THE AFFILIATE MARKETING PRIMER

3 - HOW TO FIND AFFILIATE PROGRAMS:

You might have in mind some specific companies or types of companies whose offerings could fit in with your website or the other advertising you envision.  It's definitely worth going to individual sites to see what the affiliate programs you come up with are like.

Some companies, however, choose for whatever reason not to announce their affiliate programs in this way.  Unless you contact the company in question (which might not be a bad idea - at least it would give someone at the company the feedback that you might be interested in such), to know whether they had one or not, you would need to turn to one of two kinds of affiliate program directories to find out...
 
 

The first type of affiliate directory is that of an affiliate program clearinghouse (the 3rd-party vendor often called an "affiliate network") that actually administers the programs for affiliate companies.  An affiliate company can pay this middleman a fee to handle the tracking, sign-up, and payments for each referral/sale and affiliate.

Most of these clearinghouses offer visitors to their site a view of their "stable" of affiliate companies.  Some, frustratingly, force you to sign up with them (at no obligation) before you can see their list of companies.

You can find these clearinghouses by doing a web search on terms like "affiliates", "associate programs", and the like [and see the partial list below].  It's very instructive to search through one or more of these databases of company listings...  You may be amazed to discover how many types of companies might fit in with your website (or whatever).  And if you are intrigued by a company, it will open up possibilities in your imagination for how to intrigue others...
 

AFFILIATE PROGRAM CLEARINGHOUSES (3^rd-PARTY VENDORS):
 
Below is a list of some of the major clearinghouses from around the world...

("affiliate commissions" = they pay to refer merchants and/or affiliates to the clearinghouse)

[updated 1/2010]

The other type of register is an affiliate directory set up by someone who has done research on various companies and offers the results on a website (or in a book) for the benefit of anyone who wishes to peruse it.  To be honest, a benefit may also accrue to the author of this information, because s/he may have signed up as an affiliate for many of the companies on the list - and is more than willing to have you sign up as a sub-affiliate under her or him, where that applies.

Most of these affiliate directories list indiscriminately a whole raft of programs to choose from, often with many in the same category.  Some give annotations to each program (which in some cases are simply advertisements from the companies themselves) and sometimes rank them according to a (not necessarily obvious) set of criteria.

In a huge, indiscriminate directory, you can hope for guidance amongst the programs from a rating system...  Unfortunately, the visitor-rated ones aren't very actively used by program participants, and editor-rated ones tend to focus only on webmarketing.  Directories that contain many, or only, editor-recommended programs, though, can offer more value... especially if they contain programs that may be of interest across the board.

Aside from the occasional warning about a company's lackadaisical treatment f their affiliates or poor customer service, the main virtue of any directory, in my mind, is to find out about companies that might fit in with your plans...  You'll then evaluate the website and affiliate program yourself, according to your own criteria.
 

SOME AFFILIATE PROGRAM DIRECTORIES:
(* = of particular interest)

SOME CAUTIONS ABOUT THE SEARCH:

Many affiliate program directory editors and affiliate gurus will particularly recommend their favorite programs... which will usually mean, they'd like you to sign up for the programs that will bring them the most money thereby! (i.e., they'll highlight multiple-tier programs with high-ticket sales potential).  But remember two things...  Your job is to find the programs that are best suited to your business niche; and sometimes "little" programs - even those of only passing interest - might also complement your efforts to make "real money" with those that are proven top-producers for others.  Work creatively with little programs, and you might make them big.  

Especially considering that many programs still promoted widely are rather "over-worked" in this now more mature web environment of jillions of sites, it's important to do your homework...  You don't want to unwittingly come off as a mere copycat.  Choose those programs that will be the best affiliate programs for you! - and your clientele.  

If you concentrate on filling the needs of your unique website users, you'll be far more likely to succeed at webmarketing in the long-term than any site developer who relies on a guru to tell him how to do what he did!  (What he did was unique, if he's successful - and if he's very successful, he's probably sewn up the market for that subject offered in that way, so what would you be doing creating a copy?  Think about it...  Always look for ways to provide a new angle, or provide for a new niche.)  

As far as your income expectations go, only you can say what success will be for you - making enough to live a little more comfortably or to retire wealthy on are vastly different goals!  The route you select might also depend on how much of yourself you're willing to invest in this webmarketing effort.  But whatever your path, real success probably comes down to this:  

Find your niche, and fill it wisely.  

I'm sure there are some good affiliate programs that you can incorporate into that recipe.

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