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Affiliate marketing is a wonderful way for seniors to generate income online. If you know what you’re doing, the sky truly is the limit. Yet, so many seniors who are marketers struggle to make a cent online. In fact, over 95% of them never see any positive results.

While their lack of action is usually to blame, there are also many affiliates who try their best and still fail miserably. They do everything they can, but the results are paltry. It reaches a point where the juice just isn’t worth the squeeze and they quit affiliate marketing.

Here’s a truth that you must sear into your mind – people will only buy from you if they trust you. This cardinal truth is the cornerstone of all sales and marketing. People only buy from companies and people that they trust. That’s why reputable brand name companies see billions in sales. People trust them.

The same applies to you as an affiliate marketer. The visitor to your site needs to trust you. If you have an email list, the subscriber needs to trust you and your judgment before they spend their hard-earned money.

Very often, affiliates are so desperate to make money that they hype up a product to a point where it’s just not believable. Their desperation is subconsciously picked up by the reader and they’re put off by it.

In the make money online niche, marketers mail for products daily. Some even go so far as to mail several times a day. Nary a thought is given about the quality of the product. Their goal is to sell, sell and sell. A fellow marketer calls this a “product pitch fest”.

This problem is exacerbated when most of the products in this niche are poor quality and never deliver on their promises. All foam and no beer. Once the subscribers have been bitten once, very often a huge chunk of them become twice shy. They’ll be much less likely to buy what you promote.

You’ve lost all credibility… and the root cause of this is greed. This is the biggest pitfall for so many marketers, seniors alike.

It may sound tough to hear, but this is the harsh truth. The goal to make as much ‘easy money’ as possible by bombarding your audience with offers is a very short-term strategy. There’s even a term for it in this industry – churn and burn.

It is called that because the subscribers on the list get jaded fast and just stop buying. So, the list becomes useless because it stops generating money. The only way to keep getting sales is to keep adding new leads on your list.

A much better strategy will be to selectively promote good offers. You’ll need to provide a balance of value and offers. If your approach is only to sell, you’ll turn off the subscriber. If you take the slow and steady approach, the lifetime value of your customer will increase considerably.

Your list will have a high retention rate, and when you promote something, people will believe you and buy it. Industry statistics show that it’s 7 times more expensive to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing one.

So, be sensible and treat your list like people instead of numbers or cash cows. People join lists or visit sites to get information and value. If you can provide that while promoting products, you will get the sales and win the hearts of your audience.

[avatar user=”mike” size=”thumbnail” align=”” link=”file”]Mike Gaudreau is the owner of The Wealthy Boomers, a site devoted to helping seniors make money online. Mike resides in Montreal Canada.[/avatar]

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