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Growth Hacks for a Successful Affiliate Marketing Program

Affiliate Marketing is not easy, which leaves most people guessing. There is no growth map or guideline to follow in this industry, which makes it difficult to succeed as an affiliate marketer or an affiliate program manager.

Those are the two sides of affiliate marketing. Affiliate marketers want to make a full-time living by selling products and services made by others… but the question is, how to succeed? There are many paths to take, but it’s hard to know if you’re going in the right direction, so it’s easy to fail.

Affiliate program managers want to find the most engaged and well-connected affiliate marketers to increase sales for their brand. They need to supply affiliate marketers with all the tools they need to be successful but still allow for a lot of diversity of styles among affiliate marketers, who often want to white-label the product or service. It’s hard to create resources that work for all your affiliates and keep their sales high.

I want to help you break free from that cycle of not knowing what works, which is why I've put together a collection of powerful hacks for aspiring affiliates looking to launch their own affiliate marketing program.

Continue reading to find out more!

Growth Hacks for a Successful Affiliate Marketing Program

What Is Affiliate Marketing and Why Should You Care?

What Is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is the process by which a brand pays an affiliate commission for promoting the products of their company.

For the company, it’s a way to extend their sales by creating alliances with individuals who have (or can tap into) markets that buy their products, reaching them more efficiently than the company is able to do themselves. Affiliate marketing is like a referral system, but potentially much stronger in terms of results because affiliates are highly motivated. That’s why having affiliates is a strategy that works well for many companies, and especially those without prominent brand names or large advertising budgets. Companies pay for sales only after the customer buys, and because affiliates are independent, the company doesn’t have to add more people to their office payroll.

What is an Affiliate Marketer?

For the affiliate marketer, it’s a way to earn an income by leveraging personal sales and marketing skills and/or access to the right markets, selling products or services without having to provide, manufacture, or store them. The company with whom they have an affiliate agreement does all that work.

Affiliate marketers search for a product they like, sign up for the company’s affiliate program, and earn a percentage of the profit from each sale. The “buy now” links on the affiliate’s website include tracking numbers that tell the company which affiliate was responsible for the sale.

So, because affiliate marketing works by spreading the responsibilities of product marketing and creation across parties, it is able to leverage the abilities of a diverse group of people for a more effective marketing strategy while also providing contributors with a cut of the profits.

Three different parties must be involved in order for this to work:

  • Sellers and product designers
  • The affiliate or advertiser
  • The customer

Affiliate marketing can be an important part of the journey toward profitability for both affiliate managers and affiliate marketers, but both parties should take care to set appropriate marketing KPIs to facilitate the growth of their respective businesses. The specific KPIs (key performance indicators) you set should relate directly to your goals because they will signal whether or not your sales and marketing efforts are working.

Why Should You Care About Affiliate Marketing?

Before the disruption of the pandemic, affiliate marketing was used by 8 out of 10 brands. Although that figure (and affiliate marketing spending) is expected to rise in the United States year after year, it is already quite strong. Most affiliate marketers promote those brands through blogging, and according to Findstack, about two-thirds of them use blogging exclusively. So, together, affiliate marketing via blogging is a very affordable way to create income, especially if you have or can build a following.

But maybe you’d like to do more. If so, read on.

Get paid

Top 3 Affiliate Marketing Growth Hacks for 2022

Affiliate marketing growth hacks are a valuable tool for any affiliate marketer. Take a look at these growth hacks that will help you grow your business exponentially and make more money, especially if you have signed up with affiliate programs that pay well.

Here are the top 3 affiliate marketing growth hacks for 2022:

1. Personalized Sales Copy

This hack is all about understanding your customers and what they want to buy. It's important to use a personalized approach when writing your sales copy because it will help you get more conversions and sales.

2. Building an Email List

Email lists are one of the most valuable assets in the internet world today, so it is essential that you build your own email list as soon as possible if you want to succeed in affiliate marketing.

3. Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing is an excellent way to acquire new customers and grow your business. You’ll want to streamline your social media creative process so that you can post frequently.

Speaking of social media, if you’re an affiliate marketer and find yourself so busy with blogging that you don’t have time for the rest (it can happen!), you can look into getting a remote social media manager. They can help with the social media side of your business. However, affiliate margins can be thin. Thus, you might want to peek at current social media management pricing to get an idea of what you’ll need to budget.

And if you’re an affiliate manager for a company, you can’t just sign up eager affiliates and assume you’re done, because no form of marketing works all by itself. Just ask any knowledgeable growth hacker. You’ll need to determine the best affiliate strategies to grow your business, based on what your affiliates need to succeed, from running promotions to creating a newsletter and establishing an affiliate community for your brand.

Bonus tip: Whether you’re a company affiliate program manager or an independent affiliate marketer, there are lots of resources out there for you. I suggest you start by looking for long-time experts who post advice on affiliate marketing blogs for people just like you. Taken all together, they are a living textbook of useful information that can make your affiliate life easier.

how affiliate marketing works

5 Ways to Grow Your Company’s Affiliate Program in 5 Minutes a Day

Best products

1) Create a List of Products or Services That You Want to Promote Through Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a type of performance-based marketing. Your company rewards one or more affiliates for each visitor or customer brought to the company by the affiliate's independent marketing efforts.

The basic idea is that the affiliate marketers promote your company’s products and make a commission on every sale. They can achieve this through various channels like social media, blog posts, and email campaigns, etc.

Here are the most popular affiliate programs that can help companies expand their brand presence online and increase sales:

1) Amazon Affiliates Program

The Amazon Associates program lets marketers earn money by placing links to your products on their Amazon lists and collections. Look for the most popular Amazon influencer in your category. Then, work with them to include your products in their selections.

