The Amazon affiliate program is one of the best converting programs on the web. People trust Amazon, and they offer truly amazing discounts on thousands upon thousands of products. It really is a pain to set up pages and pages with affiliate links and having to go to Amazon, search products, then create different ads and creatives to place inside posts, and that is why Amazon Affiliate plugins are so handy.  In Affiliate Marketing time is always of the essence, we work hard long hours and anything that saves time and is also efficient at making money is welcome in my book.

Here are the two best Amazon Affiliate plugins for Wordress.

WpZon Amazon Affiliate Plugin - This is a great multi purpose plugin.

It creates complete pages or posts by pulling Amazon products, with ratings, descriptions and actual user reviews. The screenshot below is an example of the post. You can edit or add your own content to the product description. The More Information button and all review links take the visitor back to Amazon with your affiliate link.

WpZon Product Post

Insert small blocks anywhere in posts or pages with star user ratings for any products with a link back to Amazon to read reviews

WpZon Product Reviews Insert

Other Features Of The WPZon Affiliate Plugin

• Create entire sites very quickly
• Fancybox Image Galleries For Products
• Add YouTube videos from post editor
• Plugin admin interface pulls products by keyword or ASIN; Add Your Choices To Queue; Create Many Posts At Once (choice of pending, draft or publish immediately or a set date to publish)
• Has interface in the WordPress Post and Page Editors to create Amazon product posts.
• Sidebar Widgets
• Click Tracking
• SEO Features : Link Cloaking, Auto Integration with All In One SEO plugin, No Follow Amazon links, Auto Bold and more
• Commenters on your WordPress site can also leave their own reviews, with star ratings in comments.
• Can be used with any countries Amazon affiliate program.
• Easily translate product posts to other languages
• Integrates with other plugins, like PHPBay for eBay auction listings.
• Automatic Product Data Updates With Days To Update Set By User
• Excellent support
• Much more, see the video and learn more

Learn More, See The Video of WPZon In Action And Buy The Plugin

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EasyAzon Amazon Affiliate Plugin - Another great plugin for Amazon affiliates that has different uses and generates different ads than WPAzon above.

The EasyAzon Amazon affiliate Plugin creates image adds, text links or small ad blocks anywhere you choose inside pages or posts, the screenshot below is an example of an ad block displayed inside a post.

EasyAzon Affiliate Plugin Ad Block

Pulls products right from inside the post editor. Search with keywords or ASIN and the plugin displays various products to choose, then choose the type of add you want, position (none, center, left or right) and the add will be placed right into the post, as the screenshot below shows.

EasyAzon In Post Editor Product Pull

No more having to go to Amazon and search for products, then create ads, it's all inside the WordPress post editor with this plugin so you can quickly ad creatives into posts or pages. This is a really great plugin, very easy to use AND these ad blocks convert great as well.

LEARN MORE AND BUY EASYAZON PLUGIN

Which Amazon Plugin Is Best?

This really depends on what you want to do, both are different because they have different ads, different functions and uses. I use both and both are a huge time saver. I have found that the reviews generated onsite by WPZon Amazon affiliate plugin are great for conversions because people trust user reviews. The EasyAzon Amason plugin offers a quick way to add ads to any post or page for any product, and these ad blocks convert very well too, they show a link to reviews which is great for shoppers.

Since the news hit of the Affiliate Nexus Tax being passed in California many affiliates, including myself, have been receiving cancellation letters from various affiliate programs, as I mentioned in my post yesterday California Passes Affiliate Nexus Tax Bill I have started a list of the affiliate programs that are accepting and keeping California affiliates as great alternatives to those, like Amazon and Overstock that have canceled us or will cancel us as a CA affiliate.

First thing that's important to understand is that the only Internet merchants that are vulnerable to this tax are those that do not have physical entities related to their business in California. So all those merchants that have affiliate programs that reside in California are already charging sales tax to their customers and so are not threatened by the Nexus tax.

I also want to acknowledge several of these affiliate programs that HAVE decided to collect the tax in order to stay loyal to their affiliates, unlike Amazon and Overstock, several of the affiliate programs listed below, such as, BuyCostumes, ChecksUnlimited and others are now collecting CA sales tax!

