How to Get Started with Affiliate Marketing

My business makes over 6 figures every year from affiliate marketing alone. Plus, it’s some of my favorite money to make, for a few reasons. So if you’ve been thinking about getting started with affiliate marketing, you’re in the right place!

We’ll discuss:

• What is Affiliate Marketing? 
• Affiliate marketing for beginners
• Why affiliate marketing is awesome
• How to choose good affiliate partners
• What type of content is best for affiliate marketing
• And more!

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is when you earn a commission based on helping other companies find new clients. Basically, you refer a product to someone, and then if they buy, that company will pay you a percentage or flat free for the referral.

Affiliate programs are often referred to as referral programs, associates programs, or partner programs, among other things! But they all share this same basic principle: you get them a new customer, they pay you money.

Why Try Affiliate Marketing 

Affiliate marketing is one of my favorite ways to make money for two main reasons:

First, I don’t have to handle customer service on any products that I recommend via affiliate marketing. I don’t have to deal with password resets, cancellations, questions about the order, shipping issues, just any of that customer service stuff. Of course, this doesn’t mean I am promoting crappy products or products with crappy customer service. But there are always things that have to be dealt with with any product – and I love making money while knowing I’ll never have to deal with those particular issues!

The other reason you might love affiliate marketing is that it feels a lot more like sharing than selling. While I come from a sales background, and have no issue selling myself and my own products – it’s still nice to have some things that feel less serious. If you don’t like selling, then affiliate marketing is a great way to make some additional income sharing the things that you love with others who might love them!

Is Affiliate Marketing the Same as Being an Influencer?

Yes and no. Almost all influencers rely on affiliate marketing in some form. They’ll share products they like with their audience, and hope that they earn commissions when their audience purchases those products. 

Influencers often also make money from sponsored content (“spon con”) too though. Spon con is not based on referral commissions. Instead, a company sponsors content from an influencer by paying the influencer up front to create content around their products.

A lot of types of businesses make money from affiliate marketing, that aren’t technically influencers. As an example, I am first and foremost an educator. I teach people how to start and run their creative businesses. Affiliate marketing fits into that space well, but it’s not the only way I make money.

In general, whether you consider yourself an influencer or not, I find that you will often have more success with affiliate marketing (and sponsored content too!) if you have some type of core offering in your business in addition to that. Instead of just being a general “influencer”, you want to have a specific value or message that your business supports, so that you’re not just shilling any product that comes along. If you think of your favorite influencers, you probably can think of their core value beyond just sharing random products. 

How to Find and Apply For Affiliate Partnerships

As you explore this world too, remember – what is your core value that your affiliate partnerships can fit around? Finding these relevant affiliate partnerships is key to making money with affiliate marketing. You can be an affiliate for almost any type of product or service you can think of, including:

• Office Supplies
• Machinery / Equipment
• Tools
• Art Supplies
• Software
• Vendors
• ..and more!

If you want to pick a good first affiliate partnership, I would ask yourself these 3 questions:

1. What products do I use EVERY DAY that I love?
2. What products are people already asking me about?
3. What products can I share with 100% authenticity?

You’ll often find that your most profitable affiliate relationships are the ones where you really love the product and are also a bit of an authority on it. So anything that you use already is a great fit.

Also, anything that people are already asking you to recommend – this is just low-hanging fruit! You’re probably already recommending some of your favorite products to people, so it’s time to start making some money from them!

How to Apply to be an Affiliate

It’s usually very easy to apply to be an affiliate. If the company already has an affiliate program set up, you should be able to find it on their website (often, it’s in the footer) or ask them for the application. Different applications will ask different things, but they’ll typically ask you things about:

• Your business
• Your social channels
• Your audience
• The type of content you create / plan to create

At a minimum, you often will have to provide your website info and which social channels you plan to market their products on. 

Do you Need a Big Audience to Do Affiliate Marketing?

Definitely not! Some affiliate programs will require a minimum number of followers/subscribers/etc. to sign up. But I’m in over 40 programs and the vast majority of them don’t ask about numbers at all. Remember – it doesn’t cost them anything to add you as an affiliate, but it might make them something.

