Have you ever wondered how some people are able to generate passive income from anywhere in the world?
In this guide, focused on starting an affiliate marketing business for beginners blog, I will cover all the things that you’ll need to get your career going in this very lucrative space.
I will go over some affiliate programs, of which there are many, that you can join like Amazon associates and Clickbank for example. You will get an idea of how to drive online traffic to these affiliate sites and how you can earn nice commissions by selecting the right products or services to promote.
We will first get the basics out of the way.
What Is Affiliate Marketing? (In a Nutshell)
Affiliate marketing is the process of taking someone else’s products or services, and promoting it to people on the internet.
The question that you have to ask yourself when promoting products to people are, “Why will this add value to their lives”.
The ways in which these products and services will be found by your audience online, could be from your website, email marketing, social media marketing, etc.
People are always searching online to either learn more about things or to find reviews on products or services that they interested in.
You might want to for example create a product review, on something that people are interested in, showcasing the pros and cons and ultimately providing your customers’ with the best information possible. From the information that you provide, they can make an educated decision about whether they want to buy that product or service.
Its all about building trust with your audience by creating a lot of value within your content.
Make a strong case of why the product or service will create a solution for someone who is struggling with a problem, they may want to purchase it using your unique affiliate link, and you will earn a commission from your affiliate partner for that sale.
How Do I Start Affiliate Marketing As A Beginner?
Do you want to get started being an affiliate marketer? You’ll want to follow these steps.
Step 1: Choose A Niche
A niche is a smaller segment of a bigger market. For example, you can get great ideas on Amazon.com, and look at all the different categories that they have there. Let’s take a look at electronics.
If you click into the electronics menu you will discover all the sub menu categories that are niche down.
An example of a niche down category in electronics is cell phones & accessories. Its not broad like electronics, but at the same time has thousands of possible articles that you can write about.
Main Category
Niche Down Category
Tips For Picking A Great Niche
1. Make sure that you pick a niche that you’re passionate about because this will make creating content a pleasure.
2. Make sure that your niche is in an industry that is constantly growing. Affiliate Marketing Niche is one example.
3. Make sure that you pick products in your niche that are high ticket items.(Meaning that they are expensive, but most importantly highly valuable to the people buying this product.
4. Make sure that your chosen niche helps to solve problems for people, because the more that you can help people the more you’re likely to be rewarded monetarily.
2. Choose What Platform You Want To Be Seen On
Where would you like to be seen on?
Writing A Blog – Would you like to start a website blog where you are writing most of the time. You would write reviews on products, and how to articles that would drive traffic to your affiliate links.
YouTube – You would be creating videos that get people inspired to buy products or services by talking about it on your channel, and sending them to affiliate links.
Social Media Platforms – Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, etc are some example of social media platforms that you can leverage to drive traffic to products or services.
Email Marketing – When you have built up a nice email list, this is one of the best ways to reach your audience fast.
Remember you don’t have to just stick with only one of these 4 choices, as you can use a combination of all 4 to gain as much reach as possible.
3. Find The Right Affiliate Marketing Programs
Its important to find trustworthy affiliate marketing programs that will come through for you. There are a few things to look out for when choosing a good affiliate program. Ask yourself these questions.
- Has the affiliate program been around for a long time?
- What do other people that have used it say about it? Its important to be able to trust an affiliate program because they’re essential to your affiliate marketing business being profitable. ShareASale, Commission Junction and Clickbank are some examples of affiliate programs that have been around for a long time, and have a great record.
- Does the program pay you well? – At the end of the day as an affiliate marketer we make a living off commissions, and it would be worth our hard work and time if the programs pay well. A lot of programs range between 10% and 50%, and sometimes above 70% if they are digital products. Choose a commission structure that makes sense to you, and is worth your time.
- What is the earnings per click(EPC) rate? – This is the average amount of money that you can earn each time someone clicks an affiliate link of yours. The higher this is the better for you’re earning potential.
How Do You Search For Affiliate Programs On Google?
You can just search in Google like this. In this example I was looking for affiliate programs within the cycling niche.
There are also many websites that will let you in on the best affiliate programs within specific niches, so you have a lot to choose from.
You can either sign up individually to affiliate programs, or if you go with ShareASale for example, you can sign up with many programs that are under their affiliate umbrella.
The nice thing about ShareASale and other affiliate networks like them, is that they create their homework for you, and find trustworthy affiliate programs. This is a great place to start.
4. Make An Effort To Create Valuable Content
People are always searching for answers to questions, but you have to ask yourself what will attract people to click on your content?
There’s a lot of competition online, and its important that in order for you to get noticed, you’ll have to stand out from the crowd.
Creating high quality content, visuals like pictures or imbeded video on your site will make it more appealing for people to read.
You can use the same strategy if you just want to be on YouTube, or any other social media app. Its all about creating content that people keep coming back to, because it helps them out with problems that they’re having and is engaging and interesting.
The effort that you put in will result in faster growth of your audience, and followers.
5. Be Honest When Marketing Products Or Services To Your Audience
Make sure that the products and services that you’re marketing are legitimate. Also don’t make them out to be more than they are.
If you give an honest review of a product, you can be certain that people will keep on coming back to your content because of the trust that you’ll build with your audience.
Never try to push a sale to make quick money, if its not a quality product. This tactic won’t work out well for you in the long run.
What Benefits Are There With Affiliate Marketing?
Here are some benefits of affiliate marketing.
