Dynamic Rich Media is an affiliate creative option used by 7% of affiliates, according to data in the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”.

Other affiliate link types, such as banners and text links, are static, and so dynamic rich media are ads that do things like expanding when users click or roll over, as well as interactive video or forms to collect leads.

Dynamic rich media could also include widgets and really any other interactive affiliate creative that is updated dynamically.

Widgets are a popular linking option with the Amazon affiliate program, where they have over a dozen of them.

One drawback of dynamic rich media for affiliates is that they are served through Flash and other technologies that may not work on phones and tablets.

That's a valid concern, as mobile is playing an increasing role for affiliates.

HTML for Solo Email is an affiliate creative option used by 8% of affiliates, according to data in the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”.

An HTML for Solo Email is an email that is solely dedicated to promote a product or service through affiliate links.

Some affiliate programs or networks provide this creative to affiliates, and affiliates can also create it on their own.

But it's vitally important to check with an affiliate manager before running creative that you've developed. Get it approved or risk forfeiting commissions.

While you have good intentions, companies don't want the content of their message from their brand in your hands.

Anyhow, you need an email service provider to mail out these emails. My favorite is AWeber.

I like them for many reasons, including their no tolerance stance towards spammers, as well as their features to comply with the CAN-SPAM law.

But also, AWeber makes it really easy to construct an HTML solo email with their library of templates.

Then, you need to build an email list. This is an ongoing process, so get started.

Datafeeds are an affiliate creative option used by 10% of affiliates, according to data in the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”

An affiliate datafeed is a text file featuring details on a merchant's products, such as direct links, product image links, categories, prices, and product descriptions.

These datafeeds are downloaded by an affiliate into a database.

The contents and formatting of a datafeed can vary from merchant to merchant. Common formats of dadafeeds are pipe delimited and tab delimited.

Affiliates who use datafeeds are able to maintain a fresh inventory of products on their site, and when the visitor clicks a link, they are taken to the merchant's site.

Working with datafeeds is somewhat advanced, and affiliates will need access to create databases on their server.

But there are some tools to simplify the use of a datafeed as an affiliate.

Years ago, I purchased a software called WebMerge to add datafeeds to my sites, but I never managed to make it work. This was way before I was using WordPress, and my sites were in hand-written HTML.

Since then, services like GoldenCAN and PopShops have emerged that enable affiliates to display datafeeds with little or no technical ability.

But I found a solution I like in the premimum WordPress plugin, datafeedr.

datafeedr is a powerful solution that can be used by beginner, intermediate, and advanced affiliate marketers.

It's a system that enables affiliates to create and embed an affiliate store into a WordPress blog without messing with the datafeed files, learning a programming language, or hiring programmers.

For more information on affiliate datafeeds, have a look at a series of blog posts written on the subject by affiliate Eric Nagel:

• Building a Datafeed Site – Step 1
• Building a Datafeed Site – Step 1b
• Building a Datafeed Site – Step 2
• Building a Datafeed Site – Step 3

Eric has some other posts on using datafeeds – just search datafeeds on his blog.

Landing pages are the affiliate creative of choice for 12% of affiliates, according to data in the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”

A landing page is a custom page, provided by an affiliate program or created by an affiliate, that is focused on pre-selling a product or service or capturing a lead.

This form of creative is typically more common among affiliates promoting information products or leads.

Affiliates using landing pages focus on actionable content over distractions like cluttered design. The landing pages are usually text heavy.

In order to have a well performing landing page, it is important to test the elements frequently.

There is a WordPress plugin I've used for split testing called Simple Page Tester.

When it comes to optimizing landing pages, there is a science to it, and there is a great book on the subject from Tim Ash called “Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions“.

While there are lots of templates and resources for sale out there, I'd suggest investing the nominal cost for Tim's book to get a grasp on this area of affiliate creative.

Text links are not as popular as banner ads with affiliates, according to data in the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”

But text links are the second most popular method for promoting affiliate links, and for good reason.

A text link is simply a link made out of text on an affiliate site.

So, you would select a keyword or phrase of content on a site and make it into a link.

For instance, if you are writing about health insurance, and you have the phrase “affordable health insurance” within your content, you could turn that phrase into a link to eHealthInsurance:

affordable health insurance

Text links are really effective, because they are relevant to the content your visitors are reading, and since they've already indicated that they're interested in that subject, a link to more information is available to them at just the right time.

