Blogging Tips

How to Overcome Buyer Skepticism When Selling Affiliate Products and Services Online

Written by Yuwanda Black from Inkwell Editorial

In yesterday’s post, I discussed how I recently started to promote an affiliate product, and how skeptical some buyers were when purchasing online. For those of us who spend a great deal of time online, buying goods and services over the internet is old hat. But, we are a tiny minority. Many consumers – especially those who don’t use the computer a lot – are extremely skeptical about making purchases online. Following are three tips for overcoming that.

3 Ways to Sell More Affiliate Products to a Less than Tech Savvy Audience

1. Provide Lots of Information: The more information you give about your affiliate product/service, the more trust potential purchasers will have in it. Information is the great equalizer. So fill your affiliate site with informative articles. And, not fluff either – real, useful information.

2. Cite Sources: If you can cite statistics, quotes, case studies, etc. from noted, outside sources in your articles – all the better. In the articles I wrote for my affiliate product (which has to do with foreclosures), I cited recent regulation in some articles, quotes from stories in leading newspapers around the country in others and statistics from noted institutions in others.

All of this lends credence to my articles. Credibility leads to trust, which leads to sales.

3. Give Technology Guidance: Many times when less than tech savvy consumers purchase a product online, they have no idea what a .pdf file is, for example. You’re going to have to do some hand holding with these customers.

In the access email they receive when they purchase from my affiliate site, I give explicit directions on how to access the file and which version of Adobe they need to open it. Going one step further, I even provide an email address and a phone number for purchasers to call if they have problems.

While this may seem like a pain (and it is sometimes) all of this reassures the buyer – and will turn them into repeat customers who won’t be asking for a refund, but will eagerly await your next product.

Selling affiliate products online is fun. But as with any moneymaking opportunity, it is not as “passive” as many would lead you to believe. It sure beats working for someone else though, and is a helluva lot more lucrative when you consider what you get out of it for the time you put in.

Written by Yuwanda Black from Inkwell Editorial
Posted on January 20th, 2009 and filed under Making Money
Do not forget to subscribe to our RSS feed for updates

8 Responses to “How to Overcome Buyer Skepticism When Selling Affiliate Products and Services Online”

Author comments are in a darker gray color for you to easily identify the posts author in the comments

Franklin Bishop says:

January 20, 2009 at 11:32 am

I say that you have to show them that it has worked for another person or has made someone else happy. You have to prove that other people have approved of it.
Blogging For Fun & Profit - Ethically says:

January 20, 2009 at 4:59 pm

Hi Yuwanda,

Another great article with common sense tips. . that you can easily forget or not think about .Thanks especially for the second tip. . which I had not entertained in my past review of wordpress themes. . – I’ll will now make some time, and add to that

cheers,

Derrick
Yuwanda Black says:

January 20, 2009 at 7:08 pm

@Derrick: I think this tip (#2) has been one of the main reasons my articles have been so widely distributed, which of course increases sales.

Glad to be of help, and thanks for writing in.

Best,
Yuwanda
Chris says:

January 20, 2009 at 9:23 pm

Your biggest sell is your honesty. I rely heavily on user reviews when making buying decisions. I always promote products that I’ve tried and believe in. My reputation depends upon an honest approach.
Vincent says:

January 20, 2009 at 10:42 pm

Thanks for the article. I believe sales can be improve when we are giving enough assurance to customers and convince them to buy the product.

Cheers
Vincent
Jennifer/ Single Mom Freelance Writing says:

January 21, 2009 at 9:39 am

This is information that most do not think of when they are trying to do affiliate marketing. We are always believing that are target audience has the same computer knowledge that we do. This is great information that I look forward to using in my marketing. Thank you.
Cassie says:

January 21, 2009 at 9:56 am

Not only do these tips help increase sales, they also reduce the amount of emails/complaints/returns, etc. from customers or prospects because they’re armed with a bit more knowledge before they purchase.

I was getting a lot of emails from people about a weight loss ebook I wrote because they couldn’t figure out how to download it after their payment was confirmed (even though I thought I had explained it plain enough). So I went in and explained everything so that a 5 year old could understand and the emails practically stopped.

It’s so easy to forget that our target audience may not be as knowledgeable as we are when it comes to that stuff.