How To Use Affiliate Marketing To Increase Your Online Income

Does the concept of affiliate marketing sound familiar to you? Since the Internet became integrated into our lives, we have witnessed how marketing models have changed and evolved to adapt to new forms of online sales.

We’ve expanded channels and explored countless methods to capture the attention of your target audience, but the reality is that it’s never enough. Fortunately, consumers continue to be demanding and challenge us to look for new online sales methods.

Any company that has extrapolated or generated its business activity from the gateway of the digital world is always looking for new ways to increase its online income.

And one of the most effective ways to do this is through affiliate marketing. Do you know what exactly affiliate marketing is and how it works?

What’s Affiliates Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is a digital marketing technique that allows companies to increase their sales and affiliates to earn income through commissions.

Although it is more on the lips than ever lately, the truth is that it made its appearance in the 1990s.

Affiliate marketing is a way to earn income by selling other people’s products. That is, it consists of promoting something belonging to an external company, whether it is a physical product or a service, and obtaining a commission every time you manage to make a sale or action.

To be clear, the process looks something like this:

A company offers a product for sale on its website or e-commerce and you negotiate with them to earn a commission every time you generate a sale.

In this way you promote it on your website, blog or social networks with a unique link through which you reach the questioned product. When the customer makes the purchase, it is recorded that it came “from you” thanks to the tracking provided by said link.

Affiliate marketing is, therefore, a win-win relationship in which we all win: the online store increases its sales, I obtain extra income and the reader, who trusts my judgment, has the opportunity to discover new products or services.

Who Are In Charge Of The Affiliate Marketing Model?

Four main actors are involved in affiliate marketing:

On the one hand, there is the seller, marketer or creator of the product. It is the company that makes the product, or has a service offer, and wants to make them known.

The marketer is usually the manufacturer of the product or service, although sometimes he is simply the one who offers it, but not the one who created it.

Basically, whatever its nature, it offers revenue sharing and commissions to people or other companies (or affiliates) that have a significant base of followers of your brand.

On the other hand, there is the affiliate, which is the medium that promotes said product or service in exchange for a commission. An affiliate is also known as an advertiser or product promoter, it can be a person or a company. Typically, they are bloggers or content creators active in the industry of the product they are promoting.

Affiliates help promote the product or service by creating content, whether in blog posts, videos, or other media. They can also promote content and transact by placing ads, capturing search traffic through SEO, or building a database with emails.

Another of the figures that participate in the affiliate marketing model are affiliate networks. They are in charge of dealing with the product promoters. That is, networks are digital platforms that function as intermediaries between affiliates and companies seeking to promote themselves. This strategy is based on affiliate platforms or websites that work on digital marketing and advertising to increase conversions, which favors sellers.

They also unify the entire offer, simplifying search tasks for affiliates who, without this, would have to contact each company individually. And finally, there are the consumers, the end users of the product. The consumer is the client, the person who makes the purchase. That is, consumers or clients are the ones who carry out the transaction. They are the ones who purchase the product or send a form with their data, thus guaranteeing that the affiliate obtains a commission.

How Does An Affiliate Marketing Program Work?

How an affiliate marketing program works is quite simple.

The first step is for the advertiser and the affiliate to reach an agreement on the conditions of the collaboration. Once this agreement has been established, the affiliate promotes the advertiser’s product or service on their blog, social networks, email marketing, etc., using an affiliate link.

In essence, it involves the affiliate contacting the consumer to persuade them to purchase products through an affiliate program. Within the relationship between the advertiser, the affiliate and the final consumer, it is possible to differentiate the most common forms of affiliate marketing:

Through website marketing

It is the simplest model and the one that we all imagine when we talk about affiliate marketing.

In this scenario, affiliates are administrators of web pages with content linked to the advertiser’s products and services.

The site promotes these products and services, obtaining a commission for each lead or conversion made. For the strategy to work, it is necessary that the site’s audience aligns with the figure of the buyer persona.

Through “cash back” or cash back

This model is based on sites that share their income with users. That is, they return part of the commission for purchases made through their digital platforms.

