Everyone nowadays is rushing towards generating multiple streams of income, especially from internet based businesses. Out of the many ways that one can make a significant amount of money online, affiliate marketing is the fastest, easiest, and most rewarding.
With affiliate marketing, there is no limit to how much you can earn every month. Whether you are looking for the ideal side hustle or feel like it’s time to quit your day job and focus on a more profitable business, affiliate marketing has got you covered. Compared to other internet-based businesses such as running advertisements on your website, affiliate marketing will bring in more money.
Contrary to what most people think, with affiliate marketing you don’t need to have a product of your own. This is what makes it so easy. And to make matters better, within a couple of hours into affiliate marketing, you can bag your first commission and enjoy the fruits of your efforts.
Well, now that you get what affiliate marketing is all about, let’s dive into how you can start this internet-based venture. For starters, it doesn’t matter what products or niche you intend to focus on, the affiliate marketing strategy is always the same. The objective is always to drive traffic through your affiliate link to the product(s) found on the merchant’s website.
With this type of online business, you don’t need much capital. With enough funds, you can drive more traffic through paid ads like those posted on other sites, Facebook, or Google Adwords. If you still don’t have capital, there are ways on how you can drive free traffic such as through posting to your social media platforms, writing blogs, and guest posts. Through the latter strategy, you can set aside money earned from commissions to pay for advertising.
One of the key characteristics of a successful affiliate marketer is having great copywriting skills. Most merchants are willing to share with you more information about their products. You can use this information to craft catchy and interesting posts about the products that will spark buyer’s interest when they come across your post, banner, or advert. The main reason why vendors prefer to use affiliate marketing is because it leads to more sales. And they don’t mind paying commissions for sales made through affiliates.
Enough about how profitable and easy affiliate marketing is. How do you launch a successful affiliate marketing business?
How to Start Affiliate Marketing?
1. Find The Best Affiliate Network
Before you can even think of which products to market, you must choose the right affiliate network. For you to succeed in this online business, there must exist a mutually beneficial partnership between you and the merchant. Therefore, you must research thoroughly on which affiliate network meets your marketing requirements. Examples of reputable affiliate networks include Amazon, Apple, and Google.
Nowadays, Amazon is quite popular because they sell thousands of products in nearly all categories and people trust this platform. There is also ClickBank which is Amazon’s top competitor when it comes to affiliate marketing. This company is practically the oldest and is quite popular even to date. They focus on selling digital products such as software and e-books. The good thing about digital products is that they have higher commissions than physical ones.
Finding the best affiliate network is the first step to kick-start your affiliate marketing business. But you can also approach individual businesses or companies and promote their products directly for a certain commission.
2. Choose The Right Affiliate Products
After you have settled down on a certain affiliate network, start doing research on products you want to market. Choose a niche you are familiar with and one that has plenty of products to market. You should not focus on more than three products when you are still learning the ropes of affiliate marketing. As time goes by and you gain more experience, you can further specialize in certain products or expand your horizon.
It is imperative to note which products you are successfully selling and those you aren’t. This information will be valuable in helping you decide the products that you should boost their exposure through paid advertising and those that are not worth marketing anymore.
3. Try Out A Product Before Marketing It
We all love shortcuts, and this is the mistake most affiliate marketers make when promoting products. How can you praise a product that you have no clue on how it looks like, or even if it actually works? Trying out a product not only gives you in-depth information about it, but it also helps you gain trust and credibility amongst your viewers. You don’t want a scenario where a buyer returns to your blog post and leaves behind a negative comment because you misled them.
Depending on your budget, niche, and affiliate network, you can decide to buy a product, try it and give your personal opinion or recommendation. Alternatively, if your network is generous enough, they can give you free products to sample and market.
4. Make Use Of Social Media Platforms To Drive More Traffic
When you sign in to your Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook, you will come across many marketers promoting a wide range of products. Have you ever seen a picture or video description that was so captivating it made you buy the product? Well, that’s how great social media platforms can be when it comes to affiliate marketing.
By now, you already have a considerable number of audience on your social media accounts. Instead of sharing memes and pictures of yourself on vacations, why don’t you monetize those profiles to bring you traffic? With the introduction of Reels videos on Instagram, you can do a video marketing your products and integrate an affiliate link within. If your followers like the video or even click on the link, they can make a purchase and you will earn a commission.
5. Opt For ‘Pretty’ Links (Redirects)
There is nothing that people online hate more than being sold something directly. And this is why people may be reluctant towards clicking on lengthy and ‘ugly’ affiliate links. As an affiliate marketer, this isn’t a risk worth taking. And this is why marketers nowadays prefer to anchor or cloak their links.
Despite the above being a controversial matter amongst marketers in the past, using ‘pretty’ links has become widely accepted nowadays due to the reasons stated above. A shorter, friendlier, and easier to type link has more chances of being used. Tools such as the Pretty Links WordPress Plugin can help you create more appealing links.
Final Thoughts
Let this comprehensive guide on how to start affiliate marketing inspire you to venture into this profitable internet-based businesses. Thousands of people are making money online either as a side hustle or full time. You too can be part of this by promoting products and earning commissions. Start today and watch your affiliate marketing business grow as you learn more skills.
