Where to Recruit Affiliates?

[Thatchman]

I am new to this forum but not to affiliate marketing. I have a mobile website design service that I am eager for affiliates to promote. Commissions will be generous and regularly paid. Where is the best place to try and recruit affiliates?

I used to own a financial services website and had quite a lot of affiliates there - they sort of self recruited but this is a new service.

Hopefully someone here will have some juicy nuggets.

Tx in advance.

 

[Natalie.M]

Hi, there is no magic I am afraid. You can try and register with affiliate networks.

 

[Linda Buquet]

I moved your post to the Merchant & Affiliate Manager Discussions section and you'll find lots of threads about recruiting here.

Also at the bottom of the forum we have a section for affiliate program announcements that's free and that's the only place on this forum you can promote it. BUT you can also add it to your sig.

 

[Slips715]

If you're not looking for volume, then I would connect with publishers individually through these types of forums or maybe going to a convention or 2 like blog world or affiliate summit. If you are looking for larger scale, I would invest in integrating with a network like CJ or shareasale. You can also connect with smaller affiliate networks that are also awesome like W4 or Motive Interactive, I've had good experience with both.

 

[JChiou]

If you are looking for larger scale, I would invest in integrating with a network like CJ or shareasale.

One thing that I've been doing during my first month at the helm of managing 3 affiliate programs (all on CJ) is to search for sites that might be a good fit for my programs ("textbooks," "college," etc.) and then using the find affiliates tool in CJ. It isn't the best search engine, but if you search by by URL and just copy/paste, you can find a few folks to recruit within the network.

If that site does not appear to be on CJ and I can find their contact info or a contact form, I will write a short note to them about how and why I found their site, a brief synopsis of who I am and the affiliate program I think they'd be a good fit for, and my contact info. I haven't had much of a response yet with this method, and I know affiliates get tons of emails, but I hope the personal touch will help me stand out and also not have me come across as spam

 

[Ray K]

I use big search like Google and Bing and type in keywords from my industry. If I find a publisher that is promoting a competitor then I'll reach out to them and make a connection with email (whois works well for finding contact information on a website).

Its time consuming but if you keep it up you may find a good publisher (that you know is active enough to show up on search).

As somebody else said there are no magic bullets. You must not just look for one way that works. But look for as many ways as you can (in networks, out of networks, using search, using affiliate forums, etc...). I spend about 4 hours a day in recruitment efforts to get maybe one good publisher a month. But they add up.

 

[Melanie10]

As some have suggested, search for publishers that are promoting your competitors and reach out to them. My suggestion is to make your initial contact personal, don't just send a form letter.

 

[JChiou]

Ray, what you said about spending 4 hours a day and maybe getting one quality publisher is helping to keep me motivated in growing my programs. I've read elsewhere that 50-60% of an AM's time should be spent on recruitment, so I guess that's just how the story goes.

I'm also trying to develop ways to make my programs more attractive and have more affiliates come to me! One thing I'm doing is starting up a few specialized incentive programs that are meant to help ramp up affiliates that have some traffic but no/few conversions. Has anyone found success with a similar method or done something else to make their program shine?

 

[jonrhodesuk]

Offer a generous percentage commission and make it as easy as possible for them by providing affiliate materials such as articles, emails, videos etc. That way more affiliates will come to you if they can make decent money easily.

 

[garynye]

Probably the best place to find affiliates to promote products is with registering to Clickbank and promoting from other sites such as JVZoo and Rapbank. Good Luck hope you're successful!