Don’t Get Lonely Out Here – Join A Best Web

If you’re like me, you’ve jumped into this thing called affiliate marketing with both feet. You spend hours on the computer and look up and the day is gone! Well, that’s no way to live, even on this major learning curve we affiliate marketing newbies are on. The whole point of affiliate marketing is that one day you’ll get some freedom to live life the way you want to – on your terms. If you think there’s no time for freedom now, then it’s time for a wake-up call. And you can get that and more over at A Best Web, the online forum and mega resource for affiliate marketers. I did.

Feeling more than a little intimidated by the sheer number of members – 57,400 strong, I signed up today to be part of this affiliate marketing community. Yes I felt like a newbie, but I got out there anyway. When you sign up, make sure not to just blow past the rules. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about – the form comes up, you click OK and don’t read what it says. Well here’s some of what you’ll miss if you do that at A Best Web:

• You can’t reveal your name or website in your posts.
• No recruiting anyone for something you’re selling – BIG no-no!
• You earn the right to display a signature or send private message other members after you make 250 posts.
• And break the rules and you’ll be banned and banished.

So it’s a commitment to join this forum. But my sense is that if you participate, read and post, you’ll get back tenfold for your efforts. Ask questions, get to know not only affiliates like us but the affiliate managers who are members. Learn everything you can on how to make money and how to get a life in affiliate marketing. The information is all there for the taking over at A Best Web. After you register, look me up and give a shout to a fellow affiliate marketing newbie. I’m “Midlifetrip”.

Now turn off your computer and take a break!

6 Copywriting Tips for Affiliate Marketing Newbies

Copywriting is the one skill that all affiliate marketing newbies should learn. As an affiliate marketer you communicate through words and if those words aren’t effectively conveying your message, then you’re in for a long, bumpy and unproductive ride.

Here are a few copywriting tips to help you get started writing in a way to get the right attention:

1. Know your target market. Good copywriters know exactly who they’re writing for – and to – before starting. They speak directly to ONE person and keep that same person in mind at all times. If you try to reach too many people with your copy you’ll end up missing your target altogether and even worse not reach anyone at all. Decide exactly who you’re writing your copy for and stick to it.

2. Use headlines that intrigue. Use clear headlines throughout your copy to guide the reader. Your main headline should be in bold and large letters to grab the readerís attention. It is often the headline which can either make or break your copy. Use a benefit-focused headline, which explains in powerful detail how you can help solve the customerís problem. Then use sub-headlines throughout the copy to keep the reader intrigued so they will keep reading.

3. Don’t use big words. Online writing is different from the writing you did in English class. Throw out the text book and forget all those rules your teacher taught you. Online writing is casual and should convey emotion and a clear purpose. Speak to the reader as though you’re sitting down with them, chatting over a cup of coffee. Avoid big words and long adjectives like the plague or risk boring (and losing) your prospects.

4. Be persuasive. You may love your product thatís great but you’re biased. Your customers want to hear about unbiased people who have used your product. Include customer testimonials, if you have them. Remember that not just any testimonial will do – the more information you can include the better. Try to include the person’s full name, city, state, website URL and if possible a picture of that person. A video or even audio testimonial is better yet. The more information your testimonial includes the more persuasive and believable it will be.

5. It’s not about you. In fact, it’s not about you at all. Effective copywriting is concerned with and focused on the needs of the customer. This is a big first lesson for affiliate marketing newbies. The writer doesn’t really matter! Of course, you may want to add a little personal information about yourself in order to build a connection with the reader and explain why they should trust you, but even in this case it’s all about what you can do for them. Go through your copy, does it contain a lot about what you think, then it’s time for a serious re-write. Your writing should always be about the customer and the benefits to them.

6. Don’t forget the call. The call to action that is. You must guide your readers and tell them exactly what you want them to do. If you want them to click over and purchase your weight loss product, then say so and say it in a clear way that promotes all the benefits of your products. For example “Click here to learn how you can lose those last 10 pounds and keep them off for good”. Be precise in your wording and always include a call to action that leaves the reader with no doubt as to what to do next.

If you follow these 6 tips, you’ll find that you can have success at copywriting – even as an affiliate marketing newbie.