Said return can be directly monetary or translate into points exchangeable for other products and services, or even discounts and special promotions. Here the benefit for the end user is evident.

Through search engines

Affiliates achieve conversions on advertisers’ final websites through search engine ads (based on a PPC system).

That is, the affiliate is responsible for promoting the advertiser’s products and services through the purchase of keywords on sites such as Google AdWords. For this model to be profitable, it is essential that the payment per click or conversion be less than the commission received from the advertiser.

Using databases for email marketing

In this case, the affiliate makes money from people in its database who are interested in subjects linked to the advertiser’s good or service. Good targeting on the part of both the advertiser and the affiliate is vital to the success of this specific type of associative marketing.

Through co-registration databases

In this case, affiliates group several companies into a single newsletter to which consumers interested in a specific topic can subscribe. The consumer gives their consent for their data to be sent to companies in the sector that interests them.

Through affiliate networks

Affiliate networks, as we already pointed out, aim to act as intermediaries between advertisers and affiliates. They facilitate the relationship between both parties on a large scale and provide the necessary tools to track sales and commissions.

Why Should You Do Affiliate Marketing?

There are many reasons why you should consider doing affiliate marketing.

First of all, it’s a great way to generate passive income. Once you have established your affiliate program and created quality content to promote products or services, you can continue making money even when you are not working.

For affiliates, the main advantage of affiliate marketing is that they do not need to create products or services, nor establish complex logistics structures or serve customers, since all of this falls on the company.

For the advertiser, affiliate marketing is a good opportunity to boost the growth of your business, especially in the case of e-commerce, without having to make a large investment.

It also allows them to reach a qualified audience and reduce their fixed costs, thus improving return on investment.

Cookies, the allies of affiliate marketing

Cookies play a very important role in affiliate marketing. These small text files that web servers send to the hard drive are stored in the user’s browser when they click on an affiliate link.

Thanks to cookies, the affiliate platform can track the user’s actions and assign the sale to the corresponding affiliate.

In affiliate marketing, cookies are used to “remember” user behavior. Therefore, when you click on the affiliate link, the link through which you reach the destination website (the advertiser’s page) contains information about the affiliate, the selected advertisement and the corresponding commission amount.

Keys to carrying out an affiliate marketing strategy

Creating an effective affiliate marketing strategy is not an easy task, but it is not impossible either. To do so, it is important to take into account certain key aspects.

First of all, it is advisable to choose the products or services to be promoted according to each market niche.

In addition, it is necessary to establish a relationship of trust with readers. Finally, it is essential to generate quality content and use the appropriate SEO techniques to improve visibility in search engines. To do this, it is necessary to have the audit, advice and management of companies specialized in affiliate marketing strategies.

5 Notable Examples Of Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing has become a powerful tool. Through the strategy of partnering with influencers or other companies to promote products or services, it is possible to achieve a substantial increase in sales and improve brand visibility.

But we don’t say it. The affiliate marketing examples speak for themselves:

Amazon Associates

As a pioneer of affiliate marketing, Amazon offers one of the most comprehensive and diverse affiliate programs in the world. With millions of products available, affiliates have a wide range to choose from and earn commissions.

Bluehost

Bluehost, a leading web hosting company, offers an affiliate program where sellers can earn a significant commission for each referred customer. Their affiliate program has proven to be very effective with some of them earning up to six figures annually.

Shopify

The Shopify affiliate program offers significant earnings to affiliates, rewarding them for each user who registers on their platform. It has been successful in attracting customers and promoting its e-commerce platform.

TripAdvisor

This program allows affiliates to earn commissions by promoting the largest travel website in the world. With access to 500,000 city and hotel pages, affiliates have a wide range of options to promote.

ClickBank Network

We are talking about a global retail market that offers an affiliate program with high commissions. Your digital products are easy to promote and can generate significant income for affiliates.

Obviously, there are many more examples. However, these five demonstrate the potential of affiliate marketing to drive sales and promote brands.