Before you go out on a huge affiliate recruiting campaign, make sure you are not neglecting the potential affiliates right under your nose. That's right – the people who visit your site and your customers are prime candidates to become your affiliates. If your products and marketing are good, then signing them up as affiliates should be a cinch.

How to Attract Site Visitors to Your Affiliate Program

Anyone who visits your site and views your content, whether they found you through a search engine or a referral, is interested in your field, and often your products and services too. In terms of affiliate recruiting, this is a big advantage over the vast majority of potential affiliates out there, who know nothing about your field and are not interested in it. You will have to spend a lot of effort and offer a lot benefits in order to lure them to join your program. But a site visitor is your captive audience – they came looking for you. In the interest of recruiting as many affiliates as possible, you need to get smart about signing up your site visitors. There are several ways to draw your readers to learn more about your affiliate program:

How to Recruit Customers to Your Affiliate Program

Everyone knows that satisfied customers are the best advertising for any business. Even spending millions on marketing mega-budgets can't replace word-of-mouth and personal recommendations. Think of your affiliate program as a way to motivate your customers to recommend you more often and more enthusiastically. Affiliate recruiting from the customer base is so simple – and yet so many businesses are failing to do it. Be the first one in your niche to jump on this opportunity. Send a very brief email announcing your affiliate program and the benefits of joining to every customer you have ever had. (You do save customers' email addresses, right?) In addition, add a paragraph about your affiliate program and link to your "thank you" email that you automatically send out to every new customer. (You do email an automatic an "thank you" after every purchase or lead, right?) The links in these emails should lead to the intro page described above – which links to your sign-up form. 

Some affiliate software, such as JROX-JAM, give you the option to automatically sign-up all customers to your affiliate program. This is highly recommended for many affiliate programs – you be the judge of whether it's right for your business. If you do use that kind of feature, be tactful and don't invade customers' privacy by bombarding them with unwanted motivational materials. Simply inform them that your system has automatically registered them as an affiliate – and if they choose to promote your product, they will be rewarded. Include a link to the intro page described above.

Use your Brain!

Affiliate recruiting from your site visitors or customer base is highly recommended for most affiliate managers but it is not "one-size-fits-all." Use your brain and choose an approach that works for your site and your industry. For example, if you are selling software, it is might be normal and recommended to have a flashing banner in the sidebar that shouts: "Join our affiliate program and earn $$." But if you are promoting your professional services, such as an architect or art dealer, then a tasteful, discrete link called "Partners" or "Referrals" in the nav bar or footer is more appropriate. You know your field and you know what's accepted. Be aware that many of the affiliates you recruit through your site or customer base will have little or no experience in affiliate marketing. Be sure to explain how it works. Mention that it is a common and legitimate marketing method and that it is free to join. Offer some basic tips and links that will help them get started.