Ever seen an affiliate program that claims to do '99% of the work' while all YOU do is advertise?

Yes, the company handles the inventory, billing, product delivery, customer service, website maintenance ...

... While your only job is advertising. And for every sale you make as a result of your advertising, you're paid a commission. Sounds pretty easy, doesn't it?

Don't be fooled into thinking that affiliate programs are an easy way to make money. If that were true, we'd all be rich instead of scouring the 'net to find new ways of earning an income. Even if it IS true that you're only doing '1% of the work', you're doing the hardest 1%!

When I first started online I dreamed of how much I would make: $1000 a month with this affiliate program, $2000 with that one ... and hey, since they told me all I had to do was put up a few links and banners, I was expecting sales pretty much right away.

Sadly, it didn't work that way. Here are a few things to keep in mind when you consider becoming an affiliate:

More Isn't Better.

One common mistake is to join every affiliate program that looks good, hoping that you'll be able to make more money that way. It's just not true. Focusing your efforts on a few good programs is the best way to steadily build your affiliate income. The article, 'Are You Guilty of Affiliate Greed?' addresses this issue, http://www.buildyourhomebiz.com/articles/affiliategreed.html.

Don't Depend on a Monthly Pay Cheque.

Many affiliate programs require you to earn a certain amount in commissions each month before they pay you. If you don't reach that minimum commission level, your earnings are rolled over to the next month. You get paid whenever you reach the minimum threshold.

This can be very frustrating; after hours and hours of hard work, you may not see the money you rightly earned at the end of the month.

One suggestion I often make to 'newbies' is to join Commission Junction, an affiliate management website that consolidates all your earnings into one pay cheque. < http://www.buildyourhomebiz.com/commissions.html > That means you'll get paid more often! With over 1000 affiliate programs to choose from, you're sure to find something that fits your target audience.

Advertising is Hard Work.

Sure, your only job is to advertise - but that requires a great deal of learning and effort. It's nowhere near as simple as throwing up a banner on your website or placing free classified ads. You have to put forth a consistent effort in order to make money; if you're not motivated, you won't do well. Take the free Affiliate Masters Course for surefire ways to improve your profits, mailto:tamsbenefits@sitesell.net.

Your Downline Will Not Make You Rich.

Two-tiered affiliate programs tempt you with notions that you can make more money 'with no more effort on your part' just by signing up more affiliates.

Don't depend on it. Unfortunately, most affiliates don't make money and assuming that your referrals WILL is just setting yourself up for disappointment. Some of your referrals will make money, of course, and may even make quite a bit if you're lucky. Just don't count on it: concentrate on your maximizing your own efforts, rather than on dreaming about the efforts of others.

No Product Will 'Sell Itself'.

We've all come across websites claming to have products or services that 'everyone needs'. Regardless of whether or not this is true, people on the 'net are impulsive creatures and buy what they WANT, not what they 'need'!

No product will sell itself. It might be the most wonderful product in the world that can wash your hair, balance your checkbook, walk the dog, and feed the kids ... but you have to SHOW your visitor how it will enrich their lives and make them WANT to buy.

This is even true when you're giving away free stuff. Why should your visitor bother to request your free gift unless it can do something for them? It's much easier to surf away with a simple click-of-the-mouse!

You Probably Won't 'Make Money Instantly'.

Put up a link on your website or place a free ad, and presto! You'll instantly make sales.

This isn't very likely to happen unless you have a high traffic, targeted website that is a good fit with your affiliate program ... and even then, it's not guaranteed. To sell ANYTHING online, you need to have lots of targeted traffic, quality products, and strong copy that persuades your visitor to buy.

Depending on the individual, making money with an affiliate program may take a week to several months. Put forth a consistent effort and you'll see your earnings gradually increase over time.

This article isn't meant to discourage you from joining affiliate programs. To the contrary, affiliate programs are a great way for the average person to make a solid income on the web. But, like everything else, you need to venture into the opportunity with your eyes wide open; don't get caught in the hype. With hard work, motivation, and persistence you can soon be well on your way to earning a good living online!

