Affiliate Marketing for Beginners

Becoming an affiliate marketer in 2022 is easier than ever.

The top reason people choose affiliate marketing is that it makes monetizing content easy. Plus, it offers room for big profits — 35% of affiliates make at least $20,000 a year. That’s a lot of money, considering once your content is out there, you’ll keep earning passive income without lifting a finger.

And affiliate marketing is on the rise. According to Statista, companies will spend $8.2 billion on affiliate marketing in 2022 – eight times more than in 2010!

In this article, you’ll find a complete, five-step guide to affiliate marketing for beginners.

Ready? Let’s go.Affiliate Marketing: What Is It and How Does It Work?

As an affiliate marketer, you will promote a company’s products or services and receive a commission for every purchase your audience makes.

It’s one of the best online business ideas you can start since it’s quick to set up, there are zero barriers to entry, and you can get started with no money. For example, you don’t need to invest time and money in customer service or other activities since you’re not selling any products or services directly — you’re only promoting them.

Consequently, your only real investment will be time. And the risk of failure is extremely low — it’s almost guaranteed you will make at least some profit by following our guide.

Another benefit of affiliate marketing is that you can do it at scale. That means you can promote products from multiple companies and keep receiving a regular passive income.

But how does it work exactly? Here’s a visual representation of the affiliate marketing process.

The company you choose will give you a unique link so they can track buyers that came from your site.When your readers click on that link, a browser cookie is stored on their device, so you’ll get paid even if they don’t make the purchase right away (although cookies usually have an expiration date).

Here’s an example of how it works: Let’s say you have a fashion blog and you review a T-shirt that costs $100. If the company you chose gives a 50% commission, you’ll receive $50 for each of your readers who clicks on the affiliate link you provide and ends up buying that T-shirt.

Pretty good, right? Let’s now see how much you can actually earn as an affiliate marketer.How Much Money Can You Make as an Affiliate Marketer?

According to ZipRecruiter, as an affiliate marketer, you can make about $154,700 a year in potential income, while according to Glassdoor, you can make anywhere from $42,000 to $83,000.

Having said that, the amount of money you can make depends on various factors. Some of the most famous affiliate marketers, like Pat Flynn, managed to make more than $100,000 in just a month through affiliate marketing,

As a beginner affiliate marketer, that’s not the kind of money you’ll be able to see right away. It takes time to build an online presence.

But don’t let that discourage you. With patience and the right knowledge, you, too, will manage to achieve great results. So follow our steps to get started with affiliate marketing.How to Get Started With Affiliate Marketing: 5 StepsNote:

Good to know: To start, all you need is a platform and a website to post content. Then, you’ll choose a product or service to promote. After that, it’s all a matter of publishing great content and growing your audience. Don’t have a website yet? Check out this step-by-step guide on how to create a website.

Step 1: Choose a Platform

The most common platforms for affiliate marketing are blogs, YouTube channels, and social media platforms like Instagram.

We recommend using a blog as a primary affiliate marketing channel since that’s the best way to gain free traffic and build an audience that will read your content and click on your affiliate links.Choose a Niche

Since there are several types of blogs in every industry, you must choose a niche to maximize your affiliate marketing efforts. Keep in mind that some niches — like personal finance, travel, and technology — usually earn higher commissions, but these are also the most competitive.

Don’t choose your niche based on affiliate marketing and the commissions you can earn. Instead, choose one that you’re passionate about. Remember that you’ll be able to succeed in affiliate marketing only by providing high-quality content that your audience trusts.

Plus, today, you can market products or services in any industry. Most companies have an affiliate program. And if there’s a company you particularly want to collaborate with that doesn’t have one, you can negotiate one just for you (as long as you have a good amount of traffic coming to your blog).Step 2: Find Affiliate Programs in Your Niche

There are three main types of affiliate programs: low-volume with high commissions, high-volume with high commissions, and high-volume with low commissions.

Low-Volume with High Commissions

In certain niches — such as finance, banking, and business — you can find affiliate programs that pay very high commissions.

However, these usually have two drawbacks:They’re often difficult to promote because they require technical expertise.High-paying affiliate programs tend to be very competitive.

As a beginner, consider these only if your blog is about a very technical topic that you’re an expert and authority in.

Here are two examples of high-paying affiliate programs in niches with relatively low volumes:NordVPN: If you manage to get your users to sign up for a one-month NordVPN plan, you’ll get 100% commissions for every signup and 30% commissions for renewals. Six-month, one-year, and two-year plans have a 40% commission rate.AWeber: AWeber offers a 30% commission, but keep in mind you will find a lot of specialized competitors with deep and technical expertise in email marketing.High-Volume with High Commissions

In some niches, you can find programs that have high commissions and that you can also easily promote to a large audience, because of their mass appeal.

The downside of these is that they can be competitive, and some of them may require specific expertise. Here are a few examples.Apple Services Performance Partners: Technology is an example of a niche with high volumes and high commissions. For example, by promoting Apple News, you can make a 400% one-time commission.Fiverr: The Fiverr affiliate program is your best option to promote digital services like logo design and web development. Based on the service you decide to promote, you could earn up to $1,000 for a single conversion.Teachable: Teachable affiliates earn $450 per month on average, and many earn $1,000 or more every month. You’ll earn a 30% commission for every Teachable subscription. Plus, you’ll keep getting that commission monthly, as long as users stay on the platform.Luxury Card: Credit cards are a type of product in the financial niche that has mass appeal. For example, Luxury Card offers a commission of $405 per sale.Shopify: If you’re in the eCommerce niche, definitely consider Shopify’s affiliate marketing program, which offers a 200% commission on paid stores, for an average of $58 for each user who signs up for a paid plan.High-Volume with Low Commissions

Finally, there are affiliate marketing programs that are relatively easy to promote but usually have lower commissions. These are usually the best for affiliate marketing beginners.Amazon Associates

The Amazon Associate affiliates program is one of the best for two reasons. First, you can choose to promote anything on the Amazon catalog, which has more than 350 million products. Second, conversion rates (amount of users who ended up buying the products) tend to be higher than other websites because of Amazon’s brand reputation.

The downside is that commission rates are relatively low, ranging from 1% to 15%, depending on the category.

Let’s say you’re in the beauty industry and you choose to promote a product you love that costs $65. For each of your users who purchases the physical product after clicking on your link, you’ll get $6.50 (since the commission rate for luxury beauty products is 10%).

That’s not a huge amount of money, but since users are more likely to purchase products from Amazon, you can make a good amount of money if you have traffic and an audience that trusts you. For example, if 100 people purchase it, you’ll make $650.

If you want to promote services, Amazon is not the right place. However, if you want to review or suggest physical or digital products, Amazon is a safe bet as you can find any item you can think of.Etsy