Are you being ripped off by Clickbank Merchants?

I see affiliates from two perspectives.

Firstly as an affiliate, I see myself as a business partner to
those merchants that I promote. I send them traffic, and if I
make sales for them, I expect to be paid for my efforts in the
form of a predefined percentage or lump sum.

As a merchant, I see my affiliates as partners and value the
traffic they send me. My utmost priority is to make sure that
any sales that are made are credited to the affiliate that sends
me the traffic. This is essential if my affiliates are going to
trust me and put effort into promoting my products. This is
essential if I want my business to grow!

Most of my own products that affiliates market for me are related
to internet marketing and webmaster tools. Because of the nature
of these products, those visitors are likely to be knowledgeable
of affiliate programs and probably Clickbank as well.

Imagine this scenario:

Joe goes to Google and searches for "webmaster tools". Something
caught his attention over in the Pay Per Click ads. It is an
affiliate link to a product that promises to make link exchanges
easier.

"Hmmm" thought Joe. "That looks like a great tool, let's have a
closer look".

Joe clicks on the PPC link and is redirected to a sales page.
Scrolling to the bottom of the page, Joe sees that the product is
$97.

"I want this", thought Joe, "but $97 is a bit steep".

Joe searches the webpage for that magic link, and he finds it
easily.

"Great" says Joe out loud. "A link to the affiliate program, and
this program pays 50%".

After a few minutes, Joe has signed up for the affiliate program,
created his own affiliate link, typed it into his browser, and
revisits the sales page.

Joe's mouse clicks the buy link. He fills in his credit card
details and clicks the purchase button. Closing his browser, he
checks his e-mail. He watches as two e-mails are downloaded to
his machine. The first is the download information for the new
software he purchased, the second one is an e-mail with the
Subject "Congratulations Joe, you have made a sale".

Joe checks his stats online for this new affiliate program and
sure enough, he has made $48.50 commission on this purchase. In
other words, he only paid $48.50 for the product.

OK, what is wrong with this scenario?

Is it fair that Joe used his own affiliate link to make a
purchase?

What about the affiliate who advertised this affiliate program at
Google? That affiliate paid for the click, made a sale, yet did
not get the commission. Is that fair?

What is going through the minds of merchants who place links to
their affiliate programs on their sales page?

I would imagine that some merchants think about these points:

* I want to make $48.50 per sale minimum.
* If I offer it for $97 and give 50% commission to affiliates I
will make my goal of $48.50 per sale.
* By adding an affiliate sign up link to the sales page, I can
encourage people to sign up for my affiliate program, buy through
their own link and get the software for the real price of $48.50,
but the customer will be happy thinking they saved $48.50.
*Great plan!

I am sure that a lot of merchants don't see things this way -
they just don't think hard enough about their affiliates.

A merchant that uses a link to his/her affiliate program on the
sales page is using affiliate traffic as free traffic (whether
they intend to or not). After all, the merchant does not need to
spend time optimising pages or buying traffic - their affiliates
will do that and send the traffic to the sales page for free. If
an affiliate sends someone who becomes a customer, the merchant
will make their money.

The big problem here is that being an affiliate is hard work.
You do have to create content, buy and review products, possibly
even pay for advertising. If YOU are doing these things as an
affiliate, is the merchant you are promoting doing their bit by
protecting your affiliate cookie and ensuring you get commissions
on purchases made through your links? Unfortunately the majority
of Clickbank merchants don't, and affiliates waste their time
building pages and buying advertising top promote merchants who
don't deserve it.

The bottom line

If you are promoting products aimed at webmasters, the traffic
you send will likely know how to "steal" your commission. In
this situation it is vital to only promote merchants without the
affiliate sign up link.

If on the other hand you are promoting products to the general
public, e.g. weight loss products, dog training eBooks etc, this
affiliate sign up link poses less of a problem since most of the
traffic you generate wont be affiliates themselves (most wont
even know what an affiliate is) and wont have the necessary
skills to sign up at Clickbank, create a link and purchase
through their link just to get a commission.

What can you do?

If you find a merchant that you want to promote and they have an
affiliate sign up link on the sales page, contact them. Tell
them about your concerns and that they should treat you as a
partner, not the source of free traffic. Suggest that they
remove this affiliate sign up link.

The usual reaction I get

Merchant: "I get a lot of affiliate sign ups from this link,
there is no way I am removing it!"

OK, that is exactly my point. The merchant is getting a lot of
sign ups purely to get a discount on the full price. For
everyone who signs up as an affiliate to get a discount, there is
one affiliate somewhere being robbed of his/her rightful
commission. Think about how the people who sign up to become
affiliates find this site - most are via other affiliates
promotional efforts.

Most of the affiliates you get via a sign up link on the sales
page are only signing up to get a discount, they are unlikely to
ever try to sell that product. Therefore, these affiliates are
no use.

The only affiliates who will promote the product, are those that
buy the software, use it and like it. They see the benefits and
can sell it well to their visitors. These are the only
affiliates worth getting, and you wont get them from an affiliate
sign up link on the sales page.

The best way of getting hard working affiliates is to protect
your affiliates from this type of link hijacking, gain their
trust and do everything you can to help them out. Build a
relationship with your affiliates and most of all, make sure they
are rewarded for the traffic they send.
To this end, remove that affiliate sign up link, and when someone
buys your product, send them an e-mail outlining the benefits of
your affiliate program. Active affiliates respond well to
knowing their merchants are protecting their interests.

A final thought

If there are two similar products, similar price, similar
commission, one sales page with an affiliate sign up link, one
without, which would you prefer to promote? If you want to make
money online with affiliate programs, take it seriously and start
contacting merchants.

About the Author

Dr. Andy Williams writes the free weekly ezSEO Internet Marketing Newsletter offering advice and information on search engine marketing and affiliate programs.