Affiliate marketing, in a nutshell, is you promoting other people’s products and services in exchange for a share of commissions.
It can be digital products such as e-learning programs – which comprised of e-books in PDF, video courses, software tools and website templates – and physical goods as in things that people like you and me buy everyday from shops for consumers and entertainment purposes.
To sign up as an affiliate is very simple. Simply do a Google search for affiliate programs and you will find dozens in the result listings. But from my 10 years of internet marketing experience, Amazon, ClickBank, Market Health and JVZoo are by far the most popular. While Amazon deals with consumer products, ClickBank and JVZoo specialize in digital ones I just mentioned above. Market Health – as its name implies – mainly focuses on healthcare products. Besides these, you can also promote services as well as an autoresponder, domain registration and web hosting that most marketers need as their online tools to start their online businesses.
While those companies focus on rewarding you with commissions for every sale you generated for them, others paid you for every lead you get for them whether or not that prospect buys. This comes under the term of Cost Per Action or CPA marketing. Never Blue and Peerfly are 2 most popular networks that stand out while you can also scout for others via Offer Vault and O’Digger CPA search platforms.
Upon signing up, you will be given a choice of whether you want to receive your commissions via checks or direct bank deposits depending on where you live. For ClickBank, you need to generate at least 5 sales before being issued a check and option of whether you want to continue receiving checks or direct deposits. For Amazon, you need to generate at least $100 in commissions before receiving a check if you are living outside the US or have those same 2 options if you are American.
Once you are approved, you can start promoting their products and services. Because most of my 10 years has been spent on promoting Amazon and ClickBank, I will touch upon them. Now as much as it is important to learn and earn, you need to focus on who your target prospects are and how you can help them with their needs and wants. For Amazon, the answers are very obvious. I normally look for the best sellers, hot releases and products with at least 4-5 star ratings. But for ClickBank, I will look for those who pay commissions of at least $30 and with high gravity as in most affiliates promoting before I considered whether I should do the same as well.
Upon deciding on what to promote, I simply placed ads first through classified websites like Adlandpro, Adpost, Backpage, Craigslist and Gumtree for quick cash for a start. Then I focused on creating content for long-term passive income such as writing articles, blogging, e-books, press releases, and videos.
For information products, I normally link them to my squeeze page and over time once they become my subscribers, I followed up with them on not just email promotions but the content and links to my blog posts.
For physical products, that will be my affiliate sites I am sending my visitors to. But I do my best not to make my site look like an affiliate site but a professional-looking e-commerce site using WordPress, Ink Themes and WooCommerce. So far I have promoted air purifiers, digital cameras, guitars, kindles, robot toys and seasonal gifts like Thanksgiving, Christmas and Chinese New Year.
Now with the emergence of Facebook as an all-in-one social media and marketing platform, I channeled my time and efforts towards it. Such as fan pages, groups, and ads which enable me to target my ideal prospects based on their age, gender, interests and earning potential based on their occupations.
On the whole, affiliate marketing is like referral marketing but done mostly online and can still earn you a great long-term passive income if you know how and what to do correctly and regularly. It is not a get rich quick scheme but a plan that helps you to earn long-term passively.
Even without meeting and even talking to people as compared to traditional marketing like direct sales and telemarketing.
