Today, more and more people are becoming very interested in making money with affiliate products, and rightly so. Affiliate marketing can be a terrific way to not only bring in a little spare change, it can actually mushroom into a thriving, fairly passive sort of income. This business model is especially attractive for those who are talented writers or marketers, as you can pretty much be a one man band. (that is until you want to REALLY start making some money!) But where do you find products to sell? Let’s take a quick look at several good sources for affiliate products, and ways to find others.

Commission Junction – One of the more venerable affiliate networks, CJ has been around a long time and has a load of good products to promote in a number of markets and niches, each with a lot of affiliate resources such as banners and other creatives, as well as instructions on keywords that you can and can’t use in your campaigns. The focus here is almost exclusively on physical products, and as such, the commissions are generally in the 4-10% range. This may not seem like a lot, but it can add up, and you may find less competition for your efforts.

Amazon - You can sell nearly anything from Amazon as an affiliate — that’s the good news. The  bad news is that payouts are extremely low. You need to rack up a lot of sales to create anything meaningful. This one is generally used as a filler offer; they have great tools to make ad boxes and product offers.

ClickBank - The premiere digital download affiliate network. They have thousands of digital products you can promote, and they make it very easy to get links and promo material. Commissions are higher in digitally downloadable products, usually in the 40-75% range. You can make a lot of money here, if you can generate traffic to your offers.

OfferVault - A blend of physical an digital offers, this one also has a vast selection of CPA offers. This is good as it eliminates the need to get approved by the various CPA networks, which can be problematical at times. There are more than 20,000 products here!

There are many other good affiliate networks out there, including PayDotCom, LinksShare, MaxBounty, Hydra, Google, and others. All are free to join, and most  pay promptly.  Take some time to browse the offerings and see which products you would feel comfortable promoting, and then get to it!

Perhaps like many, you find something of a contradiction with the models of affiliate marketing and social media marketing. They don’t seem to be made for one another. On the one hand, you’ve got the affiliate model where most strive to be as anonymous and non-engaging as possible, and then find yourself exhorted on every side to be using social media marketing to get huge numbers of visitors to your offers by virtue of your personality and wit.  How to do both? Or should you even try?

There can be a case made for both sides. On the one hand, a lot of affiliates market far more than one product or service, and trying to become a social media maven in more than a market or two can be a daunting,  if not impossible, task. But all that traffic!! Who can really look the other way? What many end up doing is striving to become an authority in a general market space, where they can feel the freedom to pitch products within that space without betraying either their social profile or their ability to market many products. This does require limiting yourself to one general market, like say, health and fitness, or business opportunities. This keeps your authority intact, and doesn’t spread you so thin.

One thing to be aware of is to make sure and not try to be all things to all people. Spreading your “expertise” over several markets at once, unless you simply happen to possess great knowledge and social acumen, is a recipe for disaster! You will necessarily be forced to share your pearls of wisdom and best case scenario, you’ll likely come off as mediocre. Worst, a fraud. Many, if not all of the “super affiliates” do not attack multiple, very different markets at once. They take the time, energy, and focus on dominating the market they know, and sometimes different products within that market. It’s very rare to find someone so versatile they can do otherwise.

Spend your time and abilities becoming as much of a genuine voice in your market as you can. Besides becoming an authority in your space, it’s a sure way to benefit from social media. It will be time well spent, and will enable you to get the best of both worlds!

The short answer: probably not. However, it is a very good idea to know what the rules are as defined (or in this case, loosely defined) regarding the relationship between you as an affiliate marketer and the audience you are pitching to. The FTC came up with a new set of guides for affiliate marketers last October in an effort to provide some guidance in an otherwise unregulated marketplace. The guides are not laws, but serve as a template for marketers who need to comply with truth in advertising concepts.

The FTC Fact Sheet states:

The revised Guides – issued after public comment and consumer research – reflect three basic truth-in-advertising principles:

*  Endorsements must be truthful and not misleading;

*  If the advertiser doesn’t have proof that the endorser’s experience represents what consumers will achieve by using the product, the ad must clearly and conspicuously disclose the generally expected results in the depicted circumstances; and

*  If there’s a connection between the endorser and the marketer of the product that would affect how people evaluate the endorsement, it should be disclosed.

What this is all about is making sure there are no untrue claims, and that if you are being paid to promote a product, whether by receiving payment, free products, or an affiliate commission, that relationship needs to be fully disclosed, and it can’t be a ten word statement in fine print at the bottom of your About Me page. It needs to be where people can reasonably expect to find it.

This really isn’t as onerous as some are making it  out to be. Common sense seems to be prevailing, and so far there has been only one action, and that was a warning letter. Rumors of fines for bloggers who have undisclosed affiliate banners are false, but we believe you should be armed, so here are a few resources, two straight from the FTC:

Good article on the whole situation from the The Citizen’s Media Law Center

FTC Fact Sheet

FTC Revised Endorsement and Testimonial Guides

You should take some time and look over these resources. There are many real-world examples that lay out precisely what works and what doesn’t. While the sky doesn’t appear to be falling just yet, it’s a very good idea to keep an eye on the weather!