10 Ways To Differentiate Your Affiliate Business And Crush Your Competition
One of the most common mistakes made by affiliate marketers is the lack of differentiation in their business. Their website reads and looks just like hundreds of other affiliate websites in their niche. They all use the same web or blog templates, articles, affiliate promotional tools and photos for their websites.
Conformity is fine… if you’re in high school. Back then, if you deviate from the norm, you’ll will be ostracized and ridiculed by your peers and teachers.
But in the business world, conformity is the kiss of death. If your business, websites and products are just copycat versions of your competition, it’s game over. You won’t be able to stand out in a crowded market and you’ll struggle to generate long-term profits.
So, here are 10 strategies you can use to differentiate your affiliate business and crush your competition:
1. The All-in-one Strategy
This is the Amazon.com strategy. You offer the largest or most comprehensive selection of products/services in your niche. For instance, if you’re an affiliate marketer in the golf market, you could create a portal site that covers every aspect of golf, from product reviews to training articles. Your site can also offer daily news and a forum for golfers.
The goal of this strategy is to become the toll gate in your chosen market. Any merchant or advertiser that wants to reach your market will have to pay a toll to you, so to speak.
The downside to this strategy is you may end up being a jack of all trades and master of none. So, use this strategy only if you believe that you can develop an all-round website that’s superior to your competition.
2. The Independent Verification Strategy
Submit your affiliate website for awards or certifications. This is an opportunity to prove to your visitors that you’re the best in your market. It also builds your credibility if your website is selected as the best by independent publications.
So, look for magazines in your niche that give out the “Best Online Resource” award. If you win an award for your website, you’ll have an edge over your competition and you’ll be getting free publicity as well.
3. The Specialist Strategy
You can specialize your affiliate business in two ways:
- A specific niche market.
- A specific type of product/service.
Interestingly, you can combine the All-in-one strategy with the Specialist strategy. For example, you can build a portal in the dog market that offers product reviews, health and training tips, and a forum for just one specific dog breed.
4. The Celebrity Endorsement Strategy
Get celebrity and/or expert endorsement for your website. It doesn’t have to be expensive if you ask local or retired celebrities. You can offer free publicity to the celebrity in exchange for her endorsement.
For example, if you own a golf website, find a celebrity who plays golf and interview him. Then, ask him to check out your site and if he likes it, request a testimonial from him.
5. The New Category Strategy
One effective way to claim the No. 1 position in a market segment is to create a totally new category for your affiliate business.
For example, if your affiliate website reviews and promotes comics and action figures and you’re having difficulty in becoming the No. 1 comic book site or the No.1 action figure site, why not create a new category, i.e. comics AND action figure site?
Then, you can claim that you’re the No.1 comics and action figure authority on the internet. You’re No.1 because you’re the only one in the category.
6. The Value Added Strategy
This strategy involves offering free unique, valuable services or products to entice your visitors to buy through your affiliate link.
For instance, you could add information products as free premiums to entice your referrals. Information products like ebooks, audios and videos are cheap and easy to produce. You could just interview an expert via Skype and record the interview.
Another great value added product is software. Just hire a freelance programmer to develop a simple software that will save time or money for your referrals.
7. The Controversy Strategy
Controversy sells. Just ask Madonna. A controversial affiliate website will generate publicity and word-of mouth traffic easily and quickly.
To create controversy, look for accepted norms in your market or industry. And then, brainstorm ways on how you can break the norms and yet still give your market what they want.
8. The Design Strategy
All things being equal, the affiliate website with the more attractive design will win repeat visitors. Humans are naturally attracted to beauty. So, having a visually attractive website will generate more repeat visitors and hence, more revenue for you.
Unfortunately, most affiliate sites look amateurish and boring. So, hire a professional designer to create an attractive and unique web template for your site. It’s a one-time expense that will have a lasting and positive impact on your business.
9. The Squeezer Strategy
A company that uses this strategy all the time is Wal-Mart as they use their size to squeeze their vendors for maximum profits. You can use this strategy if you’re one of the top affiliates for a merchant.
