A) bloggers who want to share their passion but struggle to make money from advertising,
B) new businesses who offer services and don’t have products to offer, and
C) network marketers who are spinning their wheels with an overwhelming amount of information on how to succeed and not knowing where to start.
Well, to be honest, anyone struggling or new online is likely dealing with an incredible amount of overwhelm from information on how to succeed online.
In my last post, I pointed out the single most important thing that any blogger, business or network marketer needs to focus on more than anything else – your email list!
It’s not always enough to rely on your own products or services – whether you run a blog, a business, or you’re a network marketer.
You cater to a specific niche – often times a very small and specific niche. One thing I’ve learnt over the years of working online is that there’s always more you offer to your audience and customers.
Which is also the very reason your email list is so incredibly valuable! You’re missing a huge opportunity to provide a lot of value and service to your audience while increasing your profits at the same time.
The key is affiliate marketing – which is basically providing a product or service that is being sold by someone else while you make a commission from the sales. It’s really quite simple.
And before you dismiss affiliate marketing, know that there is a LOT more out there than you probably realize. Regardless of what niche you’re in, there is likely something out there that you can take advantage of that your own audience will love and thank you for recommending.
Let’s take a quick look at a few guidelines to live by when it comes to affiliate marketing.
Affiliate Marketing is no joke
#1: Make sure honesty comes before commissions
This is your audience that you’re recommending a product or service to. Don’t try to scam them. The more the know, like, and trust you, the more commissions you will earn in the end. Never put commissions above honesty. Hopefully you valued that guideline before my having told you. 🙂
You want your audience to trust you. So any time you recommend a product, especially when the time comes you sell your own, you will have the trust of a large group of people, ready to buy, any time you’re ready to send an email.
#2: There are other people online promoting the same product
There are obviously other people online that partake in affiliate marketing. So you can bet there will be others promoting the same product that you want to promote.
While your niche audience may not be receiving the same recommendation, it’s still good practice to give your audience an incentive or bonus for taking your advice on a product. Especially when you know they’ll thank you for it.
Here are a few ways you can incentivize an affiliate product to your audience:
- Include a quick-start PDF guide for the product or service that you’re promoting. Or perhaps a few instructional videos.
- Offer and insist that your audience answer questions. Perhaps offer a live Q&A webinar about the product. People who ask questions are interested in making a purchase and they’re highly likely to buy.
- Offer personal support after their purchase. Let your audience know that you have their back if they have any questions or problems they might have to ease their fears or worries.
#3: Let your audience know your personal experience with the product
It’s not enough to just recommend a product. Your audience will need to know why you are making the recommendation. The best way to reach your audience is to share your personal experience with the product or service you are recommending.
How did it help you? What did it do for you? What do you like about it? Even let them know what disadvantage it may have. Honesty goes a long way and your audience will appreciate it.
This is also a great way to tell your audience what they can expect. Perhaps even make a video! You could even share the video on YouTube which could attract even more potential buyers.
#4: Focus on one product or service at a time
Don’t bombard your audience with multiple affiliate products per email. Even if you find several great products or services that you’re excited to share, make sure to spread those offers out over time.
Focus one email solely on one recommendation. Your audience will simply get lost and will likely not appreciate an email filled with products you want them to spend their hard-earned money on.
However, offering multiple products and services does have its place.
For instance, a resources page on your website is a great way to share the tools and resources that you use or have used to do what you do. That can be extremely helpful and valuable to someone who is in the same niche and is just starting.
Check out my resources page as an example. And feel free to take inspiration from it for your own website.
Another obvious use for offering multiple products at once is adding affiliate products to your store on your own website. An example might simply be to sell books on your website from Amazon. While you won’t make a huge commission selling books, every little bit helps, and if they are books that have helped you in your life or career, your audience might appreciate your insight and recommendations.
#5: Think outside the box
People and companies that offer affiliate products want you to succeed. And often times they’ll go out of their way to help you do just that.
