Is Affiliate Marketing The Best choice For You?

In my previous  three articles, I covered the subjects of, "You're Never Too Old To start Your Own Business"; "What Type of Business To Start"; and the third was "Three Choices You Have For Starting An Online Business".

In my third article, I also discussed the choice of MLM, or Multi Level Marketing. In this article I will discuss what affiliate marketing is, and the pros and cons of this business model.

What is Affiliate Marketing?

The most basic explanation is this: Established online marketing businesses discovered, that building their business went faster, and was more profitable, if they had a sales force to multiply their efforts.

For many reasons, which we won't go into in this article, hiring sales people as employees, was not a viable alternative.

The solution was to find people, and make them independent contractors, and then pay them up front commissions for referring sales to them.

While MLM Companies, both on and offline, do this, they have a different business model, and they call them "Distributors".

Just about every online marketing business has an affiliate program to sell their products. When you register as an "affiliate" in an online marketing business, you are licensed to sell their products.The usual commissions are in the 50% - 75% range, but 50% is the most common amount.

When you make a sale, the commission is paid, usually within a week or month. You don't need to worry about delivering any product, or having your own merchant account.

You refer a sale to the Company, and you get paid up front. You are your own independent business, and the company sends you a 1099 Form at the end of the year.

Affiliate Marketing is booming on the Internet, because it is the fastest way to start an online business for yourself. However, there are some drawbacks to this type of marketing, and I would be remiss if I didn't point them out.

Because Affiliate Marketing is so popular worldwide, you will find that the level of competition is very high.

Let me give you an example; say ABC Company publishes an online e-book on the subject of "Preventing The Common Cold." This book has become very popular, because it delivers on its promise, and sales are booming. The majority of customers register as an affiliate, so they can get paid for referring sales. After a short time ABC Company has 10,000 affiliates.

ABC Company has a great affiliate program. They supply their affiliates with their own personalized web site, all of the marketing and advertising materials they need. The problem is "Competition". Ten thousand others have the same tools.

The problem becomes, "Distinguishing yourself" from all the others, selling the same product. There is a solution to this drawback, and it involves getting your own domain name and sales funnel set up, on your  own website.

This is something you will need to do in the future, but it isn't something that a new marketer should tackle in the beginning.

In future articles, I'll be covering those steps, one by one, and in more detail, so look for them.

Conclusion:

Affiliate Marketing has become the best and fastest choice for setting up your own online marketing business. It's the choice I made for myself.

In spite of the drawbacks, there are viable and easy solutions to them. As I said, I will cover them in future articles

In my next article we will examine your third choice of an online business, which is "Marketing Your Own Product Online".

Three Choices You Have For Starting An Online Business

In my first two articles, I covered the subject of, You are never too old to start your own business. Then we covered the types of business to choose, and covered offline choices you have.
In this article we will explore your choices of types of online businesses to start.

1. MLM or multi-level marketing onlline.
2. Your own product or service on your own website.
3. Information Marketing.

MLM Online, By now I think everyone on the planet has heard of Amway. They were the first major success in Multilevel Marketing, and fought the government and won the right to use this type of marketing structure. This paved the way for thousands of new MLM companies to start up. They collectively created a major industry.

There were major problems with this business model. It directly conflicted with human nature, not to mention business statistics. We will look at the 3 major problems first.

Problem 1, Human Nature. I have heard many statistics about the percentage of people, who have an entrpreneur's mindset, and it ranges between 1% to 5%.

That means if you recruit 100 people, only one to five will stay with it. So, to build a downline big enough to give you residual income to live on, will require that you recruit thousands of new people.

Problem 2, Business Statistics. In all new start up businesses, whether offline or online, the average success rate is as follows: Out of 100 new businesses, after two years, the majority are already out of business. After five years, only one or two still remain.

How many MLM companies can you name that have been around over five years? Out of the thousands of MLM startups in the last 30 years, I can only think of three, off the top of my head: Amway, Shacklee, and Herballife. I am sure there are a few others, but the percentage of lasting successes are near one percent.

Problem 3, Online scams and hype. MLM has taken its business model online. Distributors can now recruit, and advertise to a worldwide audience of prospects.