We Love Making Money While We Sleep

OK, I’ve heard the hype that affiliate marketing can make you money while you sleep. Well it’s true!!! I woke up this sunny Saturday morning, turned on my laptop and lo and behold, there was an email from one of our affiliate programs saying that we made $50 overnight. I called my sister and fellow Extreme Newbie with the news. We couldn’t believe that we made our first money while we slept.Wooo Hoooo!!!!!

Now you may be thinking that $50 isn’t much. But guess what. If we made $50 last night while we slept, ya think we can do it again? We flat out know we can through affiliate marketing. But it’s not for the faint of heart.

Getting started in affiliate marketing requires a lot of grunt work – and we’ve been doing it, day in and day out since we started this website and our Internet marketing business. Success is starting to dribble in and one day soon – we know that the dribble will become a flow.

How do we know that? Well what we have here at Extreme Newbies is a little special combo called faith and believing. This combo gets us up each day, keeps us at our computers for hours, has us learning things we never thought we ever want to know let alone become passionate about. There’s a saying we live by now:

Understand to achieve anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination and dedication. Remember all things are possible for those who believe. ~ Gail Devers

If you’re thinking that these two Extreme Newbies are overly optimistic – think again! What we are is relentlessly optimistic and more focused now than ever because guess what – we really like making money while we sleep!

How about you?

The Extreme Newbie Buddy System

You don’t have to go into the affiliate marketing business with a partner; although for my sister, Karen and me it has turned out to be the perfect business venture. You will definitely benefit from having a few buddies, throughout the process. Karen and I each bring different talents and skill sets to the table, which works well, especially during the stressful times. Of course, you can do this alone, but our experience has proven that a helping hand here-and-there is a good thing.

Our greatest business asset, outside of each other, was our decision to share the learning curves in this experience with two other newbies. We began with a weekly, one-hour conference call to learn each stop of the process together, sharing tips, resources and lessons learned. We chose to use Affilo Blueprint 2.0 as our primary training tool, so each week we had tasks to complete, which kept us moving forward.

Along the way, each member of our team found resources and information to share that enhanced our learning experience. Together we’ve made these recent newbie discoveries we want to share with you:

You can build your own affiliate website or hire a contractor to do the work or purchase a pre-built website.

• If you buy a pre-built website, your purchase generally includes the domain name, a number of articles about your niche, an opt-in box and products to monetize the site.

• Buyer Beware: Find out if the seller will take care of replacing the their affiliate links with yours, i.e., your Click Bank name, so that subsequent sales from visitors to the site are properly credited to you. You don’t want to buy a website that’s set up to pay someone else. Many sellers will also take care of minimal installation of the site, for a small additional fee; some will even coach you through establishing your first affiliate marketing site. Just figure out exactly what you’re getting.

You can write your own content, hire a freelance writer online or purchase private label rights (PLR) articles that target your specific niche/topic.

• PLR content is written by someone and available for fee or free for you to edit, rewrite and claim as your own. We recommend changing the title and make word changes and text edits. Some PLR vendors require that you change an article by 30% or more.  Be sure to check the list of rights you get with a PLR purchase and always do spell and grammar checks before you publish.

Continue to grow your buddy list as needed. The goal of building a network of relationships is to help you sustain and grow your affiliate marketing business, whether it consists of one site or a hundred. Some good ways to network include:

• Join a group like Warriors Forum. It’s an amazing place to get quick answers to questions, referrals for various resources to help you build your business and those must-have tips and tricks.

• Learn about the tools and resources you need to maintain and market your site. Take the time to learn how to use these tools. Your learning curve will lead to profits down the road.

The point is that just like building a house, you don’t have to do everything yourself. This is the true key to your ultimate success. So hang in there, Extreme Newbies. There’s light – and income – at the end of the tunnel.

Hosting For Your Affiliate Website

If you’re getting into affiliate marketing, you’ll end up with a website at some point and want to find a home for it. That’s what “hosting” is in the online world – that place called a server where your website lives. There are a number of website hosting companies with even more features and benefits. How do you select one?