If you find an affiliate product or service that you want to promote, contact that business. Tell them about your interest in their product or service and ask them for a special offer or promotion to entice your audience.
They may be willing to offer your audience a bonus that is only for your audience, special pricing just for you, or to host a webinar for your audience while you get the commissions.
They may say no, but it certainly never hurts to ask. But, the bigger your audience and the more they trust you, the more willing affiliate companies will be to go out of their way to help you succeed!
What affiliate products can I offer?
There are an absolutely enormous amount of affiliate products to be found online. So I’m quite confident there’s something out there for any niche.
Below are a handful of niches along with some affiliate marketing ideas and where to find the products or services you might find value in recommending.
Obviously I can’t possibly cover every niche, but read through the ones I do, you’ll likely find some good resources regardless.
Note: Some of the recommendations below are affiliate links. I want you to be aware of that up front. I’m certainly not trying to trick anyone into commissions for me. But, like this article mention, affiliate marketing is part of my income stream. And every little bit helps. 🙂 I don’t mind if you use a recommendation or not, or whether you sign up through an affiliate link of mine. But if you do, just know that I am very grateful for your support and am blessed because of it.
And, as always, if you have any questions at all about any of the affiliate programs below or any that might not be mentioned here, let me know. I’ll be happy to help any way I can.
On to the list:
Photographers
There are a lot of startup photographers these days. In an ever-growing over-crowded niche, offering more than the norm and thinking outside the box is crucial.
Along with selling prints and photography packages on your website, why not sell some recommended equipment? Create a page that tells your audience the gear you use and where to buy it. Sign up as an affiliate on Amazon and link to the gear you use do create your amazing photos.
Create a resources page on your website directing your audience to other tools and resources that help you run your business. Training courses? Email marketing services like AWeber or ConvertKit? LeadPages?
Also think about the types of products your customers might enjoy and benefit from as well. Are you a wedding photographer? Connect with other wedding vendors to be an affiliate of their services and offer amazing deals to your customers!
Travel
Have a travel blog? Don’t just try to rely on advertising on your site to support your travels… use your email list to your advantage – and your site!
Sign up on AWin to promote companies like Lonely Planet and TravelZoo. Let your audience know of great travel locations and great deals on travel to get there.
Create a resource page on your site to let everyone know what they want to know more than anything… how do you afford to travel and blog – because everyone wants to do that! haha.
Network Marketing
Affiliate Marketing is crucial to network marketers. Your entire business is based on the first word in your title – Network! You make your living off of your network. You connect with people on a daily basis to promote your product, whatever it may be. Use that to your advantage!
Make sure you start building your email list now if you don’t already have one, and make sure you create a website of your own, not just the generic site that your network marketing company gave you when you joined. Those two things are key to your success.
Why? Because you are going to run into a lot of people who aren’t interested in your product or your opportunity. But a lot of those people will be interested in how you do what you do. If they join your email list or visit your site, there may be something that you can offer they still may be interested in that they can apply to their own business. Especially if you treat them with respect and earn their trust.
And what about the people that you sign up to your opportunity and customers who order your product? They will benefit greatly by knowing what tools and resources you use or have used to become their mentor.
My favorite affiliate marketing tool to recommend to network marketers that compliments their business in every single way is the Home Business Academy. The HBA is my favorite and the single best affiliate program I have ever seen in my 15+ years in affiliate marketing. In short, the HBA is an online training academy that teaches you everything you need to know (and I mean EVERYTHING – even mindset!) about succeeding online for a monthly price of $125/mo. A lot, right? It’s actually not a lot for the amount of training inside this academy, but here’s the kicker … When you refer someone to the HBA, you earn $100/mo. for each person you sign up and that reoccurs for as long as they’re a member. Meaning you simply need two referrals to start making a reoccurring income every single month. It’s really quite brilliant. And definitely worth checking out. Watch the video here to learn more.
Inspiration/Motivators
Motivators, life coaches, business coaches, and other niche experts is one of the most profitable and fastest growing industries in the world.
