Graphic Designer Finds Cash Cow With Home
Business Ideas
GotDot.com profiles Andrea Thompson
a graphic artist and affiliate marketer who loves web design and making
money with home business ideas.
Andrea first learned about affiliate
marketing while volunteering to help build a website for their local church.
Her husband didn’t understand why she was donating her services, considering
at the time she was working a full time job as a graphic designer and
building websites for her own freelance clients.
But, sometimes things happen for a reason.
While working for the non-profit, website Andrea met
James Martell, an entrepreneur, successful affiliate marketer of over 70
specialty shopping sites, author of the James Martell’s Affiliate Marketers
Handbook, who just happened to be working on the community website. One
thing led to another and James approached Andrea about doing web design for
his affiliate marketing business.
At the time Andrea didn’t understand what
the business was about, so she met with James and his wife. They showed her
several checks and just kept smiling. But it was all still a mystery. Pieces
of it, she’d come to understand by doing web design work for James and a
team of affiliate marketers. But it would be months before Andrea went from
doing design work for affiliates web sites, to reading James book detailing
a proven 8-step system™ for success with affiliate marketing, to ultimately
launching her own affiliate marketing baby site.
When the first checks came in Andrea
remembers, jumping up and down and saying, “Holy cow it works.” And there’s
been another and another check, for Andrea’s discovered what so many
affiliate marketers know, that the revenue stream just keeps on building.
What is an affiliate program?
Simply put, an affiliate program is a
business relationship where one website owner (a “merchant”) agrees to pay
another website owner (an “affiliate”) a commission for referring customers.
Merchants typically manage their affiliate
program by joining a commission network such as Commission Junction or
LinkShare who provide third-party tracking and infrastructure or by
purchasing and installing specialized tracking software on their own server.
See
Commission Junction
and
LinkShare
for a list of merchants who are looking for affiliates to promote their
products and services.
How Andrea Thompson started making
money with affiliate marketing
Over the last 2 years, Andrea’s gone from
being financially challenged with a young family to being able to quit her
“day job”, and is now living and breathing affiliate marketing whether it’s
designing affiliates web templates or working on her own affiliate marketing
sites.
The combination has turned everything
around. Andrea works at home now, balancing family life and kids, and has
the flexibility to enjoy it all.
Andrea remembers how James kept saying to
her, “You are a natural at this, just do it, run with that enthusiasm.”
The first affiliate marketing site Andrea
built in February was a baby site. Andrea says, “In the beginning I made
mistakes, because I build websites I kind of had the attitude, I know this.
But I’ve learned if you’re serious about making money and being in affiliate
marketing you really have to follow James book to a tea. James breaks it
down into baby steps. He has this amazing way of speaking to techies and non
techies.
Got Dot: What’s the money like?
When Andrea first started building her baby
site, she did not have a clear goal about money. She got excited when the
first check for $20 came in, then $90. Now the baby site is making around
$1000/month.
Andrea says, “Now I know it’s a sure thing.
Any site I build is an investment.” Andrea follows the same methods for web
site construction developed by James Martell. These principals are
incorporated into Andrea’s sites featuring:
home fitness
equipment,
maternity
clothes, and
designer
baby clothes.
Got Dot: Can you explain a little bit
more about the Affiliate Buzz?
Andrea listens to the
Affiliate Buzz, while designing websites and explains how before
listening to what James talks about, you can read more information about the
issue or look up past topics. Andrea says, “The Affiliate Buzz helps me stay
on target and make plans. My favorite part is the motivational section. Just
hearing people talk about affiliate marketing helps so much and networking
with the other affiliate marketers is real valuable.”
Once a month Andrea meets with other
affiliate marketing ladies, Andrea says, “The running joke is how soon can,
we start talking about our websites. Recently, one of the gals had a
birthday, so we all asked about the kids, but before answering, everyone
wanted to know about the commission checks, the web site traffic, the search
engine positioning. So we all gave the lowdown then got back to socializing,
but it always kept coming back to affiliate marketing. But these times are
fun too, through socializing you get these little tidbits that people are
doing. Just hearing others success makes it real.”
Got Dot: What’s the biggest wow, from
reading James’ book and launching your own affiliate sites?
Andrea mentions link partners: The key is
making sure the link partner links to keywords. In James’ book, he describes
the software program, Wordtracker, and how you can get a free trial and find
out about the top keywords on the search engines. Andrea liked the program
so much she bought the full package and uses it all the time.
She explains how with her web design
business, the keyword she asks link partners to link to, is
"low cost website design", versus the name of the business, Golden
Pinecone. Andrea says, “When people do blind searches on the net looking for
low cost website design, it has nothing to do with my business name, it’s
all about the services that are part of Golden Pinecone.”
Got Dot: What’s it like working with
the other affiliate marketers, when you develop their websites?
Andrea says, “The enthusiasm is incredible.
These people are literally all fired up and I’m the same way. I wake up in
the morning, excited. I have three kids and just saw the Grinch cartoon. At
the end of the cartoon the Grinch is so happy his heart is bursting out of
him, that’s how I feel. It’s this uncontained enthusiasm. Everyone knows
they are onto something big, that’s why I quit my job working for someone
else. I wanted to work with the enthusiasm all the time. I feel like I’m
bursting with energy, overflowing with energy and ideas.”
Got Dot: What are the websites like
that you design for affiliate marketing?
Andrea describes the websites templates as
following the James Martell web style, lot's of white space, no flashing, or
distracting graphics. The templates all have energy, look classy, without
being stale. Another key part of the design is making sure they don’t look
like templates or all look the same. In fact, Andrea, will not let another
person in a niche use the same template. She even has a tracking system to
keep designs separate.
All the web templates are lean and
professional, embodying the philosophy: less is more. The content has to
jump off the page. Lots of times the users are not designers so what ever
graphic is designed has to be good, the focus is on functionality first.
Each client can choose the color and design the header. A key factor in
design is creating something that speaks to the product and that is not time
related or won’t go out of fashion; with affiliate marketing that’s really
important, since manufacturers and products come and go.
Got Dot: What advice would you give to
someone starting affiliate marketing?
- Work hard, follow the system in James
Martell's
Affiliate Marketers Handbook.
- Take it seriously. Andrea says, “In
beginning I treated affiliate marketing like a hobby. I was tinkering with
the baby site. When the first money came in I got serious and read the
book again and treated it like a business.”
- Do it right the first time.
- Understand and follow the basics. Andrea
says, “Some folks in the business spend too much time researching and
analyzing the results. Instead of over analyzing things write more
articles, and get more link partners.”
- Read James’ book every since months to
stay focused and on track.
- Listen to the Affiliate Buzz for tips.
- Just do it, like James says.
Andrea says, “Give affiliate marketing home
business ideas a chance. Before you know it, your family will catch the
enthusiasm too. My husband and sister are reading James book now and friends
are interested too.”
Like Andrea says when the checks come in,
“Holy cow it works!”
Alan followed a simple 8-step-system™ for
affiliate marketing created by
James Martell, entrepreneur, successful affiliate marketer, and
developer of over 70 specialty shopping sites with topics that include
weight loss programs,
fluorescent lights and
skate bearings; and is also in the business of helping those people
interested in making money using affiliate programs.
Related Resources:
-
James Martell’s Affiliate Marketers Handbook
-
James Martell's Affiliate Buzz
Got Dot is a
freelance writing firm profiling successful affiliate marketers.
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