Affiliate Programs Accepting and Keeping CA Affiliates

• Any merchant/store that has a physical presence in California.
• eBay
• Shopping.com
• Target (via Google Affiliate Network)
• Nextag
• Betty Mills
• Shoe Shopping Spree
• Carousel Checks
• Girly Checks
• Extra Value Checks
• BusinessChecks.org (via ShareASale)
• Christiangear.com
• DesignForYourWine.com
• GearForGoldens.com
• GreekGear.com
• GuidoGear.com
• JustIrishStuff.com
• MilitaryGearUSA.com
• NationalityShop.com
• TShirtHub.com
• EverythingFuriture.com
• EverythingOfficeFurniture.com
• KelleyFurniture.com
• TheFurnitureParadise.com
• Fanatics and Surf Fanatics
• CCB Radiance
• BuyCostumes
• ChecksUnlimited (via ShareASale)
• WicksWorks
• Applian Technologies (via ShareASale)
• Koyal Wholesale (ShareASale)
• Art.com and Allposters - (Also  available via Commissions Junction)

Via LinkShare Affiliate Network

• PetSmart
• Buy.com
• Wal Mart

Via Commission Junction Affiliate Network

• Petco
  
• Newegg
• Best Buy
• GuitarCenter
• Inkgrabber
• Blockbuster
• Oneida
• Applian Technologies
• Art.com and Allposters

I am actively seeking to update this list so please post any affiliate programs you know of that are accepting and not canceling CA affiliates in comments.

Well, it's been a long time coming and recently the ignorants in Sacramento passed a bill that was signed into law yesterday, June 29, 2011, as part of the budget by their leader Jerry Brown (governor of California) called the Affiliate Nexus Tax (Bill ABX1 28), (previously rejected and vetoed by Gov Schwarzenegger) which in turn triggered Amazon and other merchants to cancel all California affiliates, with more expected to follow suite.

Confirmed Closures of CA Affiliate Programs:

• Amazon.com
• Fabric.com
• Endless.com
• Zappos.com
• Cabela’s
• Backcountry
• Overstock.com
• 6pm
• Total Gym
• ThinkGeek.com
• GiftBaskets.com
• Hayneedle
• Barware.com
• ShopBop.com
• CSN Stores
• PC Connection
• ShoppersChoice.com

For a constantly updated list of confirmed merchants dropping CA affiliates, see Trisha Lyn's Blog Post - Thanks For Nothing Jerry Brown and also this forum thread: CA Merchants Canceling Affiliates

Since I'm an affiliate based in California, I got my Amazon "Notice of Termination due to New California Law" letter last night and my affiliation with and all commission tracking has stopped as of 9pm last night. This is real nice since Amazon is a nice chunk of my income and I have several sites built around Amazon products, which I now have to completely reconstruct.

It is estimated by the Performance Marketing Association (who has filed suite in Illinois, that has recently passed this law as well) that 25,000 small businesses (affiliates) in California will suffer significant losses because of this law.

What Is The Nexus Tax

The Nexus Tax specifically imposes the collection of taxes from consumers on sales by online retailer, which include, but are not limited to those referred by California based affiliate marketers, even when those retailers have no physical presence in the state. So basically, this law means that Amazon and any other online merchant has to charge sales tax to any California buyers that make the purchase as a RESULT OF CLICKING THROUGH A CALIFORNIA BASED AFFILIATE MARKETER'S LINK. Learn more about Nexus tax at PMA - Affiliate Nexus Tax Basics.

No surprise that the CA Nexus Tax Bill was written by, passed through by and then approved by Democrats who take take take and mismanage mismanage mismanage.

From Nexus Negotiator

Click-Through, Affiliate Nexus. Under this bill, an Internet retailer with no physical presence in California would be considered to have established nexus if they operated an affiliate marketing program that allowed California residents to participate. These are programs that allow individuals and businesses to set up websites and provide links to a retailer’s website. When a California shopper goes through one of these affiliate website links and buys a product, the Internet retailer gives a small commission to the Affiliate marketers. The only way for a retailer to avoid having sales tax nexus in California is to cancel their affiliate relationships – which is happening now.