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Many online businesses publish some sort of newsletter or announcement list. This presents an opportunity to make some extra income by selling ad space. It's popular because it's fairly straightforward. You provide the demographics / statistics about your publication; you set the price; a customer places an order; you send out the ad.

Selling ad space can be decent money, but there's still a price to be paid. Selling "reputable" ad space takes time and effort. I don't understand editors who don't screen the types of ads that go into their publications (nor do I understand why someone would want to spend the money to place an ad to a generally uninterested audience). You need to review ads and weed out those that are inappropriate for your list. If you don't, people come to expect crappy or useless ads and will ignore them.

The advertiser won't be happy either -- poor results means no repeat business. Your time could have been better spent acquiring a long-term customer rather than a one-shot deal.

There's also the customer service part to selling ads, too: proofreading, scheduling, sending confirmations, handling ad changes, etc.

Another problem is the availability of ad space. If there's lots available in your market, you're likely going to have a harder time selling it -- and you may have to settle for lower rates, too. It's hard to rely on ad revenues, which can change dramatically depending on market conditions.

Remember, too, that with email newsletters it's getting harder to find a responsive list. Not that there aren't quality lists available -- there are -- but email delivery is simply getting much more difficult, what with filters and fed-up people whose email inboxes filled with junk mail. People have to at least read an ad before they'll consider visiting a business, let alone making a purchase. Unhappy advertisers won't buy again, and acquiring new advertisers takes time, effort, and money.

Selling ad space may actually limit how much you can make off your list. Essentially you'll make whatever profit you can from these sales.

If you use the "ad space" for yourself, though, you have the potential to make even more. Combined with quality content and credibility, any recommendations or specials you run in your own publication can really help sales.

So how do you use your publication if you're not going to sell ad space? Try:

• Use editorial space to recommend a product or service. Great for joint ventures or for affiliate programs.
• Place an "editorial-style" ad in the publication. Good for promoting your own stuff.

  For instance, one of my other newsletters has never sold ad space. It's steadily brought in sales, issue after issue, without any blatant advertising. Then, once in a while we'll mention a product, and sales will spike after that issue. We don't even have to worry about writing an "ad" - we just write a few comments about a product and let it be.

• Send a stand-alone mailing, promoting a) your own product or service; b) an affiliate product (endorsements work well); c) a product you're promoting through a joint venture. Don't overdo these types of mailings -- bombard your subscribers with them and they'll likely get used to hitting the "delete" key (or unsubscribe altogether).

Be selective if you choose to endorse products or services in your publication. Readers will be much more likely to listen, than if you're constantly pushing one product or another just to try to make a few bucks.

Of course, selling ad space has its benefits. One of the advantages is its simplicity. It can be a relatively stable income source if you have a group of loyal customers who will regularly place ads. That's one nice thing about selling ads -- after a while, if you have a group of customers who keep coming back, you need to be very little promotion. In that sense I guess it could be called "easy money".

It comes down to making a business decision: are you able to earn regular, loyal advertisers who you're comfortable relying on for the income? Or do you prefer to take more of a risk and try to earn higher profits by using the ad space for your own stuff?

www.onlinebusinessbasics.com

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What is Affiliate Marketing?

An affiliate-marketing program is an agreement between a company that has products or services for sale and anyone who believes they can help to sell those products and services for the company. In short, if you have products and services, consider using an affiliate system to get the word out about your products. Alternatively, if you have a popular website, consider putting someone else's products or services on your site and earning commissions on your sales.

Who Should Sell Through Affiliates?

If you offer any products or services on your website in such a way that customers actually make the payment on the website, then you are a good candidate for selling through an affiliate program. If you tend to "close the deal" over the phone, then the affiliate management company will be unable to know when sales occurred and will not be able to administer the program for you.

Your product should have appeal to people throughout the nation or even the world. Local products are harder to sell through affiliates although it is possible.

Why Sell Through Affiliates?

Imagine having ads for your products placed on hundreds of websites throughout the nation or even the world. Companies such as NetFlix.com are very successful with their affiliate programs.

Who Should Sell Products Using Affiliate Marketing?

If you have a website that is rich in traffic but poor in generating cash in your pocket, then you are the perfect candidate for adding affiliate marketing to your website. Affiliate programs are ideal for anyone that already has content and visitors. If your site is not very popular then an affiliate system may not be worth the trouble. For this article, we will assume you are the ideal candidate for affiliate marketing.

