What is affiliate marketing?
Simply put, affiliate marketing is a partnership between a company and an individual (or group of individuals) that allows the latter to earn commissions whenever they refer customers to the former and said referral turns to a successful conversion.
Successful conversion means that the customer should make a purchase, visit a page, sign up, fill out a survey, or download something, depending on the goal of the campaign, before the affiliate earns their commission.
If you wish to learn more about this topic, check out the FAQ section below:
Question #1: What makes it attractive to businesses?
The number one reason affiliate marketing is so attractive to businesses is that it is an extremely cost-effective and super powerful way of marketing their products.
It is extremely cost-effective because it allows a company to ‘hire’ as many people as it wants to help promote its products without having to pay any of them a full-time salary. The only time the company has to shell out money is when a referral actually turns into a successful conversion.
On the other hand, it is also super powerful because it gives a company the ability to use word-of-mouth marketing by having its affiliates talk to their relatives, friends, and followers about its products and services.
Think about it. Who would you listen to more? A company trying to sell you something or a relative, friend, or content creator you religiously follow recommending you a product or service that they believe in? It’s the latter, right?
Question #2: What makes affiliate marketing attractive to affiliates?
Affiliate marketing is so attractive to affiliates because not only is it extremely easy to do, but also has the potential to generate a lot of passive income.
All an affiliate really has to do is share affiliate links to their relatives, friends, and, if they are a content creator, followers and just wait for the commissions to start rolling in. That’s literally all it entails.
Question #3: Can I get rich doing affiliate marketing?
A lot of people do get rich doing affiliate marketing, but success in this industry does not come easy. While the actual process of sharing affiliate links takes very little effort, building a large audience that is eager to listen to what you have to say requires serious time, money, and effort.
Selling to your family and friends can only get you so far. If you want to build a successful affiliate marketing career, you will need to treat it like a business and set up ways to continuously grow your customer base.
This is why if you are a content creator on YouTube or any other popular social media platform, you are in the perfect position to get into affiliate marketing. You are already creating content that you can use to promote your affiliate links on a platform designed to help you build an engaged audience.
Question #4: Can anyone do this marketing?
While anyone can do affiliate marketing, professional marketers, content creators, and influencers are more likely to do well because they have the number one thing affiliates need to succeed: an engaged audience.
This, however, does not at all mean that you should not give it a shot. Just keep in mind that, again, you need to treat the whole thing as a business. Do not go in expecting to make ridiculous amounts of money right from the get-go—unless you are already a successful marketer, content creator, or influencer.
Question #5: What kinds of products and services can I be an affiliate for?
You can do affiliate marketing for virtually any product or service you could think of. You can sell books, courses, workout gear, gadgets, online platforms, and so much more.
If you want to up your chances of success, however, you will need to pick products and services that you know your audience would be interested in.
Here’s an article from Big Commerce for more ideas on affiliate marketing.