In this post I’m going to discuss Viglink, which is a really cool service for affiliate marketing.
In particular if you live in the USA and have been affected by the laws in some states such as California and Colorado, stopping people from doing affiliate marketing, then you want to read this post as it provides a solution for you.
What is Viglink?
Before I explain, I first need to give credit to Sara Young, who recently explained Viglink to me on a webinar I did with her this week, you can check out the replay for that here: Webinar.
Viglink is a service that makes becoming an affiliate for 100’s if not 1000’s of merchants a lot easier. There are two very obvious advantages of using this service.
The first one is that if you live in a state in the USA which has that annoying affiliate tax law, then you can still be an affiliate if you join via Viglink, because technically Viglink is the affiliate and not you, even for places like Amazon.
A lot of people I know who live in California find it really annoying that they can’t be affiilates for as many places because of this law, and if you fall into that category 
then perhaps Viglink is for you also.
The other major advantage is that getting accepted to be an affiliate by merchants with Viglink is easy, as once again Viglink is the affiliate getting approved.
What this means is that if you’re new to affiliate marketing and have problems getting accepted by merhcants to promote their products, then you can get around this and get automatically approved by joining via Viglink.
For example, if you join up at Commission Junction, what you have to do is apply to each individual merchant in that network, and often times merchants reject applications, if the applicant is not experienced, or perhaps doesn’t live in the USA, which can be really annoying! However Viglink solves this problem.
Tracking
Viglink provides powerful tracking aswell, which means you can track all your affiliate activity from one central hub, which I can see the benefit of. Speaking from experience, being an affiliate for dozens of places can get a little messy.
Viglink provides access to over 12,500 merchants across 20 different networks, so you should have no problem finding something to promote as an affiliate. The service is very straight forward to use too, you just paste in the codes on your Worpdress blog posts or whatever sites you have and off you go.
Ofcourse Viglin does make money from their service, and although free to join, they get a small slice of your affiliate commission per sale.
So if you want an easier way to get accepted as an affiliate or a way to get around a tax law issue in your state, or maybe just want a central hub to track all your affiliate activity, then perhaps check out Viglink.
Related articles
There has been a new ruling that people in california etc. can now be an affiliate directly with amazon again. Just read the information on amazon.com last night.
Regards
Noel Reply:
October 8th, 2011 at 6:49 am
It’s true. I just had my amazon affiliate account re-instated. 🙂
Zoie Reply:
October 8th, 2011 at 7:46 am
I believe that is for 2012 only. Then things will be looked at again. I could be wrong on that… only scanned the article.
I live in North Carolina, one of the many states which Amazon doesn’t allow affiliates in. So what happens in California doesn’t impact us, in which case “Viglink” could be a godsend. I also thought about getting a mail forwarding address in say, Oregon, to get around this “Amazon thing”. Don’t know if that would work or not. But now there’s “Viglink”.
songe Reply:
October 8th, 2011 at 7:50 am
Well,I read that too.they simply cannot do away with affiliates.How would you like a load of salespeople working for you -NOT on a salary but on performance.every business loves that.
When will that affect people in the whole world Matt? You think this will be true with CPA networks? If so, its will be better, way better…..
Because in my case have been having problems getting confirmed. I am not from the US you know. Things are different here…
Would love to here more about this…
Matt I must say that you are the first one to let me know about this. This helps a lot. Almost all of my clients are from the US. I’ll have some more research done on this.
Then, I’ll send it to all of my clients as well, to let them know of this good news….
Thanks Matt.
thanks for the share matt,will try it !
I checked out Viglink but decided to use Skimlinks instead.
There is Viglink and Skimlink that do the same thing. Viglink will make you sign papers that you will give 30% of your income for USA taxes – that’s if you are NOT a usa citizen.
If you don’t live in the USA – go check out Skimlink.
Matt – how big is the slice?