This tax has been hitting many states, and originally started in New York back in 2008, where Amazon sued and lost in a lower court and is waiting appeal at the Supreme Court level. Since then several other states have followed in enacting this counterproductive law that legislators think will bring substantial revenue, but in reality all it does is destroy small business and actually winds up losing the state money because of the losses of income tax revenue from those same affiliates. In CA it is estimated that in 2010 Affiliate Marketers paid $151 million in state income taxes, now that ABX1 28 passed these small businesses will go out of business and many will move out of state to preserve their incomes and of course, instead of generating more money California’s current deficit and economic outlook will get worse.

This Law Is Moot

It's important to mention that this law is moot, since Amazon, Overstock and most affiliate programs are canceling CA affiliates there will be no tax to collect, and our politicians just managed to destroy thousands of small businesses and lose vital income tax revenue.

Solutions for Affiliates in CA

Are there any solutions to saving income from the merchants canceling due to Nexus Tax? I have done a lot of research into this and the only solution that seems to be legitimate as far as the legality issues is moving to a state that does not yet have the tax. The basics of the Nexus is it is BASED ENTIRELY ON THE RESIDENCY OF THE AFFILIATE, this means that using someones address can be construed as tax fraud, using stuff like Incorporation in Nevada or Delaware does not apply to the Nexus tax bills because you are still physically residing in and working in CA, so the only real solution is move, BUT, remember that many states have enacted this bill and many are considering it now, so basically moving might be a moot and also ridiculous proposition. Of course, I am not a lawyer and you should consult your attorney or CPA for any advice regarding your business and this Nexus Tax.

In my humble opinion the only real solution is to roll with the punches and restructure your business and keep pushing forward with other affiliate programs that are not affected like Google Adsense! There is some critical info about solutions to this issue where people are discussing various ideas at: Any Solutions To Nexus Tax Without Moving.

My Messages To CA Politicians and Amazon

To Amazon,

Your cancellation letter to me which came without warning canceling me "immediately" , oh, well, to be fair, let me mention that you did send me a warning letter about an hour before the final cancel notice, was to say the least a SLAP IN THE FACE. Oh, and it really made me feel better that you "deeply regret" having to take this action as your email stated AND when you let me know that I can still BUY from Amazon and this will not interfere with that I was simply touched.

In reality, your lack of loyalty to the thousands of CA affiliates that have brought in god knows how many boat loads of customers and cash in the past years is just BAD BUSINESS. And, I resent that I worked my butt of on recent months to promote you only to be dropped because of some stance you are taking with the various governments around the country and now CA.

and

Your promise to "continuing to work on alternative ways to help California residents monetize their websites and we will be sure to contact you when these become available." is JUST COMICAL, NO THANKS!

To the CA Politicians that supported this and Governor Brown,

Thank you very much Mr. Governor and to all CA politicians who saw fit to pass this Nexus Tax Bill into law! I'm sure you all ready realized that, as Amazon had prewarned they would do, they have canceled their affiliation with CA affiliates and so one of the biggest, if not the biggest, online retailers that you thought you were gonna collect from is gone like the wind.

Very soon you will realize, like other states who have passed this law, who to date have not reported any significant or even any income being raised from such bills, that not only does this tax not bring you the revenue you dream of, it will actually lose money from lost income tax revenue from affiliates!

More Information on Affiliate Nexus Tax

• California Passes Affiliate Nexus Tax

• Get news alerts for other states who have passed such a bill and those considering Nexus Tax at PMA Blog.

• Excellent discussions about this at A Best Web Forums:

  CA Affiliate Tax Discussions

  CA Merchants Canceling Affiliates

  Any Solutions To Nexus Tax Without Moving

I have compiled a LIST OF AFFILIATE PROGRAMS ACCEPTING AND KEEPING CA AFFILIATES AFTER NEXUS TAX - please help keep the list updated by going over and commenting on any I have missed.

How have you guys been affected? This can be coming to your state, are you prepared? If you know of Cali based affiliate programs please comment!

It looks like Google is on the lookout and actively banning MFA sites.

What is MFA

MFA stands for "Made for Adsense Sites." And these are sites created for the sole purpose of making money with Adsense.

• Some of them are mediocre at best using half - assed regurgitated content from the web, republished articles from Ezine and other sites and some of them are really crappy where the ads themselves are placed in such a way that they overlap over the site's written content, these are really bad.

• They offer no real original quality or information.

• Some have 5 pages of content, and some may have hundreds, but the content is poor, and the MFA quality is very evident.

