While some affiliate programs claim that you need virtually no technical Web skills to succeed, the truth is that learning at least a bit about creating websites will help you become a better affiliate. However, if you just don’t have the time or energy to learn how to create websites yourself, there are many creative developers available to create a complete site at a reasonable price.

The availability of HTML tutorials, free Web templates, open source Web publishing, and freelance Web developers make it no problem finding a website development solution to meet your requirements.

The benefits of Learning to Create Websites

Quite possibly if you don’t intend on becoming a web designer, understanding the fundamentals of website development can help you in all aspects of planning, creating and maintaining your affiliate website. Fortunately, learning basic HTML is a fairly easy and quick process. Start by searching for basic tutorials for newbies or find a book targeted exclusively at newcomers. Learn a few of the basic HTML tags and important components of website development.

So why is studying ways to produce websites essential for affiliate marketers? The following are just a few of some great benefits of knowing at least a small amount about website creation, structure, and upkeep.

In case you intend to hire a freelance Web developer to design your site, learning this basic information can assist you appreciate how an excellent website is made. You will be better able to plan your website’s structure, content, and features.

Being familiar with several of the basic HTML tags will help you carry out some of the basic maintenance on your site. The main element to becoming a successful affiliate is always to provide unique content that is updated regularly. Having to pay a freelance Web developer each and every time you would like to put in a new article or update an affiliate link costs too much for most small affiliate businesses. Learning the best way to undertake these essential tasks could save you a great deal of money.

By gaining good experience of the way in which to produce a website, you’ll be much better equipped to compete with many other affiliate websites. Once you’ve discovered the basics of website creation, start adding useful features like blogs, RSS feeds, and other interesting features which help promote your website and draw in new customers.

The main advantages of Hiring an outside Developer

Although creating your own website may be best, it’s not always possible. If you plan to utilize advanced features such as Web databases, content management systems, or Flash animation, hiring a expert is generally the most beneficial option. Rather than risk losing players as a result of technical problems or poorly designed features, specialist designers can ensure that your website looks great and operates properly.

When is it crucial that you retain the services of a professional to do your website development?

The following are just some of the reasons and potential benefits of having a third party develop and create your affiliate website.

Professional developers have the design and technical skills needed for complex projects. If you plan on having specialized features that are far beyond the scope of your basic website skills, it is usually best to hire a professional to get the job done. Despite the expense, the money you will save in time, energy, and effectiveness will be worthwhile over time.

Professional designers can offer suggestions, tips, and know-how you could not otherwise access. Most website developers have had considerable experience and are well aware of what works and what does not. This advice can be especially beneficial to you if you are new to the world of affiliate marketing.

Best Choice for Website Development

Fortunately in the Poker World, there is a company which handles all the technical side for you, letting you concentrate on your niche, and pursue your marketing channels. Rakeback Engine, is the leading provider of White Label Rakeback Solutions & Websites, with over 500 partner sites world wide.

Ten Top reasons why so many Poker Affiliates prefer to use Rakeback Engine, as their rakeback solution provider:

1 No hassles. No upfront costs.

While the rakeback engine is the backbone of our services, in order to maintain a running operation, there is need for additional services. Our complete rakeback customer management package ensures our rakeback affiliates can operate an efficient and successful enterprise. Rakeback Engine provides unique tools and rakeback solutions for affiliate marketers, whether you have an existing rakeback customer base via an established website, or you’re still just thinking about getting into rakeback.

2 On-demand revenue cashouts.

It’s easier than ever to become a rakeback manager, especially when you make the decision to utilize or advanced system and instantly establish and/or improve the level of rakeback customer relationship management you can provide your customers. With our toolbox and branded rakeback engine skin, you can develop your business through us, letting Rakeback Engine handle the technical points, so ultimately you have more time to pay attention to building your customer base and driving more rakeback players to your site. By letting us offer you a tailor-made frontend rakeback management system, you are allowing us to take care of everything for you, from technical support and content development assistance to tracking accounts and rakeback payments.

3 Range Top Deals with the Leading Online poker rooms

Your site will offer rakeback and bonus deals with all the leading online poker rooms around the world. We have identified the leading networks and negotiated the perfect affiliate percentages which, in turn, allows you to offer your players top level returns and provides you with excellent profits. Also, we never stand still and rest on our laurels: we actively pursue new deals and integrate them into Rakeback Engine when successful.

4 Automated Accounting

Rakeback Engine accurately records and reports all the rakeback that your players earn. Better still, it adds up all the rakeback that your players have entitlement to cash out at any one time by displaying a current balance, even if a player earned the rakeback through a variety of rooms in the same month. This allows you and your players to keep track of money owed and money paid out to players.

5 Owned and Run by Poker Experts

Rakeback Engine was designed and developed by IT experts with years of experience as players and organisers in both the live and online poker community. Due to this, we understand what regular players expect and demand from online poker rooms in addition to websites providing rakeback. We also have many contacts throughout the industry that allows us to resolve any issues that may arise and work with them on future developments where the opportunity arises.

6 Fast and Responsive Service

Sick of emailing businesses and receiving a response two weeks later or, worse, no response at all? We know that internet users demand fast and immediate service so at Rakeback Engine, we rapidly respond to all queries, technical issues and concerns with friendliness, accuracy and professionlism.

7 Professional Design and Customisation Option

We provide you with several professionally made design choices and can upload your logo to the website’s header. If your website generates $5000 in rake or you are willing to pay upfront, we can provide you with a custom design. We consult with you during the custom design stages to ensure that your rakeback sites looks both professional and attractive to new sign ups. Furthermore, we can modify and update the design and colour schemes of your website upon request (within reason).

