In this article I will cover some “ins and outs” of how to earn money with affiliate marketing and touch on what it takes to be a successful affiliate marketer.
Like Africa, affiliate marketing is not for sissies and requires a certain amount of perseverance dedication and self-discipline.
If you have an entrepreneurial leaning all the better.
Table of Contents
What Does it Mean to Be an Affiliate Marketer
The best description of an internet affiliate marketer I have heard is:
“Affiliate Marketing is the business of selling other people’s products, to people you don’t know and will never meet, in countries you’ve never been to!”
That is it in a nutshell.
A practical example of this is me.
I live in l’il old New Zealand * (that little pimple on the butt-end of the earth) and as an affiliate of Amazon (for example) I can sell any of their over 5 million products to anyone in the world.
This is achieved through having a website that promotes to a niche that uses the Amazon product.
For example, I have a photography site whereby I yak about photography gear and my personal experience with some of that gear.
If the visitor to my site likes what I have to say and clicks the affiliate link that takes them to Amazon and subsequently buy something from Amazon I get paid a commission.
I think it is a brilliant and ingenious system.
Amazon is just one of many thousands of sites that run an affiliate program allowing affiliates to sell their products.
So once again – “Affiliate Marketing is the business of selling other people’s products, to people you don’t know and will never meet, in countries you’ve never been to!”
It’s as simple as that in practice but the technicalities and understanding how to make it all work is a bit more complex.
How Much Can You Earn With Affiliate Marketing?
I call this the million dollar ($1,000,000) question – it’s a question everyone asks.
The second million dollar question is how soon can I start making money? I’ll cover this in a bit more detail later.
No-one wants to go into a venture only to find out that there is no money in it. Why would you?
Commissions on products can range from as low as 1% to as high as 75% (and sometimes even higher).
Amazon typically pay a low percentage of between 1% and 10%, with 4% being the most common. To make $1,000 per month with Amazon products you would need to sell about $25,000 worth of products each month!
Amazon base their business on volumes in turn over. Being the most trusted online retail outlets in the world it is easy to sell Amazon products.
Digital products on the other hand typically pay 75% of the sale price of the item. To make $1000.00 per month on digital products you would need sales totaling under $1400.
You may be wondering why digital products pay such a high percentage. The answer lies in production costs. A Digital PDF is created once and can be sold millions of times over for no additional costs whereas a material product is gone once sold and needs to be replaced in order for another to be sold.
It’s impossible, and pointless to say exactly how much you can earn with affiliate marketing because it will depend on:
- You …
- Your chosen niche and product
- The commission percentage paid for that product
- Your marketing strategy/s
- How many hours you work in a day/week/month
- Etc. Etc.
I can tell you that there is NO LIMIT to what you can earn.
In affiliate marketing the more you earn the easier it seems to make even more money!
What You Need to Become a Successful Affiliate Marketer
This is probably the most pertinent question of all.
Before you even consider what you want to sell and how much money you want to earn it is imperative that you understand every aspect of affiliate marketing. In such a fast changing environment as the Internet, controlled mainly by Google and other search engines, marketing skills have to be regularly updated and adapted.
It is not just a matter of throwing together a website and then sitting back with a glass of wine to watch as your bank account grows.
A lot of affiliate marketers start off on a part-time basis working in their spare time in the evenings and on weekends – this may be you. Or you may be able to work up to 40 or even 60 hours a week on your business. If the latter you will probably succeed quicker and earn more money faster.
You will definitely need:
- To learn all there is to know about Internet Affiliate Marketing – including selecting your niche and building your own website
- A computer and an Internet connection – check, right?
- A website and a hosting company for the website
- A disciplined approach to your online business
- A plan that you can comfortably work – this ultimately means you need a to be self-disciplined and motivated (it’s going to get lonely)
- Accept that affiliate marketing is not an overnight get-rich-quick scheme
- Staying power and a positive outlook
Why Affiliate Marketers Fail
There are a number of reasons why a high percentage of affiliate marketers fail.
- They think it is easy and neglect to learn what the vital steps are.
- They don’t have a plan.
- They select the wrong niche.
- They select a low paying product with low volume sales.
- They expect to make a living straight away.
- They stop working as soon as the sales start coming in.
- They keep buying the latest and greatest suggested product from Gurus that will make them rich overnight. You have a plan – work the plan and don’t get distracted.
- They give up too early – this is probably the most common reason and ties in with expecting to make money too soon!
You still Here?
Good – let’s continue.
The Fastest Way to Make Money With Affiliate Marketing
Of all the ways to make money as an affiliate marketer the quickest is what is known as “Pay per Click” or PPC.
With PPC you will still need a website, niche, product etc but the method of attracting customers is different.
Essentially you pay for your “landing page” to be displayed high in search engine results.
What that basically means is that your wesbsite will appear above all the other websites that appear in searches. That means people are more likely to click on your advert and land-up on your site.
Each time someone clicks your ad you pay Google whatever amount you bid to secure that top spot in searches.
PPC is the fastest way to make money as an affiliate marketer but it is also the quickest way to burn through money if you don’t know what you are doing.
Sorry to harp on but there is no short cuts – you have to learn the ins and outs of affiliate marketing and there is no shortcut.
Do You Have What it Takes to Earn Money With Affiliate Marketing
I’m going to wrap it up by asking you two question
- Would you like to earn money with affiliate marketing?
- Would you like to learn everything there is to know about affiliate marketing?
If the answer to these two questions is YES then head on over to this page for a free look at how it all works.
See you over there and remember …
Keep trucking!