Are you an expert in a particular niche or working to become one? You have a lot of leverage and a lot of people are going to trust you, want to know what you know, and how you do what you do. A resource page on your site would be a great idea.
Whether or not you have your own courses yet or not, teaming up with other inspirational people in your industry/niche is a great idea.
If you have a course on mindset, you might want to team up with someone in your industry who sells a course on wellness or meditation, etc. Your audience will thank you for it. And even though you are sending them to another expert, they will still follow you for recommending them in the first place.
Also, when you team up with someone else in your industry/niche and introduce them to your audience, they are likely to do the same for you to their audience.
Personal Trainers
Personal Trainers need to do more than just work in a gym. They have to be their brand. They need to market themselves in order to become successful.
You can create huge followings on social media and use that to get them on your email list and promote affiliate products from time to time.
Sign up with AWin and promote products from Beachbody and Bodybuilding.com. Join Amazon to recommend certain workout equipment, gear, etc.
Web design/SEO/Internet Marketers
Check out my resources page for inspiration. Everyone in this niche has best practices and what they recommend. So recommend what you use to your audience and tell them why!
I use SEO Powersuite for all of my SEO needs. It does it all and pays out 40% commissions when you refer someone.
Elegant Themes is my go to web design tool. Divi is my absolute favorite WordPress theme, the most advanced, and the easiest. It also has an amazing payout of 50% commissions.
I use LeadPages for their amazing ability to quickly and easily create landing pages, and their amazing 30% reoccurring commissions affiliate program.
I use ConvertKit for all my email marketing needs.
Recommend Fiverr for your outsourcing needs by signing up with AWin.
For hosting, I tend to recommend my own service or Bluehost if they have a special deal going on. They offer payouts of $65 per sign up and they are a really great hosting company.
ShareaSale offers Wp Engine affiliate program which pays $200 per signup. I haven’t used Wp Engine yet, but it’s become a growing, popular, reliable hosting option. So if you have experience with Wp Engine, you might want to recommend that to your audience.
If you’re interested in creating your own hosting company to offer your clients and audience, go here to sign up to become your own hosting/domain company. While I offer my clients very cheap prices, you have the power to set your own prices on all products. The best part for me is you get hosting and domains at wholesale. So honestly it pays for itself just in the amount of domains I own and get at near half price. haha.
And if you didn’t read the Network Marketing section, I’ll have to mention the Home Business Academy again. This is my favorite affiliate marketing tool to recommend and perfect for this niche. The HBA is my favorite and the single best affiliate program I have ever seen in my 15+ years in affiliate marketing. In short, the HBA is an online training academy that teaches you everything you need to know (and I mean EVERYTHING – even mindset!) about succeeding online for a monthly price of $125/mo. A lot, right? It’s actually not a lot for the amount of training inside this academy, but here’s the kicker … When you refer someone to the HBA, you earn $100/mo. for each person you sign up and that reoccurs for as long as they’re a member. Meaning you simply need two referrals to start making a reoccurring income every single month. It’s really quite brilliant. And definitely worth checking out. Watch the video here to learn more.
If I didn’t mention a niche you’re in, just know there are literally hundreds of thousands of affiliate programs out there. I mentioned a few Affiliate Hubs above that each house tons of programs you can look through, such as AWin and Clickbank.com.
ClickBank is great and unique because it has affiliate products for nearly every niche: Arts & Entertainment, Betting Systems, Business/Investing, Computers/Internet, Cooking, Food & Wine, E-Business & E-Marketing, Education, Employment & Jobs, Fiction, Games, Green Products, Health & Fitness, Home & Garden, Languages, Mobile, Parenting & Families, Politics/Current Events, Reference, Self-Help, Software & Services, Spirituality, New Age & Alternative Beliefs, Sports, and Travel.
What is your niche? Are you having trouble thinking of or finding affiliate products to promote? Let me know and I will help!
