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Missouri-based software consulting and development company FirstPlace Software was
founded in 1991, but is best known online for their WebPosition software released in
June, 1997. A ZD-Net "5 star" software tool, WebPosition was the first software
product to help Webmasters analyze, track, and improve placement in the major
Internet search engines. Their affiliate marketing program (which pays 15% to 40%
commissions to affiliates and dealers) has been a major contributor to the growth in
distribution of their software tool.
With a product aimed squarely at the online marketing niche, ReveNews knew that
FirstPlace Software President and founder Brent Winters would have great marketing
advice for affiliate program participants:
ReveNews: How does your affiliate program fit into your overall marketing
plans?
Brent Winters: Before we even completed the development for WebPosition, I
knew that a strong affiliate program would be a critical component to our success. We
now have over 6,000 affiliates comprising 23% of our total sales. Our dealer program
comprises another 15% of our sales, with most of our dealers having started out
originally as affiliates.
RN: How much commission do your high-producing affiliates generate?
BW: Our top affiliates do over $1,000 per month in commissions, although we
have online dealers that do several thousand or more in commissions each month.
However, most average less per month, depending upon how prominent they want to
advertise their referral link and how much traffic they get to their site.
RN: What types of websites show strong results participating your program?
BW: Websites that cater to Webmasters, marketers and businesses do the
best. However, sales come from all types of sites, since anyone who has a Web site is
a potential customer for WebPosition. Many studies have shown that software ranks
among the hottest selling products on the Web. Therefore, the popularity of the
product being sold should be a big factor in any affiliate program you look at. For
example, you won't get nearly as good of results referring people to a site that
sells gardening tools, unless of course you have a site about gardening.
RN: Among your affiliates, what's the most overlooked method for increasing
sell through?
BW: The single most effective way to increase sell through we've found is
to follow up with the prospect via an email to lend assistance and to make special
offers. This literally doubles sales. Luckily for our affiliates, we have a system
that does this automatically for all of their referrals that download the WebPosition
trial. We also follow up with newsletters and other advertising to increase sell
through -- it doesn't matter when the customer buys: once we've flagged the person to
the affiliate, they'll get the commission for it.
The number one problem I've seen among our affiliates is that they simply don't
make the effort to be successful or to follow through. Many will fill out the sign up
form (which is free), receive their referral link, but then never take the step of
putting the link on their site! There is nothing more fundamental about being
successful in business than plain old-fashioned initiative.
RN: What are some of the techniques used by your high-producing affiliates?
BW: I think many of them simply work hard at publishing their referral link
in a number of places: their Website, newsgroups, discussion lists, email signatures,
etc. Many simply give their testimonial in a discussion list of how they've found the
product valuable, and find they pick up increased business that way.
In addition, many of them use WebPosition itself to optimize their rankings on the
search engines. That increases traffic to their site significantly, which follows
through to increased affiliate sales. Since WebPosition can bring free, targeted
traffic to just about any Website, there's no way the affiliates can lose money.
RN: What advice would you give one of your affiliates if they don't
generate any sales commission in their first few months?
BW: Referrals will download our product and try it out for up to 30 days.
We find that well over half our sales come in after 30 days, despite follow up emails
and offers. We send out a monthly newsletter so that the prospect is repeatedly hit
by our "message". Whether the referral buys the first day or 6 months down the road,
our affiliates still get the commission (as long as they remain an active affiliate.)
It pays to stay in it for the long haul, and commission generally grow over time.
Many people expect instant riches from affiliate programs, but I don't care what
people say, it just doesn't happen. Participating as an affiliate partner should be
just one piece of your marketing mix. The beauty of affiliate programs are they
require little or no effort on the part of the affiliate to get started, but can
produce a boost in income. In our program, we also refer people back to the affiliate
in a follow-up email, so it's a "win-win deal" -- they can try and get some affiliate
revenues, plus sell them their own products and services.
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