But this isn't just my opinion – this is based on my experience as an affiliate since 1997.

Basically, if you're running a content site, the text link will likely be the best performing type of affiliate link for you.

If you're not clear on how to create a text link in WordPress, I created a video with an example of how to do it: How to Insert an Affiliate Link in WordPress

Banners are the most popular types of affiliate links, according to data in the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”

A banner ad is a rectangular or square shaped advertisement on a website, usually above, below or on the sides of the site's content.

The banner ad is linked to the website of the advertiser running the affiliate program with a link that is unique to the affiliate. The banner is usually hosted by the affiliate program or network, though some affiliate programs will give the option of hosting the banner(s) yourself.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) oversees Display Advertising Guidelines, which are their recommended dimensions for banner ads.

You can typically find a variety of these sizes in a given affiliate program.

But the affiliate marketing community doesn't fully adhere to these guidelines, as the IAB delisted a variety of ad units as of February 28, 2011, including many that are still very common among affiliate programs.

Anyhow, while banners are readily available in affiliate programs, and they are the most popular way to promote companies through affiliate marketing, I would suggest that you focus on text links instead, and I'll talk about them in the next section.

This is because my experience has been that people have “banner blindness” when they visit sites. They simply don't see those banners, and mostly click and buy through text links, at least in the case of my sites.

Affiliate programs and networks typically offer a variety of ways to link to them, but two that are standard are the banner links and text links.

My example here will be to grab the code for a banner link.

The process is very similar across the various affiliate programs and networks to get the code. I am going to use the Affiliate Summit affiliate program, which is on ShareASale in this instance.

After logging into ShareASale, I then go to Links, followed by Get a Link / Banner from the top navigation bar.

The next step is to click on the dropdown box on the left and select the specific merchant I want to promote. So I'll pick Affiliate Summit and then click “Refresh Report to View Below” on the right side.

On that screen, I click the text that reads “Get Links”.

You may have noticed that my commission level is 0% here. That is so I don't earn commission from the affiliate program, since I run it.

Anyhow, then there is a menu with tabs for the various affiliate link options in this affiliate program. I'll go and click the “BANNERS” tab.

After this page loads in, there are a variety of banners to consider. When I see the one I want, I click on it to get the code.

As I hover over it, I can see the dimensions.

At this point, I have to go highlight the code, and then copy it.

Now that I have copied the code for the affiliate banner, the next step is to paste it on my WordPress blog.

I want to put it in a sidebar that will show on every page of my site, so I go to the admin screen in WordPress, and then to the “Appearance” section and click on “Widget”.

From here, I'll put my mouse over “Text” in the “Available Widgets” area, click and keep my finger down to drag that widget to the “Sidebar 1” area on the right.

Then I let go of the mouse.

This will pop open the text widget, and I will paste in my affiliate code. You can add a title to go over the banner, but I won't bother here.

After pasting the affiliate code, click Save on the widget box.

That's it – now that banner is up on my affiliate blog.

Next up, I'll discuss the various types of affiliate links and how and when I use each one.

OK, so you've been working on creating content and driving traffic to your site, as well as finding out how to find affiliate programs to promote. Now it's time to get links set up.

What are affiliate links? They are pieces of code in a graphic image or piece of text on an affiliate's site that notifies the advertiser or merchant that an affiliate should be credited for the customer or visitor sent to their site.

You can get your affiliate links from either independent affiliate programs, like Amazon and eBay, or affiliate networks, such as Affiliate Window, ClickBank, Commission Junction, LinkShare, and ShareASale.

In the 2011 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report, where over fourteen-hundred affiliates were surveyed, we asked, “What are your preferred link types?”

As you can see, banners and text links are the two most popular.

Based on my experience as an affiliate, banners don't perform nearly as well as text links. But I would highly encourage you to test the various link types to determine what works the best for your site(s).

Here are the topics I'll be covering in this section.

• Getting Code for Affiliate Links
• Banner Ads
• Text Links
• Landing Pages
• Datafeeds
• HTML for Solo Email
• Dynamic Rich Media

One word of caution – take it slow when adding affiliate links to your site(s).

Your affiliate links should supplement your content, rather than be the focus of your pages.