The Banning of MFA's

There has been quite a bit of buzz of late that many Blogger blogs that were MFA's have been getting completely deleted by Google and the Adsense accounts associated with those getting banned as well, or if the sites were self hosted there has been a a complete deindexing of these websites from the SERPS.

Best case scenario is some Adsense accounts were not completely banned, but the sites were from the index.

This recent rash of deindexing of MFA sites and bans all seem to come from a particular network of bloggers that followed an MFA model that was widely taught and blogged about on some popular make money online blogs. Many of these sites even used the exact same "minimalist" blog theme, Blogger blogs and duplicate layouts.

The end result is that only did the weak MFA sites get hit, so did some of the MMO bloggers that were blogging about these kinds of techniques got hit with some sort of penalty as well.

In reality, the "get rich quick" and the "easy" ways to make money online for beginners are very attractive to most newbies, and so of course, many jumped on the MFA bandwagon, which in turn attracted the attention of Google.

I don't really want to get into the who's and what's, as the purpose of this post is not that, but to warn all of you to not waste time building crappy sites for the purpose of making money with Google Adsense.

Make Money Online with Adsense Properly and 6 Valuable Lessons We Can All Learn From This

1. Don't Make Google Look Stupid

Look, it's simple, monopoly or not, like it or not, Google is the cornerstone of any online business, they can make or break you, so play by their rules and follow their webmaster guidelines- it's really that simple!

Google's rules are really not so bad, all they want is quality for their customers the searcher, and if they are gonna pay you money for clicks then they have a right to  dictate the kind of sites those ads are placed. Most any valuable ad network actually monitors and evaluates websites where their advertisers ads will be placed.

Google, has, does and always will protect their interests and market share as they should, and if you think they don't monitor the popular MMO and IM blogs to see what kind of teachings and information is being spread then you live under a rock.

2. Use Adsense Wisely

Adsense can be a great income stream when used properly. It should be used to compliment the website as just one revenue stream, it should not be sole purpose of building the website, this is the hallmark of MFA's.

This is actually true for any affiliate site as well, there has to be value for the traffic over and above the ads and affiliate links or else these type of thin affiliate sites will suffer in the Google SERPS or possibly get completely deindexed all together.

3. Don't Waste Time

Don't waste valuable time launching 100 crappy sites sites just to make money with Adsense. Provide value and quality to users and build good sites that will bring long term revenue and a solid business model that doesn't possess the risk of getting banned and wasting months of hard work.

4. There are NO Real Long Term Get Rich Quick and Easy Schemes Online

This business takes work and a lot of it in order to see long term and permanent results of your labors. Taking shortcuts that can get you banned are never wise choices, they may work for a little while or even some time, but eventually they only lead to problems.

In reality, in the world of Internet Marketing and Making Money Online you get back what you put in, and while building 100 MFA sites with crappy links and no quality may take some work, it doesn't compare to the real work of building quality sites that endure and bring revenue for years to come.

5. How To Get Your Sites Banned

If you really want to get your websites banned, then build a site that uses the same theme, republish a few articles on it from Ezine or Article Dashboard, add some Adsense ads and place them in a way that they overlap and block your site's content:  rinse and repeat a lot of times over and I guarantee that you will get your sites banned very quickly .

6. Learn From Others - Don't Make the Same Mistakes Yourself

I am now going to refer you to a very educational and comprehensive post from Ben, one blogger who was hit very hard with this Google MFA banning - I’ve had my last 4 months of work knocked out in an instant by Google – hundreds of sites completely deindexed last week .

It is a 4000 word synopsis on how NOT to make money online in 2010 and really hits home about the experiences of someone who within a day of reaching the $100 a day Adsense revenue mark had all his Adsense sites deindexed.

I appreciate Ben's honesty and clarity as to what he learned, and I truly believe that some of the most valuable lessons in making money online and Internet marketing are learned from the negative experiences AND we can learn from others, like Ben and not have to suffer the same fate!

As affiliates we know the importance of having a wide variety of creatives for the affiliate marketing links we put on our affiliate marketing websites. The usual suspects of text links and banners are fine, but we know that that is not always enough, plus the fact that banners are not always the best creatives for conversions because Internet surfers have gotten immune, and often ignore banners on a website. It is always good to test out new affiliate ads and periodically shake things up on your websites and only having banners and text links can become stale and BORING!!!

