International Affiliates & Affiliate Marketing
Recently I’ve been getting a lot of emails from affiliates and readers that want to know how they can start making money online if they have a foreign web site, or aren’t located in the US. While it may seem like a big dilemma, there are a lot of different factors that will play into your success with affiliate marketing.
US vs. Non-US Affiliate Networks
The majority of big networks that the affiliate industry usually talk about, are US (or Canada) based. However, some of them do accept foreign traffic and affiliates that live outside of the US. Something I’ve heard from many networks, is that a big majority of new foreign affiliate signups are usually very low quality. In turn, this wastes the time, money and management of the network, to work with these affiliates, then weed out the garbage. This may just be due to lack of english skills, they are farther behind in the affiliate marketing learning process, or they simply have no idea what they are signing up for.
With that being said, there are networks that cater specifically to international affiliates and offers. Networks like TradeDoubler, Buy.at and Zanox.com have built their businesses by working directly with affiliates that live and target their offers around the globe.
If you’ve been in the affiliate industry for a few years now, you will notice a huge increase in international offers appearing on networks. Everyone is finally catching on, and it’s not just the US demographic that is spending money, nor just making money with affiliate marketing.
Getting Accepted to a Network
Outside of the three networks listed above, it may be tough for an international affiliate to get accepted into the top US/Canada affiliate networks. I would recommend first signing up with NeverBlue, as they are more accepting than others in this area. However, I would recommend you spend time learning affiliate marketing before signing up, and wasting your time, and theirs. Having the knowledge of how you want to proceed with affiliate marketing, will have you that much closer to being accepted by networks.
Other variables that will determine your acceptance into a larger affiliate network, is the content of your web site or your marketing methods. If you apply to a network that is mainly US, and you submit your web site which is in another language, it will lessen your chances of being accepted. Try creating an English/US version of your web site. Make the signup process as easy as possible.
The best way to get accepted by a network, is to actually talk with them. Almost all networks require a phone call to verify information before accepting new affiliates. If you are a PPC or social media marketer, make sure you have made that clear in your application. You don’t always need a web site to get accepted into an affiliate program.
As for payment issues. Not all networks will mail outside of the US, but paypal and wire transfer are sometimes an option. In worst case scenerios, you can setup a bank account or mailing address within the US or Canada to accept payments. This may take some time and effort to set up, but if ncessary, don’t let it stop you from getting into affiliate marketing.
Running International Offers within a US Network
As mentioned earlier, the number of new international offers appearing on US based affiliate networks is rapidly increasing. Offers that used to be limited to the US, are now open to several new countries. The largest category for ad campaigns on Neverblue, is “International“, which now has 173 different offers to choose from.
No matter what country you are looking to promote towards, you should be able to find at least a handful of offers to test.
As you continue to learn how the networks respond to international affiliates and what type of offers are available, you increase your learning and potential to expand in affiliate marketing. Even if an affiliate network doesn’t look like they accept international affiliates, try contacting them and see if they will make an exception. There are “super affiliates” located all over the world!
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We're happy to accept international affiliates. With the large majority of our transactions occurring online, location isn't as much of an issue as most affiliates think. As long as you meet the publisher requirements, we look forward to working with both US-based and international affiliates.
Thanks for sharing this Zac.
International affiliates like me always have problems signing up with the top affiliate networks. Though there are a lot of smaller affiliate networks that will accept international affiliates by only verifying my phone numbers. Others requires letter from the bank etc. I know this is how they are trying to weed out the scammers and spammers but it's a real turn off. I guess we cannot be lazy to provide these things if you wanna make money but they can make it easier.
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Thanks for the info on international affiliate programs. I know some folks (outside the US) that are looking to get into this type of program. I bounced over to the Neverblue website to read up on them a bit before deciding if this is something I think my contacts could benefit from. One thing that I did find interesting and want to pass on … the Neverblue site said they no longer sign up affiliates from the following countries:
India
Nepal
Mongolia
China
Sri Lanka
Seychelles
Mauritius
Bangladesh
Pakistan
Afghanistan
Kazakhstan
Kyrgyzstan
Uzbekistan
Iran Iraq
Saudi Arabia
Yemen
Oman
Syria
Jordan Myanmar
Thailand
Vietnam
Laos
Cambodia
Philippines
Indonesia
Taiwan
Nigeria
Estonia
Malaysia
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I think there are definately plenty of affiliate networks within each country – enough for everyone to handle. I have previously used zanox and was very happy with their service
Thanks for this, Zac. I get a TON of questions about this and will refer people to this article.
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I don't really agree with you.
First of all it's not really that hard to get accepted at a big affiliate network as an international affiliate. I am from Romania and I've been accepted at all the big networks like clickbooth, azoogleads, maxbounty, advaliant, etc without a problem.
International affiliates usually DON'T promote international offers. I only promote US offers because it's way easier for me to do that and I get the best conversion rate doing this. I would never promote offers that accept traffic from Romania because I simply don't think they are worth the time.
You said that neverblue is a easy network to get accepted at. I would disagree with this. Neverblue is one of the bests affiliate networks and they really select their future partners wisely.
Now, talking about English. I don't really see how an internet affiliate marketer could learn about this English if his English skills are very very basic. Yeah, there are people who sign up for those companies and they don't even have an idea what they could do there.
Like you said, super affiliates are everywhere, don't judge by their location. I could always move to American and that wouldn't change NOTHING at me.
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trend of development of international programs is increasing, and this is perfect because it would facilitate the work
I would like to tell Zac one thing, Just delete the line that says "In turn, this wastes the time, money and management of the network, to work with these affiliates, then weed out the garbage. ". I felt very sad to read that line from this blog.
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It's also possible to geotarget your website using sub domains which will allow foreign affiliates to target other countries or vice versa. Also duplicate content doesn't seem to be a problem any more according to this post on seomoz.org
The link didnt appear so here it is just put seomoz.org in front:
/blog/new-info-from-google-and-yahoo-tilts-the-geotargeting-balance
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How can I know that an Affilaite Marketing Program open for foreign membership? What should I know as an international affiliate with reagrads to payment of commissions(i.e tax and foreign account considerations)?
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