When I started my first affiliate website all I cared about was making money. I’d run in all different kinds of directions and try anything I could think of or read on the web. Honestly, I had no idea about the different mistakes I was making that were likely affecting my chances at having success with it. Throughout the years I’ve learned to slow things down, read more, and think in greater detail about different ideas I have. There are lots of things I’ve learned throughout years of affiliate marketing and in this blog post I’m going to share some of those secrets with all of you. Hopefully these affiliate marketing tips will save you some time and headache, while also leading you on the pathway to success a little bit quicker!
1. Selling Rather Than Helping – Sure, the term marketing is part of the phrase affiliate marketing. However, your job should not be to sell – That’s the job of your affiliate links and landing pages. When I first started affiliate marketing all I could think about was pushing the Buy It Now button rather than helping the reader learn why they should have the product. People want to hear from other people before buying a products, and that’s partly why Amazon reviews are so helpful to buyers. Customers don’t like being hassled by people when buying a car, and they don’t like it across the world wide web either. When doing your affiliate marketing remember that you want to help people and explain why they need the product you’re selling rather than just trying to push it in their face.
2. Not Testing Affiliate Programs – Whenever I’m out looking for Clickbank offers to promote, I put myself in the shoes of a potential customer and opt-in to test and see what the vendors’ follow up sequence looked like. Trust me, I had to learn this the hard way! Nothing will break a readers trust more than being led to an affiliate offer that will blow up their inbox. Try putting yourself into the shoes of a potential customer and see what will happen if they decide to follow your advice.
3. Not Properly Tracking – This has to be one of the biggest mistakes I made when first starting out. I started my affiliate marketing career by using free-to-make web pages on sites like Squidoo. I would often promote Amazon products on those pages and seldomly used unique tracking IDs in each of my links. That means anytime a sale comes through from one of those links, I’ll have no idea it actually came from there. Unique tracking IDs can be used to tell you where a sale came from and by not utilizing them, you’ll be clueless. Creating tracking IDs is actually very simple and I’d recommend everyone use them no matter which affiliate program you’re promoting (Clickbank, Amazon, MaxBounty..etc)
4. Not Comparing Affiliate Products – One of the best converting tactics I’ve used to sell affiliate products across the web (especially physical products on Amazon) is to compare the “main” product with the other similar products. When people are in buying mode for a physical product, they tend to have their options narrowed down to just 2 or 3 and want help deciding which is best. By comparing them, you’re not only helping your readers make the right choice, but you’re also using affiliate links they can click and quickly purchase them. That makes comparison pages not only popular among affiliate marketers, but also highly profitable for them!
Always keep these 4 helpful tips stored in the back of your mind if you’re just getting into the affiliate marketing arena. Trust me, some of these took me years to get down and once you do both conversions and your success should begin to rise. Always keep an eye out for cool new offers that you think your visitors might be interested in and remember to help them instead of just trying to sell the product!
