Merchants

How To Become A Merchant

As a merchant, you will be able to set yourself up to receive payments from your customers by credit or debit card, or you can set up as a merchant account agent, a third party source, to accept  payments on behalf of other sellers.

If you are setting up an online business, you will need a 'shopping cart' account or one with a 'buy now' facility.  Establish contact with merchant service companies and research their terms of business and their rates.  Most companies will charge a monthly fee or pre-transaction fee, as well as a percentage of sales or transaction  volume fee.  Rates will be fixed and variable and some charges can be quite high and rates will vary, so it is best to spend some time researching your options.

You will need to purchase or lease the relevant point of sale resources such as credit card charging terminals and printers.  The easiest and best systems to use are either Paypal or Google Checkout.  You can talk to your bank about setting up a merchant account, and you can link this account to your bank account and your bank can provide you with the necessary charging terminal. 

You will be able to negotiate rates with the  merchant account provider but rates are determined by your business track record and credit history. 

Once you have set up your business to process  transactions, if you are selling globally, always remember to take into account the exchange rate.


Affiliates And Merchants Need Each Other


Affiliates work for merchants by bringing customers to the merchant's front door (in this case the website) and earning money in the process. Affiliates send a visitor to the merchant website through a special link, and are eligible to be credited for anything that the visitor buys while at the merchant website. When a visitor buys something, the merchant will pay the affiliate a commission, sometimes up to 75% of the sales value. So, it's simple; an affiliate's job is to get web surfers (traffic) to visit the merchant site and to ensure that they buy, buy, buy.

Why are affiliates important to merchants? If you are a merchant and  have a product that you want to sell online, you may not have the expertise to advertise the product online, so you have partnerships with affiliates who will do this for you. You pay your affiliates a percentage for every sale that they generate. As a merchant, you'll get less overall return on investment (ROI), but you will reach potential customers you wouldn't have been able to attract otherwise. Many companies rely completely on their affiliates to bring them business and they are more than happy to pay them for that service. 

The relationship between affiliate and merchant is very important. As a merchant, you must provide your affiliates with as much support and as many promotional resources as you can to help them publicize your product. It is imperative that you pay the affiliate on time and don't try to haggle on commissions.  If payments are constantly late, you are likely to lose affiliates and thus sales.   It is important to remember that the affiliate has done their utmost to get a converted sale.

Make sure that you market and target the product to the affiliate.  Ensure that you have provided all the necessary information about the product such as tech spec, dimensions etc, and if applicable, provide the affiliate with any extra information or unique selling points to make their job of selling your product easier.

If you are new to the affiliate and merchant relationship, then take a look at conversion rates for similar products and always remember that affiliates want to market and sell products with a low return rate, as commission is not paid for returned products.  If return rates can be kept low, it benefits both parties.

The top affiliates work for the best networks, promoting and selling the merchant's products.  These affiliates know that the only place to comprehensively promote and sell products is via a network; this also means that affiliates can advertise and sell merchant products in huge quantities. 

Calling All Merchants
 

We all, are in the midst of one of the worst financial crises, and if you are not doing absolutely everything in your power to increase your sales potential; you will find yourselves joining the 300,000 plus small businesses that have already failed due to the credit crunch.  ClickBank can get you ahead of the game and will drive huge amounts of traffic to your products by harnessing the power of the internet and providing you with excellent salesmanship.

Founded in 1998, ClickBank is a secure online retail outlet for more than 12,000 digital product vendors and 100,000 active affiliate marketers.

ClickBank makes a sale somewhere in the world every three seconds, safely processing more than 26,000 digital transactions a day. They serve more than 200 countries, and are consistently ranked as one of the most highly-trafficked sites on the web.

ClickBank is privately held with offices in Broomfield, Colorado and Boise, Idaho. Click Sales Inc. is a subsidiary of Keynetics Inc. All products and services offered by Keynetics or its subsidiaries are subject to the ClickBank Legal Notice

Merchants are losing massive sales and earning potential bypassing the biggest and best retail outlet offering a huge market of products.  This is what ClickBank has to offer your business:

E-Commerce

• Secure, reliable payment processing
• Low start-up costs ($49.95 activation fee)
• Industry-leading fraud prevention
• No merchant account required
• Accept credit cards and PayPal
• ClickBank provides customer support

Massive Affiliate Network

• 100,000 plus active affiliates
• Global affiliate reach
• Experience in promoting niche products

Reliable Reporting & Payouts

•  Detailed sales reporting
• Weekly payments and direct deposit available
• Get paid on time, every time - ClickBank has never missed a payment in 10 years

Automated Affiliate Payments

• Accurate affiliate commissions tracking
• ClickBank handles affiliate payment distribution
• Reach customers around the world
• More than 100,000 active affiliates in 145 countries worldwide
• Sell your products in English, Spanish, French and German

What are you waiting for; the potential to increase your sales is slipping away and you missing out on this unique opportunity, one that your competitors are gaining with!  Let ClickBank drive your sales through the roof!

You can become a merchant and have a team of specialist affiliates marketing your products for you.