There are many people on the Internet looking for ways to increase their passive income. I can tell you from personal experience that affiliate marketing is a reliable approach. Even if you're watching videos and playing games, money will automatically come into your account.
As early as more than a decade ago, there are many foreigners who rely on alliance marketing (such as Amazon alliance, CJ alliance) to make money, and there are also a number of people in China who rely on alliance marketing (such as Taobao alliance, Ali Yunyun Ambassador) to make money. As long as you have seriously studied the network money, you will find: affiliate marketing is a very good network money project. In order to help friends who are interested in alliance marketing dig the first bucket of gold early, I specially organized the introductory knowledge of alliance marketing, and I believe that this article will inspire friends.
What is affiliate marketing?
In essence, affiliate marketing is a sales model in which merchants pay commissions to those who promote the product (in technical terms, affiliate customers) in order to achieve marketing results (bring in more customers). Simply put, affiliate customers are like merchants' sales, helping merchants promote products and obtain orders, and merchants pay corresponding commissions to affiliate customers. To improve the visibility of a product or brand, businesses rely on their own Shouting is far from enough, he also needs more marketing, such as: advertising, sponsorship. Affiliate marketing is one of the promotion methods, and it is a three-way win-win way: customers buy the desired products, alliance customers earn commissions, and merchants get orders.
A good affiliate marketing project can attract thousands of affiliate customers to the business to promote. Similarly, a successful alliance customer can be promoted to many businesses at the same time, so the income of the alliance customer is very considerable.
How does affiliate marketing work?
The operation mechanism of affiliate marketing is not complicated.
First, the merchant should do an affiliate marketing program, and explain how much commission, how to pay the commission, and the expiration date of the cookie (a common range is 30-90 days).
Second, the merchant should assign a dedicated link to each affiliate, so that the manufacturer can track each order from which affiliate. When a user clicks on a link dedicated to Affiliate, a cookie is recorded in the user's browser. Affiliate customers earn a commission if they place an order within the expiration date of the cookie.
Finally, every time an affiliate successfully recommends an order to the merchant, the merchant will pay a commission to the affiliate.
For example, you read Big Dog's introduction to the iPhone, and then you click on Big Dog's iPhone purchase link. Although you didn't immediately buy an iPhone after reading about Big Dog, the cookie was recorded by the browser. A few hours later, you go to see the introduction of the iPhone and place an order to buy, then the merchant knows through the cookie that the order is recommended by the big dog, and will give the big dog a commission.
Why affiliate marketing?
Well, through the above introduction, I believe you already know what affiliate marketing is and how affiliate marketing works. Now let me talk about why affiliate marketing is a great way to earn passive income online.
- Flexible and convenient
Compared to many money-making projects, affiliate marketing can be said to be very simple. Because you are only responsible for promoting the product, not responsible for manufacturing, research and development, storage of products, etc. Many affiliate marketers (people who make money from affiliate marketing) promote their products by writing an article or shooting a video, and do everything else. As long as someone orders through the link in the article or video, the affiliate can get a commission.
- Low risk factor
Affiliate marketing programs are free to join, that is, do not invest capital, this model is equivalent to no capital. Of course, affiliate marketing requires a small amount of investment: you need to have a computer and a working network, and you need to spend a small amount of money (several hundred yuan per year) to build and operate a website, but this money can be controlled by yourself. The biggest investment in alliance customers is time and energy, and the money investment is too little to be ignored.
- Passive income
Affiliate marketing is seen by many as a great way to earn passive income, which is determined by the nature of affiliate marketing. For example, if you spend an hour writing an article promoting a product, then you play a video game or binge-watch a TV series. Every second of the day, you don't have to do anything, as long as someone reads your article and clicks on the exclusive link in the article to place an order, you get an affiliate commission. This commission income is passive income because you didn't do anything when you earned it. The opposite of passive income is active income, and the most common type of active income is the salary you earn when you go to work. If you work one day, you earn one day's pay. If you don't, you don't get paid. Affiliate marketing can not only earn passive income, you can also choose those affiliate projects with high commission to do, so that you can earn more commission.
- Work from home
There are a lot of great associates who work from home, they can do everything on their own, don't have to deal with people. Working from home doesn't mean you can watch TV or sleep all the time. You still need to plan your work time so that you can do affiliate marketing more quickly and effectively.
- Get paid for results
Unlike many jobs, affiliate marketing doesn't come with a minimum or guaranteed salary. Every penny earned by affiliate customers is based on performance, which in many affiliate programs is calculated by order. Affiliate customers receive commissions only when orders are placed. Therefore, alliance customers need to create good content and recommend good products, so as to bring more orders.
