When done right, affiliate marketing can be a very profitable business idea. Around the world, thousands of people earn money every day from promoting affiliate programs, with over $5bn spent on affiliate marketing annually. Over 80% of brands on average use affiliate marketing programs to boost their sales.
Why are the Top Affiliate Programs So Popular?
Advertisers like affiliate marketing since this form of marketing only requires them to pay when the desired action is completed. Unlike other forms of marketing like email marketing or search campaigns where advertisers must pay for thousands of messages or clicks that might not always lead to an action, affiliate marketing means that an action will always occur before the advertiser pays.
Affiliate marketing involves sharing a commission of a sale or lead with an affiliate. This is often a less expensive option compared to display advertising or pay per click advertising.
What is the Best Affiliate Marketing Program?
Whether you want to use affiliate marketing as your main source of earning an income or as a way to generate some additional cash on top of your regular job, choosing the right affiliate marketing program is important for your earning potential.
Unfortunately, with hundreds of affiliate networks and countless affiliate offers to choose from, the process of searching for the best affiliate marketing program for you can be quite challenging.
How to Choose Affiliate Programs for Bloggers
If you are just starting out with affiliate marketing, the first step is to sort through the hundreds of different affiliate programs and networks to choose from. Not all affiliate networks are created equally so it’s important to understand your requirement and learn more about what’s on offer to find the right option for you.
When getting started with affiliate marketing, you can choose from large affiliate networks that maintain various programs from different advertisers, or smaller networks that are specialised in a certain niche or industry. If you run a website or blog that targets a specific niche, you will usually be more successful by looking for a network that manages affiliate programs in your industry. This will help you find better and more relevant affiliate programs.
On the other hand, a larger and less specialised network might be easier to find and get started with. These networks often include thousands of offers from a wide range of advertisers. However, the quality of the offers and conversion rates might not always be as good, and it can take longer to sort through all the offers to find one that is going to be relevant to your audience.
Best Affiliate Programs to Make Money – Why Work with an Affiliate Manager?
If you can, it’s a good idea to get support from an affiliate marketing manager. This can make all the difference to your success, especially if you want to earn a full-time income from affiliate marketing. An affiliate manager will work on your account to increase revenue for the affiliates and the network. They can help you make better decisions about the affiliate program types that you choose to run and the offers you choose.
Along with this, an affiliate manager can also help out with other issues such as troubleshooting technical problems or handling payment issues.
What to Consider to Find the Best Affiliate Partners
There are several steps to consider when choosing the right affiliate partners for you. First of all, it is important to have a solid understanding of your audience and niche. When you understand who your audience is and what they’re looking for, you can generate an audience that is more focused and dedicated, since your content will remain within a certain niche.
You can find out more about your audience by conducting research on them. Ask them about their interests and any problems that they are trying to solve to give you a better idea of the content and offers they might prefer. This allows you to then promote products and services that meet their needs.
Finding the Best Affiliate Programs for Beginners
Affiliate marketplaces are the best way for beginners to get started with an affiliate program. One such option is Amazon Associates, where you can promote a wide range of products that are listed for sale on Amazon on your blog or website. Since Amazon is a site where a huge range of different products are sold, it is easy to use this affiliate program to find relevant offers that you can promote to your viewers.
Along with this, Amazon is often a top choice as it is a trusted and well-known site, meaning that people might be more likely to buy a product that they find listed through your affiliate link as they recognise the site where it is sold.
What to Look for in the Best Affiliate Programs to Make Money
The price of the products or services that you want to promote is an important factor to consider when choosing the right affiliate program to make money. In general, the higher the price of the item or service that you are promoting, the more commission you will earn.
Most of the time, affiliate markers will try to maximise the number of customers that they appeal to by offering a variety of price points for the products and services that they offer. However, don’t fall into the trap of believing that just because something is cheap, people are going to buy it.
Promoting cheap products might help you get more clicks and, in some cases, more successful purchases, but they will often be low on commission. This means that you will need to sell more compared to a high-value product. While expensive products can be harder to promote, all you need is one sale to potentially make a lot of commission.
What are the Most Popular Affiliate Products?
If you want to get started as an affiliate marketer, understanding the most popular affiliate products can help to drive your success and increase your profits. There are several different products that you can promote; however, it’s important to choose the right ones. This can vary depending on your audience and what they are the most interested in. However, some of the most popular and best-selling affiliate products to promote right now include:
- Home Automation
- Virtual Reality
- Security Systems
- 3D Printers
- Drones
- Wearables
- Travel and Tourism
- Wireless Chargers
- Phone Accessories
- Car Vacuum Cleaners
- Gym Equipment
- Managed Cloud Hosting
- Shapewear
- Gaming
- Food Delivery Services
- Pet Grooming Products
- Office Accessories
- Jewellery
- Safety Gear
- Subscription Boxes
As you can see, there is a large and varied range of products that tend to do well in affiliate marketing campaigns. Affiliate marketing is currently one of the biggest sources of eCommerce orders. Choosing the right affiliate products to promote and sell can be tough, but there are some main things to consider before picking the right one.
Popularity
First of all, consider the popularity of the product. If you want to promote a highly popular product that is taking off, like virtual reality, or something that people are always going to want or need, like financial products or insurance, then it might be worth creating a dedicated site. Comparison sites are an ideal way to promote your affiliate products and services.
Relevance
If you already have a website or blog that you plan to use for affiliate marketing, then consider how relevant the products or services are to your site. No matter how popular a product is, you will not get much luck promoting it to the wrong audience. If you run a fishing site, for example, you probably won’t get many conversions promoting jewellery.
Pricing
It’s also important to consider the pricing of the affiliate products that you want to promote. Remember that the higher the price, the more commission you will be able to earn. Consider promoting products with a range of price points so that there is something to appeal to everybody and your profits can be maximised.
Site Reputation
Before you choose a product or service to promote, it’s important to think about the reputation of the site or business that is selling it. Remember that people do have to purchase a product before you can earn commission, and most customers will not be willing to make a purchase on a site that looks dodgy. For the best results, only promote products and services sold by reputable and trustworthy brands.
Longevity
Consider how long you are going to be able to promote a product or service for before you might need to rethink things. Some items are always going to be needed, while others are trending and might become less popular over time, which is why having a plan for the future is crucial.
Affiliate marketing involves promoting products and services to earn a commission when they sell. When done right, it can be an effective way to make an additional income.