One of the reasons why 20% of the affiliate marketers earn 80% of the total affiliate marketing money is because they're proactive in matching up audiences with the products their marketing.

I think every one of us affiliate marketers started out with passive marketing, where we created a website, and then joined a few affiliate programs that seemed to match up. We sprinkled some links here and there, and expected money to roll in. But alas, a little bit of money came in, enough to encourage us, but never enough to pay the bills with.

That's passive marketing. That is, you started by creating lots of good content, and then added some affiliate links to it.

Proactive marketing starts the other way around. You start with an affiliate program, and then determine what are are the best customers for that merchant, and then design a website that will attract that demographic.

Here are some things to think about...

• What are the most popular keywords customers use to find the products your merchant is selling? Use AdWords Keyword Tool to find out.


• Register a domain name that has these keywords, limit to no more than three keywords


• Build a handful of companion websites, each on their own domain names, to point links to your main affiliate site. These companion sites can be blogs, forums, or even a dedicated Twitter account.


• Keep your main affiliate site very simple in design. Use very little graphics; use too much and it diverts attention away from the affiliate links.


• Don't expect overnight success, good affiliate sites take time to refine and tweak.