Raise your hand if you’re a newbie blogger and you’re doing some affiliate marketing?
For me, I didn’t start promoting products or services until after a year of doing freelance writing.
My focus online – at the time – was to build my freelance writing business so that I can earn a living from it.
If you have no clue what affiliate marketing is that’s okay!
I had no clue what it was at the time I started my biz.
If you’re new to blogging, affiliate marketing basically is promoting other people’s products or services and earning a commission from it.
To help you, I have a YouTube video on how to make your very first affiliate sale!
And it doesn’t have to be other people’s things; it can be business’ products.
For example, many new bloggers join affiliate programs for hosting companies like Bluehost or SiteGround.
Typically, you become an affiliate because you fell in L-O-V-E with the product or service.
When you join an affiliate program, you earn a small commission – anywhere from 2%-80% or more – when you refer someone.
So, you make a piece of the profit every time someone clicks on your referral link and buys.
Easy money, right? And in one month, I was able to triple my affiliate earnings! And wait until how much I make a year later!
Before we dive into affiliate marketing, I have this guide of 12 rockin’ ways you can promote your affiliate products. Just sign up below to grab your guide.
Two Things to Make a Killing with Your Affiliate Earnings
I’m sure many of you know of Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income, right?
He’s THE one that does affiliate marketing and takes it to the next – or triple – level.
Here’s just a small screenshot of some of his affiliate earnings in ONE MONTH.
How the heck did he do that?
Well, besides having the time to do it, the two main things he had was:
Traffic
To make a living from your affiliate earnings alone, you’re going to need butt loads of traffic. Not boatloads – buttloads 🙂
But, to earn a few hundred or even thousands from affiliate products, you don’t need tons of traffic, but you do need enough.
How much? If you’ve dialed in on your target audience, then 100-200 visitors a day can result in some conversions.
But, if your blog is all over the place and you’re attracting a variety of people, you might need 500 visitors or more to see any conversions.
To help you get more traffic to your new blog, check out my course, Ready Set Blog for Traffic!
Promotional Tactics
If you’re not killing it in your traffic – as most new bloggers are, including me! – one way to bypass that a bit is to promote, promote and promote.
But, there’s a right way and a wrong way to doing that.
Right way – placing your referral link naturally in relevant content.
Wrong way – spamming a post with your referral link, blasting it all over social media and your email list
As I mentioned earlier in this post, I started affiliate marketing this year with a freelance writing tool – Contena job board.
For most people who start an affiliate program, one of the first things you do is make a blog post about it. I didn’t do that.
And with a few clever things, though, I was able to triple my affiliate earnings in one month.
Why I Don’t Create Posts for My Affiliate Product
My other blog is a freelance writing blog. I divvy up tips on anything related to freelance writing. I knew that if all of a sudden I wrote a promotional post, I would get unsubscribes from my email list. Guaranteed.
Why?
Because for a whole year, I have only been giving the best tips around and nothing more.
I don’t have ads on my site or sponsored posts. Imagine going to a blog every week and reading stellar tips and then seeing a post about how great XYZ product is.
Would that turn you off?
Another big reason why I didn’t write a blog post was that a lot of promotional posts don’t have high engagement.
I didn’t want my blog to suffer like that. So, what did I do instead?
At first, I dropped my referral link in my most pinnable posts. I made three sales and earned $79.38.
Not bad for a few minutes of work, right?
But, being me and wanting to out do myself, I thought I could do better.
What I Did Instead to Triple My Affiliate Earnings
There are a ton of ways to promote a product or service (I mention these in my freebie!), but what I chose to do instead was create a tutorial based post and published it under Pages.
Created a Tutorial
I made my entire post a mini tutorial on how I used the product – the job board – with screen shots and tips.
For someone new to this product/tool, having a guide on how to use it is extremely helpful and converts a lot better since they are now more familiar with it.
Made a Pinnable Image
I knew I could market this post on Pinterest since I could use Tailwind to schedule my pins. Instead of blasting it on my Twitter account or Facebook, Tailwind can space out my affiliate pin across days.
I created a pin-worthy image and it’s been doing fairly well on Pinterst.
I then published under Pages, so that my loyal readers wouldn’t be annoyed by my affiliate post. If they happen to see it on social media, then that would be fine.
From there I scheduled it with Tailwind and when I got my next check I was shocked!
Wha-what! I couldn’t believe that. I just scored an extra two hundred dollars in my account. All from one post and using Tailwind.
Now, whenever I write a blog post, instead of dropping my referral link, I link to my guide post.
**Update: I’ve an affiliate for this service for over a year now and that one little pin + blog posts that mention this link and its pin has generated a consistent $1k every month for me.
If you want even more ways to rock your affiliate earnings, pick up my list of 12 ways to promote your affiliate products.
And I’m already on track to making that amount and hopefully more for next month.
The Savvy Mompreneur
I think for many bloggers and mommy bloggers, building a tribe of loyal followers is on top of your list of things to do for your blog.
At least that’s what I want to do. I want to get to know my audience and those that leave comments on my blog and in Facebook.
Building a community is important to growing your blog and it’s important to me. I’ve been holding off on monetizing my blog so that I can build trust and credibility with my audience and get more traffic!
That’s not to say you can’t start making affiliate commissions right off the bat though. If it works for you, then why not, right?
As a new blogger though, you may want to try placing your referral link in your posts and then creating a separate tutorial or guide in Pages in WordPress. Some bloggers place that link in their menu then.
For example, Sarah Brooks of The Frugal Millionaire, has a ‘start a blog’ page with her affiliate link(s).
We be hustlers, day in and day out 🙂
Oh, and one more thing:
Don’t think affiliate marketing is sleazy.
Some bloggers are worried that they are “selling out” when they sign up to an affiliate program. You’re not!
You’re actually helping other bloggers figure out what works and doesn’t work.
Your readers come to you to learn from you and if you are successful in one area of your life because of an eBook you read or course you took, then tell them!
Over to you – how are you killing it with your affiliate marketing strategy?
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