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Affiliate Marketing

What Is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is a process where publishers earn a commission by promoting a product or service made by another retailer or advertiser using an affiliate link. The affiliate partner is rewarded a payout for providing a specific result to the retailer or advertiser.

This usually results in a sale. However, some affiliate marketing programs may reward you for leads, free trial users, website clicks, or app downloads.

Most affiliate programs are usually free, so you don't have to worry about high initial costs. An effective affiliate marketing strategy done right can go from a side hustle to a profitable online business idea by providing you with a healthy income.

Affiliate Marketing

How affiliate marketing works?

Affiliate marketing involves referring a product or service by sharing it on a blog, social media platform, podcast, or website. The affiliate earns a commission each time someone makes a purchase through the unique affiliate link associated with their recommendation.

Affiliate Marketing - Work

To review:

1. You show an ad or a link for Store Z on your website, blog, or social network.
2. A customer clicks your unique affiliate link.
3. The customer makes a purchase in Store Z.
4. The affiliate network records the transaction.
5. The purchase is confirmed by Store Z.
6. You get paid a monetary commission.

Affiliate commission rates vary by company and offer. At the lowest level you will earn about 5% of sales, but with some measures you can earn up to 50%, usually when promoting a class or event. There are also affiliate marketing programs that provide a flat rate per sale instead of a percentage.

Types of affiliate marketing

Affiliate partners always have a bit of a mystery to them - you never know if the person has actually used the product or if they're just promoting it for money. Both cases still exist today.

It wasn't until 2009 that renowned affiliate marketer Pat Flynn divided the different types of affiliate marketers into three groups. Understanding these types of affiliate marketing can show you the different ways people in this space are making money online, regardless of your moral compass.

Unattached affiliate marketing:

The first type of affiliate marketing is referred to as "non-affiliate" or when you have no authority in the product you are promoting. There is no connection between you and the customer. You often run pay-per-click advertising campaigns with your affiliate link, hoping people will click on it, buy the product, and earn a commission.

Unaffiliated affiliate marketing is attractive because you don't have to do any work. Affiliate marketing businesses rely on the reputation and trust of their target audience online. Some affiliate marketers don't have the time or inclination to build these relationships, so this type of marketing is their best bet.

"Unaffiliated affiliate marketing is not a real business model, it's for people who just want to generate income," explains Elise Dopson, founder of Sprocker Lovers. "Our focus for Sprocker Lovers is building a community and providing free education for a specific area, which in our case is the Sprocker Spaniel dog breed, and selling to others."

Related affiliate marketing:

Related affiliate marketing is the practice of promoting products and services that you don't use but that are related to your niche. In this case, the affiliate marketer has an audience, whether through blogs, YouTube, TikTok or another channel. The related affiliate marketer also has influence, making them a trusted source for recommending products even if they've never used them before.

While related affiliate marketing can generate more affiliate income, it comes with the risk of promoting something you've never tried before. It could be the worst product or service ever and you wouldn't even know it. One bad recommendation is all it takes to lose the trust of your audience. If you don't have trust and transparency, it will be difficult to build a sustainable affiliate marketing business.

Involved affiliate marketing:

Involved affiliate marketing only refers to recommending products and services that the affiliate marketer has used and truly believes in. “Involved affiliate marketing is the way forward,” says Elise. "It's rooted in trust and authenticity, which is best for your audience and business."

In this type of marketing, an affiliate marketer uses their influence to promote products and services that followers may actually need, instead of paying to click on a banner ad. Building this type of credibility with your audience takes longer, but is essential to building a sustainable business.

Elise explains that the involved approach makes advertising much easier for affiliate marketing partners. “You don't have to hide behind expensive PPC ads and hope for clicks and sales. An organic Instagram story or blog post about your experience with a product will go a long way.” Elise prefers this method because it's honest and “the only real way to become a trusted source on any topic.”

Advantages and disadvantages of affiliate marketing

Advantages

While industry growth is a good indicator of success, entrepreneurs go down this referral marketing route for several other reasons as well.

Easy to execute:

Your side of the equation simply involves mastering the digital marketing side of creating and selling a product. You don't have to worry about more difficult tasks like development, support or offer fulfillment.

Low risk:

Since there is no cost to join affiliate programs, you can start making money with an established affiliate product or service without any initial investment. Affiliate marketing can also generate relatively passive income through commissions – an ideal money-making scenario. Although initially you will have to invest time in creating traffic sources, your affiliate link can continue to bring you a steady payout.

Easy to scale:

Successful affiliate marketing offers the potential to significantly increase your income without hiring additional help. You can introduce new products to your current audience and create campaigns for other products while your existing work generates affiliate income in the background.

Before you get too excited, know that great affiliate marketing is built on trust. While there seems to be an endless number of products or services to promote, it's best to highlight only those that you personally use or would recommend. Even if a product interests you or fits into an existing hobby, becoming a great affiliate marketer for that product takes a lot of work.

Disadvantages

Affiliate marketing also has several disadvantages compared to other types of marketing campaigns. Before we get into that, let's take a look at some of the challenges you'll face on your journey to affiliate marketing success.

Requires patience:

Affiliate marketing is not a get-rich-quick scheme. Growing your audience and gaining influence takes time and patience.

You'll want to test different channels to see which will best reach your audience. Research the most relevant and trusted products to promote. Spend time blogging, publishing free content on social media, hosting virtual events, and doing other lead generation activities on your marketing channels.

