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Marketing through forum

afflimaster
Posts: 1
Joined: 30 Aug 10
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Marketing through forum

Hi forum. 

I'm a new to affiliate marketing. I'm still researching and learning the ropes. However I have an idea for marketing products and wanted to run it by experienced marketers. 
 
I want to start a forum and market affifiate products through the forum in two ways. 
1. Through products reviews and suggestions (blog style). 
2. Through forum discussions. I noticed that members often suggest products to other members. I had the idea of (depending on the product and whether the product has an affiliate program) editing members post to include the affiliate code in the link so that when a member clicks on the product and purchases It I would get the commission for it. I wanted to know if this can be accomplished? Is it a viable idea? And most importantly how do you think members would feel about the site making commission from their suggested products without compensating them?    
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PremiumMember
jmpruitt
Posts: 3918
Joined: 19 Jun 09
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that would not be a good idea at all. if you are new, start up a site first. building a forum is an advanced strategy, and should not be where you start.

Also, most of us that recommend products are doing so through our own affiliate links. changing them to yours will build a bad reputation, and will piss off your members.

The forum should be about helping your members, not about how you can get more money out of people.

It takes a lot of work to run a good forum. I would recommend having at least 3-4 good staff members that can handle the technical details, and to help moderate spammers.
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faradina
Posts: 1895
Joined: 01 Jun 09
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I would not go with editing the forum members' posts either. Editing their posts to insert your affiliate id is a sure way of losing forum members and readers fast.

A better option would be to put in banners for relevant products, like the way they do it on the abestweb forums.
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garett
Posts: 5
Joined: 29 Jun 10
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To have a forum for running an affiliate business is a good idea.
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careybaird
Posts: 14
Joined: 06 Nov 10
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Great idea you have afflimaster but I agree with fara, you should not go along editing member's post may it be negative or offensive because it would be a reason to lose active members.
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michael025
Posts: 197
Joined: 07 Oct 10
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I agree with everyone here....affiliate marketing using a forum is indeed a great idea, but might be too complicated for a beginner....If you are already familiar with making money online, then go for it....but not if you are just starting....

Also, it is not a good idea to edit member's post's to put in your own affiliate links as it would make you lose your member's fast, and kill your forum's credibility. Just think if it was done to you....all your profits hijacked by somebody else...you'd be pissed. It can be done, but it's not worth it.

I suggest that if you want to push through with your idea of marketing through a forum, try to come up with more positive ideas on how you can promote products and earn, and also keep the trust of your members....
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f5mtadas
Posts: 28
Joined: 15 Dec 10
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True, for that reason many new members geting ban trying pump and jump tactic to them blogs and pages.

It is not easy to market on forums, but it is one of most effective way to get buyers and subscribers. You need share your experience on forums and discuss about problems, if you will start share your sources how to get traffic, how to earn money and so on. you would warn or even ban as spammer.

You should be orientated how to help peoples, that means how to gain the forums members trust on you and they wil follow your threads and follow your signature ad and profile.
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luckylook3
Posts: 28
Joined: 07 Mar 11
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it is better that you will build a blog and review your products

than go for article marketing to get traffic and backlinks, this is the better way because some forums will consider it as a spam and also links from articles directories will make you rank higher
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This topic was started on Sep 04, 2010 and has been closed due to inactivity. If you want to discuss this topic further, please create a new forum topic.