How to Start Affiliate Marketing for Beginners: Step-By-Step Guide

It’s 2021. Working 9-to-5 every day in an office is turning old school. Everyone is finding a new source of income that can replace office hours.

Surprisingly, there are tons of passive income methods that you can try. However, recently affiliate marketing has taken over the world like a storm. It’s easy and doesn’t need any investment!

You simply need to know how to start affiliate marketing and grow it.

Once you get the hang of it, you’ll start earning your dollars without making much effort.

The best thing about affiliate marketing is that you can make money while sleeping as well. It’s a continuous earning process. If you get good at it, you’ll be earning much more than what you’ll earn from your regular office job.

That is the reason more and more people are either shifting completely to affiliate marketing or just doing it as a side hustle.

Statista says the US affiliate marketing spend is expected to reach 8.2 billion US dollars by 2022. So, it’s evident that this marketing method is only getting popular.

If you are still skeptical about affiliate marketing let me tell you in detail.

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is a passive method of income where you earn commission on recommending certain products or services. But only recommending won’t do. People must buy after getting a recommendation from you.

Source: Amazon

You’ll have to provide them a link or a code that they can use for purchasing the service or product.

When they’ll use the link or code, the vendor (product creator) will know that the customers are purchasing after hearing from you. So you’ll get your share of the commission for the promotion of the product.

But to get started you need to be part of an affiliate program. You must have a connection with a vendor. I’ll come to this later in this blog.

You must be thinking about whether doing affiliate marketing will be worth your time, right? So, here is the answer.

Why You Should Go for Affiliate Marketing in 2021?

Affiliate marketing has numerous benefits. I’ll mention a few. To enjoy these benefits all you need to know how to start affiliate marketing.

• Easy way of earning: You simply need to get a link or code from the merchant’s website. You can get that by signing up for any affiliate program. You’ll get your payment every time someone buys from your link or code.
• Work from home: You need to have access to the internet and an online audience. And you can get that right in your home.
• No investment: You don’t have to pay anything for joining an affiliate program. You have to select the products from the merchant’s website and you are good to go. You can start promoting through your channels.
• No experience required: Anyone on this earth can start affiliate marketing. Students, office goers, stay-at-home parents, elders, and more, whoever wants can start affiliate marketing. You need to know how to communicate, that’s it.
• No risk: Unlike other income ways, this doesn’t involve any risk. Since you are not investing anything there is no chance of losing.

How to Start Affiliate Marketing? (6 Steps)

Making your first dollar through affiliate marketing is simple. Most people use their channels which already consist of an audience. It may be a blog, YouTube channel, Instagram, or more.

If you already have an engaging audience, you are one step ahead. You simply need to follow the rest of the steps to start affiliate marketing.

Step 1: Create your channel

When I speak of channels I mean online platforms that you’ll use to share your affiliate links and codes. Most influencers start affiliate marketing with their blogs. They include the links by linking them throughout the blog.

So, when people read the blog they can click on them and visit the product page. However, it’s good if you mention before that the links you have shared are affiliates. You can share it as a disclosure on the top.

Source: Simpler Smarter Life

YouTubers and Instagrammers on the other hand share a code along with a link. Codes are easier to remember than the link. So, they use a code that is similar to their channel name.

It helps people remember.

These are codes that they can avail to get some discounts if the merchant allows. If you have a good number of subscribers and followers, you may get these special codes.

People are eager to buy when they find discount codes like these.

So, to start affiliate marketing, you need to have a channel or platform. If you don’t want to deal with a social media platform, you may also use messengers to share your links. However, it’ll be a difficult process.

When you share links with people, you have to tell each one of them about it. But when you are using a public platform like social media channels, you can share with a lot of people.

But the key is to build your audience through content and other marketing strategies. So, you have to learn that as well.

Step 2: Select an industry according to your niche

When you start affiliate marketing on your channel, you cannot randomly choose a product. The product should be something your audience wants.

Every influencer has a particular audience type according to the content.

For example, you are a book blogger. So, your audience will be interested in books. You can then share affiliate links for books, e-books, and more.

So, your merchant should be selling the products or services from your niche. Then only you’ll be able to share the right affiliate links.

