Tag Archives: Finding

Finding Affiliates for Your Products

I started out as an affiliate marketer and the most effective recommendations I shared were those for the products, courses, and services I had purchased, was already using and benefiting from in my business, and was anxious to tell other new entrepreneurs about for their businesses. So if you are looking for affiliates to promote and recommend your products, begin by contacting those whom have already purchased from you and who have become raving fans.

If you step back and think about this objectively you will find this to be an excellent strategy. Yet so many people are willing to promote products they have never purchased or used, simply to earn the income as an affiliate. This will not bring long-term success in most cases, unless you are purchasing traffic in various niches. For the majority of us this is a relationship business that is based on people doing business with other people they know, like, and trust.

When I was just getting started I had no affiliate program whatsoever. Instead, I attempted to sell my products on my own. This was somewhat effective, but definitely not scalable over time. Eventually I set up an affiliate program, but only opened it to those who had purchased something from me. My thinking here was that the people who had gone through my products and courses would make better affiliates because they had experienced what it was like to learn from me and would share that enthusiasm with others. Finally I opened up my affiliate program to everyone. I was curious as to what would happen once I did this. It turned out that those who did not know me at all were ineffective at selling my products and courses as an affiliate.

These days my affiliate program is still open to anyone who applies, but I do reach out to those who already know me and encourage them to actively promote and recommend my products and courses to others. Taking this extra step ensures that I am top of mind when a marketer is thinking about recommending something to their audience. And I always offer to create a discount coupon for them if they think this will be helpful.

If you are new to affiliate marketing these are the strategies I would suggest. Write a blog post about what you are doing online. Mention one or two products, courses, or services you have benefitted from in your business. Include your affiliate link and ask readers to click on the link to get further information. When others know that you are using a product or service and getting the results promised by the product creator or vendor they are much more likely to give it a try themselves.

Over time you will connect with more people who can be helpful to you when it comes to having affiliates promote for you. Just two or three well connected affiliates can increase your income substantially over time. And remember that the best affiliates are those who are familiar with you and your products.

I’m Connie Ragen Green and I’ve been an online entrepreneur since 2006. If you are ready to get started on your journey to multiple streams of online income, visit my site at Online Entrepreneur Blueprint and download your complimentary training to get started today. If you would like to become an affiliate for my products and courses please visit the Connie Ragen Green Affiliate Center to get started.

How Are You Finding Your Prospects?

Are You Finding Your Prospects?

Finding your prospects is crucial to your online business success. Everyone who wants and needs to hear your message is already on another person’s list, so the goal is to find those people and to get in front of them. First of all, let’s define what exactly a prospect is and why they are important:

A prospect is a person who is interested in you and what you have to offer, whether that interest is in you, your products, services, or methods, or any combination of those things. They may have a need, desire, or interest in what you do in the area they are involved in.

There are many methods and strategies for finding your prospects and I will share the ones that continue to work for me.

Content Creation – By far, creating and syndicating content is the very best way to achieve success. Finding your prospects by allowing them to find what you have written, recorded as audio, or published as video ensures a much better fit than any other method. As long as your message to market is a clear one you will be able to reach the exact people who will be an excellent fit for your products and services.
Live Events, Workshops, and Conferences – In my opinion, this is the next best way to connect with prospects. I attend several live events each year, as well as hosting two of my own. I’ve done this for more than eight years now and this is how I have been able to build my business and sustain it throughout this past decade. Even though I am an introvert I’m willing to do what it takes to meet more prospects face to face. You can start by networking in this way locally and then expand your reach to include a wider audience of people.
Your Website/Blog and Email Marketing – More than ninety percent of my business is online and finding my prospects in this way is crucial to my success. I blog on two sites regularly and have an optin form on each for people to join my list. I then email daily about what I am doing and how my prospects can achieve their goals. This strategy keeps me connected to my prospects and enables me to have an ongoing conversation with them over time.
Influencers – I define “influencers” as the people who have come before us in our field and have paved the way for you and I to become successful entrepreneurs. Once you and your message receive the seal of approval from an influencer in your niche, potential prospects and clients will feel more confident to go ahead and follow you, share your content, subscribe to your list and potentially purchase from you.
Social Media – You may be surprised to know that social media is the least effective method for finding your prospects and growing your business. There are so many reasons for this, but perhaps the most important one is that you will spend too much of your valuable time on these sites when you could be using those hours to create products, write content that will lead to a book, learn more about your area of specialization, and to teach the topics you know well. If you make a study out of it you will see that most of the people you are interacting with on social media have already decided if they are interested in you and what you have to offer. And they will be the first ones to notice that you are too available on a regular basis to be pursuing your business in a serious manner. My motto continues to be “Get in, get out, and get back to work!”.

