I am pleased to announce that an affiliate program for the Snooker Guide online snooker coaching program is now live on the Clickbank network. Snooker Guide is one of the most professionally presented snooker tutorial programs online and because of that it converts extremely well. During testing it has converted at 1/50 on all traffic and under 1/10 on specific targeted keywords. As an affiliate you earn 50% per sale or in other words just short of £10 (Approx $16) for every new member you refer. There are not many snooker affiliate programs around and even fewer that offer such high commission rates and good conversion rates. Therefore this is a great chance to monetize your site or to enter a new fairly uncompetitive niche promoting a great product. Full details and promotional ideas can be found here: Snooker Affiliate Program Resources are currently being developed (including articles and banners) and will be released soon. If you have any questions or need any help please do not hesitate to contact me.
Thanks for the comments Silverpoint. The reason is that the development costs of the product were pretty large. Not only did I pay a professional snooker player (Daniel Wells) to help develop and present the tutorial videos but we also hired out a table at the World Snooker Academy (where players such as Peter Ebdon and Ding Junhui practice) and a professional filiming company. This means that the guide is far more professional than every other guide out there without costing the customer any more..... both of these factors lead to the great conversion rates the product gets. I would also add that this is not a crappy ebook, its not even a set of downloadable videos. It is a complete online members area with streaming videos, articles, competitions, etc - A proper premium product unlike much of the crap that is on Clickbank. Once more of the costs of development have been recovered there may be scope to increase the payout % but for now 50% is what it is. But ask yourself this, if you sent 100 visitors would you rather convert 10 of them at 50% per sale (about $160) or only convert 5 of them 75% per sale (about $120)? Its not about the commission percentage but rather a combination of both conversion and commission percentage ;-)
That makes no sense, so if you increase your commission percentage to 75% the conversion is suddenly going to bottom out? Don't get me wrong it looks like a great product but affiliates are fickle beasts you will lose a number of affiliates by having 50% and some wont even promote you because per sale < $20. Good luck though
No increasing the percentage will not effect conversion. My point is that to offer 75% commission I would either have to increase the product price or sacrifice some of the quality of the product. As the main content is already developed I cannot sacrifice anything there and therefore sacrifices would have to be made on the regular new content that is added, the competitions, and the server costs. These are all sacrifices that could effect conversion. In order for me to continue developing the site with new content, competitions and smooth running server 50% is the highest commission that can be offered at the moment. I fully appreciate that some people will be put off by the fact it is 'only' 50% commission and that the per sale payout is less than $20. However, that is fine it means that more money will be left on the table for those that know that the commission amount is only a part of the formula for a successful product to promote. Those who take in to account the conversion rate, competitiveness of the niche, quality of the product, and support/resources available as well as the commission amount will be the ones who benefit the most from this
While I agree with the first part of what you said the later half is bit sketch. The Snooker training video niche isn't exactly popping, so the idea that someone wouldn't promote it just because of the low commissions seems a bit irrational.
Well I am not in the snooker niche and this pitch has not convinced me to join it as 1) As you said the snooker training market is not popping and 2) It's not worth all the effort to test the niche for $15/sale. So here is someone not promoting it because of the low commissions with what I believe is a perfectly rational reason and I am certain the majority of affiliates who do not already have a presence in this niche will feel the same, and they will do so rationally
I'm actually agreeing with you, but I'm saying because of the niche and price-point 50% is the best he can do without settling for peanuts for himself.
Suppose, but he seems to be thinking majorly short term with his pricing in my opinion, he thinks he cannot make his money back from investment by offering 75% means he doesnt see his product selling that well!
Marcusio - I appreciate your point and if you dont want to promote it then thats fine Im not here to force you What you have to realise though is that a site like this uses a lot of bandwidth, you are asking me to accept £5 a sale which given that the bandwidth increases for everyone using the site just isnt viable. Especially not when you add on Clickbank fees and the development of the members area with content and competitions. I am not thinking short-term, but I know that starting off with a low commission and then increasing it as and when you can is a much better option then having to decrease it because you realise you are not making any money off affiliate sales! To be fair I have been here before, when I released my turtle guide on Clickbank I got told the commission was too low, the price was too low, etc and that has done more than ok for itself As for the snooker niche in general, I agree that it is not as popular as other niches but for that reason its also nowhere near as competitive. This means lower PPC costs (thus negating the problem of low commission) and relatively easy SEO. Snooker is still a popular sport to play, its probably more popular for people playing it than watching it which is quite unusual for a sport. Whilst its not popping as you say, its by no means dead either - in fact now is when it starts to pick up. It goes quiet over the summer months but starts to pick up now as snooker gets back on TV. The peak is in May when the World Championships are on. So now is a good time to start building a site as you will get the traffic as it increases, there is a mini-peak when the UK Championship is on in December. Oh and snooker is also growing considerably in asia as well as some European countries, especially Germany. In fact I would imagine with Barry Hearn's new plans and new tournaments the interest is only going to grow so there are plenty of markets to target. Anyway, thanks for your comments - I do understand what you are saying but hopefully you can see my point of view too
Yeah I wasnt having a go and this is definitely going to grab some traction and get some followers and I wish you luck with that I actually like the snooker myself and can't wait to watch the Shanghai Masters in September!
Thanks mate. I know you werent having a go, I have been an affiliate, affiliate manager and a merchant ovr the last few years so I understand all 3 angles. I appreciate your honest feedback and who knows....maybe one day you will give in to temptation, build a snooker site and make loads of sales for me ;-)
Banners are now available to be downloaded. There are two sets - one set under 50kb for Adwords advertisers (in all Adwords accepted sizes), and another set which are all over 50kb but contain more information and better quality graphics for those not advertising where they are not restricted by file size. Both sets can be downloaded as a zip file from: Snooker Affiliate Program