I was reading a few relevant tips from Darren at ProBlogger about some Do's and Dont's for professional business blogs. I wanted to pass on his wisdoms because I think that they're right on the money, no pun intended.

These are the same strategies I use on my blogs Affiliate Blogger, Affiliate Marketers and Affiliate Blog.

The topic was about what to do if you have viewers coming to your blog, but they never buy anything through you. The advice is sage:

Product relevancy and quality - unless the products you're promoting relate to the content/topic of your blogging you're wasting your time. Not only should they be relevant - they should be quality affiliate products. Don't get sucked into promoting something just because it relates to your site. Test it for yourself and if it's rubbish - stay clear. You can hurt your own reputation by recommending second rate products.

Traffic - the more people that see the promotions you run the better. While traffic isn't the only factor, it is certainly a big one. Work at drawing people to your blog and particularly to the pages that you are featuring affiliate promotions on.

Placement - affiliate links IN content tend to out perform promotions that you run in sidebars or banner ads. One genuine review of the product (see next point) seen by a handful of readers can be much more powerful than a banner at the top of your blog seen by many readers.

Your reputation and 'Sales Pitch' - I find that affiliate products work best for me on sites where I have a loyal readership of people who respect what I say and when I give genuine recommendation that show not only the positives of a product but the weaknesses in it. The way you promote the product is as influencial as almost anything else. Don't hype, don't lie and don't spin it.

SimpleTuition Debuts Affiliate Program For Organizations Looking To Share Student Loan Comparison Research
Tuesday November 14, 10:27 am ET
Innovative Referral Program Allows Donations to Educational Charitable Organizations

BOSTON, Nov. 14 /PRNewswire/ — SimpleTuition, Inc. (http://www.simpletuition.com), a company dedicated to helping students and parents make sense of education financing choices, today announced the launch of its new Affiliate Partner Program. Available today at http://www.simpletuition.com/friend, the program is open to high school guidance officers, personal financial planners and advisors, as well as professional and student organizations and others that wish to offer objective third-party student loan comparison and research.

As a SimpleTuition Affiliate Partner, organizations that refer parents and students to the SimpleTuition web site for advice will earn a reward for each new visitor that uses the SimpleTuition solution to compare student loans and then clicks through to a lender's loan application site. For non-profit partners and public schools, SimpleTuition is planning to offer the option of donating the referral reward to an educational charity, thereby avoiding any conflicts of interest. A first for referral programs, SimpleTuition is working with leading educational charities, who all share a common vision of helping students and their families attend college, to make this a reality.

"Every year hundreds of thousands of students and parents receive advice and conflicting recommendations from friends, family, co-workers and other advisors about how to best research and manage student loan finances," said Kevin Walker, co-founder and CEO of SimpleTuition. "Since launching SimpleTuition, numerous parents have been telling us how desperate they are for a resource that offers a clear and easy way to understand their student loan options. When they hear of SimpleTuition, they want to tell all their friends. With that in mind, we created the partner program."

According to the recent College Board report, caps for federal student loans are not keeping up with inflation, yet tuition costs keep rising, up 35% from five years ago. With the cost of college at an all-time high — projected to reach $220 billion this year, $86 billion of which will be financed by students or their parents — families nationwide now require multiple loans each year to pay for college. Many are desperate for a clear, concise and easy-to-use resource to help find the best student loan options.

Currently, nearly twenty organizations have already joined the SimpleTuition Affiliate Program. Designed for all types of educational support organizations, partners can choose from three options:

• Partners who want to be able to share student loan information can link directly to SimpleTuition
• Affiliate partners who want to send SimpleTuition applicants (first-time visitors that open a student loan application with one of SimpleTuition's lending partners) receive a referral commission
• Colleges, universities and other organizations can request a customized solution that integrates with their web site

The amount of information on student loans is overwhelming with many different types of loans from various lenders; each with different options, including fees, repayment plans, total loan amount, consolidation options, credit strength scores and FAFSA eligibility in some cases. SimpleTuition allows users to compare multiple financing options from a variety of lenders that can be sorted by monthly payment, total cost of the loan, number of payments, fees and APR. SimpleTuition is not a lender.

About SimpleTuition, Inc.

Founded in 2005, SimpleTuition is dedicated to helping students and parents make sense of education financing choices. Recently featured in FastCompany.com's top 12 innovative websites for Web 2.0, SimpleTuition is the only company to offer an independent and objective solution for researching and comparing parent, private, GradPLUS and federal loans. SimpleTuition is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts and is funded by Atlas Venture and IDG Ventures Boston. For more information visit http://www.SimpleTuition.com.

