BeFree.com this week revealed that it
had been hired to create an affiliate program to boost traffic to About.com, and boasted that the program,
launched quietly two months ago, has already added 10,000 affiliates.
The affiliate program allows sites to link directly to About.com’s
topic-specific sites through text links, graphical banners, and search
boxes. Affiliates earn commisions when visitors click-through to About.com
content.
“We’ve engineered an affiliate program that works best for our unique
business model–allowing us to extend our brand reach and drive qualified
traffic to our hundreds of destination sites,” says John Caplan, senior
vice president of marketing for About.com.
“With an average click-through rate of five percent, and some as high as 13
percent, our affiliates can dramatically increase the amount of traffic to
our network and offer an even greater return on investment for our
advertisers and sponsors.”
Be Free helps companies set up their affiliate program and tracks
click-through and results. The company’s other clients include America Online, barnesandnoble.com, GoTo.com, Travelocity, Mercata, Reel.com, Cnet, Priceline and Yahoo!, and GeoCities.
