Make money online in Kenya from Affiliate marketing

Even if you are living in Kenya and not necessarily in the US or UK, you can still make money online in Kenya as long as you are connected to the internet. There are a lot of people switching nowadays from physical jobs to virtual jobs because of the internet and you too can join in the trend.
I have writter about various ways to make money online but in this case, I would like to blog about Affiliate marketing.

Affiliate Marketing; What is it about?
This basically involves promoting the sales of other people's goods or services for the sake of getting a commission for your efforts.
Affiliate marketing is like traditional marketing as it involves you to get word to the potential buyers and encourage them to buy from the merchant. It doesn't really involve you buying the good first and then selling them to end users as that will refer more rightly to reselling. It has more to do with if possible sponsoring a sale or giving out useful information to the public to the benefit of the merchant who has an agreement with you as an affiliate and will reward you considerably.

Getting started with online Affiliate Marketing
In this context, Affiliate marketing is about online marketing and in order to get started, you would need to do the following things

- If possible, get a website like a blog first
- Look for merchants that offer affiliate programs
- Sign up as an affiliate and read the rules and TOS first to agree
- Copy your affiliate code from the affiliate account
- Promote your code or link at your site and several other sites
- Make a lot of reviews about the promoted item to get more traffic.

Which sites accept Affiliates from Kenya?
There are a lot of internet companies particularly in developed countries like the USA, Canada or UK who have millions of affiliates and they are still accepting people from all over the world. If you desire to use this method for make money online in Kenya, don't look for small time companies, look for the ones that have got global coverage and a better chance of remaining in business for the long term.

Some of these sites include
- Amazon.com [Consumer products]
- Bluehost.com [Web hosting and domain name]
- Marketiva.com [Forex Trading]
- Pingo [Phone Call cards]
- Bidvertiser.com [Online advertising and publishing]
- Godaddy [Domain name registration and hosting]
- Chitika [Advertising and publishing network]

There are a whole lot more and maybe I would update on the list later on.

Promoting your affiliate program
One you sign up for an affiliate program with any of these merchants, the next step is to start promoting your account. With this form of marketing, the most important thing is getting the right traffic - quality and quality. The more traffic, your affiliate link generates, the more likely you are going to make a commission for it. Some merchants even pay you for the traffic you bring to them.
Here are some tips to promote your affiliate sales;
- Get a website that is dedicated to that program or use your already existing popular website
- Use your link on forums and blogs related to that product
- Do research about the product and try to offer solutions on your site
- You may use online advertising but most merchants don't prefer this

How much can I make from Affiliate Marketing?
It depends on the rate at which your provider agrees to pay you. It could be 10% for sales like Amazon.com does. It may be a fixed rate or price but will ultimately depend on how many sales you were able to drive in. A good kind of commission is the one that pays affiliates for live for every purchase or subscription their referrals keep making from them. Some merchants only pay you for single purchases from your affiliate link while others pay for recurring purchases irrespective of whether they came through your affiliate code. You can make as much as $1000 a month from your affiliate programme as I know a lot of people are already doing but your must have have put in a lot of hardwork before getting there.