Need some friendly advice please about affiliate program.

Recently our site has started a new affiliate program. Basically it's a two tier program.

Member signs up to be able to use referral link. Basically you can sign up for free but you have to pay for an upgrade to receive your commission for your referrals. The idea behind this was that it will help keep all members stay active paying members for everyone's benefit involved.

Now the pay structure is simple. $30 for membership and affiliates receive 50% so that's $15. Also they would receive $5 for any member their referred members sign up.

The question at hand is. Is this a good system or has it been done before in adult dating? Should we just allow all members to promote but can not access the full site without upgrading. But this just makes it your typical adult dating affiliate program.

So many questions, with so little answer, any advice would be much appreciated.

I say let everyone promote, but if they want access to the full site they have to upgrade. It's never a bad thing to have mass people promoting. Now are they going to join and pay for a membership? Who knows, but they will be advertising.

I see your point zoney and was thinking the same thing. The thing about it is it is just another typical affiliate program and now I will be competing with the big dogs on affiliates. Two things are needed when going against the big dogs. Something they don't have to offer and that something must be worth while.

The idea behind all members must upgrade is simple. Think about it like this. If you decided to promote this website and became a member. After you start promoting and bring on other members you would realize that you need to keep paying your member fee meaning any and every member that joins and understands this will see why it is important. It is important because it encourages all members to stay a paying member in order to keep their commissions and it helps whoever refereed them. It's supposed to be benefitial to everyone.

Thanks a bunch for taking the time to reply, your advice is much appreciated and will definitely be considered. I am leaning towards changing it to a typical affiliate program and the benefit of for members promoting the site will be the two tiers that other adult dating sites do not offer. I don't know I am at a lost and do not want to keep changing the program after already promoting it one way. S o I need to make a firm decision here on what to do.

So this is like that "MCA" program where your affiliates join for $30. And everyone they get to join they get $15? If that's what you are doing, to get your affiliates up, you should make the first membership payment $15 or so. Or say for the first two months. That way it will be worth their time to sign up and advertise for you. As long as what you are bringing in for those two months covers your hosting and other fees, you're good. Now after those two months, membership payments back up to $30, all those members who have already joined and been paid will keep paying, and keep advertising. Thus keeping you paid, keeping them paid, and keeping everything smooth. After enough time and enough promo deals, you'll be up there with the big dogs.

Well, you got the right idea. Basically it's $30 for membership for anyone. After you have joined you now can promote and receive commission. You will receive 50% of the $30 so that's $15. And for anyone of your referred > refereed members you get $5 of the profit. So it's 2 levels deep and unlimited in width.

Your words are very encouraging I must say because I sure am having my doubts and am becoming indecisive. My idea was to do a promotion where for the first 3-4 months upgraded memberships are free but it looked desperate and it makes the product look not worth while.

I guess what we both are thinking is there is a need of some type of promotion to help get things going. I had that idea and was indecisive there as well. I need to come up with a game plan and stick with it. So that is why I am here asking for peoples advice.

Once I get the right advice I think I will know what to do.

Yeah don't make it free. Just have a nice 50% off banner or something to show it. You can buy mass tweets on twitter from fiverr promoting your site. That's a good way to get people, or any social network for that matter. Once people start making money, the ball will be rolling. This isn't some cam site where people are just trying to make good lines for people to fall for, this is people actually earning money just like the people they refer will be. So they can REALLY promote, and really stand behind it because not only is it paying them, it is probably paying a lot of people they know. Soon as everyone really sees it's not some scam, that people and their friends are actually being paid they will sign up as well.

Ya see, you got the idea. That's exactly what I was thinking. There is a true product in place, it's not just some illegal pyramid scheme. There is a mission to the project and all that good stuff.

So in the end if you don't mind me asking. Do you honestly think it can work? I would like to show you the site so you could have a better idea of where I am going with this. But the site is an adult dating site. I use boonex software for it. It has anything and everything any other social network has to offer. The difference is the mission behind it. The motto is, 'our members get laid and our members get paid'.

