The first thing you can look at is the price. Will it cost you anything to join? Most affiliate programs being offered today are absolutely free of charge. Why do I have to pay to be an affiliate? It depends on what the company offers you. If you going to pay to get in the numbers of competitors will be much lower. How is the demand for the products, the quality of the products, etc? Ask questions. Do researches on Goggle find out if there is a huge demand? Find out if you shall settle for those that charge you some dollars before joining.

Second ting – when will you receive your commission checks? Every program is different. Some pay you directly into your account at once, some issue their checks every 14 days, some once a month, etc. Select the one that is suited to your payment time choice. Many affiliate programs are setting a minimum earned commission amount that an affiliate must meet or exceed in order for their checks to be issued.

Third thing – How much traffic do you have to create before you get a sale. What is the sale per visitor? What marketing tools does the company offer you? Do you have access to affiliate statistics? This factor is extremely important because this will tell you how much traffic you must generate before you can earn a commission from the sale.

How are referrals from an affiliate's site tracked and for how long do they remain in the system? You need to be confident on the program enough to track those people you refer from your site. This is the only way that you can credit for a sale. The period of time that those people stay in the system is also important. This is because some visitors do not buy initially but may want to return later to make the purchase. Know if you will still get credit for the sale if it is done some months from a certain day.

What are the kinds of affiliate stats available? Your choice of affiliate program should be capable of offering detailed stats. They should be available online anytime you decide to check them out. Constantly checking your individual stats is important to know how many impressions, hits and sales are already generated from your site. Impressions are the number of times the banner or text link was viewed by a visitor of your site. A hit is the one clicking on the banner or text links.

Who is the online retailer? Find out what kind of company is behind the scene, is it a solid company you are doing business with or will the company be gone tomorrow. Know the products they are selling and the average amount they are achieving. Does the company offer you special discounts if you want to buy the products? People who get the sale often know the products and use or have used the products. The more you know about the retailer offering you the affiliate program, the easier it will be for you to know if that program is really for you and your site.

What about the compensation plan? Is the affiliate a one tier or two tier program? A single tier program pays you only for the business you yourself have generated. A two tier program pays you for the business, plus it also pays you a commission on the sales generated by any affiliate you sponsor in your program. Some two-tier programs are even paying small fees on each new affiliate you sponsor. More like a recruitment fee. Depending on the products but this can be very important for your earning in future. If you can build a team and earn an income every time one of your team members makes a sale.

Is it a low cost product or a high ticket product? Do you get 25% in commission each time you make a sale of 20 USD – that is 5 USD to you – or do you get 70% commission on each sale of 2000 USD – 1.400 USD to you. What about the marketing cost. How will you get the traffic? Do you know how to generate free traffic or will you use PPC. What is your marketing budget?

Mostly you will get 20 – 50% in commission, but you will find program which pay you 70% in commission. An example is YourNetBiz which is a high ticket program, which pay you 1.400 USD for each 2.000 USD sale. As you can see from the figures, you will now understand why the average sales amount and hit to sale ratio is important.

These are just some of the questions that needed answering first before you enter into an affiliate program. You should now be familiar with the most important aspects that your chosen program should have before incorporating them into your website. Remember to ask the questions before you join your affiliate program. These can help you select the right program for you site from among the many available.

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