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Sephari Global Market Place Affiliate Program

How The Sephari Global Market Place Affiliate Program Works

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What is the Sephari Affiliate Programs?

Simply put, the Sephari affiliate program, also called associate programs, is an arrangement in which Sephari Web site pays affiliate Web sites a commission to send them traffic. These affiliate Web sites post links to the Sephari.com web site and are paid according to our agreement. This agreement is based on the number of people they send who buy something from the Sephari Global Market Place. Basically, a link on your affiliate web site brings Sephari site traffic or money, the Sephari site pays your affiliate site according to our agreement.

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There are at least three parties in an affiliate program transaction:

  • The customer
  • The affiliate site
  • The merchant site

In 1996, Jeff Bezos, CEO and founder of Amazon.com, popularized this idea as an Internet marketing strategy. Amazon.com attracts affiliates to post links to individual books for sale on Amazon.com, or for Amazon.com in general, by promising them a percentage of the profits if someone clicks on the link and then purchases books or other items. The affiliate helps make the sale, but Amazon.com does everything else: They take the order, collect the money and ship the book to the customer. With over 500,000 affiliate Web sites now participating, Amazon.com's program is a resounding success.
Over the past few years, affiliate programs have grown enormously in popularity, taking many interesting forms. For many Web sites that don't deal much in e-commerce (selling products or services online) themselves, functioning as an affiliate is a good way to participate in e-commerce.

Sephari Affiliate Program Payment Arrangements

The basics of affiliate program payment arrangements:

  • Pay-per-sale: Sephari.com's affiliate program is an example of a pay-per-sale arrangement. In this arrangement, the Sephari site pays an affiliate when the affiliate sends them a customer who purchases something. Sephari.com pays the affiliate a resounding 50% split of the sale proceeds not including taxes and shipping.
  • Pay-per-lead: Sephari.com pays their affiliates based on the number of new merchants they refer who sign up as leads. This simply means the merchant registers is approved and enters items for sale on Sephari.com, then the affiliate will be paid $25 per merchant.

Sephari.com Affiliate Program Administration

Affiliate programs are pretty simple in concept, but a lot of behind-the-scenes work is necessary to make them work properly. In order for the affiliates to be compensated, someone needs to keep track of the actual activity surrounding the affiliate's link to the merchant site.
Depending on the arrangement, someone might need to determine:

  • the number of people who click on the merchant site's link on an affiliate site
  • the number of people who end up buying something
  • the number of merchants who were referred by the affiliates site

Someone also has to keep track of the original arrangement between the merchant and the affiliate and make sure the affiliate receives whatever money is owed to them.
It's a lot of work for merchant Web sites to actively recruit affiliates, and for affiliates to search for affiliate programs they are interested in. Nonetheless, many companies, such as Amazon.com, and Sephari.com deal with their affiliates directly because the administration is well worth their time. Even though they take full control over the process, and so determine themselves what they owe, these companies can attract a lot of affiliates because their offer has no real risk or cost: All an affiliate webmaster has to do is put the link up and hope the checks come rolling in.

Becoming a Sephari.com Affiliate

If you are interested in getting involved in Sephari.com affiliate program, the first thing you have to do is sign up. If you run an e-commerce site and would like to maximize your sales, you would place a Sephari.com affiliate banner on every page. If you run a small content site as a hobby and would simply like to bring in a little money to cover production costs, joining the Sephari.com program as an affiliate would be a good option. Your best option depends on what aspects of affiliate programs could best serve your site and how much you are willing to spend.

Becoming a Sephari.com affiliate is relatively easy. Go to the Sephari.com affiliate network site and fill out an online application to become a member. The application will ask for some personal information (name, address, payment method) and information on your site (URL, name, and description of content) and will have you agree to a service agreement. Most affiliate networks are completely free for affiliates.

If Sephari.com approves your application, you can begin picking Banners or Text links that interest you. Once you've been chosen, Sephari.com will walk you through the process of posting the appropriate links, which come directly from the Sephari.com site. Sephari.com will also establish payment arrangements with you. Because the amount of money you earn per action can be fluxuate, most affiliate networks have a set minimum payout amount. This means you won't receive a check until the total money owed you reaches a certain amount. After you have set all this up and Sephari.com has explained its system to you, you can get back to work on your Web site's content and wait for your money to come in.

Sephari Affliliate Linking Methods

An affiliate can link to Sephari.com site in a number of ways. The best link choice depends on the nature of the affiliate and the nature of the merchant. Each kind of link is specially suited for particular purposes. Common types of links include:

  • Text links: "The blue writing"  The advantage of text links in an affiliate program is they are ingrained in the content of your site and so don't look so much like advertisements. For a lot of affiliate sites, this is the most natural way to link to the merchant site.
  • Banner links: These links appear as boxes, usually containing words and some sort of graphic element. They may be the best choice when you think a text link doesn't do enough to attract visitors.

There are several ways affiliate programs use these links:

  • Link to the home page: This is a straight-forward link to the merchant's home page. If an affiliate wants to introduce visitors to the merchant site in general, this is the best way to link.
  • Product-specific link: If an affiliate Web site wants to sell only a specific product, they can link to that product's page on the merchant Web site. This makes things easier for the customer and simplifies the affiliate program process.
  • Storefronts: If an affiliate Web site wants to expose visitors to a variety of products, they can link to a storefront. Prefabricated storefronts are maintained by the merchant Web site. The merchant can change what products are on display, but it keeps the URL the same so that the affiliate doesn't have to change any coding. Some merchants also maintain storefront pages the affiliate can customize, so that they display the most relevant products.
  • Merchant Registration: An affiliate can link directly to the Merchant registration form on the Sephari.com site. If a merchant registers to use the Sephari.com Web site, this link is a good time-saver.

Sephari.com Affiliate Program Technology

So how does Sephari.com affiliate program know when a visitor clicks from an affiliate to the Sephari.com site?  In most cases, the answer is that the visitor sends information with each click. The visitor sends several pieces of information, including:

  • an identification number for the affiliate
  • the URL of the affiliate site

When you click on the link, the network site records a hit on that particular URL, which tells them what affiliate sent a visitor to Sephari.com. It then immediately sends the visitor to the actual Sephari.com site. This happens so quickly that you never see any hint of this in your browser window. But if you move your pointer over a Sephari banner or text link on an affiliate site you will notice that the first part of the URL your browser displays is for the Sephari.com site and not for the affiliate.
The Sephari.com affiliate program tracks sales using Internet cookies containing these same identification numbers, so they know what affiliate referred the customer.