8 User-Friendliness

Rakeback Engine is not designed to be confusing for yourself or your customers. It is made to be as logical and user-friendly as we could possibly make it. Details instructions are provided where required and simplicity is chosen over fancy gimmicks and overly-complicated processes to make it easy for everyone concerned.

9 Integration of your Affiliate Deals

If you come to us with your own existing affiliate deal and there is some substantial action going through this deal or the deal is exceptionally high, we are happy to integrate the deal into your website, which includes providing regular statistics to you and your players. We take half the normal commission of an external deals in substitution for the integration, but at the same time, it enables you to provide a one-stop-shop for all your existing rakeback customers.

10 Free Additional Services and Tools

Want email accounts under your domain? How about mailouts to all your players to promote your deals? Our competitors will often apply additional charges for services and tools like these. However, we provide reasonable use of them free of charge. Our view is that our success depends upon your success and therefore, we are happy to provide you with the necessary essentials to help you along without lumping you with small hidden charges.

So what are you waiting for! Visit Rakeback Engine now and get your rakeback website up and making money!

Today, we will show you how to leverage the power of your RSS feeds.

What If I told you could get 100 deep backlinks from an authority site from the click of a button ? Every link is “dofollow” and the anchor texts are the post titles?

When people look at their feeds they think of syndication only. But RSS can be a source of great backlinks too. You can submit your feeds to RSS directories such as RSSmountain, Feedsee.com and receive quality backlinks for free.

Some misconceptions about RSS:

* getting RSS links is spammy : The most popular sites on the internet have thousands of RSS links. There are some very trusted RSS directories that get indexed by Google in seconds.

* the SEO value is not worth it: RSS can potentially give you deep backlinks from authority sites, some of which have very high PR and are dofollow. The SEO value is underated.

Also, a lot of these sites will also make your RSS feeds rank. Sometimes rss2.com feeds rank higher than the actual post ! So you get more than just SEO value. Finding the nofollow directories can be tricky though.

We will go over the nuts and bots of submitting customized rss feeds using WordPress. We will also teach you how to leverage RSS scrapers to get automatic backlinks when you post.

Future posts will discuss creating software to get backlinks, spinning content for optimal article marketing, discovering links you never knew you had, donating to open source for links, and a lot more. You can’t only use RSS of course, you need a balanced approach.

PS: here is a poker industry news, imagine the number of links they get when the url is submitted an authority site !

People take difficulty as a sign to move on. They give up because there is “something wrong and not enough” : Maybe their idea wasn’t so great after all, they don’t have enough visitors, they don’t convert.. In general, people use difficulty as a means to justify quitting. The result can be giving up on promising projects or quitting affiliating altogether.

But you give up a lot by quitting.

Every time you conceptualize a website idea, you fill your cup
Every time you create that website, you fill your cup
Every time you write content, you fill your cup
Every time you get backlinks, you fill your cup
Every time you read Poker Affiliate forums, you fill your cup

Don’t spill everything and quit at the first signs of difficulty.

You think you are owed something right away for filling your cup. Because you have no short term results, you think you’re not good enough and that it’s just not worth it.

But in this field you need the confidence and will power to keep filling your cup when the results aren’t there. Perseverance is key like everything else in life.

My advice is to keep your cup full no mater the short term results, what people tell you, and outer circumstances. Stick to the plan and you will have given yourself the best chance to succeed.

I’m not the smartest guy in the world, but my perseverance alone has allowed me to achieve some great goals. I went from rural France to receiving a Masters from Caltech, working for a start-up in California, getting acquired, and now being a project manager.

My next goal is to be a super affiliate one day, no matter how long it takes. The formula I will use to get there is the following: networking, persevering, and listening to better affiliates.

I’m not about to give up and you shouldn’t too.

Affiliating is about having control over our visitors and their actions to accomplish a goal. How do we gain control over our visitors ? The list below covers this process. I will explain every point, including “keyword equity”.

1/ Drive targeted traffic using keywords that have high equity
2/ Use this narrow keyword range to understand visitor intent
3/ Help visitors accomplish an action based on this information

[point 1] When I started in this field, my goal was to increase traffic by any means. When you rank for tons of random long tails it’s hard to understand visitor intent. Ranking for stuff like “durrrr” gives you absolutely no control over your visitors.

[point 2] Focusing on a narrower keyword range like “play at easy poker sites” allows you to define visitor intent. Now “how to play pocket aces” also defines visitor intent very well. But two sites focused on only one of these will have widely varying results.

[Keyword Equity] This is were keyword equity comes in. Some keywords are worth a lot more than others. I remember someone  creating a site focused on starting hands in poker. He had a domain that included “hands of poker” and was excited to rank for tons of related long tails. But his results were disappointing. Although he could easily understand visitor intent, his keyword equity was low. Examples of long tails with very high equity would be “full tilt poker real money”.

[point 3] At point 3 you understand why your visitors came to your site. You carefully selected a narrow range of keywords with high equity. The result is that the actions they are trying to accomplish will be profitable. They may have typed in “rakeback percentages comparison”. Your next step will be to connect the dots for them, basically write content to convert them from a visitor to a customer. The work you did at points 1 and 2 will help you convert a lot better.

People often say to beginners to pick a niche like Omaha high lo and focus all their efforts on it because there is less competition. I think this is bad advice. The results speak for themselves, 90 % of affiliates never make it.

Basically these people are all excited about the prospect of affiliating. They write tons of content on Omaha and drive traffic. But then they give up because “Omaha high lo strategy” has very low keyword equity.

For a beginner I would recommend this: focus on something like ” poker sites that accept Walgreen debit cards”. If you do this, you automatically pass steps 1 and 2 and NONE of your efforts will be wasted. You won’t need to write strategy stuff that will never convert and be embarrassed by your results.