Just negotiate a higher commission with the merchant. In most cases, they will agree to your request if they don’t want to lose you as an affiliate.
When you earn a commission higher than the average affiliate, you’ll have more ammunition for your marketing expenses.
10. The Membership Strategy
One of the best strategies to generate repeat traffic and recurring revenue is to develop an exclusive membership site. Even if you want to promote affiliate products only and have no desire to sell your own products, you can build a free membership site that contains frequently updated content.
A free membership site with great content will generate more repeat traffic and loyalty than the usual content site. You should also set the bar really high in your market by offering more than just articles. You should offer unique content in ebook, audio and video format that your competition doesn’t offer.
And there you have it, 10 strategies to differentiate your business and crush the competition. There are many more strategies available but if you implement just a few of the aforementioned strategies, you will see a positive effect on your affiliate business.
Just think big and do more than your competition. Be the 900 pound gorilla in your market and your business will still be standing once the dust has finally settled.
If you want to learn more strategies on differentiating your affiliate business and crushing your competition, check out the Startup Rebel Competitive Magic course now.
Richard Branson’s New Book “Screw It, Let’s Do It”
I’d like to share with you a new book I just read. It’s called “Screw It, Let’s Do It” by Richard Branson.
If you want to get rich doing what you love, there’s no better person to learn it from than Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Music, Airlines and a few hundred businesses.
In his book, Branson says that everything he’s ever done, he did it because it’s fun.
Money is always secondary. It is important but it’s never his main motivator. If a business stops being fun, he’d quit and move on to something else.
Did you know he quit school at 16 and started his first business? It was a magazine called Student and he says it was a party every day.:)
They worked hard, played hard and hung out with celebs like John Lennon and the Rolling Stones. Eventually, he sold off the magazine to start Virgin Music. And the rest is history.
One of the most interesting parts of the book is how he bought Necker Island.
If you’ve seen his Rebel Billionaire show, you’d have seen his beautiful private island on the Atlantic. He bought it for less than 200,000 pounds. He couldn’t afford it initially but he found ways to get the money.
You see, this book doesn’t offer a blueprint to make millions but it allows you to get a glimpse into his mindset.
His mindset is what makes him a billionaire.
The average person would say, “I can’t afford the island. Forget about it!”
But Branson, knowing he couldn’t afford it, proceeded to find ways to buy the island. And that mindset is what separates the rich and the poor.
People think being rich is about education, experience, connections, intelligence, skills, creativity.
It’s not. It’s your mindset.
In his book, Branson shows you how he thinks and how he makes decisions. And that is priceless.
So, run to your nearest book shop and grab a copy. It’s cheap and a quick read. You can finish it in a few hours.
And remember to have fun in your business!
Five Easy Ways To Make Money With Your Travel Photos
There’s money in your photos. No, not your nude photos! (although I’m sure there’s a market for them somewhere…:)
I’m talking about the photos that you took from your trip to Spain or Australia or just about anywhere in the world.
Most people return from their vacation with tons of photos and a huge stack of credit card bills.
With rising fuel costs and inflation, you have to be smart and find ways to monetize your vacation and use the money to pay off some of your travel expenses.
So, here are five ways you can make money from your travel photos. They are arranged in the order of difficulty (from easiest to hardest):
1. Create and sell calendars, posters and t-shirts via Cafepress
Just upload your photos on Cafepress and you can start selling calendars, posters and t-shirts that feature your photos instantly.
You set the prices based on Cafepress’s wholesale prices. Cafepress will print, deliver and collect payment on your behalf.
2. Create and sell screensavers
Just download a screensaver editing software from Download.com and create screensavers with your photos. You can sell them on Ebay (they have a category devoted to screensavers) and/or your own website.
Screensaver prices range from $1 to $30. Since they’re digital, there’s nothing to ship and you can sell them over and over again at 90% profit margin.
Update: Ebay doesn’t allow digital products to be sold on its site anymore.
3. Sell photos to the media via Scoopt
Scoopt is a media agency that helps members of the public sell photographs and videos of newsworthy events to the press.
