We live in an Internet era with various terms thrown around that rarely anyone understands. The digital era has completely revolutionized the jobs industry. Thanks to the success of affiliate marketing, for example, there have been numerous new jobs created. It’s a $9 billion marketing channel that works better than many types of advertising. But, while everyone is running to get a piece of that pie, you first need to understand what it represents before you can achieve tangible results with it.
The truth is that affiliate marketing is a powerful channel and tool to grow your brand. There’s a lot of money to be made in it, but more importantly, it’s a great way to establish your brand and see it grow. Many brands can scale incredibly through affiliate partnerships, but things are easier said than done. There might be many digital books on the art of affiliate marketing, but they rarely tell the whole tale.
If you’re looking to understand how it can help your brand grow, our guide should help.
What Is Affiliate Marketing?
Not that long ago, big brands were spending thousands of millions on ads on TV, radio, and ads in the newspaper. Those were all effective strategies until the Internet came along. It quickly opened up new marketing channels that were still new and unexplored. The biggest companies and brands stuck to the old ways of marketing, but it wouldn’t be long before they realized where the future was.
The Internet solved one of the biggest marketing problems in the past – how to stand out from the crowd. With affiliate marketing, everyone gets a chance. By definition, affiliate marketing is an advertising method used by companies to promote their brand without having to spend millions. It minimizes cost while maximizing efficiency, giving everyone a chance to grow their customer base.
Affiliate marketing is a performance-based marketing method. Affiliates and businesses work together in a revenue-sharing relationship built on links. Affiliates promote the product with a commission whenever a customer purchases the product from the affiliate’s link or does something else like sign up. For example, claiming online casino promotions through an affiliate link will bring the affiliate brand goodies and a new customer. This marketing model is heavily used by online casinos, with smaller and major brands benefiting heavily from promoted links on big websites.
It’s the perfect choice for online brands such as casino sites, sportsbooks, or online merchants. Of course, the digital presence of a brand is a must these days, so it works for literally any type of brand.
Affiliate Marketing Stats & Information
- Affiliate marketing is an advertising model where a brand pays affiliates (bloggers, websites, etc.) to promote their services or products and generate sales. Depending on how big the website or blog is, it could lead to large sales and customers in the millions. Affiliates place banners and add a build-in link on their website, app, or blog, and commissions are paid on any converted sale;
- The global affiliate marketing industry is worth over $9 billion annually;
- 81% of brands have their own affiliate programs;
- This marketing channel is excellent for any brand with a strong online presence;
- Nearly 95% of publishers use marketing affiliate networks for sales and growing their basics;
- More than 40% of online marketers consider affiliate marketing an essential skill;
- The average conversion rate through affiliate marketing in 2022 hovers around 1%;
- It’s not just for new brands – nearly 80% of marketers use it to engage existing customers.
Affiliate Links
How do companies grow their sales through affiliate marketing online? Through affiliate links. In the simplest terms, these are unique URLs that contain the affiliate’s username or ID and their advertising URL as well. These links are used by brands to measure traffic to their website. Whenever a person clicks on the link, it takes them to the brand’s page. For this click and eventual conversion (sale, registration), the affiliate gets paid.
When using these links, sites must disclose them by law. The law requires disclosed links or promotions that might result in a commission. If the website fails to disclose the link, it could be charged, and the links will be banned.
Affiliate Marketing vs. Affiliate Programs
Affiliate programs are quite popular these days, with many confusing them with affiliate marketing. They’re a channel for affiliate marketing in which the advertiser pays the publisher or influencer commission for closing sales.
There are many different types of affiliate programs. The majority are tailored to a brand’s unique needs. Search affiliates, email marketing programs, review sites, casino bonus websites, and coupon promotions seem to be among the most popular. They have pretty solid conversion rates, which is why brands are interested in using them to boost sales and grow their product.
