Poor Ad Design is one of the biggest and most common mistake made by Internet Marketers. In their desire to live the Instant Internet Lifestyle and make money quickly they cover their pages with ads that don’t logically fit in with the page on which they are displayed. Differences in font, text size, and image colors distract users from the content they are viewing. This leads to frustration, and considerably lowers the chances of someone actually buying your product.

To avoid annoying users, internet marketers should avoid some common mistakes. Auto-playing sounds or voices saying “congratulations, you’ve won” tend to be particularly annoying (and even embarrassing). Many Internet users can relate to the experience of web browsing in a quiet office or library, only to unintentionally barrage their neighbours with audio from an extraordinarily loud advert. Another reason for blocking ads is bandwidth consumption. On mobile devices where bandwidth is extremely limited, this can be especially important. A banner ad can range in size from 2kb to upwards of 2mb so at 20 cents per megabyte, you could potentially pay 40 cents just to view an ad! If ads were incorporated into the page content itself, as in a link to a review or article about a new gadget, the consumer would not feel less intruded upon. They would not have to download the banner, but could still click on a relevant link. In addition to the technical challenges faced by advertisers, there exists a problem of trust. Users tend to judge the quality of content subconsciously.

Banner ads are in essence the “cold calls” of the digital world. They provide no context, and no real persuasive force. If online marketing attempted to incorporate their sales pitches directly into the content of the site, users would be more inclined to trust them and thus, more inclined to respond to them.  In general, the online marketing community should reduce its reliance on banner ads, pop-ups and other flashy gimmicks. Instead Internet Marketers should take their cues from the salesmen of past generations and appeal to the consumer’s desire for quality products at a competitive price.

1. Always go for a hungry or desperate market. By this I mean a market that has a problem that needs fixing..and fast!  You need to use your common sense here but products that help people ease pain(either physical or emotional), loose weight or save relationships are examples of hungry and desperate markets and therefore people who are more likely to buy.
2. Only promote products that are popular and have a good gravity.  You must put aside personal preferences here.  Go to Clickbank and see which products are the most popular and which have a reasonable gravity (greater than 50).  Gravity is an indicator of how many other people are promoting the product.  If no-one else is then there is a very good reason for that!
3. Know your product inside out.  Its common sense but the amount of newbies who pick a product without knowing anything about it is staggering.  Check out the sales page.  Would you buy it?  Well you should because how can you recommend it to others if you haven’t tried it yourself.
4. Create an effective squeeze page.  Never send a prospect directly to a sales page, always create your own intermediate squeeze page.  This is particularly important if you plan to use PPC as a method of driving traffic.  Your squeeze page should be personal and capture the prospect straight away but never loose site of the fact that the sole purpose of the page is to direct the lead to a sales page so make sure that is crystal clear in your call to action.
5. Do your keyword research thoroughly. Keywords that are not relevant, do not drive traffic or that are too competitive will only end up wasting your time and money. So do your research properly.  It is well worth investing in a keyword tool to help you do this.

If you stick to these 5 affiliate marketing strategies you will instantly be ahead of a lot of other internet  marketing newbies and save yourself a lot of wasted time and money.  If you would like to know more then check out this great resource