Starting an Affiliate Program. What's better? 1 tier or 2...

[Ben Marroquin]

Hi All,

Need some advice. I'm working on adding an affiliate program to my new
website http://www.AskBrainy.com

I've been looking for opinions as to what's better:
A) A 1 tier affiliate program that pays out 50%
B) A 2 tier affiliate program that pay out 30% on the 1st tier and 20% on
the 2nd tier.

My goal for the Affiliate Program is to have quality affiliates over quantity.
Affiliate Program applicants are going to have to meet the following
guidelines/standards:

1) They must have a content rich family friendly site. By content rich I
mean over 20 webpages of real content. Not sales letters. 10 of which
must be there own original work.

2) They must have a page rank of at least 3 or more. Most serious
webmasters do.

3) They must have at least 3,000 unique visitors per month and 75% of
that traffic must originate from North America. This is my target market.

4) All search inquiries must originate from valid search inquiries. No
promoting search result pages. A real human must make the search.

Again, basically I'm looking for honest, ethical, quality Affiliates. Not
mass numbers. I want quality highly targeted searches for
AskBrainy.com's advertisers. Basically, I want the best for both my
Affiliates and Advertisers.

Affiliate commission will be paid out by Paypal only. If a person doesn't
have a Paypal account then they'll need to open one. If a person can't
get one then my affiliate program is not for them. Sorry, but no
exceptions.

I hope to get everything set up during this new week. I'm anxious to start
promoting AskBrainy but want to make sure I start off on the right foot.

Anyways, Your responses and suggestions are much appreciated.

Sincerely,

Ben Marroquin

P.S. I'm also going to be looking for some quality editors for
AskBrainy.com's directory if you're interested.

[sugarrae]

Most pro affiliates would rather have 50% on first tier than 30/20. Most pro affiliates prefer to rely on their own sales.

However, I'll be honest. A lot of pro affiliates aren't into being "babysat". If you have hoops to jump through and micromanagement going on, they'll probably find something else to promote.

There is never a guarantee of quality affiliates. The time you'll spend trying to limit yourself only to quality affiliates will take more time than simply ignoring the non performers. Just my two cents .

[Lynn Terry]

[alice]

[Ben Marroquin]

[Lynn Terry]

[karadawn]

[Ben Marroquin]

[john925]

[Ben Marroquin]

Thanks for your comments John. There are some other areas that the
programmer is working on. Right now I'm testing the affiliate program
on a 1 tier 40% level.

Once everything is worked out (meaning some minor bugs and user friendly
updates) then he will begin work on making it a 2 tier program with bonuses.

Thanks again everbody... definitely appreciated

Sincerely,

Ben Marroquin

[Mike Merz]

[Ben Marroquin]

[ambrose]

I personally prefer a 1-tier large commission than a 2-tier program. However, my husband is a big fan of the 2-tier system, so most of our affiliate programs have been structured as a 2-tier. I just think that people rely too much on their downlines, and never really put forth much marketing efforts of their own.