How do I become an affiliate?
I believe that the friends who see here are already itching to know how to do alliance customers and earn their own passive income.
The first step is to choose the promotion channel
Alliance customer promotion channels are very many, different people prefer different channels, I say a few more popular channels.
1. Personal website: The investment in building a personal website is low, and it has been sought after by alliance customers. I shared how to build a personal website.
2. Video website: Whether it is domestic or foreign video website, there are many alliance customers through the creation of videos to drainage.
3. Social media: Foreigners prefer Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, etc., while Chinese prefer Douyin, wechat and QQ.
The second step is to choose the field of promotion
Each alliance customer has its own field of expertise, for example, some alliance customers specialize in promoting a variety of food products, and some alliance customers specialize in promoting a variety of digital products. Generally speaking, it is best for novice alliance customers to choose a small field of segmentation to start, because the smaller the field, the competition is relatively less fierce. In addition, I also recommend that the novice alliance customers choose what they are really interested in, because only what they are really interested in has the power to stick to, otherwise three days of fishing and two days of drying nets, it is difficult to earn commission. Combining the things you are interested in with the things you are good at will make you feel more accomplished with less effort.
Step 3: Select an affiliate project
There are tens of thousands of affiliate programs around the world, but which ones are right for you?The following are recommended to take a closer look。
Impact
Formerly Impact Radius, their Marketplace was built to offer content creators a seamless way to monetize their work and offer their audiences a lot of value through a huge list of brands looking to advertise and a suite of tracking and automation tools.
With direct access to global brands like Airbnb, Adidas, and Allstate, flexible payment processing, and robust reporting and alerts, there’s a good chance you’ll find them a great fit for your audience and business.
CJ
Formerly Commission Junction, CJ has spent the last 2 decades building relationships with brands and publishers to create an affiliate marketing platform worth exploring.
Advertisers you’ll find here include Priceline.com, Overstock.com, and J. Crew.
CJ also includes some one-click join affiliate programs to make it easy for beginner affiliate marketers to start their journey, while also offering omnichannel tracking (across browsers, devices, etc) and strategic recommendations based on business size, vertical, and region for when you’re more established.
ShareASale
ShareASale helps beginner and expert affiliate marketers alike create profitable long-term partnerships with brands their audience will love.
With 260+ affiliate programs launched every month (businesses like Etsy and Rebook are already on board), a product discovery bookmarklet for quickly generating affiliate links, and a slew of analytics and reporting tools, if you find a product worth promoting to your audience here you won’t be going astray.
ClickBank
ClickBank has done a good job of owning the information product affiliate program space, offering products like online courses and ebooks that you won’t find as readily on other affiliate marketing platforms.
A word of caution: I’ve seen a lot of shoddy products that were created with an earn-a-dollar first approach on offer so be sure to do your due diligence before recommending what you find here.
If the affiliate product checks out, though, this is an affiliate marketing network you can rely on for ease-of-use and on-time payments.
Best Affiliate Marketing Programs
What is an affiliate marketing program?
Beyond the products you can promote, affiliate programs include the commission rates, payment terms, marketing materials, and promotion rules a business with an affiliate product offers affiliate marketers like you.
Again, please do not start by seeing the financial opportunity in these programs and working backward from there to fit your business around them.
These affiliate marketing programs are great examples of what’s available to you as an affiliate marketer so use them, but only if they’re truly going to benefit the audience you’ve built a relationship with.
Amazon Associates
You know Amazon, now you know about their Amazon Associates affiliate program!
They’re the world’s largest retailer so if your business is related to any sort of physical product, you’ll find a quality option to offer here.
Worth noting, Amazon recently caused quite a stir by drastically lowering their commission rates (from 8% to 4% in many categories), which is a good example of why building relationships with your audience and eventually creating your own offerings is so important.
That being said, on top of having the world’s largest catalog, Amazon has poured billions into optimizing their site for conversions and you earn a commission for any product purchased visitors purchase within 48 hours of clicking your links, so they’re still a top recommendation for physical affiliate products.
Learn more about making Amazon Associates work for your audience and business in my Amazon Affiliate Marketing Program guide here.
Fiverr Affiliates
Fiverr, the popular marketplace for freelance services, offers a few different affiliate products and services that might be a good fit for promoting to your audience.
These include:
- Fiverr, the freelance marketplace offering services for everything from graphics and copywriting to complete websites and custom apps.
- Fiverr Business, their suite of premium tools and vetted talent for business owners.
- Fiverr Learn, their online courses platform.