The problem is that online MLM advertising appeals to people who are looking for a fast and easy solution, a company that will do the work for them.

Remember, that the majority of people don't have the entrepreneur's mindset, to build their own business. They are looking for a magic system, that will do the work for them, fast and free.

By now, you are probably inundated, daily, with sales letters. These letters are written by skillful copywriters, and they appeal to the, something for nothing crowd.

There are legitimate online marketers, that do offer valuable information products, software, and systems. In a future post, I will cover the best way to find them, and the questions, you will need to ask.

Conclusion: MLM, whether done offline or online, follows the same basic business models. They all have a downline structure that pays the big bucks, in the future, after your downline is filled.

I did offline MLM for 18 years, and I have never seen a downline matrix filled by anyone, including the leaders.

In this third article, we looked at MLM online, as one of three choices you have, to build an online business.

In the next, or fourth, article we will take a look at your second choice of online business. It is called, Affiliate Marketing.

In the fifth article, we will look at your third choice of an online business. That is, creating and selling your own product, or service.

For now, look for Article Four to follow this.

How To Choose What Type of Business To Start

In my previous article we made the case that you are never too old to start your own business, and creating your own job is the best way to build a secure retirement income.

In this article we will cover your choices of businesses to start, and help you decide the best choice for you and your family. We will break down businesses in two major categories; Offline or Online.

We will start with Offline 
If you choose the traditional offline business, you will need to consider your startup costs. They can be substantial.

Lets say you want to open a clothing store. You will need to find a high traffic location and sign a lease. Of course, you have to remodel the store. Then there's the business license, arrange for utilities, then start advertising, and finally the grand opening.

Now the real costs begin! What are you going to sell? What are the inventory costs? Keep in mind the variety of styles and sizes you will need to compete with Wal-Mart, K Mart and Target. Can you match their prices? To make things worse, are the state and federal reports and taxes you have to manage.

Its my considered opinion, after 45 years in business, this is probably the worst choice in todays economic climate.

Offline Services, is going to be easier than a retail business. You can set up a service business in your home. Lets say that you are an air conditioner repairman with experience, and your own tools. You decide to go independent and start your own business.

The problem will be that your income stops from your job, and you have to build your own customer base. That means you must have the funds saved to advertise and to live on. From my experience you should have enough to live on for a minimum of 6 months. It will take you at least a year, and maybe even 2 years to get into a profit. Another option is Franchising. When you buy a franchise, you buy a System and instant credibility. You also will get group advertising, specialty equipment and marketing tools.

The problem, however, is that you are sill starting from scratch, with no customers, with immediate costs of franchise fees. When I bought my Duraclean Carpet and Furniture cleaning franchise way back in 1965, the costs of a franchise was $7,000. Today it is $25,000. My franchise fees began after 2 weeks, and had to be paid even when I didn't have any business.

My conclusion is that either franchising, or going independent, is not very practical. Either option will be very difficult, if you are trying to build a residual retirement income. This series of articles is to help anyone planning to retire soon, such as baby boomers, or those retired, but forced to look for more income.

You need a business that will provide a secure residual retirement income, so lets take a look at Online Marketing.

Online businesses will involve either physical products or information products. There are three main ways to market online; MLM, Affiliate marketing, or your own product on your own website.

In the next, or third article, we will explore all three options. What we will be looking for are three things:

1.    The fastest way to reach your goal.

2.    The least expensive way to get there.

3.    The simplicity of building this business.

Be sure to look for the next article, and I will help you decide which choice will be best for you and your family. These articles are posted on Ezine Articles, and on my blog. http://jerrygarner.blogspot.com/

You Are Never Too Old To Start Your Own Business!

Why You Should Start Your Own Business

With more and more jobs disappearing, baby boomers, who are starting to retire at the rate of 10,000 a day, as well as those already retired, are finding it difficult to survive with such an uncertain financial future. Social security, Medicare and Medicaid are going broke, and even if they weren't, the dollar is inflating faster and faster, and no one can survive on that alone.

Then we have those who have built up a comfortable retirement income with investments, real estate, IRAs and 401Ks. They have stood by helplessly and watched them disappear partially or completely. Finally we have the victims of scam artists like Enron and Bernie Madoff.

