounce Rate, and Relevancy.  However, it also includes things like how many sites are linking to yours using relevant anchor text, if the keywords on your landing page match those in your PPC account, etc.

As you can see, not only do they look at PPC factors when they decide your Quality Score, they also look at things that would be considered SEO factors.

Also, as mentioned above, SEO traffic is free!  So even if your not a die hard SEO person, like myself, it still makes sense to at least try it out in order to receive free traffic.

Personally, the way I do it, is to first build my PPC campaign and after I have it up and running and making a profit I’ll start doing some SEO work to my site as well.  Again, as I said above, it’s a great long-term strategy.  As more and more people use PPC, prices are going to continue to rise so what would be a feasible amount to pay for traffic now, may not be feasible in 2 years from now.  However, if over those 2 years you’ve used SEO to your advantage, your campaign will still be receiving tons of traffic thus it could still be quite a profitable campaign even if you stop doing PPC on it.

Let me know what you guys think in the comments and if you have any advantages or disadvantages to using either PPC or SEO.  Also, let me know what method you personally use and why!

Instead, I would like to talk about Negative Keywords! These are keywords that if you are using they will increase your ROI significantly.

The problem with most keywords and keywords groups is that no matter how well you target your ad groups and weed out your so called bad keywords, your still running a campaign that most likely is using the broad option as the match type. What does running a broad match type mean?

Well, let me give you a little example. Let’s say that you run a site that sells Power Tools so in one of your ad groups you have the keyword Power Tools. Now with the broad match type your ad will actually show up for a lot more keywords then just Power Tools. Your ad will most likely show up for other keywords such as Buy Power Tools, Rent Power Tools, Repair Power Tools, etc.

So what doesn’t negative keywords have anything to do with this? Well, if your selling power tools and running a campaign using a keyword such as Power Tools, but you don’t rent or repair power tools, your spending money on keywords that just aren’t going to convert for you! That my friend is where negative keywords come to save the day!!!

In your negative keywords list you can place the keywords Rent and Repair for example and that will stop any keyword that contains those words from triggering your ads thus increasing your ROI (return on investment) in just a couple easy, quick, and painless steps!

Enjoy and don’t forget to subscribe to get more great PPC tips and tricks!

Make Sure Your Ad Groups Are Laser-Targeted

This is especially true when using Google Adwords, but what a lot of people don’t realize is that is also very important when using YSM (yahoo search marketing) and Microsoft Adcenter.

Laser-Targeted Adgroups simply means that you make sure your keywords in each ad group are closely related. For example if you have a campaign about “Widgets” you would want all your keywords about “Red Widgets” in one ad group, “Blue Widgets” in another ad group, and “Green Widgets” in yet another separate ad group.

You’ve probably heard about this in Google Adwords and why its important because of their quality score, but most people don’t think too much about it when it comes to the other two major PPC engines. So why do you need to worry about this when using YSM or Microsoft Adcenter?

While YSM and Microsoft Adcenter doesn’t have much a quality score one very important thing that they do measure to determine what spot your ad is placed and how much that spot costs you per click is your CTR% (Click Through Rate).

Naturally if your ad groups are laser targeted, its going to mean that your ads are going to be targeted better also as each ad will relate to a specific set of keywords. This means, that your ads will have a higher CTR% because people know from your ad that they are getting exactly what they are searching for.

Use Your Display URL Wisely!

Another mistake I see people do in PPC is not using their ads display URL to their advantage. Let me explain what I mean.

So according to the last tip above you should now have your ad groups tightly targeted. So why aren’t your ads? Most people write their ads to go along with their keywords, for example again, if you have a group of keywords for “Green Widgets” then your ads for that ad group would also contain the keyword “Green Widgets” but what about your URL?

I would say 95% of affiliate would make their display URL for that ad Widgets.com when really they should have their URL as Widgets.com/Green-Widgets. Again, not only will this make your ad stand out a little, but it will also let people know they are getting something fulfilled that they were looking for so it will also increase your CTR% which we all know is very important if you’ve read the first tip of this article!

Avoid Your Homepage As Your Landing Page

Again continuing with the above tip, don’t send all your PPC traffic to the Homepage of your website. Instead you should have a separate landing page for each set of keywords. So as we said above if your display URL is Widgets.com/Green-Widgets your actual URL should lead to that page as well.

You should have a separate landing page for each group of keywords so you would end up with something like this for your URL’s if you use the example we have been using thus far in this article.

Widgets.com (Your Homepage)
Widgets.com/Green-Widgets (Your Green Widgets Landing Page)
Widgets.com/Red-Widgets (Your Red Widgets Landing Page)
Widgets.com/Blue-Widgets (Your Blue Widgets Landing Page)

Again by doing this simple step you can instantly increase your conversion rate and also convince your users even more that they are on the right site to fulfill their needs.

Remember this simple phrase…

Land People In The Relevant Place!

So that wraps up the first part of this article and I truly hope you’ll subscribe to our feed in order to make sure you’ll receive the next article as well!

If you have any suggestions or questions you’d like to see answered in the next part of this series please feel free to leave them in the comments below!