Affiliate Program FAQ

Affiliate Program FAQ

What are the advantages of joining the BDSM Store’s affiliate/partner program?

The primary advantage is that we are interested in each of our affiliates making money for themselves. Sure we hope to make money too, but we want you as an individual to make a nice profit. We worked hard to create a program that is unlike the other cookie cutter affiliate sites and different from anything else being offered in the industry. Our affiliate’s store sites are customized to match their main site(s), so that it helps promote our affiliates online endeavors. Because we customize the store to match your site, we have a lot invested in our affiliates success and it is important to us that they do well. Our customized approach also means you are not sending your visitor away to someone else’s site. When your visitor is done shopping, they are still at your site.

In addition, we are BDSM Oriented. We have been in this industry since 1999 and we have a lot of experience with what the BDSM shopper wants. We are recognized as one of the major internet retailers of BDSM gear, books, fetish apparel and soon videos. We don’t sell primarily dildos and vibrators with a few BDSM items thrown in. We don’t sell many novice type items either. Our product offering is the same items you see in many of the professional done images. We sell serious gear for serious enthusiasts. No fuzzy cuffs or Velcro restraints here.

Who is eligible to become a BDSM Store.com Affiliate/Partner?

Unfortunately, not everyone is eligible. First you must have an established site that specifically is a BDSM related site. Second it must have significant other content. Third, it must receive significant traffic. Membership sites that cater to the BDSM enthusiast are strongly encouraged to apply as well as BDSM informational sites, portal and alternative lifestyle matchmaker services. Personal sites would probably not be considered unless they meet the above criteria. Sites that promote unsafe conduct, bestiality, rape or child pornography will under no circumstance be approved.

How does the BDSM Store.com affiliate/partner program work?

Our affiliate/partner program is the most generous program offered to webmasters in the BDSM niche industry. It is also very easy to get started once your site(s) have been approved. Along with your approval, you will be contacted by one of our site designers. They will work with you to create a store design that closely matches your site. They will even use graphics provided by you to make the site as seamless as possible. Depending on the amount of customization need, your site will be ready to go with-in a few days. Once it is complete, all you have to do is provide a link from your site(s) to your store’s site. The store site we create for you is on our servers, but it is exclusive to you and you only. Therefore you can also have them include promotions to other areas of your site on the store site. We handle all site maintenance as well as updates and revised product offerings. In addition, because the store site is on our servers, all bandwidth cost are handled by us as well.

It’s not a quick as others, but we do an excellent job of creating a store site that will provide you with a significant revenue stream for a long time and encourage your customers to return again and again for their next purchase. Also, our criteria protects you by not making our affiliate program available to everyone and thereby diluting it. We want you to work hard to promote your store and therefore we feel responsible for protecting your efforts and ensuring that you make significant revenue.

What if I operate more than one BDSM oriented website?

We would like to be able to create you one site to use with all your websites, however if this just isn’t possible and the volume is sufficient to justify multiple store sites, we will create them. Monthly sales figures will then be based on a combined total for the various store sites and NOT on a per store site basis.

How much money will I make?

That's up to you! You may have thousands of visitors to your site every day. Many of these visitors will be looking for a place to buy the items they see and hear about. So why not take advantage of this opportunity to offer your customers what they want? Your ability to market your site and direct them to your store is the key to making significant money. The better your site and then promote the store site, the better you will do.

BDSM Store.com pays a commission of 20% on total monthly sales of less then $10,000.00. Sell over $10,000.00 in a given month, and the commission jumps to 25% on the total monthly sales. It’s not hard to sell $5000.00 worth of product in a given month, but the higher the sales, the more effort you are putting into it and we feel that you should get something greater for that harder work. Also, along with higher sales comes bigger volumes and more profit, therefore we can afford it. As a result, we pass some of the savings on to the shopper and some on to you. Shipping and handling charges are breakeven items and are not included as part of monthly sales, therefore commissions are not paid on these items.

When and how will my monthly commission be paid?

Monthly sales totals and checks are generated and mailed out on the 15th of every month and paid in US dollars. (This means that your sales totals for a given month will be paid on the 15th of the proceeding month). We will set the check up to be paid under the name you direct. However, before we can cut the check we must have a correct and qualified tax payer identification number for reporting purposes. At the end of the year we will issue to you and provide to the IRS a 1099 reporting the revenue paid. Under no circumstance will we in anyway not report these payments to the IRS. We are a law abiding business and will not risk prosecution for failing to follow the law. It should also be understood that you are independent from us and are in no way an employee of BDSM Store.com, its parent company or subsidiaries.

How can I track sales and commissions from my store?

Once you are accepted to the program and the store site is set up, you will receive a link to the stats section and a password. There you will be able to monitor your sales. You may also elect to have the designer set it up so that an e-mail is sent to you each time a person places an order so that you know how your sales are doing almost by the minute. If an order can not be processed because the charge is declined or refused, we attempt to contact the user and see if the problem can be resolved, but if it cannot, you will receive an e-mail stating that the order has been rejected. We will include the order number and customer name and it will be removed from the orders section of the stats page.

How may my customers pay for their orders?

Your customers can pay for their purchases using all major credit cards (including Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express) or sending in a money order to the address provided under the payments section of the store. Personal checks are not accepted as this delays the shipping process and would cause us to have to place a hold on the sales credit until after the check has cleared to ensure that the sale is legitimate and fraud free.

What name do you bill under?

Your customer’s privacy is very important to us. In order to protect that privacy we bill under the name of CY Worldwide, Inc. We do this because the name does not provide anyone with any identification of what it is your customer has purchased. Also all shipping is done under this same name AND IN PLAIN PACKAGING for the same reasons. Once it leaves our warehouse, no one will know what is inside until your customer opens there purchase.

Do you have banners I can use?

No, because this is intended to be seamless to your existing site and specifically for your visitors, we don't have any banners because then we would be promoting our site. Unlike some other affiliate programs, we want your customers to buy through you and if we made it blatantly known that your store is operated by us then there would be no reason for them to come back to buy from you. Just for this reason, our sales receipt isn't even on the BDSM Store.com letterhead. Hey you worked hard to get that customer and we think that you should keep him to yourself.

Once a customer buys through me, is he mine forever?

The answer to that is yes and no ! As long as the customer continues to buy through your store site, they are yours. But if for whatever reason they buy through another affiliate, then the commission on the sale goes to the other affiliate. Due to the vast audience that the internet makes available, we can not control who targets what customer, either by geographical area or any other preset definition. However it is very likely that a customer you win may have previously purchased through another affiliate and so we feel that it evens out over the long run.

Do all affiliates stores have the same prices?

Yes, we do not feel it is fair for different affiliates to have different prices. Also that would be quite an accounting headache for us to manage. However one affiliate did want to offer something special to it's paying monthly membership customers and so they elected to cut their commission to make up for the price reduction. In addition, to verify that it was only available to current paying members and not being made available to just any visitor, they agreed to make there membership files available to us for verification. Although this was something new we tried, it has not been much of a benefit to the sites operators as they have not gained new membership by offering this. Therefore, we can not recommend this approach.

Why wait an longer?

Why lose out on the extra revenue?

Why promote someone else's site?..... Apply Now !

If you have any questions, please send them to Dennis@bdsmstore

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