You’ve joined an affiliate program and affiliate marketing will be the theme for your home based online business. During your research\u00a0you’ve spoken to many experienced webmasters online and the consensus of opinion among all of them is to never openly use the URL that an affiliate program provides to link directly to your affiliate website.<\/p>\n
Instead you should bypass this address and connect to a page on your website which then links to your program site. There are 5\u00a0very important reasons for this and here they are:<\/p>\n
1. If your visitor goes directly to the affiliate site and it turns out they aren’t interested in that particular product then you may have lost them forever because they left your home page to check out the affiliate page. On the other hand if they stay on your home business site they will be able to check out the\u00a0links you have to your other merchandise which could\u00a0lead to a sale.\u00a0<\/p>\n
2. If your affiliate identification number is visible in the affiliate URL there is always the possibility an unscrupulous visitor will delete your code, join the affiliate program, and replace the ID with their own and take credit for the sale and claim your commission. Or, they may just remove the code so you don’t get credit for the transaction and go directly to the affiliate site thereby cutting you out of the deal.<\/p>\n
3.\u00a0If you\u00a0bypass the affiliate website and go to your own page via the affiliate link you will get a second opinion on your advertisement because your own site statistics will give you an indication of the response to your ad as well as the numbers provided for you by your affiliate website. This is a great way to gauge your traffic and decide whether or not any\u00a0changes should be made with regard to your advertising campaign.<\/p>\n
4. If for some reason the affiliate program shuts down or goes out of business you can let your customers know while they are still on your home business site and redirect them from there. This way your potential customers aren’t visiting a non-existent or blank page and you can still try to entice them with another offer.<\/p>\n
5. And\u00a0finally, by redirecting your visitors to another page on your home business\u00a0site\u00a0they can\u00a0read\u00a0your own personally constructed advertisement which outlines the benefits of the product, how it will help make your visitors lives a little easier and, while there, they can also learn\u00a0about you which helps build trust and helps establish relationships with your guests. People are more likely to do business with someone they feel they know and trust rather than with a perfect stranger.<\/p>\n
These 5 benefits should convince you that not linking directly to your affiliate website, and instead, redirecting people to a page within your home business site will increase your odds of closing the deal and of getting credit for your commissions which is why you’re in business online in the first place.<\/p>\n
Bob Withers<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n