Make money as an affiliate marketer

Does whatever stage of life you are at right now make you happy? Are you happy personally, career wise and are you happy financially, are you stuck in a work situation and you can’t seem to find a way out?

Are you nearing retirement and you don’t have a good pension plan, are you looking for a answers on how to make money as an affiliate marketer.?

Let me tell you about affiliate marketing and how affiliate marketing is fast becoming a way for thousands of people to make money online.

Affiliate marketing is a way for online companies to promote sales and revenue through a team of affiliate marketers by offering a percentage of any new sales for their efforts.

Let’s take a look at the statistics:

• In the USA 80% of brands and 85% of online publishers use the power of affiliate marketers, a growing statistic.
• More than 5.5 billion dollars was paid out to affiliate marketers in 2019 that is set to increase by over 10% in 2020.
• Amazon the largest sore on earth pays out between 5-10 % on their gigantic range of products
• 16% of all online sales are attributed to affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is a person driven approach where a product or service is introduced to a much wider audience by means of content marketing, content marketing is a learned skill that draws people interested in finding out in more detail about a product or service.

Content marketing is found on websites and blogs, it is written by the affiliate marketer it attracts people to a company’s product, if they purchase the affiliate marketer gets paid  a commission based on sales through an affiliate link on that website or blog.

In a nutshell that is how you make money as an affiliate marketer,you can learn more about affiliate by going here.

How does it work?

Affiliate marketing is part of the mix of marketing a product or service by large companies to the  consumer, it relies on the work done by affiliates to leverage the marketing effort and increase sales on a profit sharing basis. For this to work out three parties are involved,

1. The company or seller of the product or service

2. The affiliate marketer

3. The customer or consumer

Let’s take a closer look at the relationship between all three to examine what actually happens to make a success of this process.

1.The company or seller of the product or service

The company is the legal entity be it a sole trader or a limited company as the product creator, vendor, wholesaler, retailer, or merchant who has a product or service to market. The product may be a physical product like something for the house or office or it could be a service like insurance or software.

A product or service can also be a brand or trademark where the company or sole trader own the rights to said brand sometimes they may not even be involved in the marketing of the brand, that would be handled by an advertising agency.

2.The affiliate marketer

Affiliate marketers are known as publishers they can also be sole traders or limited companies with offices and staff, the affiliate marketers responsibility is to create online content that promotes the company’s product to as wide an audience as possible.

When sales are made through the affiliate marketing process a commission is paid to the affiliate marketer and in a nutshell that is how to make money as an affiliate marketer.

3. The customer or consumer

The customer or consumer finds out about the product or service by reading an article on a website or blog post, they are unaware that the seller and the affiliate marketer share the profit on the sale even though any professional affiliate will have an affiliate disclosure notice on their website.

The bottom line is that the customer or consumer doesn’t pay any extra for the product whether they find out about it through the affiliates website or directly through the company website.

How are affiliates paid?

As an affiliate marketer getting paid is the easy part, that’s why it has become such an attractive method of making money online.

Depending on what affiliate program that you join, here ar a number of ways to make a commission pay per sale, pay per click, or  pay per lead.

1. Pay or sale

This is the standard way to earn a commission, the seller or merchant of the product or service pays you a commission  following the product sale, this way is very favourable for the affiliate because they don’t have to invest in the product.

2. Pay per click

Pay per click is different to pay per sale, in this instance the affiliate marketer recommends or writes convincingly so that the customer or consumer go directly to the merchants website, so the payment is for driving traffic to the merchants site.

3. Pay per lead

Pay per lead affiliate programs are based on the affiliate marketer convincing the consumer to visit the merchants site and do one of the following sigh up for a product trial, download software or a file, fill out a contact form or sign up for the company’s newsletter. The merchant pays the affiliate a commission based on one or more of those actions.

Why should you consider affiliate marketing?

There are a few reasons why you should consider affiliate marketing, it’s not expensive to start, you will earn passive income, you don’t have to deal with customers, it is cost effective, work from home, the hours are flexible, you get paid for results.

1. It’s not expensive to start

I have seen so many people go into business where the upfront fees are more than $20,000 on top of that an office may be required or a company vehicle, compare that to starting as an affiliate marketer where the up front costs are less than $1,000

On top of that the risk element wont keep you awake at night providing you complete your affiliate marketing training.

2. Earn passive income

Passive income is income that occurs whether you are working on your computer or not, so you could be away on vacation and the sales keep rolling in because of the work that you have done previously.

3. No dealing with customers

Customers are great, but when something goes wrong at least you wont have to deal with that, that is the responsibility of the merchant.

4. Cost effective

You can run an affiliate marketing business from the comfort of your own home, all you need is a good computer, an internet connection and time to research and write.

5. Work from home

Working from home is a real  benefit, no more getting up early to beat the rush hour traffic, parking costs, fuel costs etc.

6. Flexible hours

You can work as an affiliate marketer as much or as little as you please, however when you get started you will have to put the hours in to build out your website.

7. Paid on results

You are paid on the results that you achieve, the more you achieve the more you get paid.

How do you learn affiliate marketing?

You can ,earn affiliate marketing, I recommend that you complete the online Entrepreneur Certification course, I did this course and to be honest you will learn everything (almost everything) there is to know about how to be successful as an affiliate marketer.

By doing the course you will learn from the very best affiliate marketing platform on the internet, it was set up by two friends in college, Carson and Kyle both of these guys started as affiliate marketers when there was very little help available at that time.