You will find different programs that work better for smaller and/or larger audiences, though. For instance, Amazon Associates pays about 3-4% commission on sales. A lot of those sales will be smaller too. So you’d need a higher number of transactions to make a larger sum of money. Some affiliate programs pay out several hundred dollars per sale, so making 1-2 of those conversions in a month could be a game changer! 

What Type of Content is Best for Affiliate Marketing

There are so many types of content you can use for affiliate marketing! Social Media, Blog, Video, etc. can all be really successful avenues for affiliates. 

My favorite types of content to use with affiliate marketing are those that are evergreen. This just makes affiliate marketing more passive for me in the long run. So I like to employ blogs, YouTube videos and static landing pages as my primary methods of sharing affiliate content. Social media is also very powerful too, however that content often has a more limited lifecycle. 

For long-term content absorption, you’ll want to learn more about SEO or Search Engine Optimization. Search Engine Optimization is basically the process of helping search engines (mainly Google) suggest your content when a person searches something relevant to that content. So when it comes to affiliate marketing, this is a great combo! Your content sharing your favorite products will come up when someone searches for info about that product (or similar products). They’re already in the buying / researching process, and you’re the pro who’s gonna tell them everything to love about that product! It’s a win-win.

Our Clicks to Cash: Affiliate Marketing Magic course will have an entire module dedicated to getting you started with SEO and breaking it down so it doesn’t feel so technically complex (because it really doesn’t have to be)! 

Affiliate Marketing vs. Sponsored Content

What’s the difference between affiliate marketing and sponsored content? We keep referring to affiliate payments as “commissions”. This basically means that you make money after someone buys the product or service that you recommended. In sponsored content, they pay for the content creation up front. 

In affiliate marketing, you only make money if people purchase the product. With sponsored content, you make money simply for creating the content, whether or not it leads to sales. 

Both have pros and cons – personally sponsored content stresses me out. But affiliate relationships are ongoing, and low pressure. So I can just toss in my affiliate link whenever it comes up, and not have to worry about creating the most awesome, viral content with the one chance I get. 

Do Affiliates Get Free Products?

Great question! The answer is…sometimes. Often, if a company searches you out based on your audience or obvious love for the product, they are willing to send you free products. If you are applying for an affiliate partnership with a big brand, they might not be willing to send you free products.

I personally will never become an affiliate for a product or service I haven’t used. Some of my relationships were built off of products I purchased and loved, and wanted to start sharing. Some of my affiliate partnerships are with products I still pay for, like the Adobe Creative Cloud. But if someone reaches out to me to be an affiliate for a course or something, I always ask for access to the course. If they aren’t willing to provide me with a product sample, then I don’t feel comfortable sharing it with others.

You’re more likely to get free products that don’t cost the company anything – such as a software or an online course – than you are with say a piece of heavy machinery that costs a lot to make and ship. But that’s not to say that you can’t negotiate free products as part of your affiliate arrangement. This is something that will become easier as you gain more traction and quantifiable results with your affiliate sales. 

Is Affiliate Marketing Worth It?

I make over 6-figures every year in affiliate marketing – so to me, it’s definitely worth it. I put a good amount of time and energy into it though, and have even stopped creating invitations as much in order to focus on affiliate marketing more. So to me, it’s the same as any other revenue stream: it’s worth it if you make it worth it.

You won’t simply create 1-2 pieces of content and make millions (most likely). But some ways to have more success with affiliate marketing might be:

• Create a clear affiliate content strategy
• Back up your affiliate marketing with your own business / products / values
• Understand the heck out of your audience – their pain points, their needs, their values, etc.
• Work with good partnerships only
• Don’t sacrifice your authenticity for anything
• Track results like a fiend! This is how you improve

If you want to dive deeper into affiliate marketing, please check out Clicks to Cash: Affiliate Marketing Magic! We’ll have modules all about choosing good partners, understanding your audience and platforms, creating and optimizing content, SEO, tracking results, and of course a few bonuses to help you make the most money possible as an affiliate partner!