So if you have photos of events, disasters, crimes or celebrities, you can get Scoopt to sell them to the media. They share 50% of the selling price.
Don’t worry, you still own the copyright to your photos.
4. Sell stock photos
You can package your photos and sell them through the following channels:
- your own website
- stock photo websites
- ad agencies
- publishers
Here are two of the most popular stock photo websites you should check out:
http://www.shutterstock.com
http://www.iStockphoto.com
If you need help pricing your photos, you can visit this stock photo price calculator.
5. Build travel websites and earn money from Google Adsense
This may be the most profitable option. Just create a website for each country you’ve visited. Place Google ads on your web pages and when visitors click on them, Google pays you.
These websites are virtual vending machines. Just build and forget them. They’ll make money for you 24/7 without any maintenance.
The cost per click for travel ads is quite high, so you could earn 3 to 4-figure income a month WITHOUT doing anything.
For more information: http://www.google.com/adsense
If you’re starting or building an Adsense business, check out the Adsense Blueprint for a $410 million Adsense success story. You’ll also learn how to build a successful Adsense business without any marketing, technical or writing skills.
Rebel Tips:
1. Whatever you’re selling, you should have your own site, so that you build your own brand. DO NOT rely solely on third party sites (Ebay, Cafepress) for your sales.
2. Always put your website address in all your products so that everything leads back to your website. You’ll need Adobe Photoshop to do this.
That’s it! You now have all the information and tools to start profiting from your travel photos.
Get started right away and good luck!
How To Predict Whether Your Business, Product Or Traffic Strategy Will Succeed
Whenever you launch a new business, product or traffic strategy, you’ll always wonder, “Will this work? Or am I just wasting my time and money?”
Well, today is your lucky day. I’m going to show you how to tell if your business, product or traffic strategy will succeed.
All you have to do is to ask two simple questions:
Question 1: What is your business, product or traffic strategy’s magic?
What do I mean by magic? I’m referring to your competitive edge, your unique selling proposition.
In other words, what makes your business, product or traffic strategy special? What makes them unique?
For example, if you have an Adsense website, what’s so special about it?
- Does it have a unique design?
- Does it have unique content?
- Does it have original content?
- Does it have frequently updated content?
- Is there a reason for your visitor to return to your site?
- Is there a reason for your visitor to tell her friends about your site?
If you answered “No” to two or more of the questions, your site has no magic. As such, it will not achieve long-term success unless you make major changes to it.
If you answered “Yes” to two or more of the questions, then your site has an advantage over other Adsense sites in your market.
However, don’t jump for joy yet. Here comes the next big question…
Question 2: How easy is it for other businesses to copy or crush your magic?
It is such an important question that it amazes me how so many entrepreneurs don’t ask themselves that question. And that’s probably why they struggle or fail in their business.
If your competitive edge can be easily duplicated or crushed by your competition, it’s game over. You won’t stand a chance in any highly crowded market.
That’s why so many internet entrepreneurs whose business is built on:
- resell rights ebooks
- private label articles
- private label web templates
- software-generated web pages
- Adsense arbitrage
- affiliate products
…struggle to generate consistent profits.
Their websites and products can easily be duplicated by anyone. Anyone!
Ultimately, all strategies, products and websites can duplicated by your competitors but the issue here is the ease of duplication. If one or two companies duplicate or crush your products, you’ll still survive.
For instance, Linux and Open Office are cheaper versions of Microsoft Windows and Office respectively. But they didn’t put Microsoft out of business.
On the other hand, if your product is a resell rights ebook or a private label Adsense website that anyone can buy for $50 to $100 and start competing with you, then you’ve got a serious problem.
So, what you need to do is to evaluate your competitive strategies. If any of your strategies is easy to duplicate, drop them. If they are hard to duplicate, keep them.
For strategies that are somewhere in the middle, you need to improve them, so that it’s extremely difficult for competitors to duplicate them.
Remember, if anyone can do what you do, it’s NOT a competitive advantage.
If you want to learn how million dollar companies develop their competitive edge and crush their competition, check out the Startup Rebel Competitive Magic course now.