Pepperjam Affiliate Network offers a fresh, new and really creative creative that is a welcome change.

Pepperjam Ads

Pepperjam allows you to create special "Adsense like" ads based on your merchants.

Create Pepperjam Ads in 3 Easy Steps

Select the merchants and then select the available ads from a comprehensive list:

You can then edit the ad format, size, border, url, text and background colors and create a nice custom ad widget to insert in your websites:

Copy and past the code into your websites and that's it!

Here are some examples:

Pretty Cool Huh? You can create these ads for every merchant on your list.

The merchant list on Pepperjam is quite large and growing daily so the selection is really great. I have been quite impressed with Pepperjam's user-friendly affiliate interface, comprehensive reporting, great customer service and accurate tracking! Join Pepperjam Network and View Entire Merchant List!

If you sign up via the banner below you will get a $10 sign-on bonus.

There are many ways to work from home, such as, work from home with online surveys, which really can only make some pocket change and there is work from home with direct sales, which involves customer interaction. If you want to build an online business, that can provide a passive income then Affiliate marketing is a great way to go.

The most common venue for Affiliate Marketing is to build a website which focuses around a niche. Prior to actually doing Internet marketing, it is
important to make sure and do the proper keyword and niche research and keyword analysis for optimal success.

WHAT IS A NICHE?

Basically a niche is a certain segment of the population where you intend to concentrate your efforts.

Some examples of niches include:

Golf, Skiing, Health, Computers, Real Estate, Insurance, Video Games, Stamp Collecting... as well as the sub categories or Micro Niches within the major categories.

For example within the macro Computer category there are several micro niches which include, desktop PC's, laptops, printers, routers etc.

Within the health field there are again thousands of smaller niches including acne treatment, hair loss, insomnia, weight loss, etc.

You can also go deeper into the micro niche with a double micro niche. For example, the weight loss niche. Weight loss is a huge business, and within the niche of weight loss you can dig deeper into niches like fat burning foods, low carb diets, natural weight loss supplements..etc. Digging deep into micro niches will further cut through the competition factor and yield optimal results. There are thousands of untapped micro niche markets and the opportunities are endless. And there are affiliate programs for every possible niche.

Finding a Niche

There are 3 main factors that should influence what niche you are getting into.

1. Consider your interest and expertise.

This is important. It is a well known fact that in today's Internet environment the content of a website can make it or break it. Believe me there is lots of work involved with creating a successful affiliate business and many other tasks involved with making money online and if you can avoid adding research of an unknown niche in order to create good content on your site then it is best to do so.

When I first started in this business my first site was about computers, a subject that I knew a little about but not nearly enough to create content with ease. I spent a lot of time on researching material in order to write content for my site, all though this has turned out to be a profitable site and is a very profitable niche, it made my job more difficult.

All I am saying is that if you pick a niche you know and even better have a lot of interest in then that takes a lot of burden off the process.

2. Check out the competition for a niche

This is crucial to your success. As I mentioned earlier there are macro and micro niches. In todays highly competitive Internet Marketing stage it is often best to go into the micro niches that have enough user demand and at the same time do not yield millions of search results in Google. ( I will reference Google as opposed to other search engines, which is not to say that the others are less important, but Google is the leading used search engine on the web today)

3. Is your niche profitable and is there a demand?

Obviously you do not want to build a niche site if no one will be searching for that niche or the products you are promoting within it. You need visitors and sales in order to make commissions, so evaluating the demand is an important element of finding a niche.

Micro Niche Finder Tool is a great tool that can help you find niches, it is not free but it can save time and provide comprehensive and excellent niche information.

Some great free tools to see what the hot searches on the web are:Google Trends and My Simon Top Product/Service Searches.

Also you want to get a feel for hot items within the niche and what people are talking about and buying, here are some ways to do this:

1. Read Industry Blogs – Search in Google by entering "blog + your niche" Check out the top blogs in your niche.

For example, If you are going for a gadget/tech niche you can visit Engadget and Gizmodo.

2. Go to relevant Forums - Search for "forums + your niche"

See what people are talking about within your niche on the top forums. Find out who the customers are, what they want, what they need, what are they looking for, hat are their biggest fears and difficulties etc...

There are lots of forums and blogs for many niches.

