Offer A Bonus can be the difference between a good marketer and a great marketer (part 1)

A bonus is anything that you give away for free to entice people to perform an action on your website. This may include a purchase, or an exchange for their contact information. Regardless, offering a bonus will increase conversions and customer interest.

Bonuses are everywhere you look and are used by many of the most successful businesses. Look
at a furniture store offer : "Buy a couch and get a big screen TV for Free!" Although they will be losing money by offering a free TV, they will make up for this and more for two reasons . First of all, they will sell more couches.  Higher volume sales will equal greater revenue. Secondly, they do not have to put the couch on sale in order to complete the sale. The furniture company is getting full price for the couch which is marked up anywhere from 100-200%

This is an example of a bonus that is a great match to the product being sold and at the end
of the day the bonus TV increased the number of couches that were sold. It also sends your
customers away feeling more satisfied with their purchase.

An online bonus is much easier to offer than a TV as this the age of "digital information". Instead of giving something away with a tangible value (like a TV), we can give people information or software that will add value to their purchase. This is the easiest and most effective way Internet marketers increase their sale conversions.

A bonus is one of the most powerful tools online. There are many 'smart' marketers that make
a fortune giving away bonuses.

Offering a Software Bonus

People tend to see a lot more value in a piece of software or a widget than they do in formation.
We are going to show you how to offer a software bonus without having to program a single line of 
code or spend a dime of your own money. There are thousands of pre-built applications ready for you to give away.

If you are not already familiar with download.com, you should take a second and familiarize
yourself with this site. It is a godsend for finding software that you can give away as bonuses.

Say you wanted to offer a bonus with the MP3 Players that you are selling on your website 
or promoting as an affiliate . There are several free tools at download.com that people can
get access to help them with music donwloads and organization . You could download them to your server and give them away as a bonus if someone purchases through your affiliate link or website.

You can also include free trials in you bonus to relevant companies with affiliate programs
that would offer a free trial. An example of this would be real.com or iTunes.com. These sites offer a pretty good commission to affiliates that offer a free trial, and this can quickly add an additional revenue stream.