Finding your prospects is an ongoing and regular activity that allows you to serve those who want and need you and what you offer. Make a serious effort to connect with these people and your online business will grow exponentially.

Blogging: Finding Your Voice

Finding Your Voice with Blogging

I was someone who talked about becoming a writer for most of my life, yet I did very little actual writing. It wasn’t until I embraced the idea of blogging that I found my voice and became a writer. This has changed my life in so many ways. Let’s discuss this concept of finding your voice in more detail.

The Art of Finding Your Voice

Having a voice doesn’t just mean the act of talking or writing. It means having a point of view, being distinctive, and maybe even a little opinionated or controversial. Agreeing with everyone and everything is the exact opposite of finding your voice. There is a lot of noise on the Internet, and one of the biggest challenges that people face is sifting through all of that noise in order to find the content that’s interesting, challenging, and sometimes controversial.

In fact, one of the things that makes blogging such a great opportunity for you – the fact that there are virtually no barriers to entry and that it’s easy to start a blog – means that there are a lot of not-so-great blogs out there.

By having a strong and consistent point of view, you’re already going to be more compelling than most other blogs. You may already have an idea of how you want to go about building your blog audience, or you may need to take a little time to self-analyze your business and your unique selling proposition. The voice of your blog should be a good fit for the product or service you’re selling. For example, if you are an affiliate marketer for natural health care products, then a writing voice that’s positive and nurturing is almost certain to be more appropriate than a voice that’s “in your face” or that uses risqué humor.

Of course, in order to have a strong voice, you also need to know who you’re speaking to.

Knowing Your Audience

Be sure to consider this factor from a couple of different perspectives. First, take a look at your current prospects and clients. On average, how old are they? Where do they live? How much do they spend with you, and how frequently do they purchase? Are there any demographic clues that you can derive from your customer data that might help you come up with a picture of your typical client?

In addition, you should also give some thought to the people you want to be talking to. Who is your ideal audience? Maybe you’re looking to just grow your following with more individuals similar to your current followers. Or maybe you’re looking to branch out into new markets and reach a new class of individual.

Being Relatable

Be personal. Now, personal doesn’t necessarily mean unprofessional or overly-familiar. In fact, it probably shouldn’t mean those things. “Personal” means that when you’re writing to your audience, you should speak to them as you would if you were having a face-to-face conversation. Your audience is made up of individual people, not a demographic group or statistic.

Appeal to them as individuals, not a market group. This means that your blog posts should make some type of emotional inroads with them, with the exact nature of the emotional appeal to depend on what you’re writing about. It might mean writing your posts from a first-person perspective, but not necessarily so.

Even if your business is a large one, and you’re setting out to create a blog that speaks to your customer base, there are always ways to make it personal. Show that you understand the issues they’re facing and the problems they’re looking to solve. Use your blog posts to demonstrate to your audience that you’re the best solution to those issues and problems. You might be best for any number of reasons: your solution might be the cheapest, or the easiest to follow, or the most convenient. Use your key selling proposition to relate to your audience.

Stephen R. Covey (his latest book – Primary Greatness – The 12 Levers of Success is a great one) teaches that you must ask yourself four questions as you are finding your voice. These embody your heart, your mind, your body, and your soul. They are:

What are you good at?
What do you love doing?
What need can you serve?
And finally, what is life asking of you?

Ask yourself these questions and take the time to answer them truthfully. Write every day. Blog at least twice each week. Share your most honest thoughts, beliefs, and experiences. This will enable you to get closer to finding your voice and making a real difference in your niche.

I’m Connie Ragen Green, online marketing strategist, bestselling author, and international speaker on the topics of entrepreneurship and inner game mind shifts. Let’s connect to see how I may best serve you in the near future.

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