WARNING: while innovative, this is a really “crazy” idea, so if you are one of the trend followers, please stop reading. Now, if you’re looking for “out of the box” ideas and you have what it takes (namely an existing program, server, some spare content), then this might be for you.
Before going in depth, I know there are many ways to get more affiliates. Basically, there are 2 main branches to achieve this: You can get them through pure marketing (ads, bonuses, incentives, PR and such) or you can get them through program optimization (mainly conversion and/or retention improvement, but also innovative marketing tools, customer service, payment methods and so on). I won’t go deeper on those subjects since more or less they’re quite known, and those that aren’t are part of the arsenal of tools we provide some of our selected clients.
But this time, I’ll present you a “3rd branch”, somehow a mix of the other 2 branches, although it could be considered something totally new, depending on how far you wanna go. Just make no mistake: this isn’t something spectacular or specially difficult. Like most good ideas, it’s extremely simple, just that most people would never consider it because of its main characteristic: you won’t get a cent off it. Nothing. Nada. Zero. Zilch.
At this point, you will probably stop reading, but if you got to this point, you could hang with me a little more, right?
As I said, you won’t get a cent… apparently (now sounds better, huh? 
)
The idea is as follows: You have an existing program with a line-up of sites, you have a server. You probably have loads of content. You have processing and probably a CMS. With all this, just build a great nice looking site, with all the bells and whistles and host it on a nice server. Add some good and decent processing and give your affiliates 100% revshare for life (after processing). Yes, I said 100%. I didn’t say 70, 80, 90, not even 99. I said 100%. And I didn’t said for 1 month, or 2, or 6. Not even a year. I said FOR LIFE. And by the way, before you start thinking on some cheap template, no marketing tools and a members area that will never update, I gotta tell you the secret of this is that you treat this site just like any site of yours. Or even better.
Now, sure as hell webmasters will fight to promote your site. After all, they’re getting 100% revshare without any costs involved. So where’s the trick? Well, you’ll give webmasters this site with 100% lifetime revshare barring some conditions, in example, you could add some of these terms and conditions (for ease of writing, I will call this site “A100″):
- webmasters will get 100% revshare as long as they send the same amount of traffic to the remaining sites in your program (don’t be greedy, if they send 100 unique hits to A100, then they should send 100 or more to all the sites in your line-up combined, not each of them)
- if they don’t get to this 1:1 ratio, they’ll get 90% and then a decreasing number each month they don’t get to the 1:1 ratio (ie 2nd month 80%, 3rd month 70% and so on until you get to 50 or 60% or whatever your regular revshare percentage is)
- they will be free to use content for marketing purposes, but whatever they build will be public usage for all members (thus you save money on promo material and your members will get a wide variety of marketing material)
of course, if you want to tight the bell (I’d recommend you to loose it, but it’s your site), you can make that 1:1 ratio to be not based on traffic amounts, but sales. This may scare webmasters, but again, the decision is yours. You can also count traffic based on Geo IP tracking. Either way, webmasters going for this A100 site will promote the sites in your program as hard as the 100% revshare, and furthermore, they’ll push it harder because they can’t risk to fall short. You can even put a 1:1.x ratio if you feel greedy and/or insecure.
Now, as you may see, there’s a lot to win: new affiliates, lots of traffic diverged between your existing sites and a site that you didn’t have anyway (so no loss), competitive traffic, higher quality traffic, people looking for your program just out of curiosity and so on, and so on, and so on.
But wait, this is not all. This is just the tip of the iceberg, because, as a matter of fact, this kind of setup could provide you with a very good income, either by using traditional additional sources of income (upsells, cams, etc) or by using high end non traditional marketing tools that have way more income potential power. But you won’t expect me to spill the gourmet beans just like that, right?