1. You don’t need to own the product that you’re promoting(Low Risk)
This is because you’re only focusing on promoting the product. The company that you’re promoting for has to worry about shipping the product to the customer.
An example is if you sign up with the Amazon Associates program. You will get a unique affiliate link, and when someone purchases that product you’ll receive the commission and Amazon will make sure that the product arrives at the customers’ door.
You also don’t need any upfront capital to start your business which is great.
2. Your Income Will Eventually Be Passive
This means that you create the work of creating content once and get rewarded for your effort multiple times.
The online world is running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and because of this you have the opportunity to earn money even while you’re sleeping.
This is an amazing advantage to becoming financially free.
This is what got me into this space, because I wanted to be able to earn money without having to sacrifice all my precious time that could be spent in better ways than working at a traditional 9 to 5 job.
3. There Is No Limit To Your Earning Potential
Just take a look on Amazon.com, there is almost an unlimited amount of products that you can promote. This means that you’re earning potential can amount to anything that you desire.
The more work that you put in creating quality content that people are drawn to, the more that you’ll be rewarded with traffic and commissions.
Which Product Is Best For Affiliate Marketing?
There are so many products that you can promote. Here I will explain the different categories of products that you can promote.
1. Digital Products
Examples of digital products that you can promote are
- E books
- Video Courses
- PDF’s
- Software(Games, Plugins, apps, cloud services, Design Software)
- Mobile Applications(iTunes and Google Play Store)
- Music
These digital products can either be self hosted on your website, or you can send traffic to online retail stores like Amazon.com for example. There are millions of online stores.
Advantages Of Selling Digital Products For Affiliate Marketers
- No overhead costs. (No manufacturing of a physical product, no shipping or storage costs)
- The buyer of a digital product can use it immediately without having to wait for delivery.
- Its the simplest way to help add value to peoples lives who require access to great information fast.
Disadvantages Of Selling Digital Products For Affiliate Marketers
There are a lot of digital products like e books that are not very expensive for someone to buy, therefore you have to sell a lot of e books to be able to make a living out of them.
Solution
Make sure that you look for digital products and services that are expensive(high ticket items) to buy for your clients, but very valuable, so they will want to purchase them.
2. Online Professional Services
There are many companies online that offer quality services that many will find to be valuable to use.
Example of online professional services that you can promote are
- Designers who you can commission to create something digital for you
- Content Marketing Services
- VPN services, used to help marketers target audiences in the country of their choice
- Mastermind and membership sights
- Research and consulting services
- Finance, accounting software and services
- Online hosted services like WealthyAffiliate, Bluehost, etc.
- Email service providers
Advantage Of Online Professional Services For Affiliate Marketers
- You can earn higher commissions, as these services are usually sold at a higher price point because of the ongoing value they create for their clients.
- Its easy to promote these and get sales as they solve problems for your clients.
- Many hosted services will offer recurring commissions. This is great news for affiliate marketers because you’ll get paid as long as the customer that you refered stays with the service. Wealthy Affiliate is a great example of this with commissions of almost 50% that are recurring.
Disadvantages Of Online Professional Services For Affiliate Marketers
- You may not always find affiliate programs for these services as they might choose to do all their marketing internally.
Solution
There are so many professional services that create come with high ticket affiliate programs and with many having recurring commissions you don’t want to be missing out on this one.
3. Online Digital Courses
More and more people are turning to online digital courses to learn life skills. You can find online digital courses on almost anything. The prices that these courses sell for can be in the thousands of Dollars.
An example of an online digital course that I use myself is Wealth Affiliate. They are my favorite place to learn how to run an affiliate marketing business.
Advantages Of Online Digital Courses For Affiliate Marketers
- Courses like these are one of the best ways to help your audience achieve goals that are important to them.
- Courses are very valuable and therefore offered at a higher prices points, so you’re earning potential is greater for each sale.
- There’s a lot of demand for these online digital courses, so you will have lots of interest in your content promoting them.
Disadvantages Of Online Digital Courses For Affiliate Marketers
- You will have to make sure that you do your homework on the courses that you’re promoting to make sure that you are showcasing a great product that follows through on their promises. If you promote something that doesn’t deliver, you will start to lose credibility with your audience.
Solution
Always do thorough research on any online digital courses that you’re promoting to ensure quality products.
4. The Ecommerce Business Model
Ecommerce is the buying and selling of goods on the internet.
You can have your own website where people can purchase products and pay for them. Its up to you then to see that the products make their way to your customers with the help of a courier.
Advantages Of The Ecommerce Business Model For Affiliate Marketers
- As you gain recognition and a big following from your audience, you may be approached by companies who give you free merchandise to promote to your audience.
- People like that you’re reviewing an item that you’ve tried out and tested it yourself.
Disadvantages Of The Ecommerce Business Model For Affiliate Marketers
- Don’t expect high commissions from this sort of affiliate marketing because of all the overheads(Manufacture,Storage, Shipping, etc)
- Buying the products to review may end up being very expensive.
Conclusion
If you want to create a business with very little upfront capital then affiliate marketing is the way to go.
Affiliate Marketing will give you the freedom to be able to promote anything that interests you, and you will have the unique opportunity to enjoy income streams that a lot of the time are passive, giving you extra time to do whatever you want to.
If you’re interested in going a lot more in depth and learning all there is to know about affiliate marketing then check out my Wealthy Affiliate Review. This is where I learnt everything affiliate marketing, and they always push to get better and better in what they deliver.
Let me know if you have any questions, and ill be happy to help.
All the best
Luciano, AdventurousWealth.com