So you’ve been blogging for a while. You’ve chosen a niche a topic that you’re passionate about and you’ve optimized your blog posts. You’ve become an authority blogger who generates organic traffic, and your visitors leave comments. But one questions still looms: how do you monetize your niche content?
If you’ve built your blog into the community of readers that a blog is supposed to be (and not vacuous content portal), then affiliate marketing might be your ticket to monetizing your content. Affiliate marketing offers bloggers an opportunity to promote products/services that are relevant to the community of readers they have built, and receive a commissions on any sales that they generate.
What is Affiliate Marketing?
Simply put, affiliate marketing is a performance-based marketing model. This means that publishers are rewarded for actual results. That is, publishers receive a commission for any sales or sign-ups that they refer to the advertiser.
Affiliate marketing aligns advertisers with the right publishers because there is no incentive for publishers to promote a product that their readers aren’t interested in. It’s a low-risk strategy for advertisers because their marketing budget isn’t consumed by invalid clicks or un-targeted impressions. It’s a great opportunity for bloggers because they can earn commissions by giving their readers the information that they’re looking for.
Bloggers and Affiliate Marketing
Unlike other webmasters, bloggers don’t just have visitors, they build communities. Blog readers come to you blog for niche content that they trust. When you blog about something, they know that you’re an independent third-party, and not a corporation with a loaded agenda.
This means that you have influence. You can use that influence to inform your readers about products/services that are relevant to them.
Making an online purchase is often daunting for consumers because there are so many alternatives. Between competing manufacturers and competing merchants, choosing what to buy and from where can be overwhelming.
As a blogger, you’re able to profit from helping in that purchasing decision. Simply:
- Locate the products that you are willing to put your name behind.
- Find a merchant that sells that product and has an affiliate program.
- Then whenever you blog abour that product (either as a review or in a passing mention) use an affiliate link.
Affiliate links often lead to pages where users can buy the product or similar one. By virtue of referring the user to site, you’ll make a commission on any purchase that that user subsequently makes.
Since you have a rapport of trust readers, endorsing a product will likely stimulate the reader’s interest in the product. That interest is much more likely to convert into a sale than simply placing a banner ad or button in your sidebar.
Also, blogs are so SEO friendly, so you’re also likely to pick up some organic traffic of visitors researching the product in question. Since those users are already looking into making a purchasing decisions, your endorsement can sway them one way or another, and you can subsequently make a commission off that sale.
Things to Watch Out For
The first thing to bear in mind as an “affiliate blogger” is that the affiliate marketing potential of a blog lies in trust. Consequently, if you explicitly endorse a product, you want to make sure that you’re comfortable putting your name behind it. After all, it can end up ruining your reputation
The second thing you need to remember is that you’re a blogger, not a salesman. Never allow product promotion to overrun your regular blogging mandate.
Your readers trust you because you’ve helped keep them informed. Once you stop doing that, they’ll stop coming. You must strike a balance, then, between product reviews and regular posts. You can, of course, always place affiliate banners and buttons in your sidebar, for example, under a heading such as “Products I Like” — just make sure you really like them.
Finally, affiliate marketing does not work with every blog topic. In fact, it works best with fast moving consumer goods.
A blog about travel could promote vacation packages or luggage, and a fashion blog could promote clothing. If you’re blogging about technology or blogging, however, it might be more challenging to products that your readers will be interested in buying while they’re on your site. You should always consider, then, what your readers are looking for when they’re on your blog and what moood they are in before you go out of your way to join affiliate programs and populate your blog with their links.
Interesting post. Much more detailed on how to use affiliate programs than most posts I've read on the subject.
However, what would you suggest for the non-niche blogger/blog looking to make a little extra cash?
Well, Trey, for non-niche bloggers, I would try to determine what kind of "lifestyle" products your readers are into, and then look for affiliate programs around that.
I assume by a non-niche blogger, you mean that the blog is more "personal" and contains content on everything from how-to-blog, technology, and what's going on in your life. If that's the case, I imagine your readers share a lot of the same interests as you do, so you can always try promoting the types of products that you, yourself, are interested in.
Bear in mind, however, that unless your non-niche blog has a lot of readers, you probably won't generate as many commissions. People tend to read non-niche blogs because they identify with the bloggers personality and feel connected to them. Consequently, their mood isn't so much in a "purchasing mindset" when they visit.
That doesn't, however, mean that you shouldn't give affiliate marketing a shot. Chances are that people who identify with you are going to be interested in many of the same products as you, so you can always try promoting products that you're really passionate about it.
Occasionally I look here by and read the interesting and well written contributions. Today I would like to leave gladly a greeting from Thuringia in Germany!
Nice website and great article – I will be coming back for more and linking to your site…
Great learning, will try to use that on my blog
Interesting article, I've just come here through 9rules and wanted to congratulate on joining! Keep it up.
thanks for the info will hopefully be able to use some of it to help my blog
cheers
What affiliate company are you using? Very hard to pick which one (or several) to apply for. Kind of a long hassle to get comfortable with the different interfaces and programs/advertisers they offer, and then evaluate if you actually get enough kickback from it. Would be fun to get some suggestions.
I also agree with CT above – having run a few different blogs with decent traffic, the success of affiliate marketing so much depends on the mindset of the audience and the actual content. Blogs about non-commercial topics doesn't seem to do that well pushing for affiliate purchases via banners.
@Boende,
I actually work for the affiliate network <a>Share Results, and we specialize in taking a "relationship approach" to affiliate marketing. That means we accept affiliates without a load of traffic and are willing to take the time to work with them to help them build up their portals. Of course, we also work with a number of super-affiliates, and use our "relationship approach" to develop marketing tools and commission structures that are best for their portals.
That being said, there are a lot of top-notch affiliate networks out there depending on what your needs as an affiliate are. If you want an impersonalized large brandname experience, there's always Google affiliate network. But if you're looking for more of an agency experience, then you should look into networks that either specialize in products that complement your niche, or ones that are able to actually provide one-on-one support and account management.
Great post enjoyed reading that,
I have just set up a blog for my site and
Affiliate Marketing is going to be one of the categories.
So glad I found yours. I will bookmark it and link back from my blog
Grate info Will be back to read more from you.
@Steve, I'm glad you enjoyed the content. What affiliate programs will you be writing about?
I like how you pointed out that you should have a balance in advertisements and to not forget your objective of creating detailed contents. Do you think my blog is head over heels with the advertisements? Just need a second opinion. Would you also be kind enough to able to provide us of some ideas of which affiliate program works best? Thanks.
@Albert, I took a look at your blog, and I think that you've struck a good balance between ads and content. You might want to consider, however, migrating to your own domain and maybe using wordpress to power your blog. You should be able to easily import all your posts.
As for what affiliate program is best, it really depends on your needs and goals. Since I actually work for an affiliate network (Share Results), it's hard for me to say more than that.
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Thanks
CPA Affiliate Marketing