Internet Marketing Trip

If you are an affiliate, then building review websites is certainly something you already have heard about, and even been doing for some time. As I already mentioned sometimes here, I build my websites with WordPress. I have even created a little pack of rating stars you can download and use for your reviews on your sites.

But to make things easier, there are some plugins that you can just… plug in to WordPress that let your visitors rate posts or pages. Actually they rate a product or service, and write their review in the comment box. What does that mean ? Well the post to describe the product is written by you, with your affiliate link. But reviews are written for you, by users.

Of course you can write your own in the comments, maybe to have at least one review, if you have used the product yourself. In any case, your post would then only have to describe the product.

The plugins let you rate products on multiple criteria that you define yourself. There are 3 plugins you can use to do this. You should visit their respective site to decide which one is the best for you. There are 2 paid plugins and one free that I have to show you.

• WP Review Site : $97 for one site, $199 for multiple site. You can see how it looks on http://www.awardwinninghosts.com/, where web hosting companies are reviewed. You can define your affiliate links for the keywords, there’s also a widget you can use in the sidebar, so the products listed show the average rating.
• WFReview : $139 and you can install it on unlimited websites. It has more features than the other ones, just see the video on the home page and you’ll see all the things possible. You can automatically generate reviews for example, scrap directories to make automatic posts, define affiliate links for specific keywords…
• GD Star Rating : This is the free one. You are able to use multi rating, and there are also many graphic sets to download. So if you want to rate with hearts or thumbs up instead of stars, just download a set you like. I guess you can even design your own set to use the plugin. You can also add ratings for the comments. There is a widget you can use in the sidebar too. You’ll find tutorials on customization, graphics, widgets… The plugin is free, however the premium support is paid ($25.00 per hour), but with the tutorials you may not have that much problems. Of course you can comment on the GD Star Rating website and the creator will answer your questions.

So if you’d have to go for a paid one, I guess WFReview should be preferred as it is cheaper for a multiple site license use. Both paid ones have a forum support. But GD Star Rating is free and certainly worth a try as it offers what most affiliates need.