Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate Marketing is promoting another party’s product or service, primarily via online efforts and receiving a commission for each sale attributed to your efforts. It could be a fixed commission or a percentage of the sale. Affiliate marketing is basically the online version of any type of traditional sales. What makes affiliate marketing so attractive is how easy it is to insert yourself between the buyer and merchant and earn a commission for your referrals who make a purchase. And not just one transaction at a time, but hundreds at a time! As an affiliate marketer, you are not limited by time or distance from your office. This is the commercial power of digital transactions that has leveled the playing field. There are high-schoolers doing this who are making more than traditional sales reps with 25-years experience! And you can join their ranks, it’s not too late!
Thanks to high-speed internet, wifi and smart devices, retailers reach millions of people across the world 24/7 using multiple sales channels such as an online store, social media, videos, email, and online ads. A recent study found out that for millions of people who have one, their smart phone is within six feet of them at all times. Affiliate marketing leverages this reach to sell to potentially thousands of people a day, without having to see them, know them, or communicate with them individually. All you need to do is get their attention (this is 90% of affiliate marketing, better known as getting traffic), convince them to click your custom affiliate link in your content, and hope that the company whose product/service you are promoting can close the sale. If they do, you are paid a commission. What’s great is that these businesses invest a lot in their websites– the sales copy, funnels, videos, creatives and so on, so they’re doing most of the heavy lifting in getting the sale. All you need to do as their affiliate is deliver the visitors to them, and let them do the rest.
There are several types of affiliate programs out there, each with different requirements for their affiliates. Some, like banks that sell credit card offers only accept experienced affiliate marketers with existing traffic, while others like Amazon accept just about anyone.
The basic steps for getting started with Affiliate Marketing:
STEP 1: Choose a niche. There are two ways to go about it: (1) choose a niche that you have experience working in; have strong knowledge of; or have passion for, or (2) do research on which niches are the most profitable and competitive. If you’re fortunate, you have real-life experience in a niche that is profitable and competitive. For example, a former cosmetics retail salesperson who becomes an affiliate in the Personal Care and Beauty niche can write a blog, post on Instagram and make YouTube videos of beauty tips and embed her affiliate links in her articles and videos. She can also collect emails from her visitors with an email opt-in form, use email marketing software to automatically send out weekly, valuable content embedded with her affiliate links, and get paid commissions on every purchase, even as she sleeps!
The first approach has obvious advantages, because it will be easier for you to create content around the product/service you’re promoting. You’ll be able to crank out lots of content without having to spend much time researching it, thanks to your experience. To promote something you have very little knowlege of will not motivate you as much and take much longer, unless you outsource it at a cost.
STEP 2: Research affiliate opportunities in your niche. Start your search by visiting the affiliate program links below and familiarizing yourself with how they work. They all have a Niche Search function. Look at the various affiliate programs in your niche and see which ones pay an amount you’re comfortable with, and are generating affiliate sales. Sales data and trends are conveniently provided to help you decide whether or not to join a particular program.
You will discover that affiliate opportunities fall in one of three (3) categories:
(1) An affiliate network that hosts multiple affiliate programs of multiple companies in multiple niches. CJ, ShareaSale, Rakuten Publisher, and ClickBank are popular examples.
(2) An in-house affiliate program, where the merchant manages its own army of affiliates. An example is Ulta beauty. Just go to any retail website, and scroll to their footer links. If they offer an affiliate program, there will be a link there.
(3) An online marketplace such as Amazon, EBay, and Etsy. You sign up as an affiliate and post their links on your content. Online marketplaces tend to have the lowest commission structure, but they have strong brand recognition which translates to a higher sales to clicks ratio. When someone clicks your affiliate link and buys something, you earn a small commission.
As a back up, you can also do a Google search, “Top [niche name] affiliate programs” and see what comes up. Chances are, they are in one of the affiliate platforms mentioned earlier.
STEP 3: Apply to the affiliate programs that interest you. Fill out the online application. Some, like the marketplaces, have instant approval while others will review your application. You should know that some affiliate programs will only accept people who have a strong online/social media presence. They will ask you for the links to your social media profiles (Instagram, Facebook page, YouTube channel, TikTok, etc.) and look at the activity there, such as the number of followers and engagement level. They will also ask you for your website URLs and examine the quality of your content.
STEP 4: Start promoting and earning money! Once approved, you will be given a unique affiliate ID embedded in a link that has a special cookie (a marker or identifier script) function. The affiliate platforms like CJ and ShareaSale go a step further and provide code (with your affiliate ID) for banners of different sizes that you can embed on your website. When someone clicks your affiliate link, it redirects them to the merchant’s website and a cookie is deposited in the visitor’s browser cache. If that person winds up buy something from the merchant’s site, even 30 days after clicking your link (a common cookie duration, which can vary), the cookie transfers your affiliate ID info to the merchant’s site’s back end, which calculates the commission and pays you via the payment preference you indicated in your settings; typically in 7-14 business days. This is usually via direct deposit to a bank account, PayPal, or in some cases, a mailed check. And let me tell you, the most fun about Affiliate Marketing is logging into your accounts, checking your stats, and seeing some sales! Merchants understand that top-performing affiliates are extremely valuable to them, so they provide granular stats that allow affiliates to see where most of their sales are coming from. Then, affiliates know to put more resources into the channels that produce most of their sales.
Coming Soon
Affiliate Marketing Training videos, Flow Charts and Checklists, Recommended Resources