So, take your time and find the right merchants. Also, most of the affiliate programs generally ask what content you share to get an idea about the audience.

Amazon affiliates program for instance has a section for you to select the product categories. But that’s because Amazon has thousands of product categories. It may not be possible when you are selecting other affiliate programs.

Source: Business 2 Community

Step 3: Research products that you want to review

When you find products from your niche, you have to narrow them down to a few products that you want to review. Your audience may not like all the products or services you review. So, you have to find out what they’ll like the most.

You may survey to learn what products or services your audience may be interested in. This will give you a clear idea about choosing the right product.

Suppose you are a tech guru having a YouTube channel with millions of followers. However, your content generally focuses on phones, laptops, and more. So, you can get affiliate links for these products from various merchants.

You may also get links for similar products such as accessories of phones and laptops. As your audience is interested in these products they will quickly buy a product when you share a link.

So, don’t forget to do surveys and research products. You can do that by randomly asking your audience in a Facebook or Instagram post.

Step 4: Sign up for an Affiliate Program

After you understand your niche and products that are likely to get more sales, you have to find the right merchant. You may search “Affiliate Program + your niche” on Google. You will get thousands of affiliate programs.

But if you are a beginner you might want to stick to the popular affiliate programs. Once you understand how it works you can narrow it down to a specific product affiliate program.

Here are some of the top affiliate programs you can sign up for:

• Amazon
• eBay
• Target
• BigCommerce
• Shopify

Step 5: Start creating content

Now that you have your affiliate program and products, you have to start promoting them. If you own a YouTube channel you can make a short video discussing the properties of the product. In case you own a blog, you can share the details along with the link.

Similarly, you can mold your content according to the platform you are using. But the key is to recommend your audience. You can say the positives about the products and services in your content.

But don’t forget to inform your audience that it’s an affiliate product or service.

You can create tutorials, review posts, emails, and more to share your affiliate links.

Step 6: Start optimizing

You cannot simply create content for sharing your affiliate link and wait for a hike in sales. You also have to work behind promoting that content. The more the people see it, the better are your chances for a sale.

So, if you are sharing your affiliate links through a blog do SEO and try to get it to rank higher. If it’s a social media post, use the right hashtags to boost it further. Similarly, you have to learn the different optimization techniques to make the content go viral.

When a lot of people will interact with your content, your affiliate links will get more clicks and buys. This will give you the hike in your passive income which you were dreaming of.

How to Start Affiliate Marketing (FAQ)

Q1. How does an affiliate program work?

A. The affiliate program allows users to sign up and get their affiliate codes and links for sharing. They give you the option to select the products you wish to recommend. Then they provide the links which you can use to share with your audience.

When the audience purchases from your affiliate link, you earn your commission.

Q2. What are the highest-paying affiliate programs?

A. These are some of the top paying affiliate programs in 2021:

• Bluehost
• Hostinger
• Cloudways
• WP Engine

And more.

Q3. Do I have to pay to become an affiliate?

A. No, you don’t need to invest anything to join an affiliate program. These programs are free to sign up.  Anyone using the internet can sign up and get started.

Q4. Where can I post affiliate links for free?

A. Several websites allow free promotion of affiliate links. Some of them are:

• USNetAds
• ClassifedAds.com
• Classifieds For Free

Q5. Can affiliate marketing make you rich?

A. You can get rich with affiliate marketing only if you are persistent and have the zeal to work hard. With affiliate marketing, it’s never the same day. You may earn $300 a day and the next day only $20.

But you have to stick to it and optimize your channels where you are sharing your affiliate links.

Ready to Start Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is one of the best passive income methods to try in 2021. You can do this full-time or as a side hustle. But you may have to be patient for a long time.

You cannot expect instant income with affiliate marketing. As a beginner, you may have to see a lot of $0 earned per day. But if you remain persistent and don’t lose hope there are good days also.

If you are using social media channels to share your affiliate links, then you can do optimization. Similarly, if you share your links on blogs, you can use SEO and link-building methods to gain more traffic.

Users will purchase through your affiliate links which will hike your commission. So, follow the mentioned steps and let us know your journey down in the comment box.