1. Be Personal and different - most successful marketers get propositioned on a daily basis.



2. Find major players in your industry (well-known product creators, service providers, website owners, list owners etc.) and get to know them a little (join their newsletter, read their information, buy a product or 2 from them) and if possible speak to them in person or via the phone.

Note: I've bought products from several well known marketers just to get some free mentoring or telephone consultancy from them. Not because I wanted or needed their product, but just to speak to them in person.

These people should be the focus of your efforts as it only takes one or two to take up a partnership with you and you'll be well on the way to great results.

3. Contact related webmasters, ezine-owners with a good amount of traffic or readers and do the same as above, these might not be well known people, but they have what you want and they may be useful partners. (Again, be as personal as possible).

4. Bare in mind the 'Pareto Principle' (80% of your results come from 20% of your efforts) it's likely that very few small scale individuals will be able to produce great results and you've probably read that online over 90% of affiliates do nothing once they sign up. So don't waste a lot of time trying to get just anyone to deal with you, or it'll cost you more in time and effort than it's worth.

5. Remember that for good JV partners, they're likely to have more to offer you than you have to offer them, so make sure you factor in the value of what they can offer (i.e. the lifetime value of any new customers you gain from your deal - not just the one-time sale value) and give them a respectable percentage of the profit (Clickbank allow up to 75%). If you're a beginner then don't expect to be able to make good deals with a low percentage offering on a small product.

Show your partners that you understand and appreciate the value they offer.

6. Start as high up the food chain as you can (Biggest potential partners first) as this will increase the speed and penetration of your campaign.

7. Try and build your partnership in a way that ensures you get consistent sales/traffic (i.e. arrange for an advert/banner on their site) where possible.

8. Be Prepared! - this is a vital point. If your JVs turn out to be successful then you'd better make the most of it and have everything in place or you'll lose money that you could've captured.

I mean things like having an autoresponder setup to keep track of (and follow up with) all of your customers (if you're letting your JV partner deliver the product then try and agree to share purchaser names).

Make sure your payment system is working and that any affiliate links you've provided work and that the right affiliate will get their money.

9. Affiliate Sales material - If you're intending to provide support and sales material (this is worth doing as it makes your partners job much simpler and hence gives them less obstacles to working with you) make sure this is in place BEFORE you set them off promoting your product.

10. Learn from the process - make sure that you learn as much as you can from your venture. For example if you're getting a lot more traffic than normal it might be much easier to spot where you could improve your sales copy or sales process. If you enter a joint venture that flops, you'll have a much harder time getting that partner to work with you again. Try and test everything BEFORE you make the deal (Using a short Adwords/Overture campaign to buy traffic and test your sales page is a great way to do this!)

11. Make sure that your proposals are unique (I've already seen the standard letter provided with a product I have rights to land in my own inbox, and it makes me think that person won't spend the time to be personal) and let the partner know that you understand the value in their list/traffic and that your offer is a unique one that no-one else will also be offering them.

12. Don't be sloppy - Spelling mistakes and poor grammar will kill your proposal for some people.

13. Samples - I like to provide the product to my partners whenever possible. The impact of this shouldn't be underestimated. If you want them to endorse a product for you then they should have at least had access to it. For offline high-ticket items it goes one step further and shows that you take your relationship with them seriously and also gives them a reason to want their customers to have it if it's a great product.

14. Don't use template emails. Nothing takes the shine off of a relationship like seeing the same 'personal' email they got from someone else.

15. Measure everything - If you're not providing your partner with the facility to measure the results, make sure you let them know how things are going and tell them if you think something needs to change. Don't just leave them to it and hope it all goes OK or ignore them if it doesn't work out.

One thing that can make a difference is for them not to necessarily use a pre-written endorsement as their readers/customers are likely to have become accustomed to their style and prefer that.

16. Follow-up. If you don't get a response right away, allow a few days and then gently follow up with a reminder. You probably know that most people are busy and one email is easily overlooked. Don't take it personally, just send a short reminder of the fact that you made and offer and leave it at that.

17. When the deal is done, be sure to thank them and keep in touch.

18. If you have historical information or facts about the success/conversion rate etc. of previous campaigns and JVs, provide these and let them know that anyone they send will be well looked after.