Well here’s a review site to visit, one of many that give you the skinny on hosting sites.  Remember any review site is bound to be someone else’s affiliate site – just so you know. But that’s OK, it’s where you get to see one of the more popular kinds of affiliate websites, something you can have after you pick a niche.

Just a few things you might want to look for:

1. Does the hosting company have a cpanel? That’s what you need for Wordpress which is the platform we are using for our affiliate websites. Look for our post on Wordpress here on Extreme Newbies.
2. What’s the monthly fee – and do you get a break if you pay annually?
3. Something new – is the hosting company eco-friendly? If this is important to you (and shouldn’t it be for all of us), look for green hosting. It’s out there.
4. Do they have 24/7 easily-accessible support? There’s nothing worse than having a problem at 1am and no one’s home at your hosting company.

Affiliate Marketing Newbies – First Month Lessons

We’re at our first month anniversary as newbie affiliate marketers and whew – lots of lessons learned! Here’s a few:

• Pick a niche – something you’re interested in, something lots of other people are interested in and something where there are products to sell. Examples of some of the ones these newbies picked are weight loss, weight training, credit repair and a new favorite life topic – going green.
• Do a keyword search before you do buy a domain or do anything else. Check out the Google Keyword Tool – easy to use and free. Or try out our favorite keyword tool, Market Samurai that has lots of other features to help in any kind of Internet marketing.
• Focus, focus, focus. Create a roadmap for your affiliate marketing journey. This is not a business that you want to meander along in and miss the opportunity to make the mean green.
• Ignore “bright, shiny objects”. As you get involved in affiliate marketing, you will see wonderful things on the learning curve, things I call – bright, shiny objects, the “accessories” of the trade – courses, programs, tools, resources and my favorite – ready-made affiliate websites. Unless you have a trust fund, you can’t get them all so this is where having a business plan comes in real handy to keep you focused.
• Pass on most of the freebies you run into on the Internet – teleseminars, webinars, ebook, special reports. They are there to get you to buy a paid product. Freebies usually tell you the “what” on a topic but never the “how”. And they can really be a time suck. If something really speaks to you though, follow your intuition, go for it and sign up.
• Ask questions – there are any dumb ones or I would have asked all of them already! One thing I’ve found is that experienced affiliate marketers are always ready to share some advice with a newbie.
• Take your mistakes – like the ones I’ve made this month – as absolutely necessary affiliate marketing lessons learned.

Show me a person who has never made a mistake and I’ll show you somebody who has never achieved much. ~ Joan Collins

Take Your Seat in Affiliate Classroom 2.0

We’re extreme affiliate “newbies” (and sisters) who’ve been on a bit of a quest to learn more about affiliate marketing. Why? Well, like most people these days, we’ve heard that there’s gold in them there websites and quite frankly – we want some of it. Our journey to find just the right affiliate marketing training led us to newly revised Affiliate Classroom 2.0. (Newbie Nugget: the links in this post are our own affiliate link, just so you know.)

What It Is

From what we hear, the mega-improved Affiliate Classroom 2.0 is a program that teaches you how to become a high earning affiliate marketer. Unlike other programs though, that are book or video lesson based, Affiliate Classroom 2.0 is a website community devoted to all things affiliate.

Which means that once you sign up, you get access to Affiliate Classroom 2.0, coursework on how to become a successful affiliate marketer along with tools, support, the forum and an amazing learning environment where you’re guaranteed to find answers to your specific affiliate marketing related questions.

Affiliate Classroom 2.0 launched with a whopping 62 courses and plans to add more great courses every month! There are actually almost 250 courses outlined for the students who will learn in an interactive environment at their own pace. If you’re starting off part-time as an affiliate marketer, you’ll be able to access Affiliate Classroom 24/7 as your schedule and lifestyle permits. This is a perfect solution for newbies who wants to work independently and progress at their own warp speed.

Something truly unique to Affiliate Classroom 2.0 is that this training option actually allows you to become “certified” – a new opportunity that paves the way for bigger affiliate commissions and even “super affiliate” status down the road. At the end of the day, you have to decide what kind of training works best with your learning style. Our goal is give you some of the options we’ve found with the hopes that something will be a good fit for you.

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