A Beginner’s Guide to Affiliate Marketing
Learn all you need to know about affiliate marketing work before you start making passive income online today.
A Quick Guide to Affiliate Marketing for Beginners
Of the seemingly endless list of ways to make passive income online, affiliate marketing easily takes a seat at the top because of its relatively low-maintenance yet high reward. Okay, you’re probably wondering what that means exactly. Good question, and in the next four minutes, you’re about to find out.
What is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a type of online passive income that comprises of promoting products of other companies to interested customers.
It’s in the name, you’re a sales affiliate. Through your promotional strategy, be it an informational blog post or a funny TikTok, if someone clicks on your provided affiliate link and purchases the products or services, you earn affiliate commissions.
Think of it as a “Hey, thanks for sending em our way. We don’t do cards but uh, here’s some money as thanks” from the company.
You just need to find the affiliate program page, fill out some contact information, get an Associate’s ID that will attach at the end of your hyperlink (so the merchant knows the customer came from you), and start making affiliate sales!
About each party (who’s who)
You, the Affiliate.
Think of it like you’re a part of the company’s marketing team. Except, you’re strategizing by yourself (or with a personal team), and promoting their products from your own affiliate website/platform. You’re compensated for every purchase made by a visitor using your link.
Your audience, the Customer.
This is your audience and the company’s potential customer. Before purchasing, customers are always looking for informative guides and reasons to justify their purchase. Once they find valuable content–ideally from you, they develop a trust and are more inclined to listen to recommendations.
The handling system, the Network.
Those personalized affiliate links you receive to post on your website and the paid commissions are handled by an internal third-party platform. Think of the system as the middleman of middlemen–that’s you, the affiliate marketer between the merchant. Often, the merchant and the network are the same, since some companies run their own affiliate programs.
The company offering the affiliate program, the Merchant.
This is a brand that decided they could use an extra pair of hands for their marketing. With hundreds of affiliates promoting their products, the commission is a price worth paying on their end. The merchant decides on an enticing commission rate and offers it to us as an incentive.
Why become an affiliate marketer?
It’s a fair question. Why take the time to get started with affiliate marketing and promote products to get paid? Why affiliate income other passive incomes? There are a couple of reasons, four, to be exact, on why should join an affiliate program. Let’s go through them.
Scalability: Why put a limit on your income?
See, affiliate programs don’t limit you to a single company because you’re not an employee. So, you can join as many programs as you like and earn as much as they can from each. Just make sure you can keep up with the promotional content for each company.
Focus on strategizing quality promotional content on just a handful of affiliate products. Overflowing work spreads you too thin, diminishes the quality of your work, and weakens trust with your audience.
Low Costs: What have you got to lose?
The cost of starting up your own affiliate marketing business is stupidly low. At the very most, you’ll need to pay for a hosting account and domain for your website.
A domain is around $17/year, a hosting account can be $30-40/month, and if you want a custom email domain, that’s around $8/month for one user on Google. Considering how much money you could make with a high-paying affiliate program, that’s pocket change in the scheme of things.
Alternatively, since you really only need an audience to drive traffic to another site–you don’t even need your own website to do that. You can just post your affiliate links through social media, free. Many affiliate marketers leverage YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram to build an audience and promote their products and services.
Flexibility: Be your own boss.
Affiliate marketing allows you to control pretty much every aspect of your business while making money.
Control your niche and content
Based on your passions and interests, decide which industry/niche you want to make money on. The structure, partnerships, and developments of your business are solely your decisions to make, too.
Make your own work hours
9-5? What’s that? You don’t have to worry about anyone’s deadlines except the ones you set for yourself. Affiliate programs makes it possible to take the afternoon to be with your kids and continue work whenever you feel like it.
Of course, it’s not all free willy. The content you post should coincide with peak traffic times for your audience on socials or your website. That way, you reach maximum users. Even then, content automation tools can help you schedule and post promotional content on your behalf.
Work wherever you want, whenever you want.
No need to travel an hour and a half to your cubicle. The best affiliate can have all their work as online marketing. So, you can work from anywhere in the world, all you need is a laptop and some internet. Your affiliate revenue will continue to stream in as you sip coconut water in the Maldives.
Learn high-demand, high-income skills.
Being a successful affiliate marketer demands a talented, all-around digital marketer. Through hands-on learning, that means mastering high-demand skills like:
● Website building
● Search engine optimization (SEO)
● Conversion optimization
● Social media content creation and management
● Email marketing
Thereafter, you can leverage these skills to start freelancing and building up a clientele on Fiverr or Upwork for more revenue streams. And, if you feel like starting your own business, you don’t need to outsource expensive marketing services, you can save big and create content exactly how you want it consistent with your brand.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
How much money do beginner affiliate marketers make?
As a beginner, you won’t be making much. In fact, you’ll probably be losing money while you get things started. It’s hard work and it takes time. But, once things start rolling, you could expect to make $300 a day as a “beginner”.
If you’re curious, this can go to $3000/day as an intermediate, and as a seasoned marketer, you could make over $10 000/day–but that’s just for your motivation right now.
How long does it take to make a steady income?
That depends on the quality of your content, SEO, and overall traffic. Generally speaking, you could see some profits by the 6-month mark if you work hard. Growing your affiliate marketing business to new, job-quitting heights will require years of dedication to your content output.
What are affiliate networks?
Affiliate networks are when a group of companies offer different–but compatible–products that complement each other (like a tooth brush and tooth paste),]. They help drive traffic and leads to each other for the mutual incentive. The content creation and strategy for linking each other is therefore seamlined and managed through an ‘affiliate network’.