You may have seen the pitch before- you can sell the product without even having a website! Technically, that is possible. People do make sales in other ways, but the real power of affiliate sales is in having a website of your own to call home. A website can do a lot of things for affiliate sales, and require far less promotion than advertising many separate sites on their own.

other affiliates promoting the same item. And, using nothing more than an affiliate link to the product site, there is a good chance that the buyer may take note of the site's url alone in order to come back another time to buy. With a separate site, yours will be the one that is bookmarked and read later instead of theirs.

In order to more effectively make your pitch, there has to be a site that buyers can look at, read, bookmark, and email to their friends. Building a content site does require getting some content together, which can be expensive, but it is also much more effective. And if you have many items to market, they can all go onto the site. Having them all in one place, especially if they are related items in any way, can increase your chances of having buyers purchasing more than one of your items at a time.

Having a website also gives you the chance to build up a client list. By putting out a regular newsletter to people requesting it through your site, you keep your site and your promoted products in their minds. You don't want to be the guy who wouldn't go away, but you do want to keep telling the potential buyer through the newsletter why he should buy through you. In addition, having content on your site makes it rank better in search engines. This means less promotion on your part and better traffic for the site.

There are affiliate marketers that rely on many single sales pages, and there are affiliates that don't even have that. Some marketers promote their items using ads that simply feature their affiliate link. The downside is often that there is no sales pitch, and consequently, no sales. Customers are not beating down the doors of affiliates in order to buy from them- an affiliate needs to have a space to make an effective sales pitch. A lot of people have lost money buying ads with no website of their own- don't make that mistake.

Another problem with having no website is that the items being promoted are likely being promoted by dozens, if not hundreds or thousands, of other people. In order to be effective, your sales pitch has to stand out. Using Adwords or Adsense exclusively, there is nothing to really distinguish yourself from those bozos trying to promote the same products you are. A website in itself is a product, and having a good one will only enhance your reputation. Content for your site that is practical, helpful, and well researched establishes you as an expert on the topic. Having some expert status makes you more credible and trustworthy than people simply advertising a url to sell the product. Why buy from some guy through a link when you can buy from the expert that knows so much about the product? Beats me.

Instead of wasting your money, start by differentiating yourself by building your own web site related to the affiliate program you want to promote. Write articles on the subject, include recommendations about the affiliate offer and set up a mailing list.

You are now ready to start promoting your website in Adwords. If people don't buy right away, they can still come back to your site at a later time or sign up for your mailing list. In addition, if your site offers valid content, chances are that it will get spidered and listed by Google, thus providing you with a source of free traffic.