Affiliate marketing programs are undoubtedly one of the e-commerce successes of recent years due to them being relatively inexpensive to set up – and provided they have been put together according to certain criteria. What has to be kept in mind is that a lot of these schemes fail due to lack of planning. But assuming that a program is up and running, here are 5 tips for making money out of your venture.
Promotion
Of all the pros and cons of an affiliate marketing program, one of the most obvious concerns your ability to promote your products. As an affiliate marketeer, what you are doing is offering portal for the units produced by someone else. In this respect the actual products themselves are out of control. Your part of this bargain is to take over the marketing function where responsibility would normally lie with your host – in return for being given the opportunity to sell products you don’t actually own. In the absence of a marketing department’s budget, what you can do is bring your own promotional resources to bear.
Particularly if you are marketing niche products, you can develop a strong understanding of your customers. As well as displaying web pages offering direct access to the click-through links, you can embed your program alongside other aspects of your online presence. You can use your blog in an intelligent way to help with this promotion, writing product reviews that contain keywords. By adopting search engine optimization techniques you can ensure backlinks will keep the flow of customers, boosting your own search engine ranking. As you are plugging products or services ‘by proxy’ you need to have a reliable strategy worked out before launching, so always remember to plan ahead. You can include screenshots on even the deals that can demonstrate your claims that this is an excellent product. The key is to show how much the item has benefited you.
Visual guides
Taking the latter point further, using the available technology for free web communication is another terrific way to increase your ability to make money. You can take each of the products that are on your program then produce a Skype pitch, whether by audio clip or video. Rather than simply surfing into your platform and coming across a list, albeit with attractive-looking jpegs, your potential customers will have a far more immersive experience. These interviews can be offered to your blog readers, and can be highlighted via other aspects of your social media presence.
Very few people will follow the click-through path and end up buying a product on a whim. Without the benefit of a host company’s extensive online sales pages, they will want to know what they are buying into. This is where you need to big yourself up as an authority. This is done in a variety of ways, but chiefly through building a picture of reliability through the aforementioned combination of product reviews and subtle sales pitches via social media platforms.
Collaboration
Another hint is to reach out for other affiliates who may be on a similar wavelength. Networking is a terrific way to continue boosting your presence and introduce potential new customer leads to your own affiliate network.
Tricks for broadening your appeal
It’s easy enough to register a URL forwarding address for your program, one that is short and snappy and easy for your customers to bookmark. This is especially useful if your blog contains a lot of video content.