I personally know of several victims, such as the retired surgeon in Florida, who built up a sizable real estate portfolio, and was enjoying his retirement, until the current recession began in 2008. He had to come out of retirement when the mortgage market collapsed. He had to start over and find another source of income.

What was his solution? He created his own job. He was 71 years old at the time. The job he created for himself was as an online marketing consultant, an independent contractor with an established successful online marketing training company.

My Personal story

I have been a successful businessman in Atlanta for over 45 years, operating a carpet cleaning business. In 2009 I lost my entire investment account in the Forex Currency and Option Markets. That was to be my retirement. I had to find another source of income to retire on.

What was my solution? I joined my doctor associate in the same marketing training company as an independent contractor. In other words, I started creating my own source of retirement income. I was 75 when I started this business. This brings me to the point of this article.

You Are Never Too Old To Start Your Own Business

Business history is full of stories of people who have started successful businesses after age 65. I always think of Colonel Sanders. At the age of 65 he packed up his old car with pots, pans and spices and made personal calls to restaurants all over the U.S., trying to sell his chicken recipe.

He was turned down by everyone, but he never gave up, until he finally found someone that set him up in business. As they say, “the rest is history”.

If you use excuses, such as “I'm too old” “It's too much work” “I could never learn to use a computer” and similar ideas, you are probably right.

If you are a person of action, who can take responsibility, have perseverance, faith in yourself, and a “can do” attitude, then I promise you that you are not too old to start your own business.

I would have started my current online business, even I was 85 or 90 at the time. The point is, age is no barrier unless you put it there. So the next thing to do is find the right business.

The Solution

When you start a business in your retirement age, you need to consider several factors. Probably the biggest one is “how long will it take you to make a profit”?

The purpose of this article was to convince you to start your own business, and that you are never too old to do it.

I am writing a series of articles to help you start your own business. I'm trying to keep each article short to make it easier to digest. The next one will be “What Type Of Business Should You Start?”. Look for it.

You can follow this series by going back to the Ezine where you found this one, or you can follow along on this Blog, where I will be posting all my articles.

Welcome Letter to First Time Visitors, and Purpose of This Blog

Introduction to Jerry Garner's Online Retirement Income Blog

I would like to welcome first time visitors to my personal blog, and welcome back my regular visitors. I'm Gerald Garner, but I prefer Jerry Garner, and I created this blog as a communication tool to find and help people who are fed up with their financial circumstances, and are ready to do something about it.

Purpose

This blog is dedicated to finding motivated people with an entrepreneurial spirit, of any age, and help them to establish and build their own online business, with a secure source of retirement income.

My website,  http://bit.ly/glSxgT  is geared toward Baby Boomers who are now, as I write this, retiring at the rate of 10,000 a day. At least they would like to, but our current world-wide economic conditions have made it very difficult for some, and impossible for others.

This blog is also for those already retired, but have lost part or all of their retirement income, and have to find another source of income.

Some jobs are disappearing for everyone, and since nobody wants to hire older people anyway, the choices are very limited. The only real choice is to create your own job. How are you going to do that, and what kind of job? I won't answer that question right here, but I will be publishing a series of posts on this blog to help you do that.

My first blog post will be titled “You Are Never Too Old to Start Your Own Business”. I know first hand that is true, because I'm 76 years old as I write this in January 2011. I started my online marketing business in 2010.

If you are still working, and planning for you future retirement, the information I share on this blog can apply to you, too. Why wait until you're 65 to retire? You can retire at any age.

Conclusion

I hope you bookmark this blog site and join me often. My mission is to give you valuable free information that you can use, and get value from. If I do, you will want to continue joining me on this blog.

Some of the subjects I will be posting here will be:

• You're Never Too Old To Start a Business
• Retire or Retirement; Which is Best?
• What Type of Business is Best To Start?
• What Business Should I Choose?
• How Do I Find Customers For My Business?

There will be others added as I get your feedback, and you let me know what help you need.

For those of you who are in a hurry to do something quickly, you can join me on my free information page and on my primary program at:

http://onlineretirementincome.com/thankyou2

Watch my video, read all the information, and if you have any questions contact me at jerry_garner@bellsouth.net