bubbajay.com

Ok, about 20 years ago, I was an aspiring bike racer – training with the US National Team in Carlsbad, California – racing Category 1/2 on the Road and Track all over So. Cal while managing a bicycle shop in Escondido, California called North County Bicycles (now long gone…). 

It was an amazing experience – riding 500 miles a week.  Lifting weights every other day, massage daily, riding like a mad-man and loving every minute of it.  Unfortunately I had a nasty crash, blew out a knee along the way and although I continued to race, lost that caliber of racing forever.

While I was working at the shop, and racing I was introduced to this stuff called Kool ‘N Fit.  I always thought of it as this massage stuff that smelled like Eucalyptus, but it made me feel incredible.  I used it regularly but eventually I left the shop and couldn’t find it at my LBS, and moved on.

Recently I had found out the manufacturer is actually in San Diego, and I met the owner’s of the company.  What a fantastic couple!  They seem to have a true passion for their products as well as still going to races – whether a marathon or a criterium nearly every weekend. 

Turns out they wanted to have a few web-design things done, and I had the wonderful opportunity to do the work for them.  Of course I got some Kool’nFit and man – it was like old times!  You can literally feel the muscles warming up, feeling flush and loose…and my knee that’s been reconstructed twice feels better than ever. 

As I searched the internet I read many times that people had a hard time finding Kool’nFit, but you can get it online from Kool ‘N Fit themselves  HERE .  They also have a whole site full of testimonials you can check out at http://www.KoolnFitBlog.com. 

Do yourself a favor and go check it out!

I have a website called www.JNSunSports.com where I sell my own line of bicycle clothing.  I use the shopping cart platform called ProStores and they recently released this widget and I wanted to give it a try.  It displays items from my website in my blog or where I post the code.  So…below is the result!

In one of my last few posts I talked a bit about affiliate marketing, and tody was reminded how simple and powerful it can be. 

I got an email from www.cafepress.com a site that prints t-shirts, hats, jackets, underwear, mugs…pretty much anything with artwork you provide or choose from their database.  All you do is promote it and if someone makes a purchase you get a small percentage.  Here’s the email I got today:

Now wether or not you’re an Obama fan, the fact is it’s creative marketing.  Someone is thinking ahead and setting up revenue streams.   I immediately went to my GoDaddy accout to search URL’s I could maybe make a site for.  I could register a domain like www.ChangeWonOnline.com and www.HopeWonOnline.com – which are available by the way, but a bunch of Obama affiliate links and promote them around the inauguration that’s coming up and probably make some money. 

Here’s another idea I had that I did act on…now I won’t give you all the details, but I used eBay’s Classified ads to direct traffic out of eBay legally, to a landing page I created.  Then via links on that page, I send them back to eBay but with my affiliate cookie tagging along.  If they make a purchase I get a cut.  Does it work – absolutely.  In fact in December I made $187 and only spent $10 on the eBay classified format ad.  I even made a one day commission of $47!  Not bad for doing nothing.

This particular campaign had over 615 page views in the month of December and over 500 in November.  And remember – I’m not selling anything!  No packing, shipping or inventory – the power of the affiliate program!

I have a friend of mine who is just getting his feet wet in the eCommerce arena.  He’s reading everything he can get his hands (eyes) on, and his mind is starting to run with ideas on how he can generate some extra income online.  I remember being in his shoes some 7 years ago – just starting to get heavy into making money online.  I was trying all kinds of ‘get rich quick’ programs, spending more on the programs in a year than I made using them.  But I always came back to what I considered the purist form of eCommerce – Affiliate programs.

Affiliate programs are where you get paid for sending some traffic/customers to someone else and getting paid for it.  Sometimes the requirement is simply traffic, sometimes the visitor needs to click on something or buy something, but essentially you get paid for sending the traffic.  It’s a CPA or ‘cost per action’.

I’ve made a lot of money over the years on various affiliate programs including Google Adwords/Adsense arbotrage, all kinds of independent affiliate programs and of course eBay’s affiliate program.

My friend was interested in opening a ProStores website and during our conversation about affiliate programs I gave him the link below:

In setting up that new website, he’s going to need a new domain name – so I sent him the link below:

You see it’s that simple – it doesn’t cost him a cent more and in some cases it’s a better deal, and I make a small kickback (commission) from the business I’m referring him to.  If you have sites you can integrate them quite easily to capitalize on your existing traffic.  Or you can create a site specifically to refer traffic to affiliate programs.

By far my most profitable and most consistent payouts have been from the eBay affiliate program – now called the eBay Partner Network.  It’s free to join and I make money every month sending people to eBay to buy what they were already going to buy, but I get a small bit back.  It’s not huge, maybe $100 to $200/month.  It’s not enough to retire on, but it helps, and if you get more programs going it all adds up. 

Check out this widget eBay let’s you create:

It’s all encoded with my affiliate link, so anyone that’s looking for say… snowshoes, clicks, buys and I get paid! 

Another one I use regularly is the Vista Print affiliate program:

25% Off Plus Free Shipping on Orders over $50 at VistaPrint.com!

Welcome to Affiliate Programs – your intro to eCommerce!