The KEY to success is to ad products to your site that are highly appealing to the people that visit your website. If your website does movie reviews, you want to partner with NetFlix.com and other video or entertainment programs. If your website focuses on gardening, then add gardening and home improvement products to your website.

How to Get Started

Whether you buy or whether you sell, it all starts by joining an affiliate marketing management company. These companies do all the hard work of tracking sales, paying commissions, and matching product companies with webmasters who want to add affiliate products to their site.

cj.com - Commission Junction

ClickBank.com - Click Bank

LinkShare.com - Link Share

Secrets to Success

It is important to consider the many factors affecting the success of an affiliate marketing system. There are so many factors that we cannot go into them here. We will consult with you about your particular needs. What is important is to do lots of testing. Try different ads, different products, different placements on the page, and keep switching things around while you carefully track what is working and what is not. With a little practice you will likely end up with a lucrative system.

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Many people ask me same question , how do you make that much from Adsense , now i will share my tricks , do not worry not Adsense tricks but SEO tricks. Because its all about SEO , you have to get traffic to your website. So this article will be about my SEO and Adsense tips.

See the future!

Create blogs or blog about upcoming stuff or news , for example Apple announces that they will produce a new product called iPhone as soon as you read this news go and open a blog about iphone like appleiphone.blogspot.com ( owner of is appleiphone.blogspot.com turk and made a lot of bucks only from this blog ) , or Amazon announced Kindle then hurry and register amazonkindle.blogspot.com and blog about it.

Titles are important!

Do not waste your time to find apropriate title for your article , just type keyword for title , for example if your article is about iphone , think the possible keywords that people may use to find news about iphone and type it , do not type Apple’s new phone for title , type Apple iPhone pictures videos because most people will search to see how it looks.

Use Digg!

Or other famous bookmark sites in your language. But aim for using Digg is not to get visitors from Digg ! We digg to get our blog indexed by Google. Because Google bots checks this digg-like sites regularly and releases spiders to new links to index them . Once your page is indexed you can see your blog on search results at that time.

Do not exaggerate!

Title is everything! You do not need to type tons of keywords to labels , because it may cause SandBox for your blog and also you may be banned from Google Adsense. Type the most apropriate keywords to title as i said before.

Template for money!

Doing everything above is not enough , you have to have a template for Adsense . Need examples? Here and Here , check and understand how i make that money.

Optimization for visitors!

If your visitors are mostly men and adult , make your ads distinguishable from your content. Because most of them know its ad and it has to take attention of them to click your ads. But if your visitors are kids and women optimize your ads with your content and show your ads as if they are part of your content , optimize colors with your template colors to get accidental clicks.

Text ads or image ads?

If your blog contains mostly videos , flash games or pictures you should use picture ads , otherwise use text ads since in text ads there are various advertising one of which may take attention of your visitor.

http://gosublogger.com

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Hi there we meet again, what can we talk right now? OK we can talk about the quality of our action to get important information quickly, so what can we do to get recent news and the most update knowledge. How fast we got information very influence how big ability to steps ahead from our competitor. We could starting first about our business next year, or use our information to make some idea to get some success in business.

Don't confused with how we can get the most update news and knowledge? There are many writers to share their idea, or some scientist to share their knowledge and experiment report. Don't doubt their dedication to produce a great experiment or research and result with what they write about.

Now we learn how to freelance writing, and who can developing essays, term papers, theses, and dissertations that meet customers’ unique needs? Projects requiring original field research and qualitative studies are also accommodated. Another point is our research generally accepted editorial and style standards used in some countries like UK, US, etc. Freelance writer customers must request work at a high school level or above with many Masters and Doctoral-level writing available. Job For Writers is very prospecting but we need to give more excess to make better research.

OK when we talk about what the man whom writing as their hobby can do to get job, freelance job is a interesting job which could be their part time job to get extra money. Freelance Writing Opportunities always exist for them.

