Weighing The Pros and Cons as an Affiliate — Information Products VS Physical Products

As an affiliate you have a lot of choices as to what type of products you can promote. I wanted to focus on two main types of products that have the most controversy in the topic of what sells better. So what does sell better Information products or Physical products?
 

That is a good question, and even a better one if you are an affiliate marketer who is wondering what to sell next or where to even start. In this report I am going to cover the pro’s and con’s of both information and physical products. 

Now I am not going to say that one is better than the other, as they both have their good factors and bad ones. I’ll stop my blabbing now and just get started with the information you are looking for.
 

Information Products Pros and Cons

Information products have a wide range of subject material and can reach audiences of all types. The main purpose of an information product is to do one thing and that is teach someone how to do something they don’t know how to do, in other words solve a problem. 

 

These types of products can be highly detailed in subject matter, and can provide simple step by step instructions on how to accomplish a given task.
 

There are many types of information products out there for example: how to books, recipe books, diet and exercise routines, and much more. The fact of the matter is these type of products contain detailed instructions and can provide a customer with exactly what they are looking for.
 

Pros

The biggest pro to information products is that they can be accessed immediately by download, unless the consumer purchased a physical book. They get right to the point and solve problems rather fast. Yes you have to look through the book to find answers, but all the answers will be inside most every information product out there related to the specific need that is being addressed.
 

There are no shipping costs, which dramatically reduces the price of the item right out of the gate. This is very appealing to a lot of consumers who don’t have much to spend, and are looking to do a particular project themselves.
 

These type of products are packed full of useful information, and can solve the consumers problem that night if they purchased a downloadable product. Conversions can be pretty high when targeting problem specific people, who need things done quickly at a cheap price. 

 

These type of people also are the do it yourself type, so after getting one project done they are ready to start another one, making them a great repeat buyer.
 

Cons

Sometimes there is so much information packed into one book that it causes information overload in the customer. This drives them to get frustrated and causes them to get stopped in their tracks. just a quick tip, when choosing a information product to promote make sure it is organized and easy to read.
 

The information can be unclear and hard to understand especially if there aren’t any pictures to go along with the writing. This can cause a consumer to stop doing it themselves and break down and hire someone, and then that puts the do it yourself information products out of business.
 

A downloaded version can be hard to access if the project that is being performed in outside away from their computer. Yes they can print these products, but it does take a lot of ink and paper to accomplish that. 

 

That is why when looking to promote an information product see if the product owner has the option of a printed version as well as the downloadable version, making it easier for the consumer to take with them.
 

Physical Products Pros and Cons

Physical products are well known and are usually associated with some type of brand. This instills trust in the consumer creating a sense of security when buying a product. Another factor to consider is where the product is being shipped from. 

 

Most consumers will look to Amazon when looking to buy physical products online, and they tend to keep their shipping costs low, but there are many physical product affiliate networks out there that may not be as trusted as Amazon so always keep that in mind.
 

Pros

These products are almost always very popular among consumers, and are very well known worldwide as well. Let’s take T.V.’s for example, everyone knows what flat screens are and they are very popular with a high price tag. They are made by trusted brands like Samsung and Toshiba so most of the selling is already done for you.
 

You can easily convince someone to purchase a physical product when it is popular, in demand, and sold from a trusted online store.
 

Cons

The biggest drawback to physical products is the shipping cost, and the fact it does take some time for their product to arrive. The only way you are going to make any real money as an affiliate selling physical products is by selling high price items. This in itself is a con, in that not a lot of people have all that much money to spend so your targeting has to be very precise.
 

Some consumers are a little wary of purchasing physical products online, especially high prices ones. They can’t touch it to make sure it works, and to really see the quality of the product. They have to wait for it to arrive in order to see if they made a good purchase or not.
 

As an affiliate your job is to convince them of trust and safety of the products they are looking to buy. The selling is already done through the brand name of the item’s you are selling. 

 

Convincing consumers to buy high price items online can be a chore, and the reason you have to be selling high priced items is that the commission percentages are pretty low like 4-5% to start out, so 10-60 dollar products are not going to bring in the revenue you are looking for. You need to be selling 500-1000 dollar products in order to make your effort worth it.
 

The Facts Of Both Physical and Information Products

So as you can see from above both types of products have their up’s and down’s. Information products are much easier to sell online, but can lead to more frustration within the customer than needed, when they try things on their own. 

 

Physical products already have trust built in with the brand name items you are selling, but the whole visual aspect of the product is taken away when selling online.
 

It is all in the targeting within your marketing plan that is going to get you the sales you are looking for. Since information products are usually on the cheaper side you are going to have to sell more to make good ROI. With physical products you have to focus on high ticket items or sell a ton of low priced items to make up for the small commission percentages provided by affiliate networks like 

 

Amazon.
 

In the end it is up to you to choose which product to sell online. They both can bring in good revenue, but need to be marketed differently. Find the do it yourself crowd and sell them the information products, and then find the crowd that has money to throw around and sell them on the physical products. That is the main difference in audience and reach. 

 

Physical products restrain you, more likely, to Your home country, as information products can be bought worldwide.
 

Get out there and start doing your market research and see where your potential buyers are for both types of products and then see how much it would cost you in advertising for each product. 

 

Testing is a big part of any marketing campaign so you might want to test both types and see which one brings you more ROI, or focus all your energy into one or the other.
 

Sometimes it is better to just focus on one thing at a time and when you master that move onto the next, another little hint for you. 

 

All in all as an affiliate there are a lot of products and niches to choose from in both information and physical products. Use your imagination mixed with raw facts to make your final decisions.

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