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Posts Tagged ‘my article network’

There are plenty of places where we can read about an affiliate marketing business, but there aren’t many places where you can find someone to do some of the hardest work for you.  Well, I may not have found a long hidden source of free labor, but I know that I have unearthed what is probably nearly as good.

I do affiliate marketing, although I also sell my own information products and physical products.  My online business is made up of a number of traditional sites and blogs.  I rely quite heavily on search engine optimization (SEO) to secure traffic, but that is a long term strategy.  For some of my affiliate marketing, I have tried PPC, but rarely have I had success over the long haul. 

Consequently, like many in affiliate marketing, increasing traffic at a reasonable cost is one of my most vexing challenges.  It is particularly difficult for those times when I discover a new affiliate product but for which none of my sites are well optimized.  How do I get the visitors to the vendor’s site with my embedded affiliate link?

I use the same, standard approach that most of you reading this use; I bring the visitors to my own site initially for an introduction to the product or, perhaps a comparison of competing products.  I hope they’ll click the link that will take them to the spot where they might actually buy the product that will earn me my pittance.  I have always wished that I could cut out part of the middle of that process.

I use article marketing extensively for all of my sites.  While I get some traffic directly from the articles, my primary reason for article marketing is its SEO value, which is considerable.  However, especially for an affiliate marketer, there are two major problems with traditional article marketing.  First, the major article directories don’t allow contextual links within the body of the articles.  Instead the links stand alone in a section that they call the author’s resource box, but which screams, “Commercial!” to our readers.  Second, the major article directories do not allow affiliate links or even links to redirected pages or domains.

Finally, there is an article distribution service that solves those two problems and allows direct linking using our affiliate links which can be placed contextually within the article.  It’s called My Article Network–and, yes, once you are a member, you can join its affiliate program.

My Article Network is like a consortium for article marketers and content publishers.  (The link goes to some specific information about My Article Network on one of my sites.)  It’s another of those Callen projects that most of us who hang around online business for any period of time have come to know so well.

Since I am writing to and for the benefit of affiliate marketers, I’ll cut short the presell message and let sales page of My Article Network speak for itself.  I have been a member of the system for less than seven weeks, and I am definitely ready to proselytize!  In fact, I even set up four new niche blogs to make use of the free content that my colleagues provide.  {(Go ahead.  Click the link, you know you want to.)(Do it!  You know you want to click the link.  Come on…don’t you think I deserve it?}

Being an affiliate or associate marketer is often a difficult enterprise.  There is much more to learn than most of us anticipated when we first started.  And the learning curve can be so steep that many simply give up.

The most frequent difficulty among failed or failing affiliate marketing enterprises is buying magical, secret plans and not putting them into action to see if they actually work.  Some are no more than buyers; they don’t even read the books or watch the videos they buy.  I hope that you are among those who will remain committed over the long haul, constantly improving your knowledge base and actually applying what you learn by taking action.  If not, please just stop reading, because you’ll simply waste money, and your business will fail, regardless.  I’m sorry for being so blunt.

There are two resources for affiliate marketers that I include in my recommendations.  One of those is a new approach to article marketing that automatically forwards your articles to many blogs as well as traditional websites, not just those you run yourself.  This system is a very valuable membership website called My Article Network.  Here I’m going to focus upon one use to which an affiliate marketer can put it, although the previous link will deliver you to a lengthier description of how the entire system works and may benefit you.

If you write an article for distribution via one or more article directories, your link is limited to the author’s resource box, usually placed at the bottom of the content.  With this new system, you can put up to three links directly into the article itself.  Contextual links are much more effective.  Furthermore, the top article directories (those with the most traffic, which are most likely to show up in the search engine directories) will not allow you to place a direct affiliate link into even the resource box.  However, this new, vastly improved approach allow you to use affiliate links that will go directly to the vendor, without having to send your hard-won traffic to your own site first.  You can get a feel for the whole process by visiting the site for this unique article marketing approach that will pre-spin your article so that unique versions are distributed to websites and blogs within your niche from their membership of over 10,000 websites.

The other resource is a complete educational system established exclusively for affiliate marketers who are owners of various size businesses as well as those preparing for a career in affiliate management.  This is a completely revamped reissue of Anik Singal’s famous AffiliateClassroom.  Singal, who was named as one of four Business Week Magazine’s young entrepreneurs of 2008, has spent two years, along with his partner, revamping the critically acclaimed program to make it even more expansive and comprehensive.  I strongly urge you to sign up for the complete information before all the spaces are taken.  No joke, this will fill very quickly.

As I write this, the product has not yet launched, so all you can do is sign up on the squeeze page to be continually updated.  Depending upon when you read this article, it is possible that it will have already sold out.  Check to see if they have established a waiting list.  If so, sign up and hope that a space for you opens.

Anticipating a question that I would ask, yes, both of these have affiliate programs, but you can’t use your own affiliate links to purchase either membership.  You must sign up for both prior to gaining access to the affiliate programs.