Source : http://www100x.blogspot.com

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If starting an internet home business with your computer sounds appealing but you don't have a product to sell yourself, you might want to consider affiliate marketing on the internet. Affiliate marketing is a very doable internet business model that doesn't require having your own product, there's no shipping or inventory involved and there is no customer services details to sort through. Becoming an affiliate marketer essentially means partnering with an online merchant whereby you promote their goods or services. If you make a sale -- you receive a commission.

But is affiliate marketing a real "honest

to goodness business" that you can actually make money at? ABSOLUTELY, I do it every day! And after having been involved with several internet marketing business models prior to affiliate marketing, this is the one I enjoy and love doing the most. But let's delve into this extremely profitable business model a bit more.

How affiliate Marketing on the Internet Works
Affiliate marketing is similar to a revenue sharing business whereby you promote a product of your choice and receive a commission for every product you sell.
You begin by finding a product or service you would like to promote, then find an affiliate merchant that sells the product.

You can find affiliate merchants through popular affiliate networks like Commission Junction, LinkShare or Clickbank. You can also find products through private sites that offer affiliate programs as well but I find that it's easier to start out with affiliate networks, payments are more on schedule and products are easier to find. Once you find an affiliate merchant you can sign up for their affiliate program which is typically free to join -- beware of merchants that charge money to join their affiliate programs, these are generally not affiliate programs. Once signed up, the affiliate merchant will assign you an affiliate link for you to promote.

How you promote that link is up to you, however I strongly suggest that you create a web site for promoting your affiliate product(s). There will be some costs to creating and hosting a website and the purchase of a domain name, but these costs are typically minimal.

How to Earn Money with Affiliate Marketing

There are three ways to earn money through affiliate marketing:
Pay Per Click — Any time a potential customer leaves your affiliate website by "clicking" on your affiliate link that leads them to the merchant's website. Money is then deposited in your affiliate account. The amount of money deposited depends on the what's in the affiliate agreement.

Pay Per Lead — Any time a potential customer leaves your affiliate website by "clicking" on a link that leads them to complete a registration form or register at the merchants website. Money is then deposited into your affiliate account. The amount of money deposited depends on the what's in the affiliate agreement.

Pay Per Sale — Any time a potential customer leaves your affiliate website by "clicking" on a link that leads them to the merchant's site where they make a purchase. A percentage, or commission, is deposited into the affiliate's account depending on what's in the affiliate agreement.

Look for Residual Income Programs
One of the things I encourage all affiliate marketers to be on the lookout for is affiliate programs that will provide you with residual income or income that is paid to you month after month.

Residual income comes from promoting products that sell things like monthly subscriptions or monthly services. For example I promote a hosting company called Thirdsphere hosting. Thirdsphere is a monthly hosting service and I get commission every month as long as the customer continues his/her subscription. Thirdsphere is just one of the residual income programs that I promote. There are many residual income affiliate programs that you can promote as well. Promoting residual income products or services is an excellent way of ensuring you keep a steady income arriving each month.

Benefits of Affiliate Marketing

When starting up any business there's a lot of time, work and risk involved. Developing a product requires research, marketing materials, getting established, branding and the list goes on.

With affiliate marketing the risk to you as an affiliate marketer is minimal. That's because you have the benefit of having all the business building work already done for you. All you need to do is find reputable, quality products to promote.

What's more, a good affiliate program will provide you with all the marketing tools and materials you need to promote it, things like banners, ads, email salescopy, branded materials, ecourses and many others, making your job that much easier.
But what makes affiliate marketing one of the best online businesses to start?
* No costs to make or purchase products.
* There's no inventory to stock or maintain.
* No payment processing for you to set up
* No shipping hassles. Your affiliate merchant takes the orders,
processes them and deals with customer service.

The products you can promote as an affiliate are endless. But don't make the mistake of trying to promote everything to everyone. Find a profitable niche which means finding a topic or theme that is tightly focused around the products or services you wish to promote.

For example, instead of developing a business around losing weight, focus on a more narrowed topic such as body building, dieting for women only or tighter abs. Once you find a focused topic then you can build a niche web site around that theme or product. Your next step will be to know and understand precisely who your audience is and what they are looking for. Once you know that, your marketing efforts will become tightly focused and your sales will be much greater.

