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A new website is unlikely to gain advertising sponsors straight away, but this does not mean that you automatically have to wait until your website has become established before you can start earning money from it. Rather than expecting to sell advertising space right away, new website owners are probably better off by participating in affiliate advertising, as this is easier to get involved in when your site has yet to become well known.

What Are Affiliate Programs?

To sum it up briefly, an affiliate program provides the opportunity to earn “commission” payments by referring your website visitors to the advertiser’s products or services. The Amazon Associates program is a prominent example of an affiliate program. By placing Amazon banners or product links on your website, you can earn referral payments if one of your visitors clicks on the link and goes on to buy a product through Amazon.

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Although it has been a few months since I have reported on any affiliate programs, there certainly has been no shortage of them. The latest affiliate-related email to come through my inbox advertises a relatively new possibility for people who may want to try something different from the old Clickbank or Amazon routines.

This particular company is an e-commerce site called GourmetNut.com, which as the name implies offers different kinds of nuts, although they also have some other delectable goodies like chocolates, dried fruits, snack mixes, candies, and even 22 different varieties of sea salt. They seem to accept PayPal payments (at least according to the logos at the bottom of the site), so I might try some of their mixed nuts later and see how they compare with the major name brands of nuts that can be purchased locally. Meanwhile, if you’re looking for more information on the affiliate program or coupon codes, you can read the text of the newsletter below.

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This morning I received an email from Kmart saying that they are increasing their commission rate from 2% to 4%. This comes as a pleasant surprise at a time when many affiliate programs have been reducing commissions, raising sales requirements on tiered structures, and monopolizing PPC traffic by placing increasing numbers of restrictions on the keywords that affiliates are allowed to use for ad campaigns.

Kmart’s new 4% rate puts them on par with Amazon for physical goods promotion. Their program is available through the Google affiliate network along with many other merchants. Meanwhile, if you happen to be in the mood for some shopping, I have placed the promotional link that goes to the Kmart website in the newsletter text below. You can use the coupon code to save $5 on orders of $50 or more.

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The computer optimization company TuneUp released a new version of its software this week. Known as “Version 2010″, it is supposed to be compatible with the new Windows 7 operating system and has been designed for flexibility and ease of use by both technical and non-technical users. There is a free trial download that can be accessed by clicking on the banner to the left.

Meanwhile, the company also has an affiliate program where it is possible to earn commissions on any sales generated by referred customers. These commissions have been increased to a base rate of 25% with performance incentive tiers allowing for higher rates if monthly sales exceed $500. More details can be found in the company’s latest newsletter below.

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I’ve seen many people who are not accepted into an affiliate network because they do not want to or cannot talk with an affiliate manager on the phone. Many will find this ridiculous, but it is a fact.

There are many reasons for this, the most common one being the fear of failing to answer a question. This is especially true for new affiliates who just want to get started and don’t have a clue what to do; it’s kind of hard for them to say they’ve got only 200 visitors per month to their website. There are also potential affiliates who are too young for the age requirements and are using parents’ credentials (many smart kids don’t get approved just because of this, even though they have the brains and potential to make a lot of money), have poor English accents, are struggling with physical impairments, or just have a general lack of communication skills.

In this article I will tell you how to get accepted without having to answer their phone call.

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Today a company called TrustedID has unveiled a new identity theft protection plan. It uses an interesting metric called an “identity threat score” to measure a particular person’s vulnerability to identity theft. Although this is not the same thing as your credit score, it can indirectly help you in this area by alerting you to the possibility that stolen credit card or other financial information may be negatively affecting your status. Details about the new TrustedID plan can be found below in the company’s latest letter to affiliates.

As you know, we at TrustedID pride ourselves in staying up to date with the latest security threats and protecting our customers before identity theft can happen to them. We are constantly innovating our products and services to offer the most comprehensive protection for the best value. This has led to the development of a new identity theft protection plan.

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QualityHealth.com is a fairly popular website that offers a variety of information on quality health solutions relating to things like nutrition, diet, lifestyle changes, clinical advice, and medications. There is also a newsletter where you can sign up and gain access to various benefits such as free product samples, rebates, coupons, and plenty of health tips. Fortunately for us webmasters, it is also possible to join their affiliate program and earn commissions whenever anyone signs up to the newsletter as long as these visitors are residents of the United States and at least 18 years old. Information about the affiliate program, which I received in the latest email from them, is posted below. Meanwhile, if you’re just here for the free samples and information, you access this by clicking through on the big square banner in the upper left corner of this paragraph. Please make sure that you have a vaild email address so that you can actually receive the newsletter.

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The affiliate program for Circuit City has announced that commissions will be increased for the month of August, apparently as a way to encourage more sales during the back-to-school season. This program is available through the Google Affiliate Network that I mentioned in yesterday’s post. Details about the new commission structure, including some helpful information on current promotions, available link types, and the CircuitCity.com data feed can be found in the latest announcement below.

We are so excited about the launch of the new CircuitCity.com affiliate program and cannot wait to see what the back-to-school season brings for all of us. There is not a better time to launch the new CircuitCity.com affiliate program because we are increasing the standard commission for the month of August by 1%! The standard commission structure is 2% for computers, laptops, notebooks, netbooks and 4% all other categories. For the entire month of August the standard commission will raise to 3% and 5%!

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After its acquisition of DoubleClick back in July 2008, Google has been gradually integrating the affiliate network with other services and streamlining the process of allowing publishers to assist advertisers in their ongoing quest to obtain valuable sales and leads. This morning I received an email notifying us that beginning approximately one week from today, we will be able to link our Google Affiliate Network accounts with our AdSense accounts for the purposes of accounting and receiving payments.

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Earlier this week, someone who found my page on getting approved with Panthera sent in an inquiry via the Contact page regarding how to get approved for CPA (Cost Per Action) networks. The visitor was wanting to know what kind of questions might be asked by the program owners and whether or not a website would be needed for approval. As often happens with my email replies, I ended up writing enough content in my answer to make a separate article out of it. Since there are many of you who are probably looking for the same kind of information as my curious visitor, I might as well post it here so that others can benefit from my experience. Included in my reply is the standard site description that I use for applications to affiliate programs, CPA networks, and other online venues where this information is required. You can use this as a template for your applications — just remember to change the site name, topics, and numbers to reflect your own site statistics!

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Yesterday I received another affiliate newsletter, this time from a spyware removal company called BluePenguin Software. I almost forgot about this one; BluePenguin is one of the many affiliate programs that I had signed up for a few months ago when I joined the Commission Junction network. They seem to have a pretty good program going so far — the commission rate is 40%, there is a 90 day cookie, and according to the description, BluePenguin is the only company that offers a guarantee of 100% spyware removal.

As always, if you would like to check out the product for yourself I have provided a nice big banner up there in the top left of this article for you to click through on so that you can reach the correct site. You can use the coupon code SPY10 to take 10% off your order. More details about the products and the affiliate program can be found in the newsletter below.

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