How to gage competition and find what people are searching for:

KEYWORDS! As an affiliate marketer this is a word that you will eat, sleep and have nightmares about, it is at the center of your efforts as your sites will revolve around keywords.

A keyword is a word or phrase used to focus an online search. When people search for something online the words they input into the search engine are keywords, which then yield relevant website results for those keywords in the search results.

For example, computer is a keyword and cheap desktop computers is a long-tail keyword, which simply means it is a phrase and not just one word.

Niches and Keywords are synonymous. Simply put, if my niche is laptops then my keywords will revolve around laptops, keywords are just how the niches are searched for by Internet users. I wish someone had explained this to me clearly when I was a newbie, because this can be confusing.

How to find good keywords:

Keyword tools are crucial for affiliate marketing campaigns as they will determine the competition as well as the numbers of people searching for those KW which will determine demand. Your can optimize your affiliate websites to revolve around several good keywords, and then the different pages will show up in different search results for their respective keywords.

I use and highly recommend Keyword Elite and SEOBook Free Keyword Research Tool. Wordtracker also has a free keyword tool that is less comprehensive but is a good product at: Free Keywords at Wordtracker.

Also, Google Keywords Tool, now shows numbers of searches and can also be used to get keyword ideas.

One thing I should tell you is that the results maybe different in all of these tools. I usually use a combination of these tools to check the numbers. Most of my successful keywords have come from Keyword Elite and SEOBook Free Keyword Tool. These tools are meant to be suggestive, to my knowledge there is no tool that exists that gives precise numbers as to what people are searching for. If you can create a tool like that, you will be a millionaire for sure !

Step-By-Step Steps to Building an Affiliate Marketing Website:

Step 1. Keyword/Niche Research:

My niche will be laptop computers and I will use laptops as my main keyword:

Go To: SEOBook Free Keyword Research Tool

Enter the word laptops into the search box

Here are the results showing what people are searching for daily in all 2 major search engines:

Now do a Google search and enter allintitle:"laptops" (The reason for the allintitle and quotes is this narrows the results to true competition of websites that actually have that KW as the title and theme of their site as opposed to just a mention somewhere within their content.)

The keyword tool shows 3,210 searches per day and Google shows the competition as 7,500,000 sites! That is way too competitive, especially since there are big big guns within the laptop niche.

BUT if you look further down the list of the keyword tool you will see the longtail KW - gaming laptops.

The keyword "gaming laptops" has a daily search of 265 and Google search results shows a competition of only 7,350 sites. THAT is a great keyword, a great niche and can be very profitable. (Note: If you are reading this and your results are different for the example KW I am using. results can vary and are based on people's searches and number of websites in the Google index at the time of research)

Look for relevant targeted KW for conversions:

Look further down the list of those search results in the KW tool and you will see "cheap laptop computers" now that KW has 430 searches per day and only 4,540 results in Google so the competition is VERY low for that KW.

Also, that is a great keyword because it is targeted for sales, for example, "laptops" is very broad and could mean people are just searching for any information about laptops or just surfing the web. But, people searching for "cheap laptop computers" are probably looking to purchase laptop computers which will more likely convert to sales.

Choosing relevant targeted keyword, like those with begin with buy, purchase, cheap etc. are KW that are better targeted for sales and conversions.

Two Keyword Guidelines:

1. I strongly recommend, especially when starting out that you find keywords that are under 500,000 in competition results and have at least 10,000 searches daily across all search engines (but you really want to have as many searches as possible) for ALL keywords you will be using on your site combined. This method will allow you to rank higher and quicker in search results (serps- search engine page results) as opposed to higher competition keywords.

This process can get you ranked higher faster in Search Engine Page Results (SERPS). See that first position which is on first page of search results? That is every Internet Marketers dream! Obviously if your websites show up on the first page of search results, you will get more visitors than if you are on page 5.

Please note: Each keyword has it's own daily search numbers and so when you combine the daily searches of all your keywords you should have 10,000 or more (this includes home page and sub page keywords).

2. Choose keywords that are relevant and targeted for sales. Find and use relevant targeted keywords and this way you get readers who are PRESOLD and looking for whatever your product or service you are promoting and those visitors are much more likely to turn into sales and commissions for you.

Repeat the above process for any niche/keyword you wish and for every site new affiliate marketing niche site.

