Affiliate Marketing is a Booming Business
Hannes Johnson is a valued John Chow dot Com reader. You’ve probably seen him around these parts, commenting on John’s posts, maybe even sharing some of his online money making tips along the way. Realizing just how huge this audience is, Hannes saw that there was no better way to give his project a flood of exposure than by ordering a ReviewMe review from John. Well it worked, because he got me to take a nice long look at Affiliate Booby Traps, a site that I probably would have ignored otherwise.
Here We Go Again?
I’m sure you’ve seen these kinds of sites before: Ones that offer mounds of online riches, all with minimal effort on your part. Online surveys, e-books with money-making strategies… they all just seem so fishy, so shady. In Johnson’s own words: “Let’s face it, people are inherently skeptical online… You see, one of the bad parts about internet marketing is that it attracts dishonest people. People whose only goal is to rip people off of their hard-earned cash.” Apparently Hannes doesn’t fall into this category.
It’s this kind of up-front honesty that almost makes me want to believe Hannes. It also helps that he has a fairly prominent presence on John Chow dot Com, so I’m a little more inclined to buy into what he’s offering: an intriguing way to make money online. Is it evil? 
Perhaps, but it’s perfectly legal and absolutely genius. As you can guess for the name of the website, they’re affiliate booby traps.
What Are Affiliate Booby Traps?
Even according to John, one of the best ways to make money online is not necessarily through direct ad sales or through contextual ads like Google Adsense. Affiliate marketing is where it’s at, especially when your site has a very specific niche. The problem with these CPA (cost per action) type ads is that it can sometimes be tough convincing people to click on them, let alone convincing them to follow through and actually buy something. That’s where Hannes’ affiliate landmines come into play.
He teaches you a variety of strategies and provides you with a huge supply of different software that will help you optimize your affiliate marketing income. Site visitors will stumble across these “affiliate booby traps” and that’s when you attack them, so to speak, when they are most vulnerable, when their defenses are at their lowest. After you sign up for a bunch of these affiliate programs and you set up them up in the best possible way (as Hannes explains it), you just might start receiving cheques (checks) in the mail from sources that you have long since forgotten. That was exactly the case with a few people that used Hannes’ special strategies.
There are three types of affiliate landmines:
- Land Mines You Set: One of the best examples of this is to customize the 404 page on your website. This way, instead of getting a page that just reads “Page not found”, you hit your visitor with an “exclusive offer” that they just can’t refuse.
- Land Mines You Give Away: People like free things. By getting your site visitors into a comfort zone, offering them something valuable for free (e.g., an instructional video), they are more inclined to trust you. Intertwine your free offer with affiliate landmines and site visitors are more likely to “trip” on the latter.
- Land Mines You Sell: Selling one e-book is fine and dandy, but what if you promoted your other (related) products in that same e-book. After all, if someone bought your first e-book, they’re very likely to buy similar items from you. The conversion rate is incredible.
A Ticking Time Bomb
I have a strong feeling that affiliate marketing may become bigger than contextual ads in the near future. It can be much more lucrative, because each person you convert results in huge income relative to CPC. I wouldn’t say that the affiliate booby traps are “tricking” visitors to your site into buying things, but it certainly helps with the conversion rate. If you’ve got more questions, check out the FAQ they have set up on the site. I think the main page is a little hard to follow (it’s very long copy) and it would be nice to have a more concise “what we are” or “what we offer” kind of explanation. Then again, this might be part of his sales plan.
You get tons of knowledge, training, support, and products from Affiliate Booby Traps, so you should be able to make the $19.95 back you pay each month, but if you’re still not sure, they have a promotion going on right now that gives the first 300 members a 30 day trial for just a dollar. Not to mention that he has a whole whack of information regarding things like choosing a host, designing your site, submitting it to search engines, how to use your blog as a marketing tool, and so much more. It’s a complete marketing and monetization solution.
I’d say it’s worth a shot.
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- Posted in Make Money Online, Reviews
- 45 comments what's your take?
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Trackbacks
- Spawners 11thMarch07 - March 11, 2007 at 4:30 am
- What Is John Chow Doing Wrong? - March 13, 2007 at 4:05 pm
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No offense, but I don’t get it. As soon as I hit the page I feel like its another one of ‘those sites’.
I think it definitely is one of “those” site. Must’ve been tough to review.
Kumiko
Same here. I start to get tire of review me posts.
It may calm down now the 50% offer is over
I think it is going to be interesting to see if John can keep his readers while doing a lot of ReviewMe reviews. I’ve read several that were very helpful–helpful enough that I went ahead and order my own review just to see the results.
I was probably the last one to use the 50% discount so the ReviewMe reviews should slow down now
That was my initial reaction too, and I think it’s something that Hannes needs to work on.
Same here. Actually, if you read into it, you can see that he’s using the re-seller rights. I’m guessing he bought this from somewhere else, and setup his own site trying to sell it.
Not a fan of these sites, but different things work for different people:)
Yeah, I might need to change it – or create another, simpler version. Thanks for the feedback.
