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Review Of ClickBank's Publisher Program(Review updated - February 2005)
Quick Summary
IntroductionClickBank is both a payment processor (allowing merchants to accept credit card payment for their products and services) and an affilate network (allowing web sites to earn commission by linking to merchants).In either case, checks (written in US dollars drawn on a US bank), are mailed up-to bi-weekly, two weeks after the corresponding pay period. A small percentage of your earnings are held as "reserve" which is paid later, in case customers are refunded, etc. We have received checks like clockwork, always on time, (and sometimes early!) from ClickBank for several years, and their customer service as always been prompt, helpful and polite. Joining As A "Publisher"(ClickBank's affiliate features are reviewed separately).Note: ClickBank publishers have access to all the affiliate features, but also get additional features described below. ClickBank's "publisher" (in the past it's been called "vendor") program allows you to accept credit cards for your products or services. ClickBank allows you to sell intangible (delivered over the web) products and services, like web site or ezine advertising, downloads, eBooks, etc. There is a modest one-time set up fee (at the time of writing $49.95 - but check their site). Additionally ClickBank charges per transaction ($1 + 7.5% at the of writing). At first sight, the cost of running a ClickBank account in this way may seem high compared to using your own merchant account, or perhaps compared to services like PayPal. The advantage of ClickBank over using a merchant account is that it's cheap to get started, that no credit checks are required, and affiliate tracking is included at no extra cost. Despite perhaps, at first sight, ClickBank's transaction fees appearing relatively large - they may still be cheaper than you think, when you factor in the costs of running an affiliate program - which ClickBank does for free. This is because, unless you're prepared to write the checks for affiliates yourself, buy affiliate management software, and recruit your own affiliates (ClickBank has about 100,000), you would otherwise have to join an affiliate network which itself usually itself comes with set-up charges and transaction fees. The advantage of ClickBank over PayPal and similar services is huge. Basically you get a much higher level of automation, affiliate tracking, and the ability to sell worldwide. In my opinion, PayPal is heavily tilted towards US customers only - as it is either not available, or can be difficult/time-consuming for customers to get a PayPal account if they are not a US resident. ClickBank's payment processing and affiliate system is relatively simply, but it's flexible enough for programmers to build all kinds of sophisticated scripted features on top of. If you look around, there are even many commercial (and some free) off-the-shelf scripts to do many common tasks. In my opinion, the only significant weakness of ClickBank is that they do not allow recurring billing (useful for private membership sites). If you need this, you will have to use an alternative service, like Verotel. ConclusionI have nothing but good things to say about ClickBank.Overall then, I highly recommend ClickBank, and choose them as an Editor's Choice. Click here to visit ClickBank. |
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