Step 2: Buying a Domain

You will now need to buy a domain for your website. I recommend buying domains from All Cheap Web, they have cheap prices and great service. Dot Com domains go for about $6.95 per year. With cheaper prices for .net and .info. By the way, there is really no significant difference between .com and .net or .info domains, but I prefer .com, only because I think it is optimal for people remembering your site URL.

The best technique for SERPS is using your keyword in the domain. This is not necessary to rank for the keyword but it makes it a lot easier. For example if your main keyword is "cheap laptop computers" then you can try for cheaplaptopcomputers.com, but I can tell you that that domain is all ready taken, so you can add more words to the main keyword like, buycheaplaptopcomputers.com or joescheaplaptopcomputers.com, etc.

Step 3. Hosting:

Once you have purchased a domain you need to get a hosting account. I have used several hosting companies and now I only use Host Gator. Hostgator is the best web site hosting company. They have almost zero downtime, their service is impeccable and their prices can't be beat. Hosting will run you $9.99/month ($7.99 if you pay a year upfront) for unlimited number of domains.

Get first month of hosting for 1 CENT at Host Gator. Enter coupon code, wordpress, 1 cent is all you will pay at checkout, the $9.99 monthly hosting fees will begin the second month of service.

Step 4. Choose a Website Builder

Now comes the fun part. Building the affiliate marketing niche site. There are several options available for this and I will direct this towards those of us who have no technical web building knowledge, have no clue about HTML code and no interest in learning.

The easiest way to build a website is to use a WYSIWYG website builder. What is a WYSIWYG? WYSIWYG is an acronym that simply translates to "What You See Is What You Get" commonly used for word processing programs and website builders that allow the user to type in the information and see it on the screen as it will look live without entering code.

WYSIWYG Website Builders are best because you design your website by typing in content from your keyboard (in English, not HTML), adding designs, colors, pictures, e-commerce AND see your website instantly on the screen as it will be when it is live and published!! HTML and all design codes are configured automatically!

The two WYSIWYG website builders I have used and recommend are Webeasy 7 Pro and CoffeeCup HTML Editor.

They both build beautiful sites easily and quickly and both are search engine friendly. Webeasy 7 Pro includes automatic settings for product feeds for the Amazon affiliate program and Coffee Cup has a member user forum and the most amazing support, you call an 800 number and a living human answers the phone! Ho holding!

I also use Build a Niche Store (BANS), which is the eBay Affiliate Website Builder. I highly recommend this software as it allows anyone to build great sites quickly and easily, and because eBay has so many product categories the possibilities are endless and you can build unlimited stores. You can learn more and get all the details about BANS at my post: Review of Build a Niche Store

UPDATE: While BANS is still being sold, it is no longer supported by the original developers, I still use it, but there is no more updating of the software so down the road it might have issues, there is a forum of users who still help each other to fix problems.

You can also use the free WordPress Software to build a site or a blog. I built this blog with WordPress and while it is not completely stress free you can't beat the price (free)! There are thousands of themes available for download and it is very easy to optimize WordPress for search engines.

Also WordPress is very easy to install with Host Gator, it comes as part of their "extra features" and literally takes seconds to download and add to your hosting account.

Step 5. Build your Website and Content

Content! Content! Content! Just like keywords, content is something that must become the center of your affiliate marketing campaigns and what you will spend most of your time on (and may have nightmares about eventually).

A huge factor in your success in building a user-friendly website that will keep your visitors on your site. Landing Pages and Headlines and Welcomes are essential for visitor retention, follow the links and read the guides.

I can't say this enough - content is crucial in the highly competitive Internet world. Just having a website with affiliate links will not cut it. You have to provide a reason for someone to visit your site over the thousands of other sites that are available, you need a hook and the hook is valuable, information rich, original content.

Also search engines place a lot of weight on content and rate the quality of your site based on content, which is good for SERPS.

For example, if your website is built around golfing. You will want to have at least 6 pages of content about the subject. How-to guides, tutorials, golfing techniques, best places to golf, etc... are some examples of content.

Write content with your visitors in mind, make it so they find your content invaluable, and they will become customers for life.

A good affiliate marketing strategy is to check out your top competing sites and see what they have and make it better. This is where knowing your niche and having interest in it comes in really handy. If you know nothing about golf, building those pages will be difficult.

