I Just Got Myself a Brand New Money-Making Website!

Internet Junkie is all about the smart ways to earn money online, so imagine being able to promote 10000 clickbank products all at the same time, all from a website you can get for free (yes, even the hosting is free!); do you think this is too good to be true?

I must say I had difficulty believing that I could really own a website containing thousands of products allowing me to earn lots of clickbank dollars, but I found it and it really looks the business; everything is there, even the free Internet Marketing Ebooks!

Owning a free website is very well and good, but now that I have this great asset, what do I do with it?

I don't expect to sit here doing nothing and having thousands of dollars mailed to me each month: there are a few steps I can think of now if I want to earn a few dollars a month (I would be happy with just that to start with!), and the first is to edit this blog's layout so that my portal can not be missed by any visitor (I will have to get rid of my own clickbank ads that didn't bring me any sales by the way!), I will have to include my brand new link in some of my forum's signatures and my Facebook profile, write an article or 3 praising the benefits of a free clickbank portal, and of course, create a new Squidoo lens about it too.

I think I have a busy week ahead of me and I really want to make this work so if you don't mind I'll get to work right now!

Oh, and before I forget, If you are interested in getting your own free money-making website, you can sign up for free through my own clickbank portal!

I read a very inspiring post yesterday called Persuasion Tactics: Two Ways to Improve Conversions for Your Website. In this post, Dosh Dosh wrote about some techniques that can be used to make your visitors click on links.

I am not going to rehash his post, but one idea sprang to my mind as I was reading: supposing you are an affiliate, if you write an article (using the methods highlighted in Persuasion Tactics... or not), talking about two products, praising one and putting the other one down, what do you think will happen?

I may not have studied marketing extensively, but my gut feeling says that the readers may feel that the first product could be a good buy and click on that link, as the fact that you are not pushing people to buy the second product tells them that you are an honest person and this may entrust them that little bit more to your opinions.

Of course, some may click on the other link (Little Miss Contrary rings a bell here), maybe by curiosity and decide to buy that second product instead, which doesn't matter since you are also an affiliate of this one. Of course, whether they will buy or not is the readers' own decisions but prompting them to click is part of the battle!

Affiliate Links: to Disclose or Not to Disclose?

There is a lot of debate as whether or not to disclose your affiliate links when you are writing reviews about a product you would like to earn commission from.

Some may argue that it is unethical not to disclose the fact that you will get a commission if someone buys a product you are reviewing, as a product review written by an affiliate has a higher chance of being biased.

On the other hand, affiliate links don't look very appealing to prospective buyers and only very inexperienced online buyers wouldn't know the difference between an original website link and an affiliate link. Some people, when interested in buying a product you are promoting, will click on a link and when they notice your affiliate link, will delete it from their browser and buy directly from the website; there is nothing to gain from this, as the product's price is the same, whether accessed directly or from an affiliate. This is called bypassing. Some, who are affiliates of the same product, will even replace your affiliate ID with their own in order to get the commission for themselves; this is called hijacking; I think it is very dishonest but unfortunately very common among clickbank affiliates, as you can spot a clickbank hoplink a mile away.

There are ways you can try and hide your affiliate links. I have not tried any so I cannot vouch for their efficiency. There is a lot of information on the Internet on how to do this but it is often a little too complicated for me; however, I just came accross Mouseover Link Hider/Status Bar Message Generator, which is very easy to use, doesn't require any sign up and best of all, it is free! Be aware, if you decide to use some of the hiding or cloaking methods, that search engines might react differently to these and also make sure that your affiliate program allows you to do this; I don't think I can ever say this enough: READ ALL THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS!

As I outlined in Write Clickbank Product Reviews that Will Sell, I think that once you do the hard work promoting a product, it is fair to expect some kind of commission if your review prompts people to go and buy it. When you visit a car dealer and the salesman convinces you that a certain model is the right one for you, do you say (supposing the price stays exactly the same): "Thank you very much, now I will go to the manufacturer and buy this car from him because I don't want you to earn commission on this sale"?

I haven't been hiding my affiliate links simply because I didn't have the technical knowledge so far and it seems like too much of a hassle (you can call me lazy if you like) so I am not sure whether I will or not.

I would just like to end this post saying that just because you can't see an affiliate link doesn't mean it's not there. The information found on the Internet is not 100% reliable so before buying anything, trust your own judgement.