Here are some things you will want not do to if you are an a affiliate marketer. In this article, I guarantee you’ll discover something new or interesting - a resource, a tip, an idea… something to help you learn more about the topic.

How can I say this? Because having read many articles like this one, I know just how much research and background investigation into the subject goes into its creation. This article comes out of Stone Evans’ free eBook Dotcomology.

Many affiliate marketers make a huge mistake of posting their ads on forums. Forums can be used to promote your affiliate programs and your website but in a proper manner like using your forum sig file for advertising your wares and making valuable contributions to forum discussions in progress. Posting blatant ads in most forums is considered spamming and will easily upset the forum administrators and possibly get you banned.

Always do your research before promoting your affiliate program to a potential customer. Do not offer affiliate programs to visitors who are not at all interested in the products associated with the program. This is a futile endeavor.

If you promote affiliate programs offered by other merchants, try developing some of your own advertising copy. Many websites commit a common mistake of using the same advertising copy as used by the merchant themselves. You will usually experience greater success recommending other company’s products in your own voice rather than the voice of the company whose products you are promoting.

Avoid copyright infringement in all cases. Always use original content or ask permission to use graphicimages or text found on other websites.

Avoid using ALL CAPS on your web page or email ad. Using caps is symbolic to shouting, which will turn off many potential customers. A few words may be written in capital text to give them additional emphasis. However, such practice should be limited.

Always respond to all queries sent by visitors as soon as possible. A slight delay in your response could easily result in losing the sale.

Do not host your website on a free server or use free email accounts. This gives a negative impression to visitors. Using free hosts and email accounts looks cheesy and loses sales.

Many websites do not have an opt-in list. Create an opt-in and opt-out list for your visitors. Without these, there is no way of following-up with potential customers. Visitors should be allowed to opt-in at any time as well as opt-out at any time.

Most sites have a poor tracking mechanism. It is essential that you track all business activities. Accurate record keeping is crucial. There are several software tools discussed earlier in this chapter that can automate your record-keeping process with minimal error.

Before we go on, a quick reminder… You’ll discover some interesting stuff on this website listing informative, educational and entertaining resources, along with other material to help you. Please take a look at them when you’ve finished reading this article.

A “mall” site is best used as a central hub to send visitors to your other domains. As a main or only site, unfocused mall sites don\’t get traffic from the engines, and they don\’t convert well to sales. Highly focused theme sites attract traffic and sales.

Offline advertising may not be effective. A lot of money and effort should not be wasted on offline advertising. Most people rarely check websites that are advertised in local magazines or newspapers. Of course, this depends on your product. If you are promoting a direct response sales website, there are times that offline advertising will work very well. The key, of course, is to test and track your ads.

Avoid focus on animated banner ads. These simply use up bandwidth, thus making web pages load slower.

When advertising, do not degrade other competitors. It is recommended that you highlight your products’ uniqueness and superiority but never mortify other products.

Banners or text links that expire are guaranteed to eventually send your visitor to a broken link or show a broken graphic on your page. Time-sensitive advertising is best used only in email campaigns.

Be cautious about putting affiliate links prominently on your home page. Instead, give your visitors a chance to browse first, sign up for your newsletter and decide that they\’d like to come back to your website before introducing them to your affiliates.

Technology changes with amazing speed. To keep up with this rapidly evolving industry, you must invest time and money in research. Remember, the investment is a tax write-off, and will pay you back many times over in additional revenue.

Finally, persist with your plan. It might take you time to get established even if you have a solid marketing plan. Persistence is the single most important factor in determining success online or off.

This article has some excellent tips pertaining to affiliate marketing. It is so easy to become and affiliate for just about any product, but very few people will take the time to learn how to do affiliate marketing properly. One affiliate program that will help you get off to the right start can be found here:

http://www.team-schuman.com/internet-business.html