Promoting Your Affiliate Marketing Products/Service
There's a little more than meets the eye when it comes to marketing or promoting affiliate products or services. Newbie affiliate marketers will often start out by getting their affiliate links, building their website and displaying their links hoping to make quick immediate sales. Be warned -- it rarely happens that easily. Why? Because I've done it and can tell you from experience that the search engines don't find favor with that type of promotion. Building a site that merely promotes affiliate links by sending viewers to the official site is not adding value to the viewer's experience, it actually makes your affiliate website nothing more than a third party advertiser.

Instead create a website that offers value and content, then support your content with affiliate products or services that will give your reader what they are looking for.
I love affiliate marketing and there's lots of money to be made in the business but first train yourself on how to effectively pre-sell by providing quality content, ideas and information, then learn how to find and promote affiliate products and services that are worthwhile, not only for your customers but for you as a promoter as well.

It makes a world of difference for those affiliate marketers that make an outstanding living at it and those that say it doesn't work.
Helpful Skills To Acquire : Copywriting, internet Marketing,
PPC (pay-per-click advertising)
Best Online Training : Affiliate Classroom
Best Ebook or Guide : Super Affiliate Handbook
Best Free Training : Affiliate Masters Course
Affiliate Networks : Listing of Affiliate Networks

Source: www.homenotion.com

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Use this list to look up commonly-used terminology in the world of internet business.

Ad Tracker: A software program that allows you to create "coded" URLs that will show you how many people click on a link, amongst other useful statistics. Used to monitor results from marketing campaigns.

Affiliate Program: An opportunity where you are paid a commission for every click, lead, or sale you generate from a special coded link.

Article Bank: A site that accepts or finds reprintable articles and makes them available to others. Some article banks focus on one topic only, while others accept articles on topics of all kinds.

Autoresponder: An email address that will automatically reply to any request with a predefined message that you set up. Autoresponders can be programmed to send out 'follow-up' messages at various intervals.

Back-End Products or Sales: Anything you sell to a customer after the initial purchase. For example, many businesses offer a low-priced product for their initial sale, and more extensive or comprehensive products or "upgrades" as a back-end sale.

Banner: An electronic 'billboard' advertising a product, service, website, etc.

CGI Scripts: Computer programs often used to add interactivity to websites. For example, CGI scripts can send you data that a customer types into a request or order form.

Click-Through Rate (CTR): The percentage of visitors that click on an ad. For example, if you place an ad in a newsletter with 1000 readers and 20 of them click on your link, your CTR is 2%.

Conversion Rate: The percentage of visitors your website or ad converts into paying customers. For example, if 1 out of every 100 visitors places an order, your conversion rate is 1%.

Cookie: A small file placed on your computer by a website. This file is used to identify the user and often used to display customized web pages for them. For example, instead of seeing a generic "welcome" page, you could instead see a welcome page with your name on it.

Cost Per Action (CPA): The price you pay to get someone to take action (subscribe to a newsletter, place an order…). For example, a $20 ad that gets 5 orders gives a CPA of $4.

Cost Per Click (CPC): The price you pay to get someone to click on your link. For example, a $20 ad that results in 100 clicks on a link would give you a CPC of $0.20.

CPM: Cost per one thousand ad impressions.

Demographics: Information on your website visitors, useful for analyzing your traffic and the effectiveness of your site. Examples include most popular web pages; time spent on each page; referring URL (ie. how did they find your site?); number of page views and unique visitors, etc.

Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL): A form of high-speed Internet connection. DSL allows you to connect to the Internet without using your telephone line. It does not give you a second line; it merely allows you simultaneously talk on the phone and surf the web.

DNS: An internet service that translates domain names into IP addresses (the internet is based on IP addresses, but domain names are much easier to remember).

Domain: Your address on the web. For example, onlinebusinessbasics.com is a domain name.

Double opt-in: A subscription process that requires two emails: the initial subscription request, plus a confirmation of the subscription request. Recommended to help build a cleaner, more responsive list. Double opt-in also helps to ensure subscribers are added to your list only with their knowledge and their consent.

Download: The transfer of a file from the Internet to your own computer.

