5 Ways to Increase your Value as an Affiliate or Blogger

The value of attending industry conferences can’t be overstated. Each type of conference can bring a large number of benefits to you personally, to your blog, and to your partnerships. Here are a couple of fantastic reasons to be sure you target a few conferences or events each year:

1. Shows a potential retail partner that you are committed to your business enough to take time out of your life to show up.
2. Gets your face in front of a potential retail partner and puts a face to your email address – they are going to be much more likely to respond and work with you.
3. Allows you to learn about a retailer, their products, and negotiate great terms going forward for yourself in the program.
4. Connect with OTHER bloggers who are in the same position as you – and learn from each other.

New customers are more valuable, typically, to a retailer than returning customers. You may ask “How Do I Do This? I can’t control new vs. old, can I?”

It is true that you can’t necessarily control this, but you can position yourself so that there is an increased likelihood that you are sending more and more new customers.

Here are of tips to set yourself up for success:

Get off (redirected) search

Search makes up an enormous percentage of traffic generated – and thus we all love it. However, as Merchants become more sophisticated in their own search efforts, they will likely de-value Affiliates who work in that arena.

This has already happened with Paid Search in the area of brand terms, trademarks, etc… and will continue into natural results. The majority of customers who have searched for their “Company Name” are repeat customers or those who would have ended up at their store without the assistance of an Affiliate. Therefore, don’t expect to drive new customers through search.

Build a Community.

As an Affiliate, a new source of traffic (one that belongs all to you) should be a goal.

There is no greater source of traffic than the one that you build yourself. Going back the topic of search engine usage, it would of better use to implement search as a way to build up your own site. Use your skills at search to bring traffic to your site, and then build a community around that traffic. Use small things like polls, questions, games, prizes, discussion, comments – all these things can bring people into your community. Communities feed on themselves – and bring the kind of organic growth to your Affiliate business that can’t be obtained thru search alone.

Be a traffic source, not solely a re-director of traffic.

Go Smaller

There is no better way to help grow both personally and your blog than to stay educated and informed. In an industry that frequently changes with new technology, laws, and policies, your website will fall behind unless you stay up-to-date with the trends. Consume everything – other blogs, books, news articles. There are even blogs that teach you how to become an Affiliate Marketer, but be warned – there are very few that do it well.

Improve your skills and knowledge by reading the following; even if you are already a productive Affiliate yourself, you will learn.