Commission-based:

There is no boss who will hand you a weekly paycheck as an affiliate marketer. Affiliate programs work on a commission basis, whether you are paid per lead, click or sale.

Companies use a temporary browser cookie to track people's actions from your content. When someone takes the desired action, you get paid.

No control over program:

Affiliates must follow the rules established by the Company for their program. You must follow their guidelines for what you say and how you present their product or service. Competitors must follow the same recommendations, so you need to be creative to stand out from the crowd.

Tips for affiliate marketing success

As we mentioned earlier, affiliate marketing income can eventually become a form of passive income, but you still have to do some hard work up front. The success of your program will depend on the quality of your review.

To create a good review, it's best to be personal. Share your experience in your blog, social media post, Instagram story or YouTube video. If you are writing a personal review, please provide an honest opinion based on your experience and knowledge of the product. The more open you are, the more authentic you will be. People are more likely to follow your advice if they feel they can trust you.

Trust is a key factor in your affiliate marketing because people need to trust you enough to act on your recommendations. The level of trust you'll need to make an affiliate sale depends on your industry and the products you're promoting – for example, it takes more trust to be an effective affiliate for a $1,000 course than a $20 t-shirt.

Talk to a product expert:

Another option is to interview others who use the product or service, or even interview the person who makes or sells it. This can give your review more depth and create a story for the reader.

Create a product tutorial:

While your success with affiliate marketing may depend on the overall size of your following, another way to increase traffic is to provide a tutorial to your offer.

People often Google "how to" things like "how to save money for college" or "how to decorate a laundry room." If you offer guidance that solves the searcher's problem and clearly demonstrates the product's value, your recommendations will make more sense in context and give the customer a stronger incentive to buy the product you're recommending.

Build an email list:

An email list is a list of contacts you have collected who would like to receive information from you. It's important to build a contact list because it's one of the best ways to connect with people outside of social media. When it comes to purchases made as a result of receiving a marketing message, email has the highest conversion rate (66%) compared to social and other marketing channels.

Collect emails from your content and send subscribers a weekly or fortnightly newsletter. Affiliate marketers can send many different things to subscribers on their list:

1. Free download
2. News
3. New blog posts
4. A look into your life or business
5. Funny stories
6. Reminders and news
7. Special offers

Use your email list as an opportunity to show value to subscribers. If they email you back, reply. Be consistent with newsletter cadence and quality. Then every once in a while promote an affiliate product or two to your subscribers.

There is no hard and fast rule on how many times to send these promotional emails. Just don't send them every time or you'll look spammy and untrustworthy. If you're promoting good products once a month, you're only providing value to subscribers who need them.

Consider your angle:

Depending on your offering, determine how much energy you should invest in instructional or learning content, which is often a natural lead for someone to try the product for themselves.

For example, you can upload a video of you using a physical product and getting the most out of it, or demonstrating the benefits of a digital product like software. Unboxing posts are popular, so if you receive a product in the mail, document your experience opening it.

Affiliate marketing program examples

A look at some of the companies involved in affiliate marketing will give you some inspiration – as well as proof that this is a legitimate, high-paying source of income.

Shopify:

The Shopify Affiliate Program is a network of entrepreneurs, educators, influencers, and creators who send referrals to Shopify. Registration to the program is free, just log in.

Once approved, affiliate partners will receive a unique affiliate link to share with their audience. They earn affiliate income every time someone signs up using their link.

On average, Shopify affiliates earn $58 for each referral that signs up for Shopify's paid plan. Affiliate partners can earn as much or as little as they want, it all depends on how much time they spend on their affiliate marketing strategy.

Shopify - Example

Healthish:

Water bottle retailer Healthish used affiliate marketing to build a million dollar brand. Instead of the traditional affiliate route, it used Instagram influencers to build awareness for the launch of its key product, the WB-1 bottle.

The brand continues to work with influencer accounts, from those with 100,000 followers and above. It works with around 300 creators a month to create content that sells and wholesales the bottle.

Healthish Water Bottle

Amazon:

One of the most common examples is Amazon's affiliate marketing program, known as Amazon Affiliates. In fact, Amazon Affiliates currently has the largest affiliate network market share (45.81%), followed by CJ Affiliate (8.14%) and Rakuten Affiliate Network (7.85%).

Amazon Affiliates offers a variety of products in many different categories. This is a great way to get into affiliate marketing as a beginner. Creators, publishers, and bloggers can use an Amazon affiliate link to direct their audience to product recommendations. You can earn money on qualified purchases from your referral link.

Take Sprocker Lovers for example. Website owner Elise Dopson wrote a blog post titled Are Spaniards Good Casual Partners? & 6 tips for safe running. In the article, he recommends a tip on how spaniels should wear a high-hanging dog jacket when running at night.

Amazon - Example

If the reader wants to buy a high vis dog jacket, they can click the link and go to Amazon to complete the purchase.

Urikar:

Retailer Urikar offers a high-ticket affiliate program with average commissions of $1,460, according to data from ShareASale. It sells fitness and wellness products such as massage guns, indoor and outdoor exercise equipment and accessories.

Urikar - Example

Urikar offers a 10% commission on all sales, which can add up quickly if you're a fitness influencer with a large following. Its most popular product, the AI ​​Muscle Massager, retails for $139.99, which means you earn $13.99 for every sale. The Urikaru program also provides your own dedicated account manager and affiliate dashboard to track conversions and sales.