“they get a small slice of your affiliate commission per sale.”
nata Reply:
October 9th, 2011 at 12:06 pm
Hi Alex, it takes 25% of your commision. check this http://www.viglink.com/support/faq
I’ve seen people mention this on the warrior forum after Amazon dumped its California affiliates.
I never really thought it would have any use to me, but if it can be used to consolidate things and make life easier it might be worth a look.
I saw this mentioned on the warrior forum by California affiliates that got dumped by Amazon, but never knew what the service was about.
It seems like it would make life easier, as long as they don’t take too much money per sale.
Taken from Viglink site.
Automatic spam control
Spam control inspired by Google AdSense: Proprietary and patent-pending software performs real-time analysis, examining factors like pagerank of linked sites, sandboxed code execution and traffic distribution. If a site doesn’t meet your standards VigLink simply turns off link affiliation.
It does look like, from the paragraph above, the Merchants do have something to say about your site.
Thanks for sharing this . But I’m wondering: what’s in it for VigLink? I mean, do they take a piece of my commission, like 10%, so that I end up with only 90% of the commission? Like they say, something’s better than nothing, which is what I’d have if I couldn’t get approved without VigLink. Just curious.
Richard
This is great! I watched your latest webinar and heard about this. I was actually planning to apply on their site. I really have to do this! Thanks a lot for this great information!
Matt, as Sara Young mentioned it on the Webinar replay,
I was across there in a flash. An amazing service and for
a small percentage of affiliate commission. Another gem
I have found in amongst your work.
Thankyou for giving me the know how, ideas and constant
encouragement through the informative emails and webinars
Matt on behalf of myself and all my future clients – thankyou
Rob Lawson
Thanks for the information Matt. Very informative. Have several websites that I have wanted to add physical product to the product mix that I was offering.
Thanks again,
Margene Smith
Hi Matt, another great article. For California Amazon affiliates, the issues that lead to Amazon’s departure have been resolved and CA residents are again able to join as Amazon associates. Residents in several other states, like Colorado and Rhode Island are not so lucky, and this is where a service like Viglink can be valuable, even if they are taking a small piece of the commission.
Great information as usual Matt – gday to you mate I hope all is good, still using your AM theme and it works great
Thanks again
John Robbins
Thanks for the Webinar, it was great. I looked at this after the Webinar, because funnily enough I was just considering another service skimlinks.com and I’m in process of signing up with them.
Have you compared the two of them? I’m wondering how they evaluate the commission a merchant will pay, because it occurred to me that one could end up with more money than setting up each merchant account oneself.
An example of this is Amazon in the UK, they pay a 5% starting commission which increases to 9% for 30,001+ items per month. As the account will be held by Skimlinks, I’d presume they might well qualify for the maximum 9% commission, which would leave 6.75% for me after Skimlinks take their 25% commission. I’d have to sell over 400 units per month to get 6.5% from Amazon, over 1000 to get 7%.
I’m going to take a closer look at how these 2 companies work, because it does look interesting. I think VigLink may have better analytics, but I’m sure there will be all kinds of differences between them.
The thought of not having to set up separate affiliate accounts is very appealing – I haven’t set up Amazon in the US yet, just because it’s not that straightforward if you’re not in the US.
Thanks Matt, I am from Colorado and have been affected with this tax law. You have great advice as always!
I was on training the other day with Sara, she really knows her stuff! Great job
What do you think of Skimlinks.org? Is it comparable to VigLinks?
Hey Matt,
I was looking into this earlier today because I heard Sara mention it on the webinar and it sounded quite interesting.
I only hesitate because of the 25% cut that they take from our commissions.
Does that seem expensive in your opinion?
Don
Wow, you’re so helpful, Matt! This is an awesome affiliate marketing loophole for US sellers!
HI Matt thanks for sharing and the webinar with Sara Young,was great I hope she opens the door again sooner or later .