Benefits and Disadvantages of Affiliate Marketing
Why should you or anyone else use affiliate marketing? The fact remains that it’s a powerful tool that can grow your digital product better than most marketing strategies. Keep in mind that it’s a $9 billion industry per year – that kind of money is never wrong. Of course, how successful it is for you depends on the affiliate site and the partnership you build. There are quality affiliate programs out there, but there are also scams that can easily run your business into the ground.
Pros
- No need to create a new product
- A great extra revenue source for anyone looking to reinforce their online presence
- Accessible anywhere – all you need is a stable Internet connection
- Low startup cost
- Passive income is a great opportunity for smaller businesses
Cons
- Building traffic takes time
- Bad traffic can damage your reputation and partnerships already built
- Competition can be tough
- Scam affiliates still exist
How to Get Results with Affiliate Marketing
There are many ways to get tangible results with affiliate marketing. Many leave it to the affiliates, which is a bad approach – it’s just like betting on luck. If you take a proactive approach to affiliate marketing, you will be more successful and convert more sales.
Use KPIs to Track Metrics
KPI stands short for Key Performance Indicator. In the simplest terms, these tools can track valuable metrics – they essentially track your success. They will allow you to see which campaigns are giving valuable returns and which need tweaks, which will make all the difference in the long run.
The top metrics you should keep an eye on are: revenue by traffic source, conversion rate, click-through rate, and average time spent on the page, among others. Keep an eye on these metrics, and you’ll manage your campaigns much better.
Update the Tools on Your Webpage
This might not seem like a valuable tip, but it’s essential. Regardless of your audience, website go-to tools and services will help your followers a lot. Check out all the plugins, and don’t be ashamed to ask others what they use on their pages. Tools can make a huge difference, and since you’re looking for a big difference, you need to add some new ones or update the existing ones.
Write New and Update Existing Reviews
If we’re talking about a casino affiliate program or something similar, you need to constantly update your website with reviews. This means new and existing content because customers love reading reviews. Whether it’s a casino or a product, over 90% of customers read reviews before they go and make a purchase.
Be thorough in your reviews, as customers love reading in-depth reviews. No matter how cliche it sounds, the devil is truly in the details.
Create Comparison Pages
When talking about content, comparison articles are the boss in the affiliate space. They can easily increase web traffic and generate more sales. How? Well, imagine listing a comparison article between two of your products. You list the key pros and cons for both, effectively helping your customers make a decision with ease.
In that way, they don’t have to go through lengthy reviews to find what they like – the comparison is more than enough for them to purchase something or register.
Repurpose Existing Content
If you’ve ever run a website with a lot of content, you probably have a lot of old stuff. Creating new content can be pretty tough, but repurposing older content is easier and very useful. For example, you can repurpose it to use on new platforms, like creating a video for Youtube out of an existing blog post. Or combine a few of your posts in an ebook. There are opportunities everywhere you look.
Use CTAs in Your Longest Articles
If you have long articles on your website, call to action (CTAs) are a must. All articles over 2,000 words are considered long-form, allowing you to cover more ground on many topics. These articles can generate leads a lot better, and they will be even better if you use CTAs.
They will give you more opportunities to convert throughout the article, which is a smart way of affiliate marketing your products or services.
Improve Your On-Page SEO
If you want to get on the top of relevant search results on Google, you need to improve your SEO. Most people never go beyond the 1st page of search engines, so this is very important. Improving on-page SEO can have dramatic results. For example, it can drive your organic traffic up and improve the user experience too.
Improving SEO means adding keywords, URLs, alt-texts, and links and improving your overall site speed too. Every little bit helps and will allow you to get more traffic and effectively more sales.
Brand Discounts Help a Lot
Deals and discounts are an effective way to encourage sales of products or services. When you see a brand sale in a store, you’re more inclined to buy something, right? Well, it’s the same with affiliate marketing. If you want to increase your brand sales, a discount can help. Or some other kind of a promo – it all depends on your product and service.
In the long run, this kind of approach should get more customers to your brand. Coupons, deals, time-based promotions, or special promos help. Mix it up a bit and try different stuff – something will surely get you leads.