Zlio.com: Review

Many internet marketers are looking for a faster and easier way to produce great search engine friendly websites that will generate income - but don't want the sort of "cut and paste" look that can go along with the easy-build-it sites.

A new affiliate website builder called Zlio has come along that claims it is better than the rest - but does Zlio actually do what it claims?

If you're already an affiliate marketer, then you probably know about BANS (Build a Niche Store), where you can stock products that are for sale at eBay auctions. Zlio has some similarities to BANS, but there are differences as well.

The main difference is that Zlio is free, compared to BANS, you have to pay a one-time fee to get started, then pay for each domain name thereafter.

Another difference is that with Zlio, you can choose from more than 110 merchants (as of this writing), and the links go directly to those merchants sites, rather than pointing to eBay.

For those of you who are not affiliate marketers, a good description of Zlio is a easy-to-build store website that allows addition of products that are for sale, where you make a commission from the merchant when a sale takes place.

The features that I really like about Zlio include:

• Easily add and modify products on the site
• When I emailed with questions, they were answered promptly
• Lots of merchants to choose from, so your store can be as general or niche-specific as you like
• Search engine friendly tools such as easy addition of a site map, product tags and pages that can be as keyword oriented as you like
• Easy to add Analytics code so that you can easily track the activity happening with your site
• You can choose to maintain a subdomain with Zlio, or you can move your Zlio store to the URL of your choosing
• It's fast to put together
• You can have up to 50 stores per account.
• Product-oriented templates with the ability to upload a header photo, you can modify the CSS of the template too
• It's free. :)

There were a few things that I found to be "negatives" with Zlio. There are not many of them, but here they are:

• The commission that an affiliate receives is less than if they would receive it from the merchant directly, as through an affiliate network like Commission Junction. (The rest of the commission I expect goes to Zlio.com for the use of their site builder.)
• The commissions reports are delayed a few days - in other words after you get a sale it may not show up in your statistics for 3-4 days. (But it does show up.)
• If you choose to put up Adsense ads, you split the commission with Zlio on clicks 60/40. (You get 60% of the revenue, Zlio gets 40% - not bad, but I like to keep all of my Adsense revenues when I can.) Again, this likely is an exchange with Zlio for the free service of the affiliate site.
• Their "help" system could be a bit more thorough in answering FAQ's. They do a pretty good job, but there were a couple of times that I had to "Google" what I needed to know due to lack of information.

The true test of an affiliate product like this is - does it work?

The answer to that question is a resounding yes! I'm picky about what I use, and especially what I recommend to other marketers. Even with the negative points, I think that Zlio is a wonderful tool for affiliates. I saw traffic 2 days after my site was up, traffic is increasing regularly. Sales are increasing too.

Zlio is a powerful tool in any internet marketers "toolbox". I wouldn't say, "Use Only Zlio!", but when you're not an expert website builder and you need a website to sell products on as an affiliate, it is a great fit.

And, compared to other affiliate "you build it" online stores such as BANS, Zlio rather leaves the pack behind. :) It just might set a new standard in the IM website world!