A couple of days ago, I introduced you to VigLink, an amazing program I discovered recently that allows you to monetize the majority of merchant links on your blog or website. As I processed through my own setup, I had my goto girl for micro-analyzing, MJ, take a look to gather her thoughts.

Between the two of us, we came up with a nice list of questions that weren’t so readily answered on the VigLink website. If answers existed, I wasn’t able to locate them and frankly, patience is not a virtue I ever developed and appreciation for.

With that list of questions, I set out to get them answered. Hopefully you’ll find these answers of benefit in deciding if VigLink is right for you or when setting up your own account.

Things You’ll Want To Know About VigLink:

Payments: When signing up, use the email address you use for your paypal account. Payments are issued via Paypal and VigLink doesn’t have a place to list the Paypal associated email account specifically – so to avoid any possible confusion come payment time, just use that email address. You can always add another email address to your paypal account if need be – just make sure the association is made at some point before payday.

Affiliate Networks: It’s neither necessary or required to sign up for all the affiliate network merchants partnering with VigLink, which happens to be over 25 worldwide. VigLink manages all the affiliate relationships from the backend. The affiliate credentials used are theirs. Basically they serve as a super affiliate and publishers like you are sub-affiliates. In the event you do wish to join individual networks, I provide a list of the networks below.

Cloaked Links: The Javascript library will see those links as internal links, and so it will skip them. Instead of using the Javascript library you could integrate with our API directly in your redirect script, and then redirect to the rewritten URL yourself. Take a look a the API docs.

Linking Options: VigLink is carefully designed so that your user’s experience is not changed at all. Whether you link to a homepage, a landing page, or a specific page deep in the site, the link will be affiliated and the user ends up on the exact same page you linked to. If you’re talking about a specific cell phone, you’ll want to link to the product page in your post and VigLink will convert it to an affiliate link if the merchant is an active partner.

Affiliate Networks:

affilinet

Affiliate Future

Affiliate Window

Buyat

Commission Junction

Link Connector

LinkShare

NetAffiliation

oneNetworkDirect

Pepperjam

Shareasale

TradeDoubler

Webgains

zanox Affiliate Network

UPDATE: If you do sign up for VigLink, be sure to sign up for my newsletter. There’s some very exciting news coming that you won’t want to miss out on!

Cheers

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My Comment Commitment: If you leave an approved comment on any of my posts, I will visit your blog and “share it” in some way whether on StumbleUpon, Twitter or Facebook depending on if I can find a nice fit.

When you decide to enter the world of affiliate marketing, there are a number of markets you should consider. Here are three programs that have captured the attention of a lot of people, simply because of their stability and reliability.

Perhaps the best known of the three programs is ClickBank: http://www.clickbank.com. There are a number of reasons why people find ClickBank such an attractive option when it comes to affiliate programs.

One aspect is that the revenue generated by any purchase made through the ad portal is credited to your account within two minutes of the completion of the transaction. Because ClickBank provides such a comprehensive tracking program, it is easy for affiliates to see how things are going, even if they run multiple sites as part of the program.

This handy software interface means that you do not have to set up a separate ClickBank account for every different program that you are working. Everything can be routed to a central ClickBank account, and the transaction detail will be plenty to help you sort the transactions into workable detail on how much you are making from each web site.

Along with the ads on your sites, you will also have a branded portal that will take visitors over to the ClickBank marketplace. Any items that are purchased at the marketplace through your portal will also be subject to a commission payment to you, and will reflect in your daily detail, just as any purchase from the affiliate ads would do.

This in effect allows you to maximize your earning potential using the resources that ClickBank provides. Payments are currently made by check, which are mailed out every two weeks.

http://www.paydotcom.com is also an excellent choice as an affiliate network. Just as with ClickBank, PayDotCom provides an easy to use affiliate interface that allows you to view your numbers in real time. You can easily track such data as the number of clicks on the ads and the amount of commissions you have made by directing visitors over to the marketplace through the portal on your web site.

One of the advantages of PayDotCom is that this program will interface with your PayPal account, which means that vendors can send your monthly commission directly to your PayPal account. It is important to note that not all vendors will use PayPal as a payment method, so you may still receive payments by check as well.

Still, a number of the vendors do utilize PayPal, and that can often mean generated revenue without having to wait for a long time. Keep in mind that if you select PayPal as your preferred method of payment, you will be subject to any fees you normally incur when receiving funds.

In like manner, you will pay a small percentage of the payout on each purchase to PayDotCom as well. This program is easy to sign up with, and the staff does a great job of working with persons who are new to affiliate marketing.

http://www.sharesale.con is a third option that is rapidly gaining recognition among affiliate marketers. As a program that is designed to match up to the content of your existing web site, Sharesale is free to join as an affiliate.

Basically, you can sign up for the program and then browse through a list of available merchant programs, selecting the ones that you believe will be of interest to the readers and visitors at your web site. The merchant list includes a wide variety of industry types and products, some of them digital, but many of them physical.

Earnings for the sale will vary. Some merchants prefer to use a flat rate for a sale, while others go with a percentage commission on the purchase amount. It is easy to determine which method is preferred while you are checking out the merchant listing.

Persons that want to take a look at the merchant list before signing up for the program can search by category, by method of compensation, and by the newest programs added in the last twenty days.

As with all the best affiliate programs, Sharesale makes it easy to view your traffic and earnings around the clock. The reports are all web based, so you do not need any special software to load the reports.

Payments on generated revenue can be received via a check mailed to you, or by direct deposit to a bank account. At present, you have to earn a minimum of $50.00 USD during the previous calendar month in order to receive a payment. Any amount under that will roll over into the next payment period.

What are your preferences in affiliate networks?

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My Comment Commitment: If you leave an approved comment on any of my posts, I will visit your blog and “share it” in some way whether on StumbleUpon, Twitter or Facebook depending on if I can find a nice fit.

Affiliate networks are sometimes referred to as pay-for-performance or cost-per-action (CPA) networks.

Affiliate networks are simply third-party “brokers” and serve as the middleman between the merchant and affiliate marketers. Merchants use affiliate networks to list their products and the details of their affiliate programs. Affiliates can apply to those networks they are interested in and qualify for.

Joining an affiliate network is free for the affiliate and the process of finding and selecting programs is as easy as searching through categories and applying to those of interest.

Networks generally handle thousands of tracking statistics, marketing tools and many consolidate affiliates’ earnings into a single monthly payment.

To join networks, you will be required to enter your contact information, payment details one time. After your application has been accepted, you can apply to each merchant program individually. Some merchants approve applications immediately while others require you to wait a period of time while they manually review your application for possible approval.

Some networks allow you to see a list of merchants in their network before you join while others require you to actually join before you can view the participating merchants.

Once you are approved, marketing materials are made available to you. HTML code for links and ads that you will simply copy and paste into your website or blog.

Banners are usually hosted on the networks servers and that can save you considerably on bandwidth charges.

The affiliate networks and programs I use to make my living are featured on My Money Makers page. If you have a money maker, affiliate link or network link you’d like me to try, review and feature, feel free to drop me an email or leave a comment here.

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My Comment Commitment: If you leave an approved comment on any of my posts, I will visit your blog and “share it” in some way whether on StumbleUpon, Twitter or Facebook depending on if I can find a nice fit.