Do you know the answers to these most-asked affiliate marketing questions?

Q. What exactly is affiliate marketing?

Affiliate marketing is essentially an effective Internet marketing tool, where outside agents are hired to promote someone else’s product or service through their own websites or ads. The affiliate marketer is given a code that will allow tracking services to determine how much traffic is generated by their promotions, as well as how many sales are actually created. Participants are paid a percentage on every sale made through their promotion efforts.

Q. What is the earning potential of affiliate marketing?

Depending on the promotion methods, as well as the product or service you choose to promote, you can usually make anywhere from 4% to 75% on each item sold. Sites such as Amazon.com and Walmart were founders in the affiliate programs idea and their participants have had great success over the years earning extra money through their websites.

Q. How are the percentages paid out?

The exact method will vary between companies but they typically all have a payout structure set in place that you can review prior to signing up. Most often, participants are paid on either a weekly, bi-weekly or monthly basis. For tax purposes, you will be sent the appropriate tax forms to reflect your total income for the year.

Q. What is an affiliate ID and link?

When you register as an affiliate with a company, you will typically be issued an ID or link for you to use in your promotions. These codes tell the firm’s site when you generated a particular visit or sale. This is how the companies can determine how much business was brought to them by affiliates, as well as how much each affiliate has earned because of it.

Q. Which companies have an affiliate programs?

Today, most firms that do any significant volume of business online may also have an affiliate program available. Most will have their own in-house programs, but some use outside firms to manage these programs for them. In the case of the independent management firm, all of your dealings will most likely be filtered through them, not the store or business that you are actually promoting. They will track your actions, your successes and failures and most importantly, your earnings.