Marketing Strategy? Unique Banner Advertisement and Affiliate Programs

I have a unique tangable product (retail $24.95) that I manufactured that fits a very Niche Market (health/ beauty/ fashion/ mostly men/ g-rated). I am not new to internet marketing, but have never marketed a product using banner advertising or affiliates. SEO would not work because my product is so unique, people would not be looking for it therefore search terms would never find it. For my product, I think the best strategy is to create a banner presence on well travelled sites that pertain to my niche market.

My current marketing strategy is to scour the internet and directly contact websites for banner advertisement that relate to my market. Some are pay per click and some charge by the week or month. My budget for this is 2 to $4,000 a month.

I am new to this Affiliate marketing approach and a have read about it in a few forums. The problem is most of the information is about people who are traffic generators looking for good paying affiliate programs. I am an affiliate looking to possibly create a program. I gather you can either do it yourself or hire a middleman like cj.com.

Since I am new to "Affiliate Marketing" a middleman might be good do for the timely learning curve and administrative functions such as affiliate payments. However hiring a middle man might not fit my particular type of site and marketing strategy. I have heard you dont get a very good quality of site links and some middle men are extreemely expensive and bite into your profit.

Would affiliate marketing work for me based on my product? If so, is it better to pay a cj.com (or whoever you suggest) or create an affiliate program myself. For banner advertisement is there a site that ranks the highest travelled web sites categorized by niche. I have found big-boards.com very usefull for identifying well traveled niche message boards.


Thanks
(Sorry for the length)

cheen,

whether or not to use CJ depends on your profit per unit sold after all costs...if it costs you $8 to make the product, $3 to market it, and $2 per labor costs, and it retails for $25, you should have ample room to pay a commission.

If you total costs are $22 then you may not have the room to use CJ effectively.

$3 to market with Cj?


I heard they take 30% That would be $7.5 per unit taken by cj.com is that correct?

Thanks

That $3 was an example I think.

I too am looking at starting an affiliate program - I am thinking of using AssocTrac.com it seems to be good and I haven't heard anything bad about it.
I am totaly new to affiliate marketing but I am aware of the bennefits if done right. I need to get loads of users to sign up for my service within a two month period.
If this happens then it will all be good!

Your product sounds very specific - what is it? Are you sure no one is looking for it? If it sells then people must be looking for it. Use overture.com keyword assistant and or nichebot.com and or wordtracker.com to find out how many people actualy search for it. You can also target related terms. You would be surprised the reach SEO can actualy have!

Also, go on forums and related sites and write product reviews - or get people to write product reviews this is a great free way of getting business!

Good Luck