Are You Cloaking Your Affiliate Links?

If you are a internet home business owner you are probably a member of several affiliate programs.You work hard to promote your affiliate programs but you are not earning as much as you think, you might actually be losing over 50% of your sales because your affiliate links are not cloaked.Cloaking is a way to protect your affiliate link so no one can steal your commissions.There are many ways of protecting the links, like making hidden redirect pages.

If you have a lot of unprotected affiliate links on your website you will probably not get too many sales, because people are vary of clicking these long ugly affiliate links with all the funny numbers and signs on them and a large portion of your commissions are probably getting robbed. Also, a protected link looks much nicer too.

An normal affiliate link looks usually something like this:

http://www.affiliatelink.com/?ref=77383393

but when it is cloaked it looks something like this:

http://www.mydomain.com/recommends/affiliateprogram

Cloaking by setting up hidden redirect pages for all your affiliate programs can be quite difficult.You need to create a php-file that contains your affiliate link and some additional code which you save and upload with your ftp-program to your server.

For more information on how to make a php-file cloaking, there is a website called Essential Keystrokes that has a really good explanation on how to make a redirect for affiliate links.

I like things that are simple and work without hassle, so I´m using a free cloaking tool called MyLinkGuard.I find it very easy to use and I recommend you download it and try it out and see for your self.

Tags: Affiliate Marketing, affiliate program, cloaking affiliate links, commissions, home business owner, php redirect

How To Make Your Home Business Successful!

Guest post by William Geitgey.

It is a miracle how the most successful home business websites have so much in common, despite of the fact that they look so different. The unique difference can be filtered down to two words - Relevant Content.

One common feature is that these successful sites are likable and somehow easy to use. Everything looks so clear, so it is easy to judge whether you like it or not.

They look so simple that I often ask what special techniques they have and how they have become so successful? It seems that the simpler and the more user friendly the site is the better chances it has to create big sales.

Very clearly one big success factor is that the fine tuning work should concentrate to take away all the unnecessary elements and non-selling links.

1. Winning Element: Attention Grabbing Title.

The title is absolutely the most important element of the site. It should contain the promise and to describe the content of the site.

A Great Title informs in a catchy way that this website includes the benefits about this topic.

The headline should be written well and it should stand out from the rest of the copy. It also should be the first element, which catches the visitor attention in seconds, because if it does not do that, the visitor continues the surfing.

2. Winning Element: Well Written Copy.

The Internet is the information highway, so the role of the copy is very important. This is the world of the words. The copy should draw the reader´s attention immediately to the benefits your offer has for him.

The style is important and the target is to build up the trust from the first contact. The copy should make the reader enthusiastic about the benefits but it should not use hype style or promises, because they will destroy the trust.

3. Winning Element: Easy Site Navigation.

This is the technical must because nothing drives the visitors away faster than the bad navigation. The site structure should be clear and logical, so that the visitor knows all the time, where he is and to where he could go from here.

The menu should be the same on every page and clearly accessible and also easy to understand. The terms should be clear, despite of the fact that you may want to use internet home business key phrases.

4. Winning Element: Call to Action.

After the copy has presented the main benefits it is the time to call the reader into action. The clearness is important. The visitor hates the situation, when he does not know what to do next so it is better to call him to action and not to leave him guessing? Action is everything and we have to call the reader to do that.

One good way is to lower the bar, i.e. to offer a cheap or free trial opportunity for some weeks before the reader will buy the product. The effectiveness of this is that the visitor gains confidence of success, thus, you make the sale.

5. Winning Element: Images.

One picture tells more than thousand words. You should include photos of every product you sell, because they make the products more real, than the copy alone.

To make the navigation easier you can use thumbnails instead of big images which link to larger images. This speeds up the page loadings.

6. Winning Element: Opt in Form.

Most of the internet home business visitors need at least five contacts before they will buy. It is important to get the website visitors name and email address in the early stage, because otherwise they can leave the site and you will never see them again.

In this process you have to give them a gift, an email course, a free e-book or something like that, which again will sell your offer later on. Now you can send them messages during a long period of time, which clearly makes the process more productive.

7. Winning Element: About Us Section.

The idea of every internet home business site is to build trust over a period of time. This requires that you tell enough about yourself and give your contact information for further questions.

All big home business brands are built by success stories, so give them one. The idea of the story is to give enough information about you and to show that there is a real person working for the customers. This shows visitors that there are real people behind the business.

8. Winning Element: Site Freshness.

People and search engines love unique, fresh information. A successful home business website goes through regular changes and additions. The visitor sees immediately that it is up to date.

It is useful to look the competing sites in your internet home business niche, because they are a great source of new ideas. Another idea is to make sure your site can stand out from the crowd. In some way, be different. The key to this is, test, test and retest until you get the results you are looking for.

The marketing is very important but the key is still the quality of your internet home business site. It makes your visitors come back to the only place they can reach you and your offers. Once you have established this trust, you are well on your way to a high ranking website and a very successful online home business.

I invite you to visit my website where I have done just that. Take the time to browse my available top online home businesses which will all provide you the blueprints to success for your work from home business.

Visit today at..
http://www.freedom1-package.com

To your financial freedom,

William Geitgey

Tags: Home Business, successful home business website, William Geitgey, winning elements of a home business website

How To Become A Successful Blogger

Technorati is probably the biggest internet search engine for blogs and are currently tracking over 112,000,000 blogs and over 250,000,000 pieces of tagged social media (May 2008). It shows that blogging is highly popular.All blogs can not be successful. What are the qualities you need in order to become a successful blogger?

There are lots of them, but here are a few things I have noticed:

A blog cannot be successful if the blogger is not writing new posts.This means that when you start a blog and keep writing interesting posts constantly, people will take notice and start visiting your blog.If you stop writing, your visitors will look elsewhere for the information.If you are running an business with your blog, writing interesting content on a daily basis should be your first priority.

With so many blogs online you must be original in some way.You are building a brand, your name online.To stand out from the rest, offer something to your visitors that keeps them coming back. People love to get free stuff. Free reports and software usually works very well, but keep the freebies related to your blog topic.

Writing your own ebook and giving it way for free is guaranteed to keep you popular,and this will grow your business at the same time.

Another thing that definitely helps you to be original and stand out from the rest is writing 100% original content on your blog.Give your visitors content they cannot read anywhere else.

More information about becoming a successful blogger:

I highly recommend reading 12 Traits of Successful Bloggers by Darren Rowse at Problogger.net.

Tags: Blogging, becoming successful blogger, blogging, qualities, traits of blogging

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