Is Affiliate Marketing Right For You?

Have you been thinking about starting an online business and wondering if affiliate marketing is right for you? Many people earn a good full-time living simply by becoming what’s known as a super affiliate marketer.

In case you are unfamiliar with the term, an affiliate marketer is someone who sells other people’s products for a commission. But there’s more to it… a lot more.

The purpose of this article is to help you decide if you want to get into affiliate marketing; if it’s right for you. We’ll also talk about being a super affiliate. Who knows, you might want to give it a try. So let’s get started.

What Are You Willing to Do to Build Your Affiliate Marketing Business?

Many successful affiliates start off on a part time basis and build their income before quitting their full time job. And that’s a smart way to go as there is much to learn.

Building a business as an affiliate marketer will take time… and a plan. There are tasks that need to be done in order to become successful. You will start by researching your market and determining your audience.

Developing a marketing strategy, along with creating content, are also necessary tasks when setting up your affiliate marketing business. Like I said, there’s much to learn.

As an affiliate marketer, the first rule is to be seen as trustworthy. Trust is one of the key factors to becoming a successful affiliate. If you simply want to set up an affiliate site and not be seen, so to speak, it will be hard to build a successful affiliate business, if not impossible.

You need to interact with people some way at some point. A good place to start is via social media. If you already have a following and many people already like you, transitioning into an affiliate business may be relatively easy for you.

Another important factor is to pick high-quality products to promote. Ideally, products you know and use yourself. If you have experience with a product it’s much easier to recommend. And, your recommendation will be more believable.

Let’s dig a little deeper and discover if affiliate marketing is right for you.

Are you willing to purchase digital or physical products?

The reason this question is important is because it’s hard to recommend and sell something that you don’t have any knowledge of or personal interest in. People can generally tell if you have experience with a product or if you’re simply trying to make a sale.

Also, when you’ve used a product personally, you’ll find it’s much easier to write about it. Sure, you could hire someone to produce a well-written, objective review, but if you have experience with the product, you can add that personal touch.

A personal story goes a long way when recommending any product.

Are you willing to write product reviews?

Are you willing to write product reviews? This is actually a key component to being a good affiliate marketer. You need to write reviews to promote products.

These do not have to be grand or absolutely perfect, but they do need to be decently written and make sense. And most of all… they need to be honest. Hype has its place in the world of marketing; just leave it at the door when writing a product review.

When you write product reviews, write with enthusiasm; show off your personality. It’s more likely people will buy through your links if people actually like you or what you’ve written.

Then keep in mind the more reviews you write, the better you become at writing them.

Being honest when writing a product review is pointing out what you don’t like. If there’s something you don’t like about the product, let your readers know. They will appreciate your honesty and they may not even be concerned with the one thing you didn’t like.

You just tell the truth and they’ll decide if they want to make the purchase. If they don’t, that’s okay. They’re more likely to purchase from you down the road because they feel they can trust you. Again, it’s about trust.

If you aren’t willing to write product reviews, purchase product reviews (plr), or can’t afford to pay someone to write reviews for you, then affiliate marketing may not be for you.

Unless you can find another way to promote products, you will have to do some writing.

Are you willing to create content to drive traffic to your product?

Whether you know it or not, content makes the world go around; or at least, on the Internet. Without content you have nothing to present to your audience. Someone not in the market for your product may come across a funny image or meme you created. They may discover a video you made and become interested.

Or, perhaps someone is interested in your product but wants more information. Maybe they want a review; a different perspective. So give it to them. Content comes in many shapes and sizes. Make a plan to include the types of content you want to use to promote your product and get it ready.

Are you willing to outsource content creation?

If content creation is just too much to handle, or even parts of it, you always have the option to outsource this work. If you haven’t got a creative bone in your body, then it’s probably a good idea to outsource ecover graphics.

If you have neither the skill nor patience to create a promotional video for your product, you still have options. You could hire someone on Fiverr or other service to make it for you. But that could become costly if you have many videos lined up for your promotional campaigns.

In that case, you could do some homework and look into the gazillion video creation software on the market. Some are great; others, not so much. But rest assured they’re usually easy to master.

