Three things turn affiliate marketers off the most:
- Stolen commissions.
- Low commission rates.
- Mot paying affiliates, either on time or at all.
I get around these issues is by looking for 100% commission affiliate products that pay me directly.
These affiliate programs not only pay me 100% commission, payment is deposited directly into my PayPal account.
Are these programs worth it? I think so, but before you jump on board with promoting full commission products, you’ll want to read this first.
As with any product or affiliate program, not all of them are created equal.
There are full commission products that are good and there are some that are really bad, so you need to be able to recognize the difference before you start promoting them.
Any good, quality, ‘affiliate focused’ program will almost always require you to purchase the product first, not all of them do, but many do.
That’s actually a good thing. If you’re a customer focused marketer, that’s what you do. Otherwise you’re simply in it for the money and that’s not how you’re going to find success, just my personal opinion 
The same is true for 100% commission products. The good ones require a purchase. However for those that don’t, I highly recommend you do your due diligence and buy the product anyway, use it and honestly evaluate it.
Why Offer 100% commission Affiliate Programs?
There IS a method to the madness of offering 100% commissions. Typically it’s because the marketer wants something in return, and in most cases it’s to build up their mailing list.
That can actually be a sweet deal for you if, and only IF, the product or service being promoted is truly worth it, many are not 
Some products promoted are purely a lure to get affiliates to promote them so the product owner can build their email list, and what they are offering is JUNK. The goal is purely about getting email subscriptions than it is about offering a quality product.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with boosting email subscribers as long as the product is a good one. And therein lies the problem. There aren’t many quality 100% commission products out there.
I’ve been checking them out and I return more of them than I recommend.
It will take me a lifetime to go through every 100% commission product out there, and I don’t intend to, but I do look out for them and on occasion I do find a good one.
Incredibly enough, I’ve only found two products so far, and honestly their quality has impressed me just as much, if not more, than the commission. I look at it this way, since these products are paying full commission into my PayPal account, that means I am also responsible for refunding their money should my buyer return the product.
Since I don’t want a PayPal account full of returns, I’m looking for quality 
How 100% commission Affiliate Programs Actually Work
Many of the affiliate programs use affiliate scripts that make it easy for affiliates to inserts their PayPal email into their affiliate link.
For example an affiliate link may look something like this:
http://www.productname.com/?e=yourpaypalaccountemail
Jonathon Leger actually provides access to these affiliate scripts in his $7 secrets guide that is also itself a 100% affiliate commission product.
These scripts will keep track of which affiliate sent the visitor to your sales letter so that the PayPal link can be modified to the affiliate’s PayPal email address and get 100% commission sent directly to their PayPal account.
What’s happening here is the product owner is making money on a one time offer on the backend and on follow-up emails.
For affiliate programs that want to pay less than 100% affiliate commissions there are other affiliate scripts that are more robust and will create a more comprehensive affiliate program setup.
One thing to note when using these scripts through PayPal is that PayPal does not do split payments between accounts. So for instance if an affiliate program wants to offer the affiliate only a 50% commission, PayPal won’t do that. Payments going through PayPal have to be sent in full to only one party.
So affiliate programs that pay only 50% might look like this:
- Sale #1 goes to the Affiliate
- Sale #2 goes to the Product Owner
- Sale #3 goes to the Affiliate
- Sale #4 goes to the Product Owner
- and so on…
Just something to be aware of when promoting.
Here’s how I evaluate a good 100% commission product:
- Consider the source. Who created the product and what is their reputation on the web?
Do some checking, don’t just look at the commission amount and jump on board.
A case in point is an Online Business Ideas guide I promote for Willie Crawford. The guide is pure quality for $27 jam packed with useful information, but it also comes from Willie who has been online for over ten years and is someone who’s honest, knowledgeable and highly admired by his followers.
That’s exactly the kind of person you will get quality products from.
- Buy the product even if it’s not required. You can’t know how good something is if you don’t use it and experience it yourself.
- Ask the affiliate manager what the return rate is. Don’t be afraid to ask this question, it’s valid and pertinent. If you don’t get a response or the affiliate manager hesitates in telling you, that’s a red flag.
- Find out what the CTR or click through rate is for their affiliates. The click-through rate is the ratio of the number of times a visitor clicks on the affiliate links to the number of impressions.
For example, if 1 out of 100 people who visit your website clicks on your affiliate link, the CTR is 1%.
- Be sure that your commission is instant. Your commission may not go directly into your PayPal account, you may have to wait for payment as is the case with most affiliate programs, so be sure that payment is instant.
The real beauty of 100% affiliate commission programs is that with just one sale you’ve made your money back on your purchase.
But don’t risk your reputation or your wallet on promoting crappy products. We all want to be profitable but be a quality source of support and benefit to your readers and followers first.
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Twitter: MicroSourcing
April 4, 2011 at 6:42 pm
The CTR ought to be a very good indicator whether the venture will be successful or not. However, the conversion rate is also something to consider.
Great post about 100% commissions… Are you using the Empower Network yet?
No Mike, haven’t looked into that one.
Cool, I’m sure I would like it. Hope business is going well for you…
Have a great day!