The platform is called Wealthy Affiliate it is made up of ordinary people like you and I, you can learn so much about how to pick a domain name, get it hosted, pick a niche, understand keywords, perform SEO on your content and images, learn how to build backlinks, learn how to get on the first page of Google

A very important method of making money as an affiliate marketer is your ability to write blog posts that will have people staying on your site eager to learn more about you and your brand..

Learn where to look for the best affiliate programs and crucially learn how to make money at affiliate marketing, to find out more go to the community page.

Affiliate marketing channels

Affiliate products are promoter through affiliate marketing channels and there are a number of these, content marketing, blogging, Influencers, paid search focused sites, email lists and large media sites.

1. Content marketing

Content marketing is the business of using keyword rich content to attract consumers, affiliate links are strategically placed within the content to create clicks to the merchants website to leverage sales.

2. Blogging

Blogging is another marketing channel because of the ability to rank high in the organic searches, bloggers create huge lists of people that follow their blogs on a regular basis.

A merchant may send the blogger a new product to review the blogger writes an in depth compelling review of the product that drives people back to the merchants site.

Product reviews are an ideal way for the affiliate marketer to write a compelling blog post and get paid a commission if somebody buys the product.

3. Influencers

An influencer is someone who commands respect from thousand of people and has a great following, their unique position makes it easy for them to recommend or mention a product in a blog post, or a social  media post. Again should a customer purchase a product through this channel the influencer will get a share of the sale.

4. Paid search focused site

A paid search focused site is a microsite that can be monetized to gain more sales by advertising within a site partner or by placement in the sponsored listings.

These microsites are separate from the main site and operate by offering more focused content that is relevant to their audience, people are inclined to purchase more products because of a direct and simple call to action.

5. Email lists

Email marketing has been around for a long time, leaving that aside it is and will continue to be a source of income for the affiliate marketer. Email lists are collected from the website visitors when they are asked to sign up for a free newsletter, from there each new newsletter will have affiliate links in the content that drives traffic to a sales page.

6. Large media sites

This type of site takes a huge effort to write keyword based content to build thousands if pages designed to attract millions of people to the site. Products are displayed on banner ads and hyperlinks to masses of people conversion rates are usually high due to weight of numbers.

My top affiliate marketing tips

1. Choose your niche

Choose your niche wisely, do your research before committing pick a subject that you are familiar with. Drive traffic to your site by establishing yourself as an expert authority in your chosen niche. Pick affiliate products that will be of interest to your target audience and will be beneficial.

2. Do product reviews

Product reviews are a great way to bring traffic to your site, the internet has such much noise around products that consumers are looking for guidance and this is where you step in and show your expertise.

Be fair and impartial, describe each product in detail, outline the pros and cons, show images of the product, give your opinion on why you prefer x over y product, there are countless products to review online do a comparison make it attractive.

3. Personalize your brand

People like to get to know people before trust is established, make your website or blog attractive in a personal way, build a connection with your audience by letting them get to know a little bit about you. In that way they can identify with you and will buy based on what you recommend.

4. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket

Affiliate marketing is thriving but you must use all of the channels that are at your disposal, use email campaigns, leverage your blogging abilities, make an impact on social media. Check your google  analytics to see which channel is giving you the most traction put more resources into that channel.

5.Higher commission programs

From my experience I can tell you that the higher commission affiliate programs aren’t always the best ones to take up, the commissions are higher for a reason, usually because the conversion rate is lower compared to a lower commission program.

A good example of this is the Amazon associates program, the commissions rate is normally between 5 to 10% the conversion rates on Amazon can be three times higher than other affiliate programs, so decide wisely before you jump in.

6. Study marketing trends

Affiliate marketing is an ever evolving process, keeping yourself informed on what changes are happening in the marketplace is essential to your conversion rates and ultimately your revenue. I suggest that you take the time to listen to Jay’s weekly broadcasts, it’s part of your Wealthy Affiliate membership.

7. Affiliate programs

When it comes to choosing affiliate programs don’t just pick the first one that comes along, examine each program in detail, make sure there is a demand for it and that the vendor is trustworthy.

Affiliate marketing trends 2020

1. Influencers

With social media becoming so popular, YouTube being a particularly strong way of reaching new subscribers a lot of people have become famous in a short space of time, some have amassed huge followers. So people like that can influence their followers to purchase certain products this trend looks set to continue and is a win win for both parties.

2. Voice search

Voice search looks set to be a major way that people look for information on the net, some of the biggest players like Amazon, Google and Facebook are gearing up for voice search, research estimates that as many as 50% of searches will be completed by using voice search technology by 2020.

3. Audio and video content

Audio and video content will still be an integral part of the affiliate marketing industry in 2020, quality well researched content will never change, there will be more demand for audio and video creation, advertising will be in the shape of pop up banners, pre roll video, and in video ads.

Slideshows, video demos of products and images will be in vogue over traditional methods, however there is no substitute for well crafted content.

4. Mobile phone marketing tactics

As mobile phone use becomes the norm for communicating with other human beings, mobile phone marketing will be the trend into 2020, mobile phone apps make advertising to the masses that bit easier.

5. Facebook ads

Facebook is declining a bit on the number, however it can be a valuable source for affiliate marketers to advertise in, Facebook are very good at analysing who is doing what on their platform making targeting your audience that bit easier.

Summary

Affiliate marketing is attractive because of the low start up costs, anyone can become an affiliate marketer, learning the skills will take time but with the help of the Wealthy Affiliate community and the top level training there is no reason that anyone can’t make a success of it.

By concentrating on writing valuable content, creating your own  branded blog, create short informative videos, work on SEO you will build your own authoritative website that drives traffic to your affiliate offers and ultimately makes you money online.