FAQ Publisher Guide

From Wiki

(Difference between revisions)
Jump to: navigation, search
Safiyya.Abba (Talk | contribs)
Safiyya.Abba (Talk | contribs)
Line 30: Line 30:
===True Content===
===True Content===
[[Types_of_Affiliates#Content_Sites|True Content|]] sites are generally informative sites that provide information relating to the products that are featured on their site.
[[Types_of_Affiliates#Content_Sites|True Content]] sites are generally informative sites that provide information relating to the products that are featured on their site.

Revision as of 13:48, 18 June 2009

Frequently Asked Questions by Affiliates, for Affiliates - Admin


What is a Merchant?

A merchant (retailer) is an online company who sell their products and/or services through an Affiliate Network. The merchant will pay a percentage/set amount once a transaction has completed. To find out more information on what merchant will pay - please visit the Join Merchants in your Affiliate Account.

What is an Affiliate?

An affiliate (also known as a publisher or advertiser) is somebody whose purpose is to drive traffic to a merchant. They can do this by featuring the banners, text links or products of a merchant on their site.

How do Affiliates make money

If a user is browsing on an affiliates site, sees a product they like and clicks on the link (which takes them through to the merchant page) the affiliate will not be paid.

If however, the user then purchases this product, the affiliate will be paid as they have provided the merchant with a customer.

What Kind of Affiliate am I?

True Content

True Content sites are generally informative sites that provide information relating to the products that are featured on their site.


Forums are interactive sites where internet users go to discuss issues that they are interested in.


Blogs are usually online diaries. They vary in content and will usually put links to products that they are ‘blogging’ about.

Shopping Directories

If you are a shopping directory affiliate you will simply provide a list of all the merchants on your site, including a short description about what they do and occasionally providing reviews of their services.

ShopWindow partners

Shopwindow partners make use of the shopwindow tools and functionality to help power their website.

Voucher Codes

Voucher code affiliates are given voucher codes by merchants which they feature on their site.

E-mail Marketing

E-mail marketing affiliates collect e-mail addresses that are interested in a particular area and send them details of offers/deals they think the database of users will be interested in.

Price Comparison

Price Comparison sites provide an easy to use service that allows users to compare the prices of specific products from a range of merchants.

Cashback and Reward

Cashback and Reward affiliates give a percentage of the commission that they earn back to their users. In the case of cashback affiliates, this is in the form of cash and in the case of reward affiliates this is in the form of ‘points’ which can be redeemed to purchase other goods.

Corporate Intranet

If you provide companies with an intranet service that offers its users discounts at retailers then you would be a Corporate Intranet affiliate.

Social Networking

Social Networking affiliates are primarily used for socialising with friends but sometimes they have banners or applications that encourage users to shop.

Pay Per Click (PPC)

PPC affiliates promote merchants via search engines such as google. PPC stands for Pay Per Click, so a PPC ffiliate pays the search engine each time a user clicks on their link.

How do I get traffic to my site?

There are two main ways to get traffic to your site: SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and PPC (Pay per click)


Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via "natural" (or "organic") search results. The higher a site or page is listed or “ranked”, the more visible it will be as well as more relevant to the user. This can increase the volume and quality of traffic to your site.

In order to improve the ranking of your site you need to consider how search engines work and what people search for. Optimising your website will therefore involve editing and improving content in order to improve it’s natural search listings


Pay per click involves paying a search engine every time a user clicks on a link that to visit either a merchant's website or your own website. You will typically bid on keyword phrases relevant to your target market to ensure that you only pay when you believe there is a chance of a sale.

When a user types a keyword query matching your keyword list, your advertisement may be displayed. These advertisements are called sponsored links or sponsored ads, and appear adjacent to or above the "natural" or organic results on search engine results pages. Content websites commonly charge a fixed price for a click.

Where to ask questions
Ask Us A Question – simply submit a question and we can answer it
Request an article – got a great idea about an article but don't know the next step to take?