- Fiverr affiliates, their affiliate program (links to Fiverr on this page are NOT my affiliate links)
If you work with clients who might need support from freelancers available on Fiverr’s platform or have an audience of entrepreneurs, a partnership with Fiverr is worth considering.
In addition to being a good fit for a broad set of businesses, I decided to add Fiverr to my list of affiliate marketing programs because they introduce some interesting commission structures you can find in some other programs.
Many affiliate programs will offer flat commissions per sale.
In Fiverr’s case, this includes a $15-150 Cost Per Action (CPA), depending on the service the person you refer buys.
They also offer percentages of the sale price, 30% for Fiverr Learn courses as an example.
Something you don’t see as often but is very valuable as an affiliate marketer is a revenue share option.
In this case, Fiverr’s “Hybrid” payment structure lets you earn $10 for a first-time purchase and 10% of all further purchases made by someone you refer for 12 months.
The beauty of revenue share commission structures is twofold:
- You have the potential to earn a lot more than flat-rate plans
- Revenue share smooths out your earnings curves
For example, as people get outside during the summer months, you’ll sometimes see a natural dip in traffic and sales for software-based products as people are spending less time on their computers.
But, if you earn a piece of the monthly fees a person you refer pays for their software, you’re less likely to see a dip in your monthly revenues.
HostGator Affiliate Program
HostGator is a popular web hosting and domain registration company you’ve likely heard of because their affiliate program is so popular.
And because so many different audiences from entrepreneurs to crochet enthusiasts can benefit from having a website, chances are your audience may be interested in a web hosting service.
While I use and prefer Bluehost because I know them, trust them, and have a great relationship with their team, I mention HostGator here because it shows us another element of affiliate marketing commission structures: pay for performance.
What does this mean exactly?
HostGator offers a tiered payments structure based on how many monthly signups they receive from you:
- 1-5 signups per month: $65/signup
- 6-10 signups per month: $75/signup
- 11-20 signups per month: $100/signup
- 21+ signups per month: $125/signup
Again, please think about your audience’s needs and the quality of the product/service first, and commission rates and structures second.
But if all else is equal between two tools, it’s worth investing your time and effort in creating helpful content and building a partnership relationship with the company that helps you grow your commissions as you grow their sales.
Wix Affiliate Program
Our last affiliate marketing program example is Wix, the popular website building software.
I mention them here for two reasons:
- Again, website-related products and services are useful for a lot of audiences, so chances are Wix might be a good fit for you and yours.
- They’re an example of one other element of affiliate marketing program commission structures – minimum payouts.
To point 2, many affiliate programs have minimum earnings targets you have to hit to get paid. In Wix’s case, you have to generate at least $300 in commissions before they’ll send your earnings to your bank account.
This is a fairly common practice and thus a nice example of why I say affiliate marketing is not a get-rich-quick scheme.
Step four: Create quality content
If you want to earn a good commission, you can't do without high-quality content. What is quality content? Content that people are interested in reading, want to click on the exclusive link, and can't wait to buy one. How do you create such high quality content? I summarized three directions:
1. Content that addresses pain points
2. Actually experience the content of the product
3. Comparison and evaluation of similar products
Step five, drain
When you create good content, the next step is to get it seen by as many people as possible, and there are several ways to increase exposure:
1. Use search engines: Rely on keywords.
2. Email list: Build up your email list and make it one of your conduits.
3. Paid traffic: This is suitable for advanced alliance customers, not suitable for novice alliance customers.
4. Use social media and community forums: Proactively post content to get potential users to click on your links.
Step 6: Turn clicks into orders
In order for an affiliate to earn a commission, it needs to complete two conversions. The first conversion is clicking on the embedded proprietary link, because the content created by the affiliate brings users to visit, the user reads the article, and someone clicks on the embedded proprietary link. The second conversion is when the user clicks on the dedicated link to place an order.
How to choose the right alliance project?
The reason why many novice alliance customers fail is that they do not find the right alliance project. So, I would like to share my consideration points for choosing an alliance project.
- The amount of commission: Although everyone likes alliance projects with high commission, the more commission projects are more difficult to convert;
- The type of commission: some are one-time commission, some are continuous commission, which is decided by the merchant.
- cookie validity: Try to choose items with a long link validity period, because the validity period is too short, even if you attract clicks, but you will lose a lot of commission;
- Relevance: The selected alliance project should be highly relevant to our field, the higher the better;
- Payment method: Choose the payment method you have, otherwise you work hard for a long time in vain;
- Word-of-mouth: Choose products with good word-of-mouth, so that it is less difficult to convert;
- Level of competition: Choose projects with the right level of competition so that conversion is easier.