2) ClickBank

This is a marketplace for digital goods that enables existing and aspiring affiliate marketers to find products and services that will appeal to their audience. They then sign up for your affiliate program, and sell your products online. ClickBank acts as a sales clearing house, collecting buyer money, paying commissions. They also provide recordkeeping for all parties. It’s a way for affiliates to find your company and a good solution for companies that don’t have a big affiliate program staff to manage all the transaction paperwork.

Amazon Affiliate program

2) Find a Few Blogs That Are Related to These Products or Services

Blogs are a great way to find out who has a following interested in the products and services your company provides. They routinely provide their audience with information, tips, and tricks on how to use products like yours. Therefore, their audience expects the kind of advice and product information you want to promote. These bloggers are great candidates for your company’s affiliate marketing program.

To find blogs related to specific product or service categories, there are a few things that will help you do this.

First, start by doing a Google search for "blog about X" where X is the product or service for which you hope to identify bloggers.

For example, if your company manufactures garden tools, you’ll want to type something like "blog about garden tools" into Google search.

3) Make Sure These Bloggers Are Willing to Affiliate

Affiliate marketing is frequently the first choice for bloggers looking to monetize their content. But some bloggers don’t do it because it conflicts with their mission. To find out, look through their links for recommended products and see if there is an affiliate tag at the end of the URL. Or, see if the blogger has posted a notice on their site that they might earn commissions on some products they recommend.

If you find either of those, then the blogger does use affiliate programs.

Bloggers typically specialize in a particular niche and cover news or reviews about products or services that are of interest to their audience. It could be customer management systems, health trackers, or credit cards, for example.

This is why affiliate programs work well for niche businesses. The more specific you can get, the better.

Once you know that a blog has an affiliate program, you can use the next hack!

4) Contact the Blog Owners and Tell Them About Your Affiliate Program

First, tell them why you are interested in them, and what you hope they can accomplish for you. Remember, a blogger’s first loyalty is to their audience, so don’t expect them to act like your employee.

Second, let them know about your terms. If you’re offering a standard deal to a blogger, you might also point out how the affiliate system you use makes their lives easier. Or, show how your super-fast shipping will keep their followers happy, or that your commissions are very competitive.

Third, ask what their conversion rate is for the other products they are promoting. This will help you gauge how successful they are at influencing their audience’s purchases.

Fourth, find out if there are any restrictions about what they will or will not promote. Get an estimate of how long it takes after you reach an agreement before you see your product promoted to their audience. Many bloggers keep a calendar and schedule their content weeks or months in advance, so you may not see immediate results.

Discuss Agreement Terms

Next, talk about how long the agreement will stay in effect and let them know if they can extend it.

Finally, make sure they are well informed. Bloggers should be familiar with your company’s terms and conditions. This ensures how they sell don’t conflict with your company’s ethics or market position. They should also be familiar with your product’s strengths and key talking points. Also, if you have competitive restrictions (such as “You may not affiliate with us if you simultaneously affiliate with our competitor, Company X” or “If you promote our luxury product line A, then you may not represent our economy product line B”), then spell that out.

5) Create an Email Template With Guidelines and Send It to Bloggers

If bloggers show an interest in working with you, then to get them on board with your product, dazzle them with reasons why it’s worth their time.

Below are some guidelines on how to create an email that will make bloggers want to write about your product:

  • Make sure the subject line is catchy and relevant to the email content.
  • Introduce yourself and what your company does in the first paragraph of the email.
  • Explain why you are reaching out to them and what they can expect from this partnership.
  • Tell them how they can get in touch with you. Provide links that are relevant for the blogger's needs (e.g., press kit, commission schedule).
  • End with a call for action by asking if they are interested in writing about your product or joining your affiliate community.

For one-of-a-kind bloggers – such as the leading authority in the nation, or a well-known celebrity with a large following. Your standard agreement may not work here. They’re likely to have higher operating costs than a typical blogger. Not to mention, larger, keener audiences, so your compensation program will have to be greater. Thus, you may have to customize your terms.

In such cases, it’s wise to protect all parties with a contract drawn up by your in-house attorney or external legal counsel. You can save time and include the information they’ll need. Start by looking online for appropriate contract templates or examples that you can mark up with the special conditions you envision.

Increase sales

3 Keys for Affiliate Marketers to Grow Conversions and Sales

Here are some bonus hacks for growing your affiliate marketing by using conversion rate optimization techniques.

But before you start using hacks, you might be interested in looking through the most popular affiliate programs in your niche. Find those that pay well and support their affiliates.  

Once you’ve got your target product(s) or brand(s) to represent, there are several ways to grow your affiliate marketing. Start with conversion rate optimization techniques.

First, you need to find out where your visitors are coming from and what they are looking for. Once you know this information, you can tailor your content to suit their needs. Include keywords that will attract the most traffic. This is essential because content, or more precisely, content marketing and its powerful ally, SEO, are integral to persuading consumers to buy.

Second, you need to make sure that your website is mobile responsive and easy to navigate. This way, you can increase the likelihood of converting a visitor into a customer. Thus, making it easier for them to find and buy what they want in less time.

You might want to consider using dynamic QR codes to increase the number of visitors to your website and make it easier for them to find you.

To accomplish this, you can use a QR code generator. This is a tool that will provide you with a QR code. Use this to stand out and manage scalable digital campaigns by monitoring scans and consumer behavior.

Finally, make sure that there is an incentive for customers to visit your website. One way of doing this is by offering a free trial or discount on any products or services offered on the site.

The Bottom Line

Hopefully, this article has provided you with a great starting point and useful resources to help you succeed. I hope these hacks help you grow your business and improve your marketing efforts in 2022!

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