Here's something to wet the Affiliate Blogger's mouth … more blogs!

Global performance marketing firm Forge Corporation Ltd. has acquired BlogKits Blogging Network. Launching world�s first performance marketing network built for bloggers.

(PRWEB) July 13, 2006 — The billion-dollar affiliate marketing industry has finally caught up with blogging. Forge Corporation Ltd., a global provider of performance marketing solutions, with offices in Johannesburg, Cleveland & Seattle, announced today it has acquired BlogKits (http://www.blogkits.com), a blog network built to help match bloggers with advertisers.

BlogKits was acquired from Jim Kukral, business blog expert, who was also recently appointed to Forge as the VP of Branding & Marketing. He has spent the past 10+ years working in the online marketing and blogging industry.

In a survey produced by BlogKits in 2005, 73% of bloggers agreed that using affiliate links on their website was an acceptable practice. The same survey concluded that the primary reason bloggers use Google Adsense is because "it�s easy" (93%).

"Bloggers want control and ease of use. They want to "place it and leave it", said Mr. Kukral. "Which is why Google Adsense works so well for them. The reason bloggers haven�t embraced the standard affiliate networks as a viable model is because those networks don�t specifically cater any offers to bloggers. There�s too much clutter going on. Bloggers don�t want to work that hard. BlogKits eliminates that."

"Google Adsense has been a revolutionary tool for bloggers, and should always stay part of a successful blog monetization strategy. BlogKit's approach is not to recommend to replace Adsense, but to add to it without penalty. We believe there�s a lot more money to be made on a well-matched cost-per-action (CPA) offer for bloggers as opposed to a few pennies per click from Adsense."

There are challenges of course. Google Adsense still holds a majority of most bloggers� income generation, and the existing affiliate networks like Linkshare & Commission Junction have thousands of existing merchant/affiliate relationships.

But they don�t have the bloggers. BlogKits does.

"I really like the idea behind Blogkits because anything that can help bloggers earn money fairly, honestly, and easily is a great benefit to the entire blogging community," said Dave Taylor, blogger at www.AskDaveTaylor.com. "I�m looking forward to getting involved with the Blogkits project."

"Jim brings tremendous affiliate marketing and blogging experience to the table," said Jonathan Miller, CEO of Forge Corporation, Ltd. "By acquiring and developing BlogKits, Forge now has a unique stable of highly targeted blogs in our network that no other network has. Merchants can join BlogKits even if they have other existing network relationships. We�re not interested in taking business away from anyone; only bringing new business opportunities that they can�t get elsewhere."

Kukral will be responsible for operating the BlogKits Offerforge Network, including working to recruit and educate new bloggers, as well as assisting merchants with developing creative performance-based offerings.

BlogKits is currently accepting applications for signup from bloggers into the network at http://www.blogkits.com, and is working with merchants to prepare offers for launch, which is set for some time in late summer of 2006.

About Jim Kukral
Jim Kukral knows the online marketing industry from all sides. He is the publisher of ReveNews.com, a thought-shaping group blog focusing the billion-dollar industry of online revenue generation. He has been blogging since 2001 and has participated and or created over 30 professional blogs in his career. Jim has written professionally for Clickz.com and Builder.com, and has been featured in Revenue Today magazine and MarketingProfs.

About BlogKits
BlogKits was created by Jim Kukral in early 2005. Originally, BlogKits was made to help bloggers find new and interesting ways to make money with their blogs. Now as part of the OfferForge network, BlogKits will allow bloggers and online merchants the ability to work together in a reliable and robust network platform.

About Forge Corporation Ltd.
Founded in 2003 by Jonathan Miller, well known affiliate marketing strategist, consultant and public speaker, Forge Corporation Ltd. is a global provider of performance marketing solutions that benefit both advertisers and publishers, with offices in Johannesburg, Cleveland & Seattle.

Forge enables advertisers to distribute online advertising through thousands of targeted websites, newsletters and other online publishers. These relationships are driven by two patented technology ad networks: OfferForge South Africa and OfferForge USA. OfferForge advertisers pay only for performance, which could be measured in sales, leads, visitors, impressions, subscribers or even new unique customers.

The ForgeConsult consulting division specializes in developing and executing affiliate marketing strategies to assist advertisers in reaching consumers more effectively such as affiliate recruitment and affiliate program management.