Affiliate Sale's Secret Money Weapon - John Buckley

For anyone who wants to finance a work at home opportunity and is interested in serious money as an affiliate site salesperson, the secret weapon is Clickbank.com. More precisely, the Clickbank "stats," or productivity scores. No other product source provides as comprehensive an overview of the marketability of the product you're considering selling.

The information is broken down into four categories. They are -- Dollars Earned Per Sale, Percentage Earned Per Sale, Percentage Referred and Gravity. I will take you through each of the four and explain what they mean, and how and why they could impact your profitability. Clickbank has recently updated and streamlined their marketplace pages, and have abbreviated their statistic's spelling and presentation. At the beginning of each of the four explanations is the category listing as it exactly appears on Clickbank and in the order it appears on Clickbank.

1. $/sale - Dollars Earned Per Sale. This is the net amount (before refunds, chargebacks and sales taxes) that each affiliate earns from this product. This score can tell alot about the buying publics' opinion of the worth of the product. If the Net Dollars Earned Per Sale is lower than it should be, then something is wrong. (To factor, roughly what a proper $/sale number should be, take the cost of the product, figure your commission rate per sale, take that dollar amount and subtract sales tax and Clickbank's commission.) If the number isn't what it should be, then their product is being refunded and charged back by a fair sized group of the customers. People don't ask for a refund on a product they like and are satisfied with. A low $/sale number is a definite red flag when considering a product to sell as an affiliate.

2. %/sale - Average Percentage Earned Per Sale. Often called a "commission," this is a percentage of the items' retail sales price, that the company agrees to pay to the affiliate for each product sold. The company that sells the product is the only one who sets and controls this number. Naturally, the affiliate salesperson should consider a high %/sale number important in picking a Clickbank product. The higher the number, the higher the profit per sale.

3. %refd - Percentage Referred by Affiliates. This is the percentage of the total number of this product sold, that were referred (made possible) by the affiliates. If this number is high, then the product sells well in the affiliate program and is worth considering, along with other factors, for selling as an affiliate. If the percentage is low, it means the majority of the sales are made by the company itself, by other means beside the affiliate program. For whatever reason, the product doesn't sell well through affiliates. A low %refd number is another red flag for the potential affiliate salesperson to consider.

4. grav - Gravity. This is the number of affiliates who earned a commission selling the product. It is not an exact number. It is a weighted sum, heavily emphasizing the sales performance of the preceeding eight weeks. For each affiliate paid in the prior eight week period, Clickbank adds a sum of between 0.1 and 1.0 to the total. If a product has a higher Gravity than those listed around it, then it is doing very well, especially for the last two months. Oftentimes however, the company is listed highly overall on Clickbank, but it's Gravity is lower than surrounding products. This may mean that the product hasn't been selling well for just the past two months and it's high overall rating may reflect a strong sales performance up until that time. For affiliates then, Gravity is the most important Clickbank category. It is the best indicator for a product's near-term future sales performance.

The idea then, is to look for products that rank high in Gravity, (grav) High in Referral Percentage (%refd) and high in Percentage Earned Sale. (%/sale) Also look for the Dollars Earned Per Sale ($/sale) number to be near the commission percentage payout that the company is offering affiliates for that particular product.

Armed with these statistics, the affiliate salesperson can make informed, correct and hopefully lucrative choices on which products to sell.

About the Author: John Buckley has owned a homebased business for five years and also reviews homebased businesses for various publications. Learn more at:
Gojacksonia.com/

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