How do you choose the products you buy? Do you simply accept as gospel truth all the good things a merchant says about their own product? Or, do you ask your friends’ opinions and look for independent product reviews before opening your wallet?

If you’re a savvy consumer (which of course you are), then you put more stock in your friends’ opinions and independent product reviews.

As affiliate marketers, we become much more successful when we approach our site visitors as friends and take the attitude that they too are savvy consumers.

From that standpoint, an affiliate’s real work is to pre-sell our merchant partners’ products by writing fair and balanced reviews, also known as endorsement letters.

Sure, writing a review for each product takes a little time and effort, but it’s an activity that sets the super affiliates apart from their less-super counterparts in terms of rewards… read ‘income’.

Product reviews can be either stand-alone or comparative. The first type focuses on a single product, while the second is an evaluation of similar items that allows readers to choose which product best suits them.

Before you begin to write a product review, you’ll need to evaluate the product. (Nothing like stating the obvious, eh?)

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Any one of the seven website copywriting secrets I’m about to reveal can increase your conversion rate by itself. But use ALL of them together and you’ll create an unstoppable online salesperson that will sell your product or service 24/7!

1. Write to a Targeted Audience

Know EXACTLY who your niche market is. Then target your sales copy to precisely what they’re looking for.

You can learn about your site visitors by looking at your server logs.

* What’s your most popular page?
* Where do visitors stay for the longest time?
* Where do people most often click away?
* When do most people visit?
Also consider the questions or comments you get from customers after a sale.

Armed with hard information, you can write sales letter and website copy that addresses their specific needs. And you can answer any questions or objections they might have, just the way a sales rep would in person.

2. Create an attention-grabbing headline

A winning sales letter headline gets straight to the point and promises an answer to the problem your visitor is trying to solve.

Here’s an example of a sales-winning online sales letter headline:

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If you’ve been working on your web site for more than a couple of months and still haven’t made any money, or your sales are dismal to the point of being depressing, you should consider the 5 points listed below very carefully.

One or more of them will likely explain why your site still isn’t making any money.

No Traffic – People can’t buy what they never see, so unless you are actively attracting visitors to your site using a variety of methods – beyond simply counting on the search engines to send you free traffic – it’s unlikely you’ll start making sales anytime soon.

The 3 most effective methods for generating traffic are pay per click advertising, article marketing and social networking. If you have a budget, start with pay per click marketing to get visitors to your site fast. If your advertising budget is currently non-existent, concentrate on the latter two methods to get free traffic. Leave valuable comments on relevant forums and blogs. Build traffic through your Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and other social marketing accounts.

Then, once your site starts getting traffic and making sales, re-invest your earnings in advertising.

Problematic Site Design – If you are getting traffic to your site, the next consideration is how visitors perceive your site. If it looks unprofessional, is impossible to navigate or is just downright ugly; it’s unlikely that visitors will trust you to handle their orders in a professional manner – regardless of how appealing your products may be.

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As a ‘super affiliate’, I set stiff criteria for how and when I choose to promote products, especially products available within the Internet and affiliate marketing niche.

First, I rarely participate in the ‘big’ product launches anymore, as many of those products (and their producers) have gone the way of the dodo bird.

Stephen Ducharme is only one example.

Do a search for his name today and in the top results are an article by Damon Zaharides titled “Stephen Ducharme Belly Flop” and a thread in Michael Green’s HowToCorp forum “Screw Stephen Ducharme Over”.

People were that mad at him for selling them a pack o’ lies.

Marketers who promoted his product had to do some serious back-pedaling to regain their subscribers’ trust.

However, breaking a trust is like breaking a porcelain container. You can glue it back together, but the cracks will always show and it may never again hold water.

Do you want to lose subscribers or your reputation as an honest broker?

I thought not.

To protect your reputation, and more importantly, do right by your customers, here are my top 6 criteria for choosing products to promote.

1. Reputable Merchant. If Yanik Silver or Anik Singal tells me that they have a new product available, I know my customers will be properly treated and respected. These merchants have built their reputations based on quality products and excellent customer service, i.e. sound business principles. Likewise, there are merchants within your niche with whom you have worked that can be trusted without question. If you do not know a merchant, research their reputation online. Review and test their sites for attractiveness, usability and customer service responsiveness. If you have any doubts regarding their reputation, do not promote the product.

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The following is a letter in response to a question about how to write sales letters. This is something you could model in layout, tone, and ideas, to write your own letters.  By the way, this is where your letterhead should go.

Jerry Jenkins asked me to tell you how to write letters that get read and get results. That’s a tall order! Well, here’s what I think the “laws” are:

1. Know what’s in it for your reader.

Get out of your ego and into your reader’s ego. Complete this sentence: “Get my book so that you can…(fill in the blank).” Your book (or whatever you are selling) is the feature. What people get as a result of having your book is the benefit. Focus on benefits. Always! Without this, your letter will bomb.

2. Write a headline that telegraphs the key benefit to your reader.

ALWAYS use a headline. There is only ONE exception to this rule. When you personalize your letter, the “Dear (whoever)” opening becomes your headline.

There are few headlines more powerful than the reader’s own name. The headline is THE most important part of your letter! Spend nearly all of your time on it.

3. Be brief.

Say what you have to say in terms of the reader’s self interest and shut up. This does NOT necessarily mean a short letter.

If you are trying to make a sale, and the reader has never heard of you or your item for sale, you may have to write four or more pages to get your message across. If all you want is a return call, a one page letter may do. Don’t be afraid of length. People will read any length of copy AS LONG AS IT’S INTERESTING!

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