If you don’t know anything about affiliate marketing or how it works, I’m going to break it down in simple terms and show you just how easy it really is. The information available online can sometimes seem confusing or overwhelming, but in reality creating an affiliate marketing business
is not complicated.
I am going to show you step by step how to build a successful affiliate marketing business online. In fact, this is the exact blueprint that I used to build my business and I can personally tell you that it is simple and easy to understand.
First let’s look at how affiliate marketing actually works and break down the general process. And then I’ll discuss the process of starting an affiliate marketing business and how you can get started TODAY with your very own online business.
How Affiliate Marketing Works
There is no doubt that the internet is full of information about affiliate marketing. However with so much information out there, it can easily get confusing and unreliable. Most of the information available online is good, but there is also a ton of bad information that creates confusion and ultimately lack of results.
I have been an affiliate marketer for over 10 years now and the same step by step process that worked back then, still works today. Some of the strategies have evolved of course, but the overall process remains the same. Basically someone is selling a product… they need a customer to purchase the product… and your job is simply to bring them together.
This is the basic process of how affiliate marketing works:
Sounds simple right? Well that’s because it is. Where people tend to struggle is how to get customers to the product being sold. But in reality, all you need is the right training and real tools that are essential to successfully accomplishing this.
To begin with, let’s look at a few terms that you will want to become familiar with.
Affiliate (that’s YOU). You are the affiliate and that just means that you can partner with companies like Target, Amazon, Abercrombie, Nike (and 10,000’s more) and promote their products and services. After joining these Affiliate Programs, you will be given a unique “affiliate link” that tracks the sales that you generate.
Affiliate Program (companies like Amazon). Almost every brand/company has an affiliate program (99% in fact). And you can become an affiliate of them and promote their products online and earn a commission. One of the biggest affiliate programs in the world is Amazon. Just think about the 100’s of MILLIONS of products within Amazon that you could promote.
Affiliate Commissions. These affiliate programs will give you a commission when you send a customer to their website and they make a purchase. For example, you promote a product from Target using your affiliate link and someone clicks on that link and they end up buying that product. Target will pay you a % of the total sale. You don’t have to manufacture or ship anything. You are just the middle-man.
Unlimited Potential. As you can see, this business model is set up for Unlimited Potential. The more people you send through your affiliate links, the more money you can make. Many affiliate marketers are making 6 figure incomes per year. The key to this success is being willing to put in the effort to build an affiliate marketing business the right way.
So, let’s look at HOW to build an affiliate marketing business…
The 4-Steps to a Starting a Successful Affiliate Marketing Business
Getting started in affiliate marketing may seem daunting, but there are actually only 4-steps to creating a successful affiliate marketing business. You just need to follow these steps and get the proper training and tools to run your business. Don’t worry, I’ll be helping you with that.
Let’s take a deeper look into each of the 4 steps so that you can understand how to implement them fully…
Step 1: Choose an Idea or Interest
The first step involves choosing an idea (also called a “niche”) for your business. Ideally you want to choose something that you are interested in or know a little about to begin with. This could be something like dog training, or tent camping, or video games, etc. The ideas are literally endless.
If you choose a passion or an interest as your niche, you will actually love working your business. The point of building your own business is to love what you do, and that’s one of the main reasons think affiliate marketing is so great!
Pro Tip: As I mentioned before, try to choose a passion or interest as your niche. Even hyper-specific obscure niches can thrive in today’s online market. Join Wealthy Affiliate to get direct access to video classes that walk you through the niche selection process. You’ll also get help from the community as well as myself when you join.
Step 2: Build a Website.
Think of your website as the headquarters or foundation of your business. It is like the brick and mortar shops in the real world but living in the online space. In essence it is the “storefront” of your business. The storefront allows you to attract customers and sell (promote) products.
A website is ESSENTIAL to running an online business. One main reason it is a necessity is because you own it. It can’t get shut down or banned like social media accounts are at risk of.
Pro Tip: Build a high performing website that has superior hosting (where your website lives) as well. I like the website builder and hosting offered at Wealthy Affiliate because it includes high speeds and it is an All-In-One platform designed for Affiliate Marketers.
Step 3: Attract Visitors (aka an Audience).
The way to make money online is to have people visiting your website. Therefore it is important to understand exactly how to drive traffic and attract visitors to your website.
One way to get quality traffic coming to your website is through a method called search engine optimization. This results in FREE traffic and is a great way to build your business. By getting ranked in the search engines (like Google and Bing) you can create a sustainable traffic source that will lead to long term success.
So after you have built your website (step 2), you need to implement a good SEO strategy that leads to more traffic.
Pro Tip: The combination of a ranking website and proper traffic strategies are KEY. There is expert SEO training within the Wealthy Affiliate platform that will teach you exactly how to master your traffic strategies.
After you master a good SEO strategy and have a ranking website, you can move on to include other traffic sources like social media, YouTube, podcasts, etc.
In-depth training on all of these additional traffic sources is included in the Wealthy Affiliate platform.
Step 4: Earn Revenue (aka Make Money)
Now for the fun part…. the making money part of your business. This is where you earn commissions through affiliate programs. So there are over 500 million products and services that you can promote and earn a commission. You will be placing the affiliate link that you receive when you partner with these programs on your website. From there, your visitors will click on the links and purchase the products you are promoting. Once a purchase is made, YOU earn money!
Affiliate marketing is one of the fastest growing industries and is expected to grow even more in the coming years. With over $12 billion in affiliate income expected to be earned this year alone, you can get in on this action as well. The first step is to GET STARTED.
Pro Tip: Learn how to properly integrate affiliate promotions into your website and to maximize conversion. This type of training is also available at Wealthy Affiliate, by the way.
So that’s Affiliate Marketing… overall it’s a basic and easy concept, but building a SUCCESSFUL affiliate business requires proper implementation of strategies and a solid website.
If you want to create your own affiliate marketing business and have little or no experience, I can help you GET STARTED TODAY!
Or if you already have an affiliate marketing business and you are not getting the results you want, I CAN PERSONALLY HELP.
Like I said, I have been at this for over 10 years full-time and you can connect with me personally at Wealthy Affiliate. In addition to connecting with me after creating your account, you will have immediate access to loads of training, websites, hosting, research tools, mentorship and support.
You can get a “test drive” Starter account for FREE…(no credit card required). This gives you the ability to take a look around and see for yourself all the training and tools available. I highly recommend it if you are at all interested in becoming a successful affiliate marketer. And I will personally be reaching out to you within 30 minutes of you joining. So be sure to look for that.
===> Click Here to Start Your Test Drive Wealthy Affiliate Account!
And if you have any questions, feel free to comment below and I will get back to you as soon as possible (usually within a few hours).