Choosing The Right Affiliate Program & The "Rules To Live By"

Following are a few related odds and ends.

Affiliate Programs and bulk email do NOT go together.

There's this "myth" out there about affiliate programs, that you go join a few, put them all in an email message and then bulk email thousands of people who will eagerly respond making you tons of money! Oh, so WRONG! This is probably one of the worst things you can do online. It's called SPAM!

Most affiliate programs have a "bulk" email clause in their agreement that says... if you spam, you can get terminated from the program and not get paid for any commissions you've earned. Be aware that there's also a very good chance that you will lose your Internet connection, not to mention your reputation!

Sending unsolicited bulk email to millions of people who have NOT qualified themselves as being interested in your product is not very profitable (you won't get any response!) can end up costing you money and is just plain RUDE!

I even know of some companies who have billed the "spammer" for the time it's taken the company to deal with the complaints and administrative problems caused by the bulk emailing done using their affiliate program URL. You spam with an affiliate URL, and it looks like it was the company doing the spamming, since the recipient is being sent directly to the company website. Not good for the company's reputation! NOT going to make you a very popular affiliate member either!!

One last thing. Watch out for any "exclusivity clauses" in affiliate agreements. Some companies will state that "they can be the only retailer of a specific product on your site". If you signed up with a book selling program for example, with this clause in the contract, that would limit you to selling only their books on your site. This may not be a problem for you, maybe you only want to sell their books anyway! Just be careful not to restrict yourself unless you want to.