Hey Matt,
Thanks for the info and the great Webinar you had with Sarah Young. It was awesome :-).
I joined VigLink the night that Sarah mentioned it on her Webinar, but haven’t put it to the “use” test yet.
It seems to work something like adsense, but not sure. If you could provide more info on how it works and/or how to use it, I’d be ever so grateful.
Hi Matt
Viglink is a US based company I think. If those from the UK want a similar service but get paid out in GBP then a company called Skimlinks operates a similar service from the UK.
Regards
Tony
Hi Matt. I heard about this in the webinar you mention. After the webinar I went and signed up with Viglink. It a very easy and simple process. Nice of you to share this with everybody.
Thanks Matt. I’ve been to Viglink and signed up. But, honestly after spending about an hour on the site, reading all there’s to read about the program, I just don’t get. Yes, I understand the concept, but as to how it works with your affiliate links, I have a problem getting it.
Any help? Thanks.
Matt,
This is incredibly helpful as I live in Illinois and was cancelled by Amazon when Governor Pat Quinn(occhio) signed the amazon tax law.
Thanks thanks and thanks again my friend. If you ever come to Chicago, I owe you a pizza!
Chas
Awesome stuff about affiliate marketing
You actually placed right stuff on the table.
I hope more users will get the information that i receive from you.
I can’t wait to read much more, maintain me coming!
Hi Matt
Thanks again for another great webinar. I have enrolled and looking forward to it. Just a quick note for those that are going to install Viglink. There is a free WP plugin for it and all you need to do is put in your API Key. Its extememly easy to sign up to. Again Matt thanks for all the great info you provide
Cheers
Linda
Yes, Sara Young methods are good. Setting up an affiliate site is the easy part but SEO n Backlinking is very tedious n takes a lot of time. Can you provide the SEO n backlinking part on Sara’s webinar? Meaning, providing guidance till site gets to google page 1.
Hello Matt… thanks for this post… It wil help me in internet marketing.
Matt, thanks for the post. I’ve also followed the webinar with Sara on the day. I am already an affiliate of quite a few networks which are also a part of Vigilink. Wonder if it would be wise to rejoin the networks through Vigilink again. Let me know because I am very new to the IM world. Thanks once again for bringing it up.
Thanks Matt, once again I have learned something new from you. I had never heard of Viglink before, and reading the comments I have learned even more.
Always a pleasure hearing from you.
Thanks Matt for organizing the webinar with Sarah Young. I am one of the people who have bought her course. Looking forward to it.
I can see the value in the service you are talking about here. Sometimes there would be certain products that people only buy from certain places.
If a product is mostly being bought from a particular online store then even if there is a small cost, it could be worth it.
I am looking forward to seeing the context that Sarah Young recommends VigLink.
Thanks for passing this information along. I live in North Carolina and have been doing some temporary work arounds. Im going to give this site a shot and see if I can have some success without all the hassl!
Hi Matt,
This definitely looks interesting. As a resident of the US, it’s always a bit anxiety-inducing when some state like California decides they’re going to make affiliate marketing harder.
I’ll definitely look into this one 🙂
Great info! Frankly I have not heard of VigLink before but only the name sounds great. I believe the services will be superb.
Regards,
Francis
Thanks Matt for the great info as always. I have been using Skimlinks for about a year now and its been great for me. I checked out and setup an account for Viglink and may try it on one of my other websites soon.
Matt, do you have an affiliate program in place for this product you’r launching on Oct 25th.
Tried to leave a comment on the appropriate page, but wouldn’t work.
“I hope this SEO tip helped. Very soon I’m launching my concise and very indepth SEO training product, where you can learn everything fine detail about how I do my SEO, so you can replicate my systems, which includes the exact methods I use for getting this 80% indexing rate. The launch date is Oct 25th, stay tuned”
Matt Carter Reply:
October 20th, 2011 at 12:06 pm
please email me about this
Matt
Thanks for this I needed this content!