How to Protect ClickBank Products from Online Theft

One of the biggest problems faced by ClickBank merchants is the expose of content theft – public downloading their digital products lacking paying for them.

To gain illicit access to downloadable product files, single-minded content thieves exploit a range of security weaknesses, all of which can be eliminated if the correct protective measures are applied. Here, we will look by solely lone area of vulnerability and a simple precaution with the intention of one ClickBank commercial can use to protect against it.

Most ClickBank merchants understand with the intention of here must never be links to downloadable product files and thank-you pages from the other pages on their website. The single way to access a product file must be via its thank-you page, which similarly must be accessible single via the ClickBank payment process. Observance of these unadorned guidelines will ensure with the intention of here is thumbs down way to navigate frankly to your downloadable content.

This deal with furthermore ensures with the intention of the thank-you page will not be indexed by search engine spiders, which is essential, as nothing may possibly be more harmful to product security than a thank-you page with a #1 Google ranking!

However, we must not overlook the risk with the intention of your thank-you page and product file URLs could be distributed in underground newsgroups and forums. While this could not necessarily lead to an immediate avalanche of illicit downloads, the expose exists with the intention of the forum posting will eventually be indexed by a search engine and with the intention of this will provide an indirect route by which the thank-you leaf itself becomes indexed.

Astonishingly, the solution proposed by approximately so-called web security experts is to list your thank-you pages in your web server’s robots.Txt file – a configuration file with the intention of informs search engines which pages must be excluded from indexing.

It’s real that this deal with ordinarily prevents indexing of the thank-you pages. But it creates an even greater weakness – it provides one would-be hacker with straightforward access to the exact names and locations of all your supposedly hidden files.

It cannot be over-emphasized – never list your product files or delivery pages in your web server’s robots.Txt file! To explicitly bring to a standstill a thank-you page being indexed by spiders, use the following Meta tag in the element of each thank-you page:

&ltmeta name=”robots” content=”noindex, nofollow” />

Although a search engine could discover your thank-you pages by approximately indirect route, it will silently ignore one page with the intention of contains the above Meta tag.

Of course, this is just lone of several vulnerabilities with the intention of expose your downloadable products to the risks of theft. Inside chapter 21 of “ClickBank – The Definitive Guide”, I examine the total gamut of techniques with the intention of online thieves aid to steal your merchandise and I explain several of the generally effectual ways in which this problem can be tackled.

Price for ClickBank Products for Maximum Profit

Choosing the right price for your digital products is lone of the generally critical, yet difficult, aspects of your business strategy.

Most merchants understand with the intention of over-valuing a manufactured goods kills sales. It is furthermore positively well understood with the intention of under-pricing cuts the element revenue lacking one promise of a significant gain in sales volume. But hardly any public are aware of a third (but equally important) pricing observation; with the intention of compromise pricing can be as risky as either of the other two blunders.

To understand why this is the case, we need to examine the doctrine that lie behind effectual pricing strategy. In general, merchants adopt one of two key philosophies as they price a product. They either fit the price by a low level (which produces a low margin but high sales volume), or they point out a high price level (which trades rancid volume in order to gain margin).

These two approaches are known correspondingly as “penetration pricing” and “pricing for profit.” The former strategy is typically used by new competitors in a market, or by existing retailers that need to quickly set up a position of dominance after a product launch. The latter technique is favored by established businesses with mature products, everywhere the objective is to earn the maximum profit yield from an existing dominant market position.

It is clear that, whether the strategy is to price low or distinguished, going too far in either direction can be self-defeating. But mid-way pricing is equally ineffective, as it compromises both strategies; it unnecessarily discounts the product lacking responsibility so satisfactorily to generate a noteworthy enhancement in volume.

Equally a publisher of digital merchandise, you are by a evident benefit over traditional merchants, since here are no marginal costs associated with your business. Regardless of how low you choose to price your product, you are still guaranteed to trade show a gross profit on each deal. In contrast, a merchant of physical goods has real fulfillment costs (product manufacturing, damaged and unsold inventory, storage space, shipping and handling) that impose a fixed lower price limit not more than which all deal represents a loss. This benefit affords you splendid flexibility in your pricing, but even if you aid this flexibility to pursue a penetration pricing strategy, you should still be aware of the expose of counter-productive price-cutting.

