Anyone can be the merchant behind an affiliate marketing program, from the solo entrepreneurs, to the startups, to gigantic Fortune 500 companies. They can be anyone who has a product to sell.
The Affiliate: This party can be a single individual or an entire company, that helps to market the products of the merchant. An affiliate marketing business can produce several hundred dollars in commissions every month to tens of millions.
This part of the system is where the marketing happens. The affiliate promotes one or more of the merchant’s products, trying to attract and convince potential customers of the value of the product in hopes that they will end up purchasing it.
This can be accomplished through a review blog of the merchant’s products or through an entire site that is dedicated to finding products that are related to a particular topic and promoting the affiliate products.
The Consumer: The consumer is what makes the affiliate system work. Without their purchases, there wouldn't be any commissions to be earned, and no revenue would be shared.
The affiliate markets the products to the consumer through the channels that they see fit. This can be through digital billboards, social media, or a search engine using a blog and content marketing. The Network: The network works as an intermediary between the merchant and the affiliate. While technically, you could promote a merchant’s product and arrange a direct revenue sharing system with them, having a network like Jvzoo or ClickBank handles the payment for and delivery of the product, eliminating the hassle. Sometimes, in order to even promote a product, affiliates have to go through an affiliate network. When it comes to the affiliate marketing system, you can choose tobecomea merchant and have others market your products in exchangeforacommission on the completed sales, or you can become anaffiliatemarketer, promoting products in order to make money.