I am just losing hope to fast I guess. I am having all these doubts about it not working and no one will want to pay to be able to advertise / promote. I guess I just need some encouragement and I guess after I get my first sale that will help boost my motivation to keep going. Once again I really do appreciate your advice. Even if I don't agree or can't understand you, I just want you to know your advice helps me a bunch. Thanks again and any more advice would be much appreciated as well.

At this point you have encouraged me to keep with the original idea and not to give up on it. I still just have my doubts about it working the way it should though.

What do you mean even if you can't understand me? I'm speaking properly. And I'd like to see the site as well, to see what's up with it. The thing about it to me is, its hard enough to find horny people to sign up for anything with a credit card. But even harder to get them to sign up with a credit card, then promote for you. The niche could become a problem, because say you get a guy name "Dave" to sign up. alright so Dave signed up, and wants to promote, but does he want to tell all his family and friends he signed up for a site to get "laid"? Dave isn't going to post "yo i just signed up for this dating site and I'm really gettin laid! come check this out".

Basically what I'm saying is you should make it a more marketable niche to ALL audiences, not just adults. Cause even adults don't want all their close friends and family to know they signed up for a dating porn website and also paid $30.

I didn't say I do not understand you, I think you missed the point to that statement but that's neither here or there. I do see what you're saying and your points about the niche. The idea is that it be only adults involved. All you have to do is search google for adult dating for me and you will see my site. There is still work in progress. Once again it's not that I do not understand the point is if I do not understand you and am confused about something I appreciate your help. Honestly I had to look up what MCA was and there I was lacking understanding but that was an easy fix.

I am a guy and I got into Mary Kay once but had no intention using the products. This will be anywhere and everywhere. When it comes to business you can't worry about what your friends and family are going to think of you so I am not worried about how people feel about that. As long as they know what they want is what is important. If you look at my homepage there is not a bunch of porno graphic images, as a matter of fact you can not access any type of porno graphic material on my site without paying for a membership and even then there is no promise of porn. To put it simple, it is an adult site for adults. Just because something is adult dating for adults does not mean it has to be filled with porno. People get that idea twisted.

It's just adult orientated and could possibly contain adult material, so only adults allowed, it's the law... I am not selling porno or anything like that...

I wasn't talking about Mary Kay, I was talking about "Motorcycle Club of America". A site similar to yours. YOU don't have to care what people think of the site, but your MEMBERS don't want their family and friends thinking they are some pervert. And who do you think they will be trying to get involved? You think the average person is going to hit Fiverr and get massive blasts, or do SEO works, email marketing? They will be targeting their family and friends. So yeah you might not think that it matters, and yes you only want to target adults; but you can't expect it to work out if your members don't want to advertise to the people who they can convince the most.

See this is where the lack of understanding comes in at. My goodness where do we start here. Ii now you were not talking about MK lol Which is why I say what I say when I say it. I used MK for example about not caring if people thought of me as a fag or whatever they might think of me as after deciding to join MK. Basically all I am saying about that is simple. If you are going to worry about what people think about you or your business it might be a good idea not to get into business with them. On the other hand I do not want members that just plan on telling mom and dad. I want members that are willing to tell anyone they think has the potential to get into the business for what it is for. I want 2 type of members. Members who use the site for what it is. I would hope every member falls into that cat. The other type of member will be the one in it for just the money and as we all know people who get into something for the money don't just stop at moms and pops door asking them to join. No they get out and promote. They are willing to pay for their ads. This kind of member is who I want. So ya if you just plan on telling a few people and the system work for you, you already got the wrong idea. I want members who are in it for the long run and are willing to go out and promote. That's the point.

Yeah welp, good luck on that venture. I'm sure you'll find out that the adult niche for a tier 2 program isn't the way to do it. Keep us updated.

Will do, thanks again for all your help, I will take into consideration anything you have told me.