Affiliate Marketing Basics for Bloggers

My introduction to affiliate marketing happened so fast I didn’t have time to blink. I didn’t know a thing about it and I was scared–so scared when I first did it.

You see, when I first started working online, I was writing content for websites and working as a virtual assistant. The latter was very tough because it made me do a lot of things I know nothing about but it ended up teaching me so much of the things I do now. And that includes affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing is a very lucrative career. You can make a lot of money here. What’s better is that being an affiliate will allow you to create passive income. That should allow you to work less and enjoy your life more.

So if you’re interested in affiliate marketing but are intimidated and don’t want to go through a long period of learning everything first, then let me share some basics.

Creating an account

It’s easy to register an account in Clickbank and Commission Junction and other similar sites. As soon as you’ve signed up you can easily get an affiliate link.

For Amazon Associates, you’ll need to apply first and that requires you to have a website first. So pay attention to the succeeding steps.

Choosing products to promote and sell

There are tons of products to promote but not all will sell. Keyword research and knowing what people search online plays a big role in finding profitable products.

Google and other paid tools can help you figure this out. A simple method is going to Google Insights. It’s a service that allows you to see what people are searching for. The term(s) that gets the most search is a good candidate.

You then go to sites for affiliate marketers, like Clickbank, Commission Junction, or Amazon and find the most relevant product.

There are indicators of popularity of certain products. These should help you feel more confident about the product you’ll choose. It’s easy to do in Amazon because it has a best sellers page.

Don’t forget to do keyword research because it’ll help you identify terms you’ll use in your affiliate site.

Building your website

Creating a website has never been easier with the different resources available. WordPress, for one, is a great tool to have. It’s free and customizable. You don’t need to be technical to build your site because it’s user-friendly and you can easily find your way.

Purchase a hosting package first and then you’ll be able to install a WordPress site.

Create the content. Using the keywords you’ve found, write articles (or simply outsource them). When writing articles, make sure that they:

• Highlight the features of your product
• Give readers strong reasons to buy from you
• Inform and educate your readers

Spread out your affiliate links throughout the site as text links, banners, image links, and even widgets.

Don’t forget to create important pages like About Us, Privacy Policy, Contact.

In addition, choose a theme that best suits your niche. You can ask someone who knows web design to give your website a nice look. Remember that how your website looks affects traffic and reader engagement.

Once you’re finished with your site, it’s time to create backlinks and get it ranked. For those who are using Amazon Associates, you can now proceed with your application.

Getting indexed and ranked

Submit your site to Google, Yahoo!, and Bing. You can’t create backlinks unless you’re indexed.

As soon as you’re indexed, you can start building links to get better rankings, which in turn, drives more traffic and sales. You can build links by doing the following:

• Create a blog for your site and make  sure it’s updated
• Write guest posts
• Link to other blogs
• Create an RSS feed
• Write and submit a press release
• Take advantage of social media
• Comment on blogs and be active on forums
• Make sure that people can easily share your content via social sharing buttons
• Give away freebies like downloadable ebooks, etc.
• Participate in forums on your niche
• Create ads (if you have the budget)

These are just some of the many ways to build links to your site. Check out this blog and you’re sure to find others that you’ll find useful.

There you have it. A simple look at how affiliate marketing works. You’ll surely find more specific steps that involve other methods but this is what you need to know right now. These should get you started.