Council Post: Boost Your Income With Affiliate Marketing

If you have traffic and followers, affiliate marketing can help you make money while you sleep by promoting somebody else’s products on your website or social media page. You will earn a commission of the sales that are generated through your marketing efforts.

Here’s a clear definition of affiliate marketing, according to digital marketing thought leader Pat Flynn: “Affiliate marketing is the process of earning a commission by promoting other people’s (or company’s) products. You find a product you like, promote it to others and earn a piece of the profit for each sale that you make.”

But first, you must learn the trade secrets of affiliate marketing: the parties involved in the process, the types of affiliate marketing channels, how to get paid and the tips for success.

How Does Affiliate Marketing Work?

Affiliate marketing works by separating parts of the digital marketing process. By sharing the responsibilities of creation and product marketing, it enables a successful marketing strategy where partners share in the profits.

This begins with three people: the vendor or product owner/the brand, the affiliate/promoter, the customer. These three parties have an interconnected relationship with one another when developing affiliate marketing. Each party shares the responsibility for success.

The vendor provides a product or service to the affiliate, who promotes the product or service to their own established audience. When consumers buy the goods, the affiliate gets a commission. I find that affiliates typically have a niche audience which narrows your target market.

Collecting payment from affiliated marketing is automated. Once you set up the parameters, your work is done until it’s time to check the deposits at your bank. You can be paid by every sale, every lead or every click, depending on what’s agreed on between you and the vendor or product owner. 

Types Of Affiliate Marketing Channels

Vendors and affiliates have a vested interest in grabbing the audience’s attention. Affiliates have several advertising options to expand their audience while narrowing down their target audience. Here are five different channels to experiment with:

• Reviews Or Content On Blogs: Offer your products to bloggers to sample and post a review for their followers on their site. This channel gets your product listed high in search engine rankings with little effort.

• Influencer Site Owners Or Individuals Who Own Popular Sites: These site owners have a strong following of loyal readers who often strive to be more like the influencer. When your product sells, the influencer takes a share of the profit.

• Paid Ads On Micro-sites: This includes placing a sponsored ad on a search engine page or paying for an ad on a partner’s site. This is a simple, direct call to action to a specific audience.

• Email Marketing Lists: Affiliates promote the seller’s products via email lists, newsletters and digital marketing campaigns.

• Large Media Websites: These are websites that specialize in a full array of marketing services. These sites use banner ads and affiliate links to draw enormous audiences

Becoming An Affiliate Marketer

In my opinion, getting a passive income is the biggest reason to become an affiliate marketer. Make money online while you’re running errands, watching TV or setting up even more affiliate marketing campaigns. But there are more reasons to pursue affiliate marketing.

As an affiliate marketer, your role is to link up the seller and the customer — the seller takes care of the post-sale activity, not you. It is a low-cost/no-cost startup, so you won’t need to have a stash of cash or take out a business loan. Ultimately, you decide your own paycheck based on how much or how little you want to work, and you can work independently from home.

If you already have a strong following on social media and on your website, all you have to do is find affiliates to work with who have products that are related to your content and set up the promotion and payment.

Here are my tips for success: 

• Cultivate a niche. Choose products and services within your niche and promote them with sincerity. Tailor your campaign to that niche

• Think quality over quantity. A few quality campaigns are better than numerous products that are poorly promoted.

• Generate traffic from multiple sources. Utilize your website, Google Adwords, social media, etc. Stay current on new affiliate marketing strategies and don’t be afraid to try something new.

• Track and analyze. Do split testing, change the positioning of your ads, and find your sweet spot. Frequently test your marketing strategies, and don’t get lax.  

• Research product demand. Products with low demand won’t sell even if the marketing effort is strong.

• Your seller’s reputation affects yours. Choose your vendors wisely and work with products that you believe in with reliable reputations. Unhappy customers won’t revisit your site. 

• Don’t become stagnant. Stay current on new affiliate marketing strategies and don’t be afraid to try something new.

Marketing is all about getting as much income as possible for the time you put in. Affiliate marketing allows you to put in a small amount of time with no upfront investment in return for a steady flow of passive income. It doesn’t get any better than that.

Getty If you have traffic and followers, affiliate marketing can help you make money while you sleep by promoting somebody else’s products on your website or social media page. You will earn a commission of the sales that are generated through your marketing efforts. ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER ADVERTISEMENT Here’s a clear definition of affiliate marketing, according…

Getty If you have traffic and followers, affiliate marketing can help you make money while you sleep by promoting somebody else’s products on your website or social media page. You will earn a commission of the sales that are generated through your marketing efforts. ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER ADVERTISEMENT Here’s a clear definition of affiliate marketing, according…