Then again, you could fall back on good ol’ PowerPoint and do it yourself for free. If you decide to create videos yourself, it will cost you time initially, but save you money in the long run.

Tips for Going from Affiliate Marketer to Super Affiliate

Now that we’ve gotten to this point let’s take it to the next step.

Super affiliates earn a great income. They didn’t become super overnight; it took a lot of hard work and commitment. If you want to be a super affiliate, follow these tips and create the success you desire.

Super affiliates are excellent at engaging people. They are well-liked and build a large following. They gain this following by having a great personality, offering solid advice, and providing honest reviews.

You do not need to be a rockstar to be a super affiliate. However, you do need to be friendly, helpful, honest, and care about the things you promote. And it would certainly help if you follow these tips.

 Start small

You won’t become a super affiliate overnight. Start small and keep increasing your online presence. As your reputation grows you will join the ranks of super affiliates who make a full time income by sharing great products.

 Be consistent

If you still have a full time job chances are you only have limited time to work your affiliate business. If that is the case, you need to be extremely focused during the hours you devote to your business.

You need to be diligent and disciplined. You need to be consistent in increasing your online presence, growing your community of followers, building your list of customers, and creating your promotional campaigns.

Stick to your work schedule and use the time dedicated to your business wisely.

 Treat it like a business, not a hobby

This is another huge factor to building an online business as an affiliate marketer. If you only work at it part time you still need to treat it like a real business and not something you play around with.

When you’re first starting out, take it seriously. If you treat it like a hobby you won’t learn what’s important… the ins and outs of affiliate marketing. If you don’t have that information, how can you make an informed decision?

How can you know if it’s right for you if you don’t know what you need to know? This is the time to learn the basics, at the very least, and test the waters.

Sooner or later you’ll need to decide if affiliate marketing is right for you. So, if you want to create a sustainable full time income, you need to treat your business like a real business.

 Only promote a few products

This is really important in the beginning and much easier to keep up with until you learn the ropes. Do not jump in and promote a dozen different products. Pick a few in the same niche that you can truly get behind and promote those.

You can add more as you gain knowledge and confidence, but start small. This will also keep you from getting overwhelmed as there’s a lot to learn. As most new marketers can attest to, overwhelm leads to paralysis and that’s not good for business.

 Offer products at different price points

New marketers often make the mistake of choosing products to promote based on their skill level in marketing… big mistake. They tend to choose products at a lower price point because they think they will fail. After all, what do they know about marketing? That’s another wrong assumption.

Your success will be based on your ability to engage with your potential customers and how well you know your product. If you choose to promote a pack of baseball cards selling at $7 and can’t even name one famous player, what makes you think you’re going to sell any? You know nothing about baseball and have no interest in it. So what if the product you’re selling is only $7?

Now, if you are a fitness trainer you deal with people desperately trying to get in or stay in shape. If you combine your day job with affiliate marketing, you’re practically gold.

Why do I say that? The answer is simple. You could choose to promote fitness equipment ranging in price from $20 to $1,997 and do quite well. Who better to talk about fitness equipment and explain the benefits better than someone who actually works with and knows each piece of equipment chosen for promotion?

See the difference? It takes just as much effort to sell a $500 product as it does a $20 product. You’re selling yourself short if you base your product selection on the selling price alone.

Go with what you know and offer products at varying price points.

And by the way… a baseball enthusiast could probably sell those packs of baseball cards all day long. That same baseball enthusiast may never make a dime trying to explain the benefits of dumbbells.

Enthusiasm and knowledge go a long way when you’re an affiliate marketer.

 Offer membership programs

If people join a membership program under you, you will earn a commission each month for as long as they remain a member. This is a great way to boost your income and have something steady come in while you’re building your affiliate business.

Conclusion

Being an affiliate marketer can be one of the easiest (eventually) and fun ways to earn a living online. But it takes time and commitment to learn what you need to learn. If you want to grow your business, treat it like a business. Whatever time you carve out for your affiliate business, make sure you stick to it. Commitment and consistency are the keys to success.

If you’re not willing to put in the work then you might want to consider something else. However, once you become a super affiliate, you can cut your working hours and still earn a great income.

That’s when all the hard work you put into growing your business pays off and it’s really worth it in the long run.