If you use as a comparison the way that an investment broker might determine the right investments for you, you will note the following: Basically he will ask if you are at the age and financial situation that you need to take high risk in order to earn the most money in the fastest time (and potentially lose the most); Or if you want to have less risk (and less earnings potential) – a mid-range risk; and last can you not tolerate much risk at all whether this means your earnings will be less or not, you do not accept risk.
Your answer will determine whether you have your money in risky stocks where the market can soar and dive? They like to believe that when you lose money if you leave everything alone that the time will come when the money you lost will come back. This is fine if you are young and you have plenty of time to recover. Not that anything is ever guaranteed or insured in any way, so feel free to ignore them on that.
There are plans in the middle ground where you have an equal number of risky investments plus more stable investments like bonds and balanced mutual funds. So you are taking risks on one hand, and being protective of your investment on the other. Lastly, there are the totally low risk and low income producing vehicles like municipal bonds. If you can’t afford to lose anything and you don’t care that you won’t be earning very much, then this is the way to go. Better safe than sorry.
So now what does this have to do with an affiliate program? You need to decide whether you want the exciting ‘flash in the pan’ that offers high returns and because it is new has lots of activity that you might benefit from in the way of referral commissions. It may cost you some membership fees and you may make some nice money for a while until it is not new anymore and although still running appears to ‘fizzle out’ pretty much.
Then there are programs that have been around for many years – even as much as 10 or 20. They have thousands of members who claim the program is wonderful and they actually may make a steady, albeit maybe modest income on a regular basis. While this doesn’t sound very exciting there is a lot to be said about stability and reputation. You will find that there are many people who prefer to gamble with this type of smaller risk. If commissions are small then depend on volume – when added together it can be substantial.
If at all possible you should always think in terms of ‘multiple streams of income’ – having more than one program that you promote to earn income from – maybe start with one and as soon as you have that down pat add another. This will hedge your bets and balance your risk especially if you have maybe a mixture of ‘new and exciting’ and ‘tried and true’.
Keep in mind with 99.99% of legitimate affiliate programs, there are no contracts beyond month-to-month. There are also other elements you should consider when determining if a program is right for you. Consider the training and advertising resources that members can use free of charge. Of course, consider the compensation plan – Does it seem fair and equitable? Don’t forget to factor in all the program is doing for you with saving you from creating a sales page, providing customer service for your transactions, etc.
Comments are closed.