..and yeah, I’m a reseller
But I provide lots of extra material.
How did you get into doing this?
I saw Russell Brunson offering the resale rights to this so I decided to give it a shot.
Scary
… and evil
…
I don’t know about scary… but it certainly is evil
– you can make money “John Chow style” 
Got the same feeling! Looking at these type of pages, my first reaction was those full page ad in magazines, and it only brought back a bad memory. But who knows, may be a 2-3% return of those ads would have been big and that was the reason you will see that those full page magazine ads are still there (aren’t they?) and these type of websites are every where too. I agree with Michael’s comment that the owner needs to work on.
its a site with crap on it. those 404 pages is totally different. its not going to help you at all. it is totally a scam. you can get all that info for free folks.
I see what you mean – a lot of the information you get from the training videos you can read about online for free.
But the exclusive products you get as a member you don’t get anywhere else.
I think the market will become “free” with more advertising, its the way a lot of stuffs going online
Speaking of which you could get a decent free template for your site which would make it look a lot nicer, Im not trying to put you down, but the appearance needs some effort putting into it IMO
That reminds me, I must do something useful with my own 404
Yeah, the 404 pages are often unused “virtual real estate”. Making money off 404 pages is pretty cool
sorry, i didnt make much since did i. anyway…
hey john (and michael),
its cool you have michael taking some of the load off your shoulders for the reviews, but if i were an advertiser i would want you to write the review.
your a great writer michael…but just my personal opinion.
matt
Yes, it would have been nice if John would have personally done the review…
But I think Michael did a good job – so I’m satisfied
This blog must take a lot of time to run now, certainly more than 2 hours a day
From all of the research and the general “vibe” I’m getting from the big guys in marketing, sites like this are on their way out. People no longer trust the majority of web sites that simply look like direct mail pieces.
Instead, you need to add videos of product demo’s and real customer testimonials, split your sales letter into multiple pages and change it to look like an actual web site – i.e. no massive headlines, no ugly yellow text, etc.
I personally don’t have a problem with sites that look like direct mail pieces because if the info is good I’ll buy it, but the general Internet public have become skeptical of sites that look like yours – very skeptical.
I think another trend is the simple blog – build up trust, become an authority on a topic and then HONESTLY recommend products you think your visitors would benefit from. If you do it this way you can’t lose, and that’s my long term goal with my blog.
Just my 2 cents worth, and good luck with the site if you’re reading this
Good points Mitchell – yeah, I’ve also noticed this new trend and I do plan on adding audio and video to the site and perhaps restructure the site.
The blog strategy is also good – just look at SEObook – he’s building a lot of trust by posting regularly.
I guess he’s right. You would have to build up the site’s credibility and make it look ‘unique’, and different from the rest of the pile. So many of these sites just look the same, from my point of view.
Exactly, Lyndon. I think if you changed your site to a blog and sold a product you truly believe in (not something you’ve purchased the resale rights for) you’d increase your chances of making a nice chunk of change.
Credibility goes a loooooong way in this game and as soon as people see your site looks like a direct mail piece you’re going to lose 50% or more of your visitors before they even read your headline. That’s how bad things are for sites that look like direct mail pieces.
All of the guru’s like Corey Rudl (RIP), Perry Marshall, etc are starting to add more content, audio and video to their sites because they know that direct mail pieces just don’t work anymore online.
Take my advice and do with it what you will, but still, I wish you all the best
Very sound advice, BTW what kind of response did you get to your own review Mitchel (in terms of new visitors etc?)
Interesting review. However I’m not into the whole “wait! 10 seconds of your time will save you bazillions” kinda outlook.
Nope all a bit naff
Not many people believe in ‘get-rich-quick’ scheme too.
With good reason, whenever I read these things I always think, if it was really that good they would not be selling the information on to subscribers.
They would keep a lid on it and use the information to their own advantage.
I know this is a bit different as its affilliate schems for sites, but if something sounds to good to be true…
I don’t know if you’re referring to my site specifically – but the Affiliate Booby Traps is definitely not a “get rich quick” scheme. If it looks like that I need to change something… There is nothing on the site that says you’ll make $10,000 a month by just joining and clicking a few buttons
I can’t comment if your service is not valuable or not but Mitchell said it best. Before you start creating ANY sites like those you need to be an authority in your respected field. Sales don’t work without trust and credibility. Also it would help if you improve the design of the website instead of the many you see already.
John,
NEVER EVER publish this kind of post any more …
that site is just a crap …
this post can give bad rep to you …
Michael,
congrats for your useless post
Money Money Money
It was a paid review after all! You can’t fault the reviewer!
No he gave it a fair review
Hey Hannes, are you eating something in your picture? Just thought I’d lighten the mood
hehe, no, I’m not eating in the picture – does it look like that?
It takes all sorts I guess. I was thinking that there is a similarity between the long single page of the reviewed site and the scrolling required to read all these comments. If you are interested, the never ending single page is quite a good idea and user friendly.
He mentioned his tactic for the 404 page. It is the most neglected page on a website, and its time to look at ours