Downline: A multi-level marketing (MLM) term. Members you recruit to join an opportunity 'under' you; typically you make a percentage from the sales made by your downline. Often hyped up as the 'easy way' to make extra money.

Dropshipping: An opportunity where you can sell tangible products without holding inventory, by working with a distributor who allows you to buy products at their wholesale price. The difference between the retail and wholesale prices is your profit.

EBook Compiler: Special software used to create an "electronic book" that people can read on their computers.

eZine: An electronic newsletter.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP): An agreed-upon "format" used to send files over the Internet. FTP programs are available to help you transfer files to and from your server.

Firewall: A program that helps to protect your computer from unauthorized connections to or from the 'outside world'. In this context, it protects you from programs that try to connect to the Internet without your knowledge or consent; similarly, it protects your computer from incoming requests for information (eg. a hacker trying to scan your computer).

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ): Exactly what it sounds like: answers to common questions. Most business sites have a FAQ page.

Hit: A request for an 'object' on your website. For example, a web page with 2 graphics on it will generate 3 hits: 1 for the HTML page + 1 for each graphic.

Hype: Misleading, unreasonable or unsubstantiated claims, such as 'Make $5000 in three days with just a $2 investment! Guaranteed income, no selling involved!'

HyperText Markup Language (HTML): The formatting language used to create web pages. Although often referred to as a 'programming' language, HTML is really just a simple formatting language that's similar to what the old word processors used.

Index: A list of web sites grouped together by category. One of the best known indexes is Yahoo!

Internet Service Provider (ISP): The company that provides you with access to the Internet, via dial-up service or high-speed services such as cable or DSL.

IP Address: A numeric identification number that refers to a specific computer or device on a specific type of network.

Joint Venture: A mutually beneficial business arrangement between two companies.

Keyword or Key Phrase: The words or phrase you enter when you're looking something up in the search engines. For example, if you're looking for a scratching post for your cat you might use, "cat tree" as a key phrase.

Link: Those 'clickable' pieces of text you see on web pages (made clickable through HTML, the web page formatting language).

Link Popularity: How many other relevant / complementary sites link back to your own. Search engines love popular sites!

List Manager or List Host: A program that automatically handles subscription management for a mailing list such as a newsletter. It also handles the mailing of messages to the addresses on the list.

Merchant Account: Allows you to process credit card orders on your website. A more popular choice with fledgling online business owners are third party credit card processors.

Message Board: An online forum where visitors can post and read messages to and from one another.

Mini-Site: A site that consists of just a few pages, that's completely focused on getting the visitor to perform just one action (make a purchase, subscribe to a newsletter, complete a survey, etc).

Mirror Site: A site that has been duplicated on another server.

Moderator: (in the context of message boards) The person(s) who is responsible for monitoring posted messages for appropriateness. Moderators remove inappropriate messages and are used to maintain the quality of the board.

Multi-Level Marketing (MLM): Any opportunity where people can make commissions from the sale of products and services, and can recruit others into their downlines to do the same. You make a percentage of your downline's commissions.

Name Server: A computer that maps domain names to IP addresses.

Newbie (slang): Someone new to the internet business / marketing area.

Newsgroup: An interactive discussion group focused on a particular topic. People post messages and others respond. Also called message boards, discussion lists, discussion forums, and others.

Opt-In: The process of getting someone's explicit permission to send them email. For example, when you subscribe to a newsletter through a form on a website, you are opting-in to receive it. Also see double opt-in.

Opt-Out: The process of requesting users to indicate that they don't want to receive further email. For instance, someone may add your email address to their 'newsletter' without getting your permission to do so. If you don't want to receive it, then the onus is on you to unsubscribe. Many people believe that opt-out is synonymous with spam.

Page View: The number of times a web page is viewed on your website. Each time your page loads, you have one page view.

Park: As in, 'park a domain'. A domain name has to point to a name server to be "valid" (although it might be registered). Parking a domain allows you to point it to a certain website. For people who don't yet have their websites designed, domain registration services often allow you to park your domain free of charge on their servers - people who type in your domain name would then typically see an ad for your registrar. Similarly, you can choose instead to park one domain "on top of" another. For instance, you could park www.YourDomain.org on top of www.YourDomain.com. Both website addresses would then display the same site.