Some ClickBank merchants use an experimental deal with to pricing. Their aim is to set up the most profitable price through trial an error. Although this is understandable, even logical, it can be a customer-relations nightmare. You must think carefully previous to over-pricing a product and subsequently being mandatory to reduce the price in order to stimulate demand. Nobody likes to return to a website and see that a product they already purchased is currently being existing by a decrease fee.

The opposite deal with is to steadily boost prices from a low level, and is usually less of a cause for interest. Some merchants launch their products with a with intent low introductory price – a benefit that they emphasize in their sales pitch. The time-limited, or volume-limited, nature of this technique can be a powerful incentive to buy, and it also allows the commercial a trial cycle in which to observe sales behavior previous to setting a definitive fee to come across his longer-term strategic objectives.

clickbank Link cloaking

The basic hoplink is not ‘protected’. A customer can simply substitute his own nickname and get commission
for the purchase.
There are techniques and tools which can encrypt (or cloak) your hoplink to prevent link theft.

clickbank Getting traffic

You now want to get targetted visitors clicking on your hoplink and making a purchase.
A good affiliate program may provide useful promotional material.
The whole topic of getting traffic and advertising is beyond the scope of this guide

Promoting the product

Sign up for the affiliate program
Once you are happy that the affiliate program is worth promoting and does not suffer from potential ‘leaks’
you can collect your affiliate link, known as a hoplink.
It has the format http://xxxxxxxx.vendor-id.hop.clickbank.net where you substitute xxxxxxxx with your
nickname.
You should check the validity by clicking on it and following through to the ClickBank order page where you
should see [affiliate=yournickname] at the bottom.
If not then you may have incorrectly formatted your hoplink or it’s possible that the affiliate program has been
discontinued.

How to succeed with ClickBank

Finding the product
You can search for a product at the ClickBank Marketplace where several thousand vendors display their
products in an organized directory.
3.1.2 Is the product worth promoting ?
a) Look at the product price and commission rates
You should aim for products with a reasonable rate of commission, say 50%, to make your efforts worthwhile.
Be aware that ClickBank deducts transaction fees from a sale: here is a calculator
b) Is it an in-demand item ?
The Marketplace listings are ranked by popularity, so you can see which are the in-demand items. Popularity
is determined by a number of factors, the main being the amount of sales and the number of affiliates making
sales over the last 8 weeks. Note therefore that a product at the low end may still turn out to be popular
especially if it is new.
c) How effective is the sales page ?
Visit the sales page of the product to confirm that the sales copy does a good job of selling the product.
(There’s another important factor – sales page leaks – which we cover in the next section)
3.1.3 Check out the affiliate support
The vendor should provide you with much more than just a link to join the affiliate program. Check for any
useful promotional material (e.g. sample ads, articles, solo mailings, endorsement/reviews, signatures).
Ideally there will be an affiliate mailing list so that the vendor can convey useful news. You want someone
reliable who won’t disband a program or make rule changes without telling you.
Tip: Check how responsive the vendor is with a simple enquiry.

ClickBank basics

Before talking about ClickBank a brief explanation for anyone who is completely new to the world of Internet
marketing.
The most common – and simplest – way to make money on the Net is to become an ‘affiliate’ which means
you get paid commission for making sales of other people’s products. You leave the whole task of product
creation, web sales copy, order processing and customer support, to the vendor: your job is simply to get the
word out about the product.
You are given an affiliate link which leads the customer to the sales site and identifies you as the person who
gets credit if a sale is made.
One of the most popular affiliate programs is ClickBank.
They are in fact the world’s largest provider of digital products – essentially ebooks and software. You can
choose from over 30,000 products in many categories and their affiliate program is simple to join.
As a guide the average price of a ClickBank product is $41. The average commission rate is 55%, although
the top sellers often offer a much higher rate e.g 70% or 75% (the maximum).
We can say that success with ClickBank boils down to
– selecting a suitable product
– promoting (getting the word out) about the product