Different Types of Affiliate Website

There are many types of websites and as you improve your affiliate marketing skills, you may want to create different kinds of sites since each is designed for different marketing goals. If you're new to affiliate marketing, please don't feel wary and overwhelmed. Below I listed the various affiliate website, their characteristics, benefits and drawbacks.
Opt-In Mini-Site: A Great Starting Point

An Opt-In Mini-Site, sometimes called a name-squeeze, newsletter sign-up page, etc. is simply a page that includes information about your free mailing list and a subscription box. Its main purpose is to get an email address so you can follow-up with your visitors.
Items You Should Add to an Opt-in Mini-Site:

• An Enticing, Attention-Grabbing Headline: Attract readers by offering "how to" articles in which you address how you're going to solve a problem, teach them how to do something, etc.
• Bullet Points Detailing What is Included: Tell them what they will receive by signing up for your mailing list.
• Subscription Box & Spam Notice: Provide your readers a box to sign up and ensure them that you will not give away, rent or sell their email address. It's extremely-effective for increasing your list as there are no other options on the page, sign up or don't. And there no other links to distract them from making a decision.

Optin mini-sites are ideal for building your list as it is an excellent option to maintain long term profits. If you don't have a way to collect email addresses, most of your visitors will come to your site, leave and never to come back. All you need is a one page website and an autoresponder service for your mailing list.
Portal: Huge Traffic & Establishing Expertise

This is a large website that contains all kinds of articles and other content on your chosen subject or a subject that your target market is interested in reading. It may also include message boards, video, audio and other interactive components. There are no specific rules on what has to be included, but a portal is essentially a big website pandering to a distinct market.
Characteristics of Portal Sites:

• Portal sites are exceptional traffic builders and fantastic for enhancing your reputation in your market.
• Search engines will most likely send tons of traffic your way and your traffic will also build through word-of-mouth.
• Portal sites tend not to be as focused as a mini-site or smaller site and may not convert sales or opt-ins as easily as a smaller, more focused sites. This is because readers get distracted due to the large volume of information and links.

You should not include your entire affiliate marketing strategy into a portal site. Instead, also add some of the other kinds of websites previously mentioned in this article. Then, once you've built up traffic to your portal site, you can direct that traffic to your higher converting mini-sites - creating a steady flow of traffic to your network of websites.
Mini Review Site:

Keep Them Focused on the Product: Rather than of a website with gobs of reviews, you may want to create a single-page website that reviews and promotes a single product that you are selling.
Characteristic of a Mini Review Site:

• You can direct highly targeted traffic to this page where you present them with a detailed review on one product only.
• Your visitors won't be distracted by other links and information so they can make a decision to buy or not.
• The only distraction away from the product review you might want to include is an opportunity to sign up for your mailing list, so if your visitors don't buy today, you can follow up with them via email.

Mini Content Site: Focused Search Engine Food

This is quite different from a portal website. Where a portal site delivers huge amounts of information to a target market, a mini content site focuses on one subject.
Characteristic of a Mini Content Site:

• A portal site might cover all subject associated with getting fit, however, a mini-content site might only focus on spinning bicycle workouts. This might include a review of spinning classes' effect on weight loss and endurance, products or videos relate d to strategies about getting the maximum results from spinning.
• The purpose of the site would be to create a highly-targeted mailing list of people who want to achieve optimum result from spinning, want to explore the subject thoroughly and to sell just a handful of products directly related to doing that.
• A mini-content site can easily attract traffic through search engines and numerous strategies. It is also highly-focused in its content so it won't be so distracting for your visitors.
• A mini-content site won't attract as much search engine traffic as a portal site due to it having less content, but it usually has a higher sales conversion rate

With a mini-content site, you'll want to keep your pages simple with only content (how to help, articles, etc.), relevant offers and a mailing list subscription box.
Blogs: Relationship-Builders

There are many different benefits in using blogs, but of the primary advantage of blogs is its use as relationship-builders.
Advantages of Blogs:

• Blogs give you a way to establish a bond with your visitors and you as an expert.
• It also helps you boost your mailing list. People visit blogs for information and to hear from someone they can relate to on a more personal level. They usually don't come for a sales pitch. That's doesn't mean you cannot recommend things, but use a more subtle approach.

Some Tips for Using Blogs:

• Make sure you have a mailing list sign-up box. Most of your visitors won't sign up for your RSS feed, but they will sign up for your mailing list. People are more familiar and comfortable with email.
• Don't post ads on your blog. When you're writing your blog posts, you can to include affiliate links when they are really relevant. For instance, if you are casually speaking about your experience with a product, link to the product. If you're writing about a discussion you had with a friend, who also sells a product to your target market, link to it.
• If there is a free teleseminar or course you're going to attend and it comes with an affiliate link, add it.

Product Info Site: Just Like a Store

This type of website looks similar to a store with a various types of products, but instead of linking to its own shopping cart, it has affiliate links to another website.
Characteristics of Product Info Sites:

• Some people manually create these sites but it's a lot of work, and others do them through automated data feeds.
• Many multi-product store owners, Amazon.com included, offer data feeds of their catalog.
• Data feeds can include product names, prices, descriptions, photos etc. and with special programming, you can convert these data feeds into ready-made websites.
• A couple programs people use are Associate Engine, Associate Engine (AE) :: Amazon.com Affiliate Script (for the Amazon catalog) and SecretMoneyGenerator.com for numerous different catalogs).

The difference between this type of site and a website with a bunch of product reviews is that a product info site is designed for the one-off sale and doesn't offer any extra value to the visitor. Where a full product review site adds an exceptional value and can build trust as well as long-term repeat and referral traffic. If you select to do a data feed website, it's a good ideal and worthwhile to add the extra value by including reviews and other useful information to the product pages.

This is a basic overview of the different kinds of affiliate websites. Keep in mind, there is no absolute right or wrong strategy to get started or to develop your network of websites - but your objective is to attract as much of your market as possible over time AND to develop a trust with readers that helps determine their buying decisions. But remember, don't try too much at once and realize that it takes time to see results.


Dania

I am mom and have awesome "how to" artcies to share about ebiz ideas for moms and other critical moms' issues like parenting, timr-managrement and more. My social media blogs provide awesome, FREE tools, articles, tips and guides for people and especially moms who are comtemplating starting an online home business . I have exceptional reviews and suggestions to share on cutting-edge marketing tactics and products designed to effectively promote your website to the world. My social media blogs also have articles, tips and other resources from top Intenet marketing Gurus and experts. Visit http://www.momsebizblog.com and Home Business Tips for Your Online Business