Own products or affiliate products?
I have always believed that to be successful in internet marketing you have to have your own products. But many internet marketers never produce their own products; they earn their money selling other people’s products as an affiliate. What are the pros and cons of each approach?
If you produce your own product, you have total control over the product, the sales copy and any bonus products offered with it.
The downsides of producing your own product are that you have to have the idea, create the product (or get someone else to do it for you) and provide the sales website and systems for dealing with the shopping cart, etc. If you have an affiliate programme, you need to recruit affiliates and set up and maintain systems to record their referrals.
If you are an affiliate, you do not need worry about product creation or the expenses involved in setting up websites and systems.
However, as an affiliate you have little control or input into the product, its marketing and customer service. If the product owner provides poor service it could well reflect badly on you.
So which is better? They both have advantages and disadvantages in certain circumstances so why not use both, even at the same time. For example, if you need to explain something in your own ebook, why not hyperlink to an affiliate product that does it for you.
Most successful internet marketers eventually seem to use them both so get familiar with both approaches so you know which tool is best in which circumstances.