One thing I noticed about the big gun sites is that they are loaded with information, sometimes too much, where you have to sift through tons of stuff and ads pasted all over the place to find the information you are looking for, and they usually only use the broad KW discussed previously and not the narrow micro KW.

You can use this to your advantage, I am sure that there are many people like me, who enjoy landing on a website that is user-friendly and not so "big" that it takes an hour to find what I am looking for.

So, one of the best affiliate marketing strategies for a highly competitive niche is to make your site "homey", a "mom and pop type of site", that is centered around a micro niche as opposed to some large "department store type of site" that has a macro broad niche. And with a micro niche you can focus on that micro content and not have to digress into huge amounts of different information. Make sense? Get tons of ideas for website content at my post Affiliate Marketing - 16 Website Content Ideas.

Keywords for Content Pages:

It is important to choose your keywords for every page of content as well as your overall (homepage) keywords because it is not only the home page of your site, but each page of your website that will be indexed by Google and once again, you want the most searched relevant targeted keywords for those pages.

For example, My main keyword is gaming laptops and my niche is gaming laptops and I write a content page that is a guide to buying a gaming laptop. I will once again research the keywords regarding gaming laptop guide that is most searched for and has the least competition.

I will go back to my Keyword Research Tools and enter the keyword gaming laptops, or guide to gaming laptops, you can try different variations to get the best results and find the best KW for this and every page of content you write.

To optimize your site to show up in Search Engines and for On-Site Search Engine Optimization, please read these guides: Simple Guide to Meta Tags Optimization and 6 Step Checklist for On-Site Search Engine Opimization.

Step 6. Choose an Affiliate Program

It is time to decide on which affiliate program you will choose. Here is a list of the top affiliate programs with tons of merchants with whom you can partner as an affiliate. You can browse the merchants and commission details after you join a program. Even though they ask for your website information when you sign up, if you don't have it yet you can leave it blank and still get approved so that you could access the member sections.

Once you join an affiliate program you will be able to access product links in various ways, such as RSS feeds, banners and links to place in your site.

Choose affiliate products related to your site niche/theme. For example, if your niche is golfing, then the banners and products you recommend on your site, should be golfing related.

You can also add some Google Adsense ads to your site. Google Adsense is a Pay Per Click affiliate program that automatically generates ads on your site that are related to your content. Google pays you a certain amount, depending on the niche, for every click (no sale necessary, just the click) that your visitors make.

Make sure these do not overtake your content, but pepper them around the content of your site.

Top Affiliate Networks:

Pepperjam Affiliate Network - eBay Affiliate Network. Tip: Sign-up by clicking on the banner on the sidebar of the home page of this blog and get $10 Sign-Up Bonus.

Commission Junction

ShareASale

LinkShare

Amazon Associates

5 Star Affiliate Programs

Clickbank - Digital Products Affiliate Network

Market Leverage

Affiliate Seeking - Huge Directory of Affiliate Programs

Affiliate Scout - Directory of Affiliate Programs

You can also search online for affiliate programs, "keyword + affiliate program" or go directly to a merchant's website. The affiliate page links are usually listed in the footer.

Step 7. Set-Up Pertinent Analysis Accounts:

Now that you are done with the building portion of the website you will need to set up some analysis tools. All of these are free.

With Google Tools, you use the same user name and password to access all your tools. Sign up for your main account first here: Google Accounts, and then you can log in to access the other tools, including Adsense.

Google Webmaster Tools - Set up your account and submit your website and sitemap so that you can track pertinent data about your site, like indexing stats, keyword rank and other important analysis.

Google Analytics - Submit your site, get the code, follow their instructions and start to track your traffic. This tool provides all pertinent details about the traffic coming into your website. It is crucial to track campaigns and performance of your traffic sources.

You will also want to read my post: 70+ Free Webmaster and SEO Tools, loaded with tools to help with everything from site design to website analysis.

Whew....I think I have covered a lot of information here. Hopefully this will help you to start an affiliate marketing website and you will be well on your way to online success.

Of course it does not end here, next comes the wonderful world of Internet Marketing, Website Promotion and getting traffic, because without traffic there is no money to be made. Also if you're new you might be interested to check out make money online for beginnners.

Please continue on to Part 2 to start promoting your website:

Building an Affiliate Marketing Website Part 2- Traffic and Website Promotion.