Persistent Visitor Tracking: With regards to affiliate programs, the ability to track a customer from one visit to the next, so that the affiliate receives his or her commission regardless of whether the customer purchases immediately or at some point in the future.

PDF: Stands for 'Portable Document Format'. A document that's formatted in PDF is viewable by anyone who downloads the free Adobe Acrobat Reader. Many online documents are published in PDF format.

Privacy Policy: A statement indicating what types of personal information your company collects and what it does (or doesn't do) with it.

Profit: The difference between your income and your expenses. For example, if you sell a product for $20 and it costs you $5 to produce and deliver it, then your profit is $5.

Pyramid Scheme: An illegal 'opportunity' where the focus is on recruitment rather than on the selling of products and services.

Reciprocal Link: The trading of links - eg. You link to me and I'll link back to you.

Reserve: (in the context of third-party credit card processors) A percentage of your income that's temporarily held back in case of future returns, refunds, or chargebacks.

Residual Income: Income you continue to receive after making the initial sale. For example, let's say you're a reseller for website hosting services. Assuming that your service is good, a percentage of your customers will continue to renew their hosting accounts with you year after year.

Revenue: The amount you make in sales. For example, if you sell 100 items for $50 each, then your revenue is 100 x $50 = $5000.

Search Engine: A website that indexes sites from all over the Internet. Visitors use search engines to look for specific information; if your website is indexed and fits the search criteria, it is listed in the search results. Google is a very well-known search engine.

Secure Server: A server that can encrypt (or decrypt) messages to protect them from tampering. For example, most ordering forms are secure to protect the customer's credit card information.

Shopping Cart Software: A program that allows users to add items to their online shopping cart. Good for sites that sell a number of related items. For example, an online bookstore can use shopping cart software so that customers can browse and add several books to their cart before buying.

Sig file: Short for "signature file"; a few lines of text about your business and perhaps contact information as well. Typically included at the end of email messages or at the bottom of a message board post.

Spam: Unsolicited, untargeted bulk commercial email. It's the 'four-letter word' of Internet marketing!

Spyware: hidden software that transmits information about you or your surfing habits over the internet.

Stockless Retailing: see Dropshipping.

Subaffiliate: Affiliates you personally 'recruit' into your second-tier of an affiliate program. You typically earn a percentage of their sales.

Superaffiliate: Someone who is knowledgeable, experienced, and very successful at earning money with affiliate programs.

Targeted Traffic: Visitors who already have an interest in the information and/or products available from your website. For example, pet owners visiting an online pet store are targeted traffic, while people searching for sports memorabilia are not.

Third-Party Credit Card Processor: A company that processes online credit card orders on your behalf. A good choice for fledgling businesses since they are both easy-to-use and cost-effective (although there are also risks to using them).

Traffic: Visitors to your website.

Two-Tiered: Usually used in reference to an affiliate program. A two-tiered program lets you make money off the sales of people you recruit. For example, you may get paid 25% on all of your personal sales. If you recruit Joe and he makes a sale, he gets 25% and you get 10% of the gross sale. Commission rates vary from program to program.

Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE): Another name for spam. There is actually a difference between UCE and spam, but most ISPs and web hosts do not differentiate between them.

Upload: The transfer of files from your computer to your web space.

Upsell: To try to convince a customer to purchase a more expensive product or service. For example, when you order a "combo" meal at a fast-food restaurant you may be asked if you'd like to purchase a larger size of fries or drink at a discount.

URL: The short form for 'Uniform Resource Locator'. Refers to the addresses you see on the web, such as http://www.yourcompany.com or ftp://www.yourcompany.com/.

Viral Marketing: Any marketing technique that 'empowers' someone to tell others about your business. For example, a freely distributable eBook embedded with your links is a popular viral marketing technique.

Virus: A destructive program that can be transmitted to your computer via email, downloading from the web, or running a program. Investing in good anti-virus software will help keep your computer virus-free.

Visitor: The number of unique visitors to your site. For example, if someone visits your site and views 5 pages, that is still only one visitor.

Web Host: A company that provides you with server space and makes your online business